I was on a friends Mac today, and after i opened a link i got a bunch of pop-ups and the screen froze. I couldn’t do anything, and there didn’t seem to be any Mac equivalent of CTRL-ALT-DELETE (i’ve since found out that there is one–i’m not a Mac user).
The only way to solve the problem seemed to be turning the power off at the wall, which i did. But when i tried to restart the computer, it wouldn’t start, and all i got was a blank grey screen with a flashing question mark (?) in the middle, superimposed on a folder icon.
My friend who owns the computer has never seen this before, and nothing that he does seems to fix the problem. The computer won’t even boot from a startup disk. Is there anything else that can be done at home, or does this problem mean an inevitable visit to the repair shop?
The question mark on the folder shows that it cannot find the startup volume. Have you been holding down the “c” key when starting up? It won’t necessarily start up from the recover CD if you don’t do that.
I had a similar problem, but it was related to a hard drive issue. I was able to recover each time by starting up from the AppleCare disk I had.
If he’s still covered under AppleCare, you can also call them and they’ll talk you through any home solutions and set up a return, if necessary. Good luck!
That’s the Mac’s way of telling you it can’t find a valid System Folder to start up from. As you probably know now, it’s very likely a direct result of the improper shutdown, but it may not be quite as serious a problem as it appears. I’ve seen this happen a few times, and each time it was due to a System Folder that had gotten damaged or become “unblessed”.
You mention that it won’t boot from a startup disc. Just for clarity, are you holding down the “C” key when you restart with a CD in the drive? Is it a bootable System CD? Also, what version is your friend running? Mac OS 8, 9, X?
Here’s an Apple Knowledgebase article on troubleshooting the problem, but it is essential that you can startup from an alternate disc. It’s been a while since I re-blessed a System Folder, but I’ll be happy to walk you through it.
when you restart, hold the 'T" This will put it in target disk mode.
2 options:
now restart the computer by holding the power button. I’ve found that if i can but it in this mode, it usually will find the sytem folder to reboot.
If you have another Mac, you can connect it by a firewire cable. The computer now acts as a booted hard drive. Now you can use disk utility and/or replace corrupted system files.
We did indeed hold “c” down when trying to restart from the disc, but with no result, so we’re at a bit of a loss. We’ll try doing “t”, as suggested by Ludicrous, when we get home.
I just remembered another thing AppleCare told me when I was having startup problems. If he’s running OSX, you can try holding down the “x” key, apparently this will search for an OSX system folder to start up from, or something. Worth a shot, anyway.
mhendo, there is a key command on that site that I have used many times on boot when troubleshooting on newer Macs (those made w/in the last 5 years or so). Make sure a bootable CD is in the tray, then restart while holding down the “option” key. As described in the link, if the machine is one of what’s known as a New World Mac, this should bring up a boot system chooser if there is a recognized System Folder anywhere on the machine. IIRC it will also have a different disc icon too, so you know what volume it was found on.
If it’s an older Mac, the key combination “cmd-option-shift-delete” should also force it to try and boot from a CD. I had to boot this way on an old PowerBook 1400 once or twice.
Just thought i’d give an update for those who were kind enough to offer advice. We took the computer in to the Mac service center, where they were able to fix everything pretty quickly and at a cost of about $120. The service guy said that there was little we could have done about it at home, because it was refusing to boot from the CD. He also reprimanded my friend for not using the “Reset” button; we had to explain to him that it was me, the PC user, who fucked up.
Thanks for all your help. I’ll know better in future.