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TICKET ARCHIVE -> G3 Imac Trouble
harlem - Nov 9, 2005 - 9:11 pm
I NEED HELP!!!!!
I'm trying to free up some space on my iMac Hd after it got stuck on the opening blue screen with an overflow HD.
I've been getting some great help here but the last two tech's got me to this point and they could'nt figure it out from where I'm at now.
Here the story...
I have a fire wire link from the iMac to my iBook and I see the icon for the iMac drive on the iBook desk top and in the finder. Yet when I open the iMac hd I see the countents of the iBook drive only. Then when I run disc utilities It say everythings alright with the drive, I see the iMac hd icon in the utilities window, but it still wont mount.
A tech also suggested I move my entire iBook hd to my external with another fire wire to give the iMac hd more space but the iBook has only one fire wire port. What can I do to get past this point, free up space and remove junk from my iMac so I can repair and install and get it back in order????
THA?NK YOU,
FRED
I'm trying to free up some space on my iMac Hd after it got stuck on the opening blue screen with an overflow HD.
I've been getting some great help here but the last two tech's got me to this point and they could'nt figure it out from where I'm at now.
Here the story...
I have a fire wire link from the iMac to my iBook and I see the icon for the iMac drive on the iBook desk top and in the finder. Yet when I open the iMac hd I see the countents of the iBook drive only. Then when I run disc utilities It say everythings alright with the drive, I see the iMac hd icon in the utilities window, but it still wont mount.
A tech also suggested I move my entire iBook hd to my external with another fire wire to give the iMac hd more space but the iBook has only one fire wire port. What can I do to get past this point, free up space and remove junk from my iMac so I can repair and install and get it back in order????
THA?NK YOU,
FRED
ishan - Nov 9, 2005 - 10:14 pm
I would try using Diskwarrior (from Alsoft, commercial app) to a) mount the imac HD and b)repair any directory damage it finds. DW should work fine regardless of the fact that your iMac HD is mounted in target mode to a host computer from which you are using DW (DW is a bootable CD and is a very useful addtion to the capabilties of Disk Utility). Once you have the disk mounted, copy everything you need from it.
I am not sure what the other techs have said, but I am not quite sure why you can't run Disk Utility that is on the install CDs that came with your imac. Similarly, you could use DW to boot your iMac and do repairs more directly than by having the iMac HD mounted as in "target" mode on a different (host ) Macintosh. In any case, HTH and please let us know what happens.
I am not sure what the other techs have said, but I am not quite sure why you can't run Disk Utility that is on the install CDs that came with your imac. Similarly, you could use DW to boot your iMac and do repairs more directly than by having the iMac HD mounted as in "target" mode on a different (host ) Macintosh. In any case, HTH and please let us know what happens.
harlem - Nov 10, 2005 - 5:00 pm
This is the complete support and replys I got fup to know just to give you the entire history....
[On Nov 5, 7:42pm Fred wrote:]
When starting my iMac desk top I can't get past the blue screen in the beggining. What can/should I do to get it going?
Thanks.
[On Nov 5, 8:05pm ishan B. wrote:]
Startup using the original install disks that came with your iMac and do an archive/install which will install a new system but not remove any third party (i.e., non-Apple) apps from your drive. There are a number of ways to fix the problem without a reinstall using Unix, so if you know Unix, let me know and I can get you started, but frankly, it's not worth the hassle. Having a fresh clean system (let software update do all the updates as well) is a better option. HTH.
[On Nov 5, 8:20pm Fred wrote:]
Ishan,
I'm installing now as you explained. Actually I'd done this before. The blue screen problem returned because I pulled out the power cord before I removed the old system folder.
When the install finishes, where is the system folder? I also noticed that before all this happened I had only about 8GB of space left and when I started this current install thats still in progress, it said i didn't have enough space left so I had to leave out the printer drivers. When I dump the system folder will I at least have my 8GB left?
