Freeze during start-up following software update.

Question

Hello everyone-
I would be so grateful if anybody can offer any help on this situation.
Software update helpfully popped up today with two suggested updates;
1) An itunes update to allow to use the new apple tv etc ?which version
2) An OS update, which had something to do with powerpc in the title, and i assume is 10.4.11
I ran these, and the itunes one seemed to go okay (at least the green tick box appeared in software update.)
Subsequently, though, I opened itunes (or tried to) and got a message that said itunes needed at least os10.4.9 to now work.
I tried to open 'About this mac' to find out which version I was upgrading from, and insted received the 'select user' login screen.
Thinking I had perhaps accidentally selected 'logout user' I went back in and the same thing occurred.
The computer then crashed - went to blue screen and became unresponsive.
I restarted, and now what happens is I get the grey screen with the apple, then the blue screen with the box saying 'Mac OS X' and the apple and the bar that should go blue, but it seems to freeze on this screen (with bar not even beginning to turn blue) and the spinning rainbow umbrella. This has been like this for about an hour now, so I don't think anything is happening.
(I've also tried to boot into safe mood - by holding down shift - to no avail.)
Reading through the posts, it seems problems after software update aren't too uncommon, but I'm a little unsure of how best to proceed as I don't have the start up disks for this computer and it - as ever - contains a lot of valuable information to me.
Questions, then:
1) How best to attempt to recover the data from the broken powerbook? I have a macbook pro at home with enough disk space to back up everything on here, but what is the best way to do this? I don't want to use this information whilst on the macbook pro as such, just put it there (via firewire target mode) whilst I hopefully fix the powerbook. is there an automated way to do this?
2)I do have the install disks from the macbook pro here, which are 10.4.9. Can I try to sue these on the powerbook, or would that be a bad idea as the hardware is different?
3)Any other suggestiosn/things to try with the powerbook?
Thank you so very much for any help you can give!
All best wishes,
Simon

Answer 1

Hello-
Sorry this has taken so long.
I managed to transfer all files via firewire target mode, and have now (finally) located the discs that came with the computer.
I have used these to run disk utility and repair disk and permissions? Permissions seemed to fix loads of stuff.
But it still won't start.
Am I right that I now need to do an 'archive and install'. (When i get to the 'select destination disk' screen, the HD has a yellow warning triangle over it, which reminds me that the OS I am installing (10.4.?1) is older than the (non-fucntioning) current one 10.4.11.
(Also, I read elsewhere about simply installing the fixed combo update fropm apple, but I suspect I need to be able to get the machine to boot to do this - can't work out ho0w to do this whilst running install disks, though maybe from a USB memory pen?)
If I do archive and install, what becomes of:
a) Proprietory software which had to be activated online via a code. (I use a programme called 'Final Draft' and it comes with only two logins. I'm pretty sure I used one on an old computer. My question then is if I do archive and install is it likely I will lose the old access? (I suspect so! And wonder if this also goes for Word?)
b) itunes and purchased music (I think I am actually about up to machine number five on some of these songs...)
As ever, thanks so much to anyone for any help you can offer.
Simon