The problem in a nut-shell:
- iBook G3 locked in boot-up process indefinitely
- disk utility failed to fix problem
- erased HDD "by zeros" with no errors
- installed Tiger while in target mode and from another iBook
- same problem ocurred, unchanged, after reboot
So, should I buy another HDD, suck it up and buy TechTools, or contact the repair center again?
For more details, continue reading...
My story:
After getting my iBook G3 back from repair (for the second time due to the infamous video/logic board defect), it worked for a solid week before acting up on me. Suddenly, while opening up Firefox, everything started to happen kinda slowly; the browser took about a minute to open, as did anything else I clicked on. Slightly annoyed, I rebooted-- the apple logo greeted me, and, after about five minutes, so did the little loading cog at the bottom... and stayed there indefinitely. My computer was locked in the boot up process, so I tried hard booting several times with no success, then zapping the PRAM with no results, either.
Contacting my local Apple repair center, they said my hard drive might be failing. One of the ways to tell is to erase the drive "by zeros," and if an error appears, there is something wrong. Well, Disk Utilities did not help, booting it as a target drive almost worked, but any computer I hooked it to could not open the drive, and I didn't want to buy TechTools. I already backed up my data the week before, so I figured, why not, and erased the drive by zeros. Promptly afterwards, I set it in target mode, hooked it up to another iBook with a DVD-ROM drive, and installed Tiger. Everything ran smoothly-- until the computers rebooted. The DVD-capable iBook suffered the same problem until I disconnected the two and rebooted both computers. Unfortunately, my iBook's condition did not change one bit-- it still froze in the start up process...
- iBook G3 locked in boot-up process indefinitely
- disk utility failed to fix problem
- erased HDD "by zeros" with no errors
- installed Tiger while in target mode and from another iBook
- same problem ocurred, unchanged, after reboot
So, should I buy another HDD, suck it up and buy TechTools, or contact the repair center again?
For more details, continue reading...
My story:
After getting my iBook G3 back from repair (for the second time due to the infamous video/logic board defect), it worked for a solid week before acting up on me. Suddenly, while opening up Firefox, everything started to happen kinda slowly; the browser took about a minute to open, as did anything else I clicked on. Slightly annoyed, I rebooted-- the apple logo greeted me, and, after about five minutes, so did the little loading cog at the bottom... and stayed there indefinitely. My computer was locked in the boot up process, so I tried hard booting several times with no success, then zapping the PRAM with no results, either.
Contacting my local Apple repair center, they said my hard drive might be failing. One of the ways to tell is to erase the drive "by zeros," and if an error appears, there is something wrong. Well, Disk Utilities did not help, booting it as a target drive almost worked, but any computer I hooked it to could not open the drive, and I didn't want to buy TechTools. I already backed up my data the week before, so I figured, why not, and erased the drive by zeros. Promptly afterwards, I set it in target mode, hooked it up to another iBook with a DVD-ROM drive, and installed Tiger. Everything ran smoothly-- until the computers rebooted. The DVD-capable iBook suffered the same problem until I disconnected the two and rebooted both computers. Unfortunately, my iBook's condition did not change one bit-- it still froze in the start up process...