Thank You
[On Nov 6, 4:46am ishan B. wrote:]
I don't know whether you'll have the 8 Gb; you may have less. Either way, you are perilously low on disk space. Generally, for Mac OS X, you want 20% of your hard drive free, because the system is constantly writing to the drive swapping data from RAM to the drive and vice versa, particularly if you have only limited RAM. That eats up disk space and also slows everything way way down. You might consider putting some of the files/folders on your drive you don't need on a CD or DVD; the much better option is to get an external hard drive. They're cheap and you have to have a backup in case your primary drive fails (and believe me, it will, and at the worst possible time
If you have less than 1 Gb RAM, please buy some. It is cheap and you'll be amazed how much better everything works when you do. Good luck.
HTH.
[On Nov 6, 6:20pm Fred wrote:]
Now when I go through the whole install process again I get this message saying there was an error during the install and to try again. I try again and it says 4.? GB is neededm to install. I remove some of the files it lists but it now says there's -1.?GB. If thats the cas and I go through the whole archive install process I'll get that error message?
Is it that these numerous installs has taken all the space on the drive?
Do I need more Ram and or a bigger hard drive or what????
THANKS
[On Nov 6, 7:41pm ishan B. wrote:]
Every time you do an archive/install, your old system folder is renamed "Previous System" so you probably have a bunch of these sitting on your drive and they are many GB each. That's why you keep losing disk space after each attempt to reinstall. At this point, I would probably back up everything important and do an erase/install (this will erase EVERYTHING on your drive forever). You will get a fresh new system and will have to reinstall all third party apps (e.g., Microsoft Office) from their original CD/DVDs; so make sure you have serial numbers written down before you do this. As I said previously, you really should get a backup hard drive. Without knowing how much RAM your system and the usual apps you use daily use, I can't tell you specifically how much RAM you need, but one GB is a good place to start for OS X 10.x.
HTH.
[On Nov 6, 10:19pm Fred wrote:]
I understand. I will step up my RAM. But how do I back up the complete drive when I can't get past the blue screen after start up?
Thanks...this is very helpful!
[On Nov 7, 4:21am ishan B. wrote:]
That's a question I can't answer, so I will resubmit your question back to the pool of "answerers".
[On Nov 8, 8:12am Beverly W. wrote:]
First of all while a Gb of RAM may be a nice thing it is pretty much unrelated to your current problem. Also whether it is worth installing that much, or if you even can install that much, rests on which model of iMac you have, so please tell me that first. Particularly important is to know whether your iMac has firewire ports or not.
Anyway 256 will work for basic use and 512 or more is plenty for most uses (my iMac that I'm writing this on has 768.)
Regarding the backing up of the drive: what other computers or equipment do you already have or have access to?
--------
Beverly Woods
http://beverlywoods.net
Low End Mac column: http://www.lowendmac.com/woods/index.html
[On Nov 8, 12:25pm Fred wrote:]
The desk top that has the problem (can't get pass the blue screen and all HD space is gone after several attempts at doing installs) is an iMac G4 and I do have fire wire.
The computer I'm using now is my ibook G4. 1.2 ghz and 256 mb.
What can I do to get back in my iMac?
Thank you!!!
[On Nov 8, 12:47pm Beverly W. wrote:]
First thing I would try is to see if the imac will start in Firewire Target Disk mode, see your Mac Help for precise directions on that, basically you hold the T key down while starting the target computer. If it works in this case, your imac hard drive will appear as an extra disk on your desktop. Let me know, if this does not work there is always Plan B.
--------
Beverly Woods
http://beverlywoods.net
Low End Mac column: http://www.lowendmac.com/woods/index.html
[On Nov 8, 5:30pm Fred wrote:]
I tried that and all I get is the yellow fire wire symbol dancing around the blue screen.
Does that mean I go to plan B now? Whats that?
Thanks!
