[Tiny-E]

Hi, I need some help here. I have an old G4 550 MHz powerbook running 10.2.8.
Over the past couple days, my computer has been freezing up on me while I'm running a few things (eg. using aquisition, playing itunes, checking the internet at the same time), where I get the spinning rainbow ball and have to manually reset my computer. This morning, I woke up to find my screen with a kernal panic and I had to reset again (leaving it on all night, which I have always done).
What gives?

[Old Toad]

I suggest you boot into Single User Mode and run the File System Check (fsck). Here's how:

FSCK - File System Check

To start up in single-user mode
1. Restart the computer.
2. Immediately after the startup sound, press and hold both the Command (Apple) and "s" keys on your keyboard. The computer will display a series of text messages, at which time you may release these keys.

When the computer has started up, it will display a command line prompt (#). The computer is now in single-user mode.

How to Run the File System Check from the Command Line

Once you have reached a command line, follow these steps to use fsck:
1. At the prompt, type: fsck -y -f (NOTE, there is a space between the k and the “-” and the y and the next “-”)
2. Press Return.

The fsck utility will go through five "phases" and then return information about the disk's utilization and fragmentation. Once the check is finished, if no issue is found, you should see "** The volume [name of volume] appears to be OK."

If fsck alters, repairs, or fixes anything, it will display the message:

***** FILE SYSTEM WAS MODIFIED *****

IMPORTANT: If this message appears, repeat the "fsck -y -f" command until this message no longer appears. It is not unusual for your computer to require several "passes" of fsck, because first-pass repairs may uncover additional errors. Run it until you get two consecutive times with an "OK" result.

3. When fsck reports that no problems were found, type: reboot
4. Press Return.

Hope this has been of some help. Good luck.

[Tiny-E]

Thanks, I'll definitely try it when I get back home.
Will I lose anything on my hard drive by doing this?
Also, what are some possible reasong why this is happening now? Could it be from something I downloaded?

[Tiny-E]

okay, I tried the fsck -y -f at the command line and this is what it says:
Keys out of order ( 4, 16051)
Rebuilding Catalog B-tree
The volume Macintosh HD could not be repaired.

Furthermore, now my computer has been freezing up on me (spinning beach ball of death) and I have to manually shut down the computer.

And tonight, coming home, I jump on my computer and while on the net (while playing itunes, etc.), it starts to make a clicking sounds for about 30 seconds and then I get the spinning beach ball and have to shut down. So, I shut down manually and start it up again, but instead of getting the nice apple sign on the grey background while starting up, I got a grey background with a little folder in the centre of the screen with a quesion mark alternating with the old apple computer smiley face (whatever that was called). So I manually shut down, tried again and got the same thing. Then I went and did the apple+"s" thing, then typed reboot and finally got my computer working again (I'm typin on it now, for how long, who knows?).

Please, what the hell is happening and how can I fix it?? I'm running 10.2.8

please, please help me!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

[Randman]

Have you added ram? If so, it could be that. Do you have the latest firmware updates on iTunes? I was having kernal panics when trying to connect an iPod (though my Mini worked fine) until the last iPod firmware update.

Do you have DiskWarrior? If so, it should fix many of the problems.

[chris v]

1. Disk Warrior will fix the keys out of order, most likely.
2. BACK UP YOUR DRIVE, NOW. Please.
3. Upgrade to 10.3, which will enable journaling by default, which really seems to be cutting down on these sorts of errors.

[Tiny-E]

How do I back up my drive??? (I have an external lacie hard drive)

What is disk warrior?

I found my computer just clicking away this morning, totally frozen and when I rebooted, got the same grey screen with the question mark and folder.

NOW, it just started clicking again, then stops sometimes....

please help....

[Spheric Harlot]

I've seen that problem on an external drive, as well.

Do you by any chance have Norton Utilities installed?

They will reliably produce this sort of problem. If so, get DiskWarrior, have it fix your hard drive, and then REMOVE ALL TRACES OF NORTON UTILITIES FROM YOUR HARD DRIVE IMMEDIATELY.

