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TICKET ARCHIVE -> Stamps folder in OS 10.4

Jerre - Feb 5, 2006 - 6:22 pm

I loaded Tiger into my G4 about a week ago. In the Pictures folder is a Stamp folder containing 277 images in png format (and a PDF preview of those images). However, when I click on any of the png images, I get a message window that says:

"Couldn't open the file. It may be corrupt or a file format that Preview doesn't recognize."

Preview certainly recognizes png images because I converted one of my jpg images to png, which then opened perfectly in Preview. Could ALL 277 png images in the Stamps folder be corrupted when Tiger was only loaded a week ago?!

Is there anything I can do to fix this problem?

Thank you.

Jerre

ishan - Feb 5, 2006 - 10:06 pm

You might try opening the image(s) with a different viewer, like Graphic Convertor or any of the other freeware/shareware apps on verstiontracker.com or macupdate.com which can open .png files.

HTH and please let us know what happens. Thanks.

Jerre - Feb 6, 2006 - 1:24 am

Thank you so much for your response.

Following your suggestion of trying another app, I tried to open Stamp images in Photoshop Elements 3.0, but this failed. In response to an Open command, Photoshop said, "Could not complete your request because the file-format module cannot parse the file." In contrast, Photoshop immediately opened a screen image, which is in png format.

Briefly, EXCEPT for the Stamp images, other png images open in Preview and in Photoshop, but the Stamp images will not open in either app.

I guess this means that the Stamp images are corrupted, even though 10.4 was only installed a week ago. Is this the correct inference?

Jerre

ishan - Feb 6, 2006 - 6:54 am

Unfortunately, I think you're right. I would be concerned about the integrity of some sectors of your hard drive, because the images are not corrupt on the install DVD.

Jerre - Feb 6, 2006 - 11:53 am

When I was running on OS 9, I had a disk for identifying possible problems on the hard disk. Is there anything like that on the 10.4 install DVD, and if not, how do I check for hard-disk problems? Also, is it possible to reinstall only the Stamps folder from the 10.4 install DVD, and if so, how? Thank you again.

Jerre

ishan - Feb 6, 2006 - 3:26 pm

Disk Utility is on the install DVD and that's the best way to look for directory corruption, among other software problems. However, if some sectors of your hard drive are becoming (or are already) unreadable, Disk Utility won't be able to detect that. You could bypass the problem by reformatting your disk, which would "map out" all the bad sectors, if that's the problem. However, you would then lose all data on your drive and have to reinstall everything.

Tech Tools Pro will help to diagnose hard drive hardware problems, but it doesn't work reliably with 10.4.

If you're not already doing so, I would encourage you to "clone" your hard drive to another internal or external (Firewire) drive, so that if your hard drive fails suddenly, you will have a bootable backup drive to use. SuperDuper 2.0 is an excellent and inexpensive utility to do this and well worth the $27.95, if only for peace of mind.

Jerre - Feb 6, 2006 - 6:20 pm

Thanks again. I'll follow your advice.
Jerre