[On Nov 8, 8:07pm Beverly W. wrote:]
That firewire symbol is all you will see when the Target Disk Mode is active. So then you can look on your desktop of the other computer (to which you've hooked the imac up via FW) and you should see the hard drive of the iMac, and you can copy/back up your files that you need that way.
--------
Beverly Woods
http://beverlywoods.net
Low End Mac column: http://www.lowendmac.com/woods/index.html
[On Nov 8, 8:36pm Fred wrote:]
So when I connect my imac to my ibook via fire wire I should see my iMac hd icon on the desk top and I can then transfer that data to the ibook?
If that works and I get about 10-20Gb out of the iMac I can then archive and install and get it up and running?
Thanks.
[On Nov 8, 8:53pm Beverly W. wrote:]
Right, should work. Of course if there are a lot of those "Previous system folders" from your previous attempts, you wouldn't need to save all of them (perhaps just the first one.). Let me know how it goes!
--------
Beverly Woods
http://beverlywoods.net
Low End Mac column: http://www.lowendmac.com/woods/index.html
[On Nov 9, 5:45pm Fred wrote:]
I'm now connected to my iBook and Have the hd open from the imac ON THE IBOOK desk top. Can you tell me where to find the "previous system folders"?
THANK YOU!
Now...
I put in DW and tried to repair the iMac drive in the host but got an error message saying "the directory of the disc cannot be rebuilt. the original disk is to severly damaged. The disc was not modified".
Where should I go from here?
Thanks
[On Nov 5, 7:42pm Fred wrote:]
When starting my iMac desk top I can't get past the blue screen in the beggining. What can/should I do to get it going?
Thanks.
[On Nov 5, 8:05pm ishan B. wrote:]
Startup using the original install disks that came with your iMac and do an archive/install which will install a new system but not remove any third party (i.e., non-Apple) apps from your drive. There are a number of ways to fix the problem without a reinstall using Unix, so if you know Unix, let me know and I can get you started, but frankly, it's not worth the hassle. Having a fresh clean system (let software update do all the updates as well) is a better option. HTH.
[On Nov 5, 8:20pm Fred wrote:]
Ishan,
I'm installing now as you explained. Actually I'd done this before. The blue screen problem returned because I pulled out the power cord before I removed the old system folder.
When the install finishes, where is the system folder? I also noticed that before all this happened I had only about 8GB of space left and when I started this current install thats still in progress, it said i didn't have enough space left so I had to leave out the printer drivers. When I dump the system folder will I at least have my 8GB left?
Thank You
[On Nov 6, 4:46am ishan B. wrote:]
I don't know whether you'll have the 8 Gb; you may have less. Either way, you are perilously low on disk space. Generally, for Mac OS X, you want 20% of your hard drive free, because the system is constantly writing to the drive swapping data from RAM to the drive and vice versa, particularly if you have only limited RAM. That eats up disk space and also slows everything way way down. You might consider putting some of the files/folders on your drive you don't need on a CD or DVD; the much better option is to get an external hard drive. They're cheap and you have to have a backup in case your primary drive fails (and believe me, it will, and at the worst possible time
If you have less than 1 Gb RAM, please buy some. It is cheap and you'll be amazed how much better everything works when you do. Good luck.HTH.
[On Nov 6, 6:20pm Fred wrote:]
Now when I go through the whole install process again I get this message saying there was an error during the install and to try again. I try again and it says 4.? GB is neededm to install. I remove some of the files it lists but it now says there's -1.?GB. If thats the cas and I go through the whole archive install process I'll get that error message?
Is it that these numerous installs has taken all the space on the drive?
Do I need more Ram and or a bigger hard drive or what????
