My iBook is dead.... Please help me.

[neoangelic]

I own an iBook 500mhz 128ram 15gb HD....

I start up the computer and all I get is a flashing "?" question-mark. I ran a "First Aid Scan," I think it was, and it said this:

"HFS+ Unmounted. Invalid B-tree node size"

My spouse was playing an old OS 9 checkers game, booted into OS 9, not running through OS X at the time, and the computer just froze.

I have a complete address book, pictures from the past 4 years of my life, old homework, media designed by myself, nostalgic eMails in my Mail program... All gone, I can't open my computer.

Can anyone please help me with this problem. I don't know if it is hardware or software. I tried holding down X to boot into OS X, even holding down 9, all I get is a flashing question mark, like it can't even start up or find a hard disk. Running Jaguar...

Thank you so much...

[Viro]

It probably isnt' a hardware problem and I'm guessing from the error message that it's showing that you're filesystem is corrupted. You can fix this if you have a tool like Diskwarrior. If not, I don't know what else you could do.

[fryke]

Well, the answer's quite simple. You get an external FW harddrive. Either buy one or get somebody to lend it to you. You then install an operating system on THAT and boot from it and back up what you can get. You _then_ reinstall your iBook completely. 'Fixing', for me, is not good enough in such cases...

The most simple answer for the future is: Backup. I mean it. Back up your important stuff, since you now know how hard it would be if you really lost all your stuff. And that, for me, means: Get an external FW harddrive bigger than your internal drive (which is easy if it's 15G, right?).

[nervus]

This happened to me once, also. IIRC, I managed to repair it by repeated use of the disk repair utility on the systemCD.
Mind you, it is about 1.5 years ago: that i-Book is now defunct (crashed backlight )
I hope you manage to salvage your data!

[fryke]

Even _if_ you manage to resurrect your computer this way, I'd still urge you to get a backup drive. I know a lot of people who "like to live on the edge" who're saying "it was YOU who made up the phrase 'no RISC no fun' when Apple released the PowerMac, fryke!", but these are the same guys asking me for advice on how to undo stuff like dropping their bikes off a mountain. Sure, a lot of things can be repaired, but a) they can be repaired more easily with a backup drive and b) some things _can't_ be repaired.

[neoangelic]

Originally Posted by fryke

Well, the answer's quite simple. You get an external FW harddrive. Either buy one or get somebody to lend it to you. You then install an operating system on THAT and boot from it and back up what you can get. You _then_ reinstall your iBook completely. 'Fixing', for me, is not good enough in such cases...

The most simple answer for the future is: Backup. I mean it. Back up your important stuff, since you now know how hard it would be if you really lost all your stuff. And that, for me, means: Get an external FW harddrive bigger than your internal drive (which is easy if it's 15G, right?).

Thanks for the replies, guys! You are a big help. I really should have backed up my stuff, but the iBook doesn't have a Disk Drive, and I didn't get the "CDR" version.

So, when you say "...and back up what you can get..." do you mean that if I boot from an external Hard Disk, that I'll be able to access the information on my internal Hard Disk? I was able to boot into OS 9 with a CD, but it didn't recognize my Hard Disk at all, other than wanting to format it, and the First Aid scan.

The "Filewarrior" sounds like a cheaper solution to my problem... I'll have to Google that program and see where I can buy it, or if it is shareware or freeware or something.

Thanks for all your help. Next time I buy a computer I'll make sure I have some sort of backupable media device.

[neoangelic]

Ok....

So I decided to just reformat my Hard Disk... I was able to erase it, then the "Disk First Aid" program found no problems while verifying it. So, I threw in my "OS X Jaguar Install CD #1," and it got like 99% of the way done with the install then just hung there for like 2~3 hours. I literally sat there watching it on and off while the timer said "about a minute," until I figured it was seriously too long to be waiting for that last "minute" that ended up being over 2 hours. I held down the power button, seemingly the only option, and I restarted the computer and now the computer won't recognize the HD at ALL.

This problem happened both before and after trying to install a new version of OS X... It wouldn't recognize the disk five times, then it would recognize it on the sixth time. But after the "99% hang" thing, now as many times as I restart it, it won't recognize the disk at all. When I try to install, there is no icon for my HD or any option to install it to a drive other than to the install cd itself...

Lengthy post... ~_~ Anyone know how I could get my iBook to recognize my HD? >_< I've resorted to using a Windows PC to write this message. ~_~;

Thanks a lot... I miss my Apple.

[mdnky]

Might be time for a new hard drive then. Fair warning though, install is a royal pain and not something for the faint of heart.


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