All text/menus show up as symbols? HELP!

[Carrie814]

I have an older iBook G4 (2001). About a week ago, all of my menus/filenames/etc turned suddenly to symbols. I haven't installed any new software...closest thing would be system updates for existing software. I tried hooking it up to another computer via Firewire and ran DriveGenius to repair things in the system, but my problem remains. My internet browsers are fine, but MSN Messenger and all applications are unreadable. I've attached a screenshot of my desktop. Has anyone seen this or know what may fix it?

[Satcomer]

Go the (if you can) /YourHardDrive/Users/YourUserName/Library/Preferences/ and find the file com.apple.finder.plist and delete it. Plus check with the people around you that one isn't messing with you with a prank.

[Giaguara]

Did you install any new fonts, do anything to any system fonts or in general do you have a lot of added fonts?

Time for some font troubleshooting. First - disable all fonts you have added with Font Book or other software, then log out and back in. If it looks correct now, it's one or some of your fonts that are acting up. Either validate them, or disable/enable 50 % of them at a time until you find the bad ones.

[Carrie814]

I deleted the .plist file (after much difficulty getting to and emptying the trash) and restarted to no avail.

I then disabled all fonts in FontBook, logged out and back in with the same result. I tried creating a new user and logging in under that as well with no improvement. I really haven't added that many fonts, but that seems to be the most logical symptom... If there's something else I should have disabled along with FontBook, I don't know what it would be or how to find it since I can't read any of my menus...

[Giaguara]

Did you touch any system fonts?
Add any fonts or remove any fonts with anything?

[djackmac]

All else fails, Archive and install.