10.3.8 not FULLY loading on my upgraded iMac?

M

MacJuice

Registered
I hope someone here can help as I am going out of my mind! aargh!

I have this purple iMac G3/400mhz (tray loading) that has been upgraded with a G4/500mhz card and has 320MB of ram.

The first time I tried to install OS 10 on this machine original 6GB hard drive, the OSX installation would start OK, but then somewhere in the middle of checking packages it would crash to a black screen with a single line message about having run into an unexpected error. (I kind of remember something about something =0, error code perhaps?)

So I thought I would try a different approach, and installed 10.3.8 (starting with 10.2 install discs) into an extra 30GB HD (mounted it on my G5 desktop) which was my old G4 Cube original HD, and replaced the iMac original 6GB drive with this preloaded 30GB drive.

Now the very first time I started the iMac with its new 10.3.8 drive, it looked as if everything was OK, first the Grey Apple logo, then the default blue desktop graphic and the basic dock appeared, but then nothing else. No menu bar on top of the screen, and no HD icon on the desktop. In other words , the loading sequence seems to hang there.

Being stuck, i tried to force quit, to no avail, tried the "paper clip" restart button on the side, no go, so I had to pull the power cord.

Since then, if I try to start this machine, I just get a blank blue screen and nothing else! :(

Help me Macosx-Kenobi, you're my only hope!
 
Hi Bob,

Oh yes, forgot to mention it, I did upgrade the firmware the day i decided to make this an OSX machine. Thanks for stepping up though, :)

Any other suggestions?
 
See if you can run fsck

To run fsck, you first need to start up your Mac in single-user mode. Here's how:

1. Restart your Mac.

2. Immediately press and hold the Command and "S" keys.

You'll see a bunch of text begin scrolling on your screen. In a few more seconds, you'll see the Unix command line prompt (#).

You're now in single-user mode.

Now that you're at the # prompt, here's how to run fsck:

1. Type: "fsck -y" (that's fsck-space-minus-y).
(If you're running Panther, v 10.3, then type this "fsck -f"

2. Press Return.

The fsck utility will blast some text onto your screen. If there's damage to your disk, you'll see a message that says:

***** FILE SYSTEM WAS MODIFIED *****

If you see this message--and this is extremely important-- repeat running fsck. It is normal to have to run fsck more than once -- the first run's repairs often uncover additional problems..

When fsck finally reports that no problems were found, and the # prompt reappears:

3. Type: "reboot" to restart,

or type "exit" to start up without rebooting.

4. Press Return.

Your Mac should proceed to start up normally to the login window or the Finder.
 
Hi Bob,

I did what you suggested, entered fsck -f at the prompt, pressed enter.

Resulting message was:

** /dev/rdisk0s9
** Root file system
** Checking HFS Plus volume
** Checking Extent overflow file
** Checking Catalog File
Invalid extent entry
(4,213)
** Volume check failed


Does this mean anything?
 
Your 30GB hard drive must be re-partitioned to at least 2 partitions. A tray-loading iMac will require that the OS X installation be installed on an 8GB partition (probably less, 7.5 or 7.6GB is OK), and that partition must be the first one.
You might have to revert to the original processor to get this to install properly.
 
You can install OS X fine using the new processor, but as DeltaMac says, you do need to partition the drive. Starting up from the install CD select Disk Utility and divide the disk into two volumes. You can use the sliding size feature in the side bar and just bring the startup volume to a hair's breadth under 8 GB (worked for me with my iForced BondiMac.) Just make sure to set up the remaining volume as well-- it will be grayed out in the side bar until then.
 
With this error;

Invalid extent entry
(4,213)
** Volume check failed


You have a disk problem. Formating or DiskWarrior should repair it.

Where did the OS X disks come from that you're using to install from?
 
Ok guys,

I really appreciate the efforts and suggestions.

I did reformat the drive in 2 partitions, one 7.6GB and whatever else for the other one. There was no indicator as to which one was the first on the drive though. I assumed that the one on top was it, and made this one 7.6GB. Remounted the drive on my G5 using my Wiebetech firewire adapter, and this time, I used the OS Install disc that came with my G5 (10.2.7), instead of the store bought Jaguar Install disc that I had tried before, which I then updated with an upgrade set of 10.3 discs., and then got the 10.3.8 combo update online after that.

Put the drive back into the iMac, rebooted, saw the grey Apple logo on light gray background, the spinning time indicator went on and on, and then went to the screen with a message in 3 languages telling that I had to restart the computer by pressing the power button for a few minutes, or using the restart button. Never saw the desktop this time.

The power button option not working , I used my paper-clip restart, this time pressing Command-S as soon as the machine restarted, entered "fsck -f" again, and got the very same message as before.

I do have Diskwarrior and TechTool Pro v4 and will try that option a bit later, starting with Diskwarrior and see if that alone does anything.

Thank you again for trying guys...
 
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