Ack! Blue screen of death!

[northzax]

Something i never thought i would see on my iBook (G4, running 10.4.3) on reboot, it shows the OSX boot screen, then goes light blue. Ran disk utilities, said there were no problems. Ran hardware check, also no problems.

anyone have any other ideas, save reinstallation?

[htuttle]

1. Did you try booting off an installation CD, switching to Disk Utility, and 'repairing permissions'?

If it's happening right before the login screen would come up, it might be a permissions problem (I've seen that before).

There's also some more complicated stuff you could try to figure it out, such as booting into single user mode, and so on, but you'd need to be somewhat proficient in Unixology.

Finally, you might be able to reinstall the OS without wiping your own stuff using the Archive and Install option. If you're unfamiliar with that option, you might want to google on the specifics of it, so you know what would be kept and what would be lost.

[northzax]

2. Now i have

No luck on the permissions. I have managed to now get to a login screen where it won't let me login, so i guess that is progress of a sort. I used the startup disc to reset the passwords, and still can't login. Strange. Guess it is time for the reinstall, but first, i think a trip to the genuisbar is called for.

thanks for your help.

[Poiuyt]

3. Usually, third party disk repair software will help

Disk Warrior or Tech Tool Pro have always fixed my problems.

You can also try running a FSCK check:

http://docs.info.apple.com/article.html?artnum=106214

[northzax]

4. good news

the genius bar guy fixed it. took a couple hours, but did the archive and install and transferred over my prefs. it's all good. three hours of tech support for an out of warranty machine for free. try getting that on Vista!

of course, I lost my keychain, and some other user-based data, but all my files are in good shape!

thank you, Apple. you have once again restored my faith.