blue screen - many concerns, new to you folks

clone

Registered
iBook G4
PPC, 1.42 GHz, 1GB RAM

6/19/09 I was prompted to update Safari a few days ago and did so, along with Adobe Reader 8. After restart I launched Safari but then Ctrl-Q before it had done much (don't recall why). Next time I went to use her she was frozen. Forced shutdown. Start. Freeze or Blue Screen of Death. Now start leads to only blue screen.

What I've done: Booted from install CD
Re-installed system
Ran Disk Utility to verify/repair disk (have done this several times now)
Learned how to boot to safe mode (hold Shift while starting - stupid? question do I have to hold it all the way to password prompt or can I let go when I have a gray apple and the thingy going around like a clock?)
Ran fsck -fy from terminal
Looked at a lot of advice on the web that basically tells me to run Disk Utility but nothing past that if/when that fails to resolve issue
Fortunately I bought a 1TB ext HD a couple months ago and dl'd a freeware backup utility from sourceforge (PsyncX 2.2.2 by Dan Kogai) and ran it 1x - so now I have all the files, etc backed up. I am using Disk Utility to make this folder a disk image with the idea that I can restore my system from it.

Questions: How long is this gonna take to create the image of a 60 GB HD. It's been running > an hour and appears to be ~1/6 done at most. I canceled the first time (b/c Help suggested it be read only - oops) and started over. I have to punch out in < 2 hours which means shutting both devices down and taking them home (and starting over again - worth it if it works - just leave it home for as long as it needs).
Will this work? Pitfalls? Things I should know? Am I going to end up taking it to an Apple store for repair (out of warranty)? I'm especially concerned with how to do this - nervous about erasing destination volume but probably no choice. If I follow instructions in Disk Utility's Help will I be OK?
I have spent some time going through other threads and didn't really get the answers I need. If I have violated any forum protocols, please correct me.
And thank you for any help, I only hope I can repay it by helping others.
 
So your saying it only does it when you open Safari? Well why would you want to do a complete reboot? Just delete safari, And download another one, You'll need a flash drive, or that external drive, download it on a different computer, save the safari dmg onto the hard drive, delete the old safari on your computer, and then re download it, Since you didnt mention which version of OS X you were running, make sure that you get the right version of safari... But im thinking that your running Leopard??
 
Sorry - should have mentioned OS - it's Tiger - was 10.4.11 now back to 10.4.2 (unless I am able to re-install the whole system from the disk image, which is what I'm nervous about).
When you boot in safe mode (the only way it will turn on now) all kinds of things are disabled. I have no audio, video, internet, etc. I am able to interact here from the PC at work (OverNight shifts).
 
I saw a later thread with similar problem. I responded thusly:
Did you recently downlad the upgrade to Safari? If you go back through the posts you should find my thread. Unfortunately the problem has not been resolved and everything I've tried makes the situation worse so I still don't have my Mac fixed. I have reinstalled the system from the original disk several times. I tried reinstalling everything from a back up which involved erasing the hard drive. Now I can't even boot to safe mode.
I suspect some kind of kernal error because Disk Utility keeps reporting the drive is fine.
 
Back
Top