-s*

[wadesworld]

Clicking sounds are quite often a sign of imminent hard drive failure.

Back up your data NOW. Your symptoms really sound like a hard drive that's on the blink and about to die.

To back up your drive, get some storage media with enough room to hold whatever is important to you and copy it off, or use a program like Carbon Copy Cloner or one of the many File Synchronization utilities available.

Wade

[Tiny-E]

I have an external hard drive, so how do I go about backing up my compter now???

Sorry, I don't know how to do this, please help

And where do I find Disk Warrior?

I can't believe my apple is about to die....

[P]

Originally posted by Tiny-E:
I have an external hard drive, so how do I go about backing up my compter now???

Sorry, I don't know how to do this, please help

And where do I find Disk Warrior?

I can't believe my apple is about to die....

Your machine isn't dying - your HD is. The difference is that HDs are cheap to replace - Macs aren't. OK, I'll walk you through making a backup. There is aprogram called Carbon Copy Cloner that can make the for you. You can find it here:

http://www.bombich.com/software/ccc.html

Select the appropriate version for you OS. Download it and start the program. It's very simple, but you prettty much chose the drive to copy from in the "Select the source" dropdown menu) and the drive to copy to in "Select the target". Do this now - as in before you read the rest of this message.

OK, got the backup? Fine. FWIW, Diskwarrior is a program that can rescue hardrives with software errors. IMO you have a harddrive error, so running Diskwarrior now is a bit like putting a bandaid on a broken leg, but for future reference you can find it here:

http://www.alsoft.com/DiskWarrior/index.html

Once you have the backup, you should at least reformat the drive - and probably replace it alltogether. With the new drive in place, you can use Carbon Copy Cloner again to restore from your backup - just reverse Source and Target.

Also, if you're wondering about programs we talk about here, you can usually find them at one of these sites:

http://www.macupdate.com/
http://www.versiontracker.com/

[Old Toad]

Originally posted by Tiny-E:
okay, I tried the fsck -y -f at the command line and this is what it says:
Keys out of order ( 4, 16051)
Rebuilding Catalog B-tree
The volume Macintosh HD could not be repaired.

Keep running fsck at least 5 or 6 times after getting that warning. It happened to me and on about the 4th or 5th time, it started fixing files. After about 3 more times it gave an all clear notification.

[Tiny-E]

I ran fsck last night over 10 times with no effect. Still giving me the same message of hd cannot be repaired.

So, sounds more like a hardware problem than a os problem?

BTW, didn't seem to have any problems with the computer when I got home last night. But I did try to use it sparingly and put it to sleep when I went to bed.

[Old Toad]

Originally posted by Tiny-E:
So, sounds more like a hardware problem than a os problem?

No, it's still probably a directory problem of some sort but it it is running OK, you might be able to just go with it as is. I would, however, make sure I have a backup of your important files, documents, data files, photos, music tracks etc.

DiskWarrior was mentioned earlier in this thread and is, in my opinion, an indispensable utility. Running that would be a good non-intrusive fix attempt.

If you still have problems or are suspicious of how your PB is operating a reinstall of the system may be in order. However, I don't remember is Jaguar has the archive and install capability. That would save you the work of backing everything up and having to do a clean install, a lot of work.

If your budget allows, an external FW drive is a very wise addition, particularly to a PB which doesn't always have storage space to spare. Those drives are getting more reasonable in price and such an easy way of backing up.

Here are a couple of things that can be done to maximize your free space on your HD.

1 - run either Cocktail, Onyx or Panther Cache Cleaner to clean out the various cache and archived log files.
2 - run DeLocalizer to remove the unneeded language modules. I saved 900+MB the first time I ran it. It will run under Panther.

Hope this has been of some help. Good luck.

[msuper69]

kernel kernel kernel kernel kernel kernel kernel kernel kernel kernel kernel kernel kernel kernel kernel

[Old Toad]

Originally posted by msuper69:
kernel kernel kernel kernel kernel kernel kernel kernel kernel kernel kernel kernel kernel kernel kernel

Sounds like you're getting ready to have some popcorn.