Dual USB iBook G3 won't boot

I am having this exact problem right now as specified in Auryn's thread (http://discussions.apple.com/thread.jspa?threadID=1552105&tstart=0). My iBook doesn't boot up, it just stays at the grey Apple screen. It's a 600 MHz G3 dual USB iBook with 640 MB ram. It was running Panther 10.3.9.
I tried those steps outlined in this link (http://docs.info.apple.com/article.html?artnum=50959) but it didn't work. I even went as far to take out the additional memory I added and still, no hope. It seems like it might be the logic board, ugh, what a hassle. Is there any other way to verify that it could be the logic board?
Oh, and one more thing to add. I did leave the iBook in sleep mode with the power plugged into the wall for about two weeks. Today I just barely started using it and it happened about two hours into use...not sure if that could be a probable cause to the problem, but yeah..
One thing I did notice is that when the grey Apple screen comes on, the centered Apple logo moves slightly down. It's weird, it's almost as if an error message is trying to appear above it or something. Is there anything I can do? Is my only hope left now to take it to an authorized center or trash it?

Are you able to start up in Safe Mode? This will take quite awhile longer than a normal startup because it does a file check and repair of the hard disk.
If this works you will see your normal desktop. Once completely started up in Safe Mode, try to restart normally, and go to Applications > Utilities > Disk Utility. Click on the top hard drive icon in the left sidebar and note the S.M.A.R.T. status at the bottom right of the pane. What does it say?
Select the named boot volume in the left sidebar, ("Macintosh HD" unless you've renamed it). What is the hard drive capacity and how much space remains available on it? Repair permissions on it.
See if you are able to do a little hard drive maintenance to help things out.

Similar Messages

Bizarre Dual-USB iBook Behavior....

As of this morning, my Dual USB iBook running 10.3.9 freezes at the Apple Icon during start-up. I hear the chime, the screen lights up and the Apple icon appears, but then the Apple curiously shifts down the screen several pixels, before start-up freezes altogether.
I found the following workaround: Start with the Option button pressed to get to the Boot Mode screen, then hit the right arrow button. This gets my computer up and running, but when I try to Use Disk Utility to repair the permissions, I get an error code of -9997 and it says, "No Valid Packages." I cannot find what -9997 refers to.
I cannot get the computer to restart properly in any mode other than Boot Mode, even to reinstall the software or run Diskwarrior.
Anyone have any idea what happened here?

The error means you have deleted the /Library/Receipts/ folder or the contents of that folder. Neither Disk Utility nor Software Update can work without the Receipts folder and the basic receipt package - BaseSystem.pkg.
If you have a backup of your system you can copy the /Library/Receipts/ folder to your startup volume to replace the one that's missing. Otherwise you will need to find a copy of the BaseSystem.pkg file from another Mac and transfer a copy of it to your computer.
The freeze at startup, however, is more likely due to corruption of one or more system files or a corrupted or failed hard drive. If you have an OS X Installer and the hard drive is not corrupted you can reinstall OS X without erasing the hard drive by doing an Archive and Install:
How to Perform an Archive and Install
1. Be sure to use Disk Utility first to repair the disk before performing the Archive and Install.
Repairing the Hard Drive and Permissions
Boot from your OS X Installer disc. After the installer loads select your language and click on the Continue button. When the menu bar appears select Disk Utility from the Installer menu (Utilities menu for Tiger.) After DU loads select your hard drive entry (mfgr.'s ID and drive size) from the the left side list. In the DU status area you will see an entry for the S.M.A.R.T. status of the hard drive. If it does not say "Verified" then the hard drive is failing or failed. (SMART status is not reported on external Firewire or USB drives.) If the drive is "Verified" then select your OS X volume from the list on the left (sub-entry below the drive entry,) click on the First Aid tab, then click on the Repair Disk button. If DU reports any errors that have been fixed, then re-run Repair Disk until no errors are reported. If no errors are reported, then quit DU and return to the installer.
If DU reports errors it cannot fix, then you will need Disk Warrior (4.0 for Tiger) and/or TechTool Pro (4.5.2 for Tiger) to repair the drive. If you don't have either of them or if neither of them can fix the drive, then you will need to reformat the drive and reinstall OS X.
2. Do not proceed with an Archive and Install if DU reports errors it cannot fix. In that case use Disk Warrior and/or TechTool Pro to repair the hard drive. If neither can repair the drive, then you will have to erase the drive and reinstall from scratch.
3. Boot from your OS X Installer disc. After the installer loads select your language and click on the Continue button. When you reach the screen to select a destination drive click once on the destination drive then click on the Option button. Select the Archive and Install option. You have an option to preserve users and network preferences. Only select this option if you are sure you have no corrupted files in your user accounts. Otherwise leave this option unchecked. Click on the OK button and continue with the OS X Installation.
4. Upon completion of the Archive and Install you will have a Previous System Folder in the root directory. You should retain the PSF until you are sure you do not need to manually transfer any items from the PSF to your newly installed system.
5. After moving any items you want to keep from the PSF you should delete it. You can back it up if you prefer, but you must delete it from the hard drive.
6. You can now download a Combo Updater directly from Apple's download site to update your new system to the desired version as well as install any security or other updates. You can also do this using Software Update.
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Dual USB iBook

