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schalliol · Jun 22, 2005, 06:27 AM

Yesterday morning I installed the latest Security Update on my PowerBook (see sig, it was running 10.4.1) and restarted from the install prompt, but then I only got a grey Apple screen at restart. The machine turns on, goes to this screen and as it does, the Apple drops about 5 pixels and I don't get any spinning loading indicator, a flashing folder or anything like that. It takes about 5 seconds to get to this stange and it just sits there for hours if I don't do anything, so I'm sure it'd stay there forever. I can't say if it was the security update, but it seems likely, given that I hadn't done anything much since my last reboot. Here's what I've tried/done:

Used FW Target mode and was able to mount the disk on another Mac. I then backed up my documents there to not lose the last day or so since I backed up.
When in FW Target mode I ran Disk Utility's repair operation, which didn't find anything to repair (later tried this from the OS X Tiger DVD)
Ran TechTool Pro to see if it could do anything. After a few hours of operations, it simply froze up (awesome). I then retried just on the volume structures, which worked at probably 95% over a few minutes and then counted up by 1 structure per second on average for about 12 hours. It was odd, it said there were x million structures to check and then when it got to that number (2 times) the number total increased to a larger number
Tried DiskWarrior, which was able to graph the structure, but noted that it couldn't rebuild the structures because it was too damaged
Since I was able to boot off of these CDs and use FW Target mode, I knew it wasn't some strange motherboard issue with relatively high confidence, so I thought I'd try to do a verbose boot and a single user boot. Neither operation succeeded.
I then zapped the PRAM a few times
I tried boot into open-firmware, which worked - though I didn't do anything there
I also tried using the option key to select the volume. Upon selecting the disk and pressing the arrow, I got the "universal no symbol" and had to force a restart
I then tried to install Tiger again with an archive and install. That operation succeeded, yet when I restarted I got the same issue!

I've pretty much run out of ideas. Any suggestions?

chris v · Jun 22, 2005, 07:17 AM

Originally Posted by schalliol

[*]Tried DiskWarrior, which was able to graph the structure, but noted that it couldn't rebuild the structures because it was too damaged

You will get this warning if you're running DiskWarrior 3.02 or earlier. Only 3.03 will work on OS 10.4. If you're running DW 3.03, then I suppose your install really is hosed.

schalliol · Jun 22, 2005, 07:43 AM

Ahh, my CD is 3.02, I'll see if I can get 3.03 on a disc.

schalliol · 09:05 AM

Update: TechTool Pro's rebuilding of directory structures now eliminated the grey Apple screen, but replaced it with the lovely your-computer-is-screwd screen in multiple languages. I tried resetting the nvram in open firmware, but that didn't seem to fix anything. DW 3.0.3 is next.

Update Again: This is an awesome message from Disk Warrior 3.0.3:

The directory of the disk "PowerBook G4" cannot be rebuilt. The disk was not modified. The original directory is too severely damaged. It appears another disk utility has erased critical directory information. (3004,2176)

Plan of Action:
1. Attempt to get all information off of my TiBook I want to keep with Target mode, if it works
2. Erase install

I'll echo a comment I just heard "never never never never never use Techtool."

Big Mac · Jun 22, 2005, 10:04 AM

Sorry you're having such a terrible time trying to fix your Mac. It's probably not Tech Tool's fault - your disk was severely damaged in the first place.

schalliol · Jun 22, 2005, 12:13 PM

Perhaps. My experience though does seem to echo the person I mentioned, who repairs Macs for a living. TTP did make it even worse, though. I've had other problems with the eDrive with TechTool in the past too.

CharlesS · Jun 22, 2005, 01:00 PM

Yeah, I would have tried DiskWarrior 3.0.3 before TTP. Who knows if this particular drive was salvageable, though.

It sounds like you already backed up the important data from the drive, which was smart, so you're probably good to go with an erase and install.

nforcer · Jun 22, 2005, 01:49 PM

I had an HD that failed a while back. When apps freeze while working with your HD it is never a good sign. The more I tried to fix my HD with recovery and maintenance apps the more unstable it became. I can confirm TTP did nothing but waste time. I ran every HD test at the most thorough level with TTP and it passed the HD with flying colors, even though the HD would mount in the Finder and then repeatedly freeze the entire comp by even opening the HD. Diskwarrior made changes then reported everything was well, only my problem persisted. I tried everything I could to recover the data and fix the drive, but all was lost. Ended up having to replace it.

schalliol · Jun 22, 2005, 02:08 PM

I think we're on the same page. Any disk utility that does what I mentioned isn't a great utility. Sadly.

UPDATE: I grabbed all the user settings off via FW Target mode and then formatted the sucker. I installed Tiger and replaced the user I created with the user folder from the previous install. Now everything seems to be working flawlessly, other than I need to install more of my apps. All of my settings are still there, but I didn't want to keep any global settings.

Thanks for the help guys. Sad that this problem couldn't have been avoided, given that everything suggests that it was an OS issue (regardless of cause).

alphasubzero949 · Jun 22, 2005, 02:27 PM

Originally Posted by Big Mac

Sorry you're having such a terrible time trying to fix your Mac. It's probably not Tech Tool's fault - your disk was severely damaged in the first place.

TTP is garbage. I've hosed my PowerBook's HD twice with it doing nothing more than using the pilot (intermediate) and volume structure maintenance.

It worsened his problem if anything.

Detrius · Jun 22, 2005, 08:16 PM

Originally Posted by schalliol

Perhaps. My experience though does seem to echo the person I mentioned, who repairs Macs for a living. TTP did make it even worse, though. I've had other problems with the eDrive with TechTool in the past too.

http://forums.macnn.com/90/mac-os-x/248286/the-thread-computer-freezes-panics-crashes/

While I do agree that the only thing TTP is useful for is surface scans, I don't agree that TTP was necessarily the source of all your problems. As said before, your directory structure was already hosed. It was hosed before you installed the security update. Installing the security update with a hosed directory structure hosed your system. In turn, running TTP made it irreparable. More than likely you had overlapped files. You likely would have had to reinstall even if diskwarrior had fixed the directory.

schalliol · Jun 23, 2005, 06:44 AM

I didn't intend to make this a TTP destruction thread, so I'm sorry if it's taken that way. Clearly from the freezing, 12 hour directory scan that kept extending itself to what would've been 24 hrs or so, and panic after a fix, there's certainly some problem with TTP. I'm not so sure tha the structure was totally hosed or a smart program might not be able to fix it, since it worked just great with FW Target mode, but the point of programs like TTP is to fix problems that exist. So at best, it didn't do its job, and at worse, it caused more problems.