[raferx]

I just got this on my lap, whaddya think it is?

The story:
I was happily surfing when my OS X session froze up. I tried to reboot, but
after a few attempts, I found I was getting nowhere. A few of my attemtps
had a psychadelic melting screen! I rebooted again, but this time connected
it to my desktop machine as a Firewire Target. My Mac desktop said it could
not recognize the drive and asked me to initialize it.

I originally thought my problem was a bad HD, but after installing the OS
(either OS 9 or OS X) I still encountered plenty of freezing but Norton even
said the disk was OK.

So now I've tried to re-install OS X from an external CD (internal CD not
working) (Cmd-Shift-Opt-Del), but everytime it just hangs. I've installed a
fresh OS 9, but can't get it to boot successfully without turning off
extensions (i.e. no 3rd party s/w installed).

Thanks in advance.

[raferx]

Bump.

[vmarks]

I choose diskwarrior over norton anytime.

as for OS X freezing, what was connected when it happened? Applications open? how much RAM and HD free?

which extensions in particular are you turning off? It could be possible you have a failing motherboard, although it is unlikely.

You should be able to perform a clean install and have it all work, provided the hardware is good.