Hi I bought an early dual usb ibook - white - not sure of exact model .
It was working fine when i first got it but i tried to install an airport card (which didn't work ) and ever since i can't get the screen to light up . It looks like it powers up as the cap light and the sound key seems to light up the number lock ...
Has anyone idea of what i might have done to make the screen stop working and how i can fix it please ?
thanks
chris

A good place to start might be with this article:
Troubleshooting: My computer displays no video
http://support.apple.com/kb/HT1573?viewlocale=en_US
If you need help identifying your iBook exactly, this link might help:
Mactracker
http://www.mactracker.ca/
Good luck!

White dual usb iBook

I think my hard drive for my white dual usb ibook has crashed. I have tried to repair with install disk but it will not even read the hard drive.
Are ther hard drives out there for replacement???

It's a difficult task to replace it.
If you could be more specific about which exact model iBook it is, we could direct you to the instructions.
You can choose from this list:
http://www.everymac.com/systems/apple/ibook/index-ibook.html

IBook G4 won't boot using Install Disk

My iBook g4 won't boot from its original Mac OS X Install Disk (10.4.2).
When I try to start by holding down the 'C' key, the drive starts to spin up the disk, but then starts up from the hard drive.
When using the System Preferences to select the install disk as the start up drive, it shows in the preference pane, I can select it, but when it restarts, I get a flashing question mark before the computer continues by booting up from the hard drive.
I've also tried holding down the 'Option' key to run the Apple Hardware Test on the disk, but my internal hard drive is my only option when trying this.
I find it odd that the drive would work normally for all other purposes (reading/writing CD and DVD's), but will not start up from it.
Thanks in advance for any thoughts or suggestions!

An update:
I tested the startup disk using an external FireWire DVD drive and received the exact same results as when attempting to boot from my iBook's internal drive.
Since it's definitely not the drive, I'd have to agree with you that my install disk is bad (although I'm still at a loss as how an undamaged install disk goes bad).
You mentioned that Apple Support would replace the disks for a fee. I went through the Apple Support page and which led me to a page informing me that I had to pay $50 to talk to them once about this issue. I'm hesitant to spend $50 on a call where they'll tell me I can purchase new 10.4 install disks for the discounted fee of $50+shipping for a total investment that's almost the cost of simply upgrading to 10.5.
Has anyone actually purchased replacement install disks from Apple? I'd be interested in knowing what you were charged.
Or is there another method of contacting Apple regarding this issue that won't cost me $50?

Did all dual-USB iBooks have an airport card installed by default?

