iBook G4: Major crash - help needed

jaqian

I've got two problems...

1.Started up my iBook G4 (Mac OS 10.3.9) last night and I got this message...

init: can't exec /bin/sh for single user: no such file or directory

It was working fine two days ago when I last used it. Don't know what is causing this as I hadn't installed any new software etc.

2. Thought I could re-install the OS but after inserting the disc I've no way of ejecting it.

Haven't a lot of experience using Macs so all help greatly appreciated.

Rob

babypink

if you hold down the eject key while you boot it will eject the drive.

first thing I would do is to boot into target mode - hold T while booting.....find someone with a mac and backup all your data. Then go about re-installing.

440Hz

If you don't know someone with a Mac... how recently did you back up all your data?

When you inserted the OS disc and it got stuck, did anything helpful happen or did the disk not mount and just get stuck? ie did you get to the stage where you had the option to reinstall?

jaqian

babypink wrote: »

if you hold down the eject key while you boot it will eject the drive.

Silly question but where is the eject key?

first thing I would do is to boot into target mode - hold T while booting.....find someone with a mac and backup all your data. Then go about re-installing.

Thankfully no data to backup its only a fresh install and actually meant as a present so hasn't really been used much.

440Hz wrote: »

When you inserted the OS disc and it got stuck, did anything helpful happen or did the disk not mount and just get stuck? ie did you get to the stage where you had the option to reinstall?

Didn't mount at all. A lot of whirring but the screen didn't change.

440Hz

jaqian wrote: »

Silly question but where is the eject key?

Depending on the machine, it should be somewhere up in the top right hand corner eg

johnk123

The eject key on an iBook G4 is on the F12 key

SouperComputer

Also if you hold down the "click" button beneath the trackpad while powering on it should force the disc to eject.

jaqian

Thanks lads, can't believe it was staring me in the face

jaqian

I found the eject key and got the disc back

However the iBook still doesn't see the disc when I start up. Is there some key I can press to get it to boot from the disc?

Cheers,
Rob

440Hz

Three options:

1. (With disc inserted) Restart your computer and immediately press the Option key. Icons for all available startup volumes will appear. Click the one you want to boot from, and then click the right arrow button to complete the startup process.
   
2. Restart your computer and immediately press Cmd-Option-Shift-Delete. You must press all the keys at once. The computer will start to boot from the CD or DVD drive. If there isn't a bootable disc inside the drive when you begin the reboot, the computer will attempt to boot from another partition or drive.
   
3. Restart your computer and immediately press the c key. The computer will look for a bootable CD or DVD and, if it finds one, will use it as its startup device.

I'd usually go with option 2 myself in this type of scenario.

jaqian

Thanks for all the info 440Hz. I'll give that a try later.

Cheers,
Rob

jaqian

Thanks 440Hz and everyone else, the G4 is now up and running just wish I knew what caused it so I can avoid it again.

Cheers,
Rob