things that suck

[denise]

* discovering that your laptop has suddenly decided to be a very expensive paperweight

(Almost positive that it just needs an OS reinstall, but nobody in the house has any OSX 10.4 install disks with them. Grarrrgh.)

Comments

Broken laptop

[cesy]

I hope you manage to get it sorted soon.

[squirelawrence]

Pretty sure I've got two sets of install disks (one for the MacBook and one for the iMac) but not certain what version. Will doublecheck when I get home tonight, if you're still in need.

[denise]

We have them, we just didn't have them in Vegas with us. :P

[cow]

I've got some, although I'm far away.

Also: If you take it to a nearby Apple Store (if there is one), they'll do the OS reinstall for free. We have some Mac laptops at work and my colleagues can never manage to keep their install CDs, so I've done this a few times. Book a Genius Bar appointment and you're good.

[siliconshaman]

Been there. Done that ... twice in 3 weeks. [second time my backup tower ate it's HD and ended up doing the dreaded click*click*click of death.]

Still cleaning up the mess...and trying to wrap my head around Linux [Ubuntu] as I went for whole 'nother OS.

You have my sympathy.

+1

[zvi]

Yeah, if anyone has a spare CD-R, you can run a LiveCD of Linux until you can get back to your OS disks. Or, if there's a spare 8 gig flash drive lying around, (and somebody running ubuntu), you can run LiveUSB and have the ability to save things while you work. :)

Re: +1

[siliconshaman]

Me, I went with the second route...

[raynedanser]

How is it going with that? I've been running solely for a year now if you need help. ;-)

[siliconshaman]

I've pretty much got a handle on most of it... but I can't seem to get the network settings right...

I've a home wireless LAN, consisting of two routers, two 'nix machines and two windows boxes... and the linux machines not only won't talk to the windows machines, but they refuse to talk to each other, even via ethernet!

They see the routers ok, but no other machines, and talk to the internet... but not the LAN

I know I'm missing something, but fucked if I know what! so, yeah, a little help would be appreciated. I want to set up linpopup and file shares, plus connect to the wireless printer.

[raynedanser]

I haven't done it myself, but I've heard networking with Windows machines can be tricky. Have you checked the support forums? There's also linux4all and a Ubuntu comm on LJ, too. I'd love to know what you figure out as I would LOVE to network with our Windows desktop.

[siliconshaman]

Thanks, I'll be check those out today... if I find a solution I'll post it.

[raynedanser]

Can I add you? So that I'll see the solution? ;-) I hope you're able to figure something out.

[siliconshaman]

Sure go ahead!

[raynedanser]

Excellent. (also? Sounds like you and I would probably get along anyway *g*)

[siliconshaman]

There is that...

[minxy]

Oh hon.

*sympathy*

[chrismm]

Oh, man, that sucks. I hope your data is OK!

Broken laptop

[azurelunatic]

Augggh. Hope you get it sorted soon, preferably before you get home.

[zarch]

if there is another mac around you can boot into target disc mode and use the remote install option.

An OS install may not be necessary:

[semtex]

What happens when you try and start it up? One clue to what's wrong is where the computer hangs during startup:

* If it never gets past the grey screen and/or you get a boot symbol with a line through it, the startup disk can't be found. This could be hardware or software failure and is best resolved by starting up in Target Disk mode (connect another computer to dead computer with a firewire and press and hold "T" at startup chime) like someone else pointed out, or start up from a OSX 10.4 install and run Disk Utility a couple of times.

* If you get past the grey startup screen and get hung up at a blue screen OR you get past the login sequence but your desktop doesn't load, you probably have some corrupt preferences or something else that is hanging up the login process. Try rebooting and doing a Safe Boot: hold down the SHIFT key until you get a Login Window (THIS MAY TAKE FOREVER because your disk is being checked for errors in the process. Once you're logged in, empty the Trash. Next, weed out any third party apps or things that could be triggering the error.

I use a free utility called Applejack that is really awesome in fixing inexplicable OS X errors. Also if you can get your hands on a copy of Disk Warrior, this can repair damage to the Volume structure and other disk errors.

/tl;dr tech support :D: Good luck.

Re: An OS install may not be necessary:

[denise]

Appreciate the advice, but I've been doing Apple troubleshooting for a long damn time; I know what I'm doing. :)

Re: An OS install may not be necessary:

[semtex]

So have I. Fair enough.

[raynedanser]

OH NO!

[animeshon]

Gah! I know all about that :(