Did all dual-USB iBooks come with an airport card installed? I ask because I just bought one from eBay (http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=270303646742) (model M6497) and the owner didn't know if it had an airport card installed. Of course, I don't know if the laptop's been modified at all, I was just trying to get an idea of how likely it was that it would come ready for wireless. Thank you

Possible sources for the original AirPort Card:
http://www.macofalltrades.com/AppleOriginal_Airport_Card_APp/airport1.htm
http://www.dvwarehouse.com/Apple-Original-AirPort-Wireless-Card-802.11B-p-31366. html
http://eshop.macsales.com/item/Apple/M7600LLE/
http://www.synaptech.com/catalog/index.php?mainpage=index&cPath=4953
http://www.teksale.com/laptops/laptopparts/listings/apple-airport-original.htm
http://www.megamacs.com/v1/?action=view&pid=967052
http://www.macrecycling.com/apple-airport-card-ibook-g3g4-powerbook-g4-p-100531. html
http://memorysolutions.com/memorysolutions/orapaica1.html
http://store.airportcardsdirect.com/
http://www.powerbookguy.com/xcart/catalog/Airport-Cards-price0-p-1-c-507.html
http://www.ifixit.com/cart/catalog/product98_AirportCard.html
http://techrestore.com/xcart/product.php?productid=16174
Links priced low-to-high, last checked November 9, 2008.
Installation instructions can be found in this Knowledge Base article:
http://docs.info.apple.com/article.html?artnum=111919

My iBook g4 won't boot up

My iBook g4 won't boot up.... I tried the option key and there is a reset option maybe and then it loads and after that the blue screen comes and after that only blue.

Hi, and welcome to Apple Support Communities.
It sounds as though it could be having hard drive problems. Have you tried starting up in Safe Mode? If not, I suggest that you give it a try. This will take quite awhile longer than a normal startup because it does a file check and repair of the hard disk.
If this works you will see your normal desktop. Once completely started up in Safe Mode, try to restart normally, and go to Applications > Utilities > Disk Utility. Click on the top hard drive icon in the left sidebar and note the S.M.A.R.T. status at the bottom right of the pane. What does it say?
Select the named boot volume in the left sidebar, ("Macintosh HD" unless you've renamed it). What is the hard drive capacity and how much space remains available on it? Repair permissions on it.
See if you are able to do a little hard drive maintenance to help things out.

IBook G4 Won't Boot - Anything!

Hey!
I have a G4 iBook that won't boot! It's a friend's. She brought it over, and it was showing the "question mark folder", so I figured I'd just boot from a CD and see what's happening, but no go. I tried to boot it in Firewire Target Disk mode, but nothing mounted, except one time I left the CD-ROM in the drive and it mounted.
So, it can't boot from the HD, can't boot from a CD-ROM, and it can't be started in Target Disk mode. Nor can I start it in Single User mode. I zapped the PRAM, but that didn't help. I figured the HD's shot, but that doesn't explain why it can't boot from a disk, right?
I'm stumped - any ideas, folks?

You will NOT be able to startup any Mac that shipped with Panther with a retail copy of Panther. The retail copies are for people who are updating. That iBook may require Mac OS X 10.3.4 or even 10.3.8 to startup and the Panther install CDs are probably 10.3.0.
If you don't have the original install disks, I would recommend making a trip to an Apple retail store. The Mac Genius there has access to all the install disks for every type of Mac. They can help you get a whole new set or let you borrow something like the Apple Hardware Test disk for that model iBook.
-Doug

