Macbook G4 will not boot

[shiznit]

Hi, my Mac has lost its startup disk and will not even boot from the leopard install cd now. Any ideas?

[fo3nix]

Any idea what caused this?

On startup, hold down "C" with the disc in the drive, until you see the installer. That should work.

[fo3nix]

BTW what laptop is it?

There's no such thing as a macbook G4.

Is it an iBook?

[shiznit]

Sorry, I meant its a powerbook g4. I stupidl , changed my startup disk to diskwarrior 4. I have tried booting holding down the c, x and option, command p+ o keys.

I just end up either with the finder folder icon or the padlock screen which requires a password, and my login password does not work

[fo3nix]

Sorry, I'm not sure what to try next.

Try asking at the Apple support forums; they should know more.

All else fails -- take it to an Apple Store and have a genius fix it.

[shiznit]

Hi fo3nix, spoke to Apple and apparentlye is my hard drive is goosed, I have to take into the Apple store now.

Not happy, but what ya gonna do?

Thanks for your replies though

[fo3nix]

Just before you do that, try this:

http://support.apple.com/kb/HT1379

There's a bit of an old joke in Mac circles along the lines of "oh, try resetting your PRAM." On older models it apparently used to be a matter of course.

Certainly less so now.

But it still may help (especially given that it seems to store the startup disk location).

Worth a try!

[fo3nix]

If you do get it back but Apple were right all along thinking your drive is toast, then the first thing to do is backup all your documents as fast as you can.