THANKS
[On Nov 6, 7:41pm ishan B. wrote:]
Every time you do an archive/install, your old system folder is renamed "Previous System" so you probably have a bunch of these sitting on your drive and they are many GB each. That's why you keep losing disk space after each attempt to reinstall. At this point, I would probably back up everything important and do an erase/install (this will erase EVERYTHING on your drive forever). You will get a fresh new system and will have to reinstall all third party apps (e.g., Microsoft Office) from their original CD/DVDs; so make sure you have serial numbers written down before you do this. As I said previously, you really should get a backup hard drive. Without knowing how much RAM your system and the usual apps you use daily use, I can't tell you specifically how much RAM you need, but one GB is a good place to start for OS X 10.x.
HTH.
[On Nov 6, 10:19pm Fred wrote:]
I understand. I will step up my RAM. But how do I back up the complete drive when I can't get past the blue screen after start up?
Thanks...this is very helpful!
[On Nov 7, 4:21am ishan B. wrote:]
That's a question I can't answer, so I will resubmit your question back to the pool of "answerers".
[On Nov 8, 8:12am Beverly W. wrote:]
First of all while a Gb of RAM may be a nice thing it is pretty much unrelated to your current problem. Also whether it is worth installing that much, or if you even can install that much, rests on which model of iMac you have, so please tell me that first. Particularly important is to know whether your iMac has firewire ports or not.
Anyway 256 will work for basic use and 512 or more is plenty for most uses (my iMac that I'm writing this on has 768.)
Regarding the backing up of the drive: what other computers or equipment do you already have or have access to?
--------
Beverly Woods
http://beverlywoods.net
Low End Mac column: http://www.lowendmac.com/woods/index.html
[On Nov 8, 12:25pm Fred wrote:]
The desk top that has the problem (can't get pass the blue screen and all HD space is gone after several attempts at doing installs) is an iMac G4 and I do have fire wire.
The computer I'm using now is my ibook G4. 1.2 ghz and 256 mb.
What can I do to get back in my iMac?
Thank you!!!
[On Nov 8, 12:47pm Beverly W. wrote:]
First thing I would try is to see if the imac will start in Firewire Target Disk mode, see your Mac Help for precise directions on that, basically you hold the T key down while starting the target computer. If it works in this case, your imac hard drive will appear as an extra disk on your desktop. Let me know, if this does not work there is always Plan B.
--------
Beverly Woods
http://beverlywoods.net
Low End Mac column: http://www.lowendmac.com/woods/index.html
[On Nov 8, 5:30pm Fred wrote:]
I tried that and all I get is the yellow fire wire symbol dancing around the blue screen.
Does that mean I go to plan B now? Whats that?
Thanks!
[On Nov 8, 8:07pm Beverly W. wrote:]
That firewire symbol is all you will see when the Target Disk Mode is active. So then you can look on your desktop of the other computer (to which you've hooked the imac up via FW) and you should see the hard drive of the iMac, and you can copy/back up your files that you need that way.
--------
Beverly Woods
http://beverlywoods.net
Low End Mac column: http://www.lowendmac.com/woods/index.html
[On Nov 8, 8:36pm Fred wrote:]
So when I connect my imac to my ibook via fire wire I should see my iMac hd icon on the desk top and I can then transfer that data to the ibook?
If that works and I get about 10-20Gb out of the iMac I can then archive and install and get it up and running?
Thanks.
[On Nov 8, 8:53pm Beverly W. wrote:]
Right, should work. Of course if there are a lot of those "Previous system folders" from your previous attempts, you wouldn't need to save all of them (perhaps just the first one.). Let me know how it goes!
--------
Beverly Woods
http://beverlywoods.net
Low End Mac column: http://www.lowendmac.com/woods/index.html
[On Nov 9, 5:45pm Fred wrote:]
I'm now connected to my iBook and Have the hd open from the imac ON THE IBOOK desk top. Can you tell me where to find the "previous system folders"?
THANK YOU!
Now...
I put in DW and tried to repair the iMac drive in the host but got an error message saying "the directory of the disc cannot be rebuilt. the original disk is to severly damaged. The disc was not modified".
Where should I go from here?
Thanks
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