Macbook won't boot

-Chris-

I'm hoping someone can give me some troubleshooting ideas.

I have a white Macbook, probably 4 years old.

Recently it stopped booting - it shows the Apple logo but then when that disappears and the screen is grey, the MB gets stuck and won't boot any further.

I'd be happy recovering some files off the desktop and reinstalling the OS, but I can't get to the files.

I've tried booting in the various modes, resetting PRAM etc.
I've put it into target mode and connected it to another Mac, but it doesn't show up on the other Mac at all.

I've booted with an Ubuntu Live CD, but that only has authorisation to access certain folders, I get an access denied for the desktop.

It's original RAM etc - no modifications.


Any other troubleshooting ideas?

Odaise Gaelach

With regards to accessing your data from a Ubuntu Live CD, if you can see your personal folders then you might be able to change their permissions with the sudo chmod command. Then you can safely back them up to an external hard disk drive.

This might help you:
FilePermissions - Ubuntu Documentation

conor.hogan.2

Yes if you can boot into the live cd and then can see the files on the harddrive then it is probably just a matter of changing the permissions and backing up and reinstalling them back on.

Kinetic^

conor.hogan.2 wrote: »

Yes if you can boot into the live cd then the harddrive is working and it is probably just a matter of changing the permissions and backing up and reinstalling them back on.

If he can boot to a live CD, surely it means that the DVD drive is working. You don't need a hard drive to boot to a live cd.

conor.hogan.2

Ye sorry, meant can boot into and see his files (that are on his hd).

He wouldnt be moving any useful files over if he wasn't able to see his files, should have explicitly stated that.

-Chris-

Yeah, will have to look at how the file permissions thing works with the sudo command (not a big Linuxophile), I think that could be the job.

DVD drive works, HD works (I can see the folders on the MB HD when I boot the live CD, but I can't get into the folders to view/backup the files).

I'll try that tonight.

Odaise Gaelach

If/when you get your data backed up...

Have you tried using Disk Utility at all? If the problem is to do with the file system on the drive it might be able to fix it. Might be worth giving the drive a check anyway, just in case there is something wrong with it.

Resolve startup issues and perform disk maintenance with Disk Utility and fsck

Apart from that, all I can suggest to you is to re-install OS X!

conor.hogan.2

Very good point boot up with the install cd in and run disk utility.