Advice needed for replacement battery for G3 12" Dual USB ibook

I need to buy a new battery for my 12" iBook, a 600 MHz G3 model, dual USB, vintage 2001. The online Apple store has something called an Extra Battery - iBook 12.1", which is a 50-watt-hour battery. However, when I phoned the Apple store to order one the salesperson insisted that these would only work in the newer G4 version of the iBook. I queried this because there is no mention of a restriction on the processor in the description in the online catalogue, only that the machine should have two USB ports. He suggested I call the Applecare technical helpline, which I did, but the engineer there wasn't sure if the battery would be compatible either, which I find surprising since they must service and repair these machines all the time. He said it might work but there was no guarantee and the increased capacity of the newer G4 battery might damage my power adaptor, which I also find surprising. He said my machine was now too old to get a new battery. I have also looked at ifixit.com in my search for answers, which seems to suggest that the 12" iBook G3 and G4 batteries are interchangeable provided you don't mind having the wrong colour rubber foot on that corner of the laptop.
If there is anyone from Apple who monitors these posts I would be grateful if you could give me the definitive answer about the compatibility of the iBook Extra Battery available from the Apple online store before I order one, as it would be a rather expensive mistake to make if won't work or if there is a risk it would damage my machine.
Many thanks
Peter

The iBook G4's battery is absolutely fine in the iBook G3 (Dual USB). In addition to the rubber foot being a different color, the battery casing is a bit different finish, too, but it will work absolutely fine.
http://eshop.macsales.com/shop/powerbook/battery/ibook-g3-g4-12inch/

IBook G4 won't boot / patchy behaviour

I'd like some input on debugging a friend's iBook G4.
System specs: White 12" 1.3GHz, 512MB RAM (wired), airport card, stock tiger, no other peripherals.
Only extra drivers I could see installed were for an MS Bluetooth keyboard/mouse. No uninstaller apparent, and can't see specific drivers for these devices in relevant system folders.
System was booting to kernel panic screen, and with an urgent paid writing assignment she brought it to me for assistance. Occasionally (after power off?) the system would boot and run for a few minutes before kernel panic.
Response to special key combos is patchy at boot time. It's hard to get the system to boot into any special mode, seems like the keyboard only responds sometimes.
When I can get it to boot, safe mode runs consistently, while normal (unsafe?) mode kernel panics quickly.
We tested the disk for errors while booted off the 10.4 install CD. No issues.
We ran an archive+install but this behaved exactly as before. (Repeated to confirm. Same results.)
I did notice that plugging a USB mouse before boot would prevent the system from booting. Plugging the mouse in during or after boot produced two results; either a working mouse, or a non-working mouse.
Trackpad works intermittently. She reported that she had cleaned the trackpad (not sure if this was very recent).
My suspicion is that something has caused an issue in a USB device, possibly the trackpad, and that the kernel panics if the USB drivers are fully loaded (would explain it working better in safe mode) but isn't sensitive to the same odd behaviour when basic drivers only are loaded.
This is pretty much a best guess, based on me having tried to isolate the issue at various other points and failed to find anything else specific to work with.
We disconnected the trackpad connector, but this didn't improve the situation; still frozen if USB device connected at boot, and still boots to kernel panic otherwise.
Are there some specific drivers I could disable to test this theory? I don't expect this to help much, however, as driver issues are not indicated by the usb mouse freezing system at boot time.
She would be very pleased to have the machine working again. Any suggestions or input will be much appreciated!
Thanks

