Hi, I would love some suggestion on this...

B

bji2001

Registered
I have an iMac that I purchased just about three years ago that my kids have 'inherited' (I have another one that's newer, that I'm on now)Last week I ran permissions repair and validate disk and it came up with an error that there were problems that couldnt' be repaired, so I reloaded OS 10.4.11 and the software and got it running again. Did all the software updates, did a permissions repair all is good.

But the kids tell me that the internet (mostly Youtube which they LOVE) was running very slowly, skipping and getting hug up on the pinwheel. This was a problem we didn't have before I reloaded the system.

So I decided to reload the system again, but this time it won't accept the software disk- Disk 2 that came with the computer. WHAT? It says that there is an error and the software wont load. Now, those disks have been in their cases, and only out the two times I recently loaded them. So I don't know what is going on.

One friend suggested that there is a RAM issue? Does that sound right? Or to try P R RAm, but the problem is that there is nothing loaded on the comp to see if that works.

Does anyone have thoughts on this, or do I have permission to take this piece of crap lemon (It died a year ago and I had to install a new hard drive- it's the worst Mac I've ever owned) and launch it with a catapult?

Barb
 
Well if you had something like Alsoft's DiskWarrior.

Now if you feel geeky the built in Unix might help that disk (if it is running OS X). So if you feel adventurous follow these steps (step by step):

1. Boot into Single-User Mode.

2. After the Unix text scrolls through and you get the first prompt, type the code:
Code: 
/sbin/fsck -fy

3. let the run until you get another prompt. If it comes back and says something like the System was modified, run the same /sbin/fsck -fy command again until it say everything is good.

4. Once /sbin/fsck -fy is satisfied type the command:
Code: 
reboot

This is the built in Unix code to help try to repair a hard disk. Now IMHO you internal hard drive is dying like an old movie death, over a long time. You should seriously think about getting a new internal disk but right now you should get an firewire external (like one of these) and clone your current hard disk (with a program like Carbon Copy Cloner) and copy the user data ASAP before the hard disk goes completely dead. This way once you get a new internal you can clone you old clone to the new internal you need to get.
 
Thank you for your suggestions, Satcomer. I did all of this, found a faulty memory card, and at the advice of a Mac savvy friend, pulled the bad card out (made sure it was the bad one by doing a follow up check) He assured me the computer would run fine with just one card.

Then I reinstalled the OS and software AGAIN - fourth time.
The thing still runs like crap. It gets hung up on the pinwheel for at least two minutes no matter what you ask the computer to do.

My question is - do these computers not work if only one memory card is present? If so, my friend was unaware of this.

I'm a a loss here. Do I need to make sure that a second memory card is avaialble? Is there just not enough RAM now? Is this a logic or motherboard issue? SHOULDN'T MAC PRODUCTS LAST LONGER THAN THIS????

Thanks,
 
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If you are running on one memory card, then (depending on the capacity of each card) you may have 1/2 of the original memory, or less. If you then have less than 1GB, or even less than 512MB, that would directly affect performance (and not in a good way!)
However, as Satcomer suggested, it sounds like the hard drive is dying a slow death.

Apple does not make the hard drive - or the memory. They just supply that memory, which can be the same memory, or hard drive, that you might have in a Windows PC.
 
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