Our iBook G4 started having kernel panics about 2 weeks ago. It would panic at start up or after a few minutes of running, similar to your story. To cut to the chase I did the standard routine for a kernel panic down to archiving and installing with no luck (http://www.thexlab.com/faqs/kernelpanics.html ). When I checked the panic log after all this it seemed to indicate a problem with the airport. I managed to get it to boot and turned the airport off and the problem went away.
I took it in to get checked today thinking the Airport would be an easy fix. They ran a diagnostic DVD and told me the problem was with the CPU and was not fixable without replacing the whole board.
I did some looking today and this seems to be a common problem with this model. The best summary of the various threads is at http://www.appledefects.com/wiki/index.php?title=IBookG41.33GHz . The only solution I could find seems to be in French and has a scary photo of a flaming computer at the end! http://www.applintosh.net/readarticle.php?article_id=1
I got back to the store about this particular fault and if it applied to my ibook and they kindly replied
"Yes I am aware of people having problems with this, I pulled the top case of the machine off and disconnected all the peripherals as part of our process of elimination, it still only booted to a black screen when trying to boot our diagnostic hard drive(this was with the airport/Bluetooth card Disconnected) I then connected the optical drive up and booted our diagnostics disc up, it still failed the CPU test.
From having the diagnostic test fail and the fact that it would not even turn on when every peripheral was disconnected leaves me with a 100% guarantee that it can only be the main logic board.
19 out of the last 22 of the iBooks that I have seen that have had kernal panic issues and then we have found it to be a conflict with the airport card have all had faulty logic boards, we have tried new airport cards many of times with no luck. 1 was a faulty airport card but it was faulty from day one of purchase and the other 2 were because they had liquid spilt on the keyboard and it leaks down right on top of the airport card."
So I dont know if the problem is in the airport itself or the logic board but it would seem that in this model they are one and the same. More depressing news was to follow - logic boards cost $1600 NZ so it would seem a new computer is the more sensible option. Bit disappointing after just 2 and a bit years use.
The iBook itself works fine when the airport is off, even with an ethernet cable connected to enable internet access. Dont feel that happy though doing anything important with a computer with a faulty logic board though no matter how well backed up..
Hope this helps a fellow Kiwi. If you find anything useful out let me know. FYI the local stores I tried were Ubertech and Magnum Mac.

IBook G3 won't boot hard drive

Hello guys.
Recently I got a whole slew of iBook G3s, broken and new, which I will eventually fix and sell (probably keep one) but I am still in the process of fixing them and have a few questions.
I have this hard drive that I'm almost certain works (I can install tiger on it without it crashing) but it refuses to boot to tiger. I know it's not the iBook itself because I have a different hard drive that boots great, even in other iBooks too. I'm figuring the mbr config is jacked up, and ive already tried option apple pr and reset nv ram, reset defaults, and so forth in the firmware. How do I make this darn thing boot? And yes, I have tried to boot directly from the cd, but when it restarts it just sits there with the two faced mac face and the blinking question mark. I bet I'm going to have to do some magic in the OF, but I don't know what to type, so yeah...
Thanks.

But you said:
+I'm trying to boot from the OS X Tiger CD, and I know there's nothing wrong with it because I've done a full install on another hard drive and it was fine.+
Are you saying it did boot off the CD and install, but now it won't boot off the CD?
By the way, Tiger normally comes on a DVD. There are a few copies on CD out there, but they are relatively rare. Is your copy of Tiger on CD or DVD? Have you used a retail copy of Tiger for the installation? If you used an Tiger install disc from another Mac, that may not work on the iBook.

Dual 1.25 G4 won't boot OS X anymore, boots linux and hardware test

Dual 1.25 MDD G4 that I've had for 5 years. 1.25 G RAM, 300 Gb HD.
No hardware changes to this machine for several years. Recently it locked up
and I rebooted it - I get a light gray screen with an Apple logo and nothing else
happens.
I cannot boot OS X from CD/DVD, but I can boot the hardware test and run all the tests (all of them pass). I can also boot from a Linux CD.
I've tried various startup key combinations (cmd-opt-P-R, cmd-opt-N-V, etc.) but
I still cannot boot into OS X from either CD/DVD or from the HD.
I tried Techtool deluxe (from old Applecare) and that won't boot the machine since it too is OS X.
Any ideas on what to try next?
Thanks,
-Mark

Dual 1.25 MDD G4 that I've had for 5 years. 1.25 G RAM, 300 Gb HD.
No hardware changes to this machine for several years. Recently it locked up
and I rebooted it - I get a light gray screen with an Apple logo and nothing else
happens.
I cannot boot OS X from CD/DVD, but I can boot the hardware test and run all the tests (all of them pass). I can also boot from a Linux CD.
I've tried various startup key combinations (cmd-opt-P-R, cmd-opt-N-V, etc.) but
I still cannot boot into OS X from either CD/DVD or from the HD.
I tried Techtool deluxe (from old Applecare) and that won't boot the machine since it too is OS X.
Any ideas on what to try next?
Thanks,
-Mark

IBook G4 Won't Boot - 'Disk Utility' sees no drive?

Hi everyone,
Over the past week, I've started to see my old iBook G4 (Late 2004 Model) acting odd. It started with a sort of generic "Mac OS X has encountered an error and must restart" type of message.
Now it won't boot. It gets to the Apple logo screen with the progress indicator, but never gets past that.
I put the Tiger disc in and rebooted, while holding down "C" -- and once I boot from the DVD, I'm getting varied results.
The first time it booted, it showed the HDD fine, but when I verified the disk, it mentioned that the disk needed to be fixed.
So I clicked "Repair Disk" and it went through a lot of HDD noises and such, then shut down.
When I restarted it, I can no longer see the HDD when I boot from the DVD. Yikes!
Any other steps I can take?

Hi Jason,
"The first time it booted, it showed the HDD fine, but when I verified the disk, it mentioned that the disk needed to be fixed. So I clicked "Repair Disk" and it went through a lot of HDD noises and such, then shut down." When I restarted it, I can no longer see the HDD when I boot from the DVD. Yikes!
Sorry to say this but it sound like hard drive failure. You could get DiskWarrior http://www.alsoft.com/DiskWarrior/index.html It can repair the directory, but it can't repair hard drive failure itself.
Another suggestion is to take it in to a nearby Apple Store or Apple reseller:
http://www.apple.com/buy/locator/
You can even make a reservation at a Genius Bar ahead of time...
http://www.apple.com/retail/geniusbar/
Carolyn

Ibook g4 won't boot, but hard drive seems fine

I have a ibook g4,800mhz. osx 10.4.8
On start up i get the folder & question mark. I have tried the following.
1) i booted with an os install disk. disk utilities reported the drive was ok it but couldn't see a disk partition so disk first aid had nothing to do.
2) next i ran disk warrior which had the same probably, it could see the hard drive, reported that the drive was functioning, but saw no partition.
3) finally i gave up and reformatted the disk, and re installed an os. this worked for 48 hours at which time the problem came back.
4) i can put the laptop in firewire mode connect it to a desktop and access the hard drive. I can format the disk using apple disk tools, i can install an new os, but after all this it still won't boot from the internal hd.
5) I reset the pram. also tried starting up with the option key down .. no hard drive is visible when i do this.
So the hard drive seems to work ok. Two different disk utilities see the hard drive and think its functioning ok. OSx installer runs without complaint, but the &$%! won't boot from the hd.
Anybody got any suggestions?

...this worked for 48 hours at which time the problem came back...
This is the time period that I was commenting on. If something was used during that time that corrupted the OS, it would cause the situation you are in.
If everything is perfect with the OS then something is wrong with the hard drive or the motherboard's interface to the hard drive.

Restoring dual usb iBook (summer 2001), can't connect to internet

Hello, I am trying to restore my ibook using the restore discs. It is a dual usb g3 ibook, and the restore cds will be putting 9.0 and 10.0.3. Ideally, I'd like 9.2.2 and 10.4.8. Anyway, I successfully restore the software, and everything works until I try to connect to the internet. I use comcast highspeed, and am connecting to a wireless network. The TCP/IP is set for 'airport wireless' and the setup assistants work without a problem. However, when it tries to access a webpage, I get the following error message: "The attempt to load (website) failed." Any advice or suggestions? The airport connects and I have full strength signal. Thanks for any suggestions!
G3 iBook, dual usb (2001) Mac OS 9.0.x

Hey Tom, thanks for the suggestion. The modem is in a roommate's room, but he's already alseep. I will give it a go in the morning. My iMac has no trouble connecting, and between 3 roommates there's a g4ibook, a dell, a psp, and a homemade desktop that all connect without any problems. Here's hoping a reset will do the trick. Fingers crossed

Dual USB iBook G3 won't boot

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