I can't get past the Gray apple screen during start-up Help!!!

I went to open my system pref. folder and when it wouldnt open I restarted it and now I can't get past the first screen of the Gray screen with the apple in the middle and the little spinning circle under it. Can anyone help me? have had several problems with this computer!!! I just had to have a whole new harddrive put in about a month ago.
powerbook g4 15 inch   Mac OS X (10.4.8)  

Welcome to the Discussions!
The first thing to do would be to boot from your original Disk 1 by:
1. Inserting the disc, pressing the power button, and immediately after the startup chime, press and hold the C key until you see the spinning gear icon appear on the grey splash screen.
2. After the machine has booted, pick your language, and when the Installer window appears, do not press Continue, but go to the Utilities menu in the menubar and open Disk Utility.
3. In Disk Utility, choose your normal startup volume in the pane on the left and then click Repair Disk. If any errors show in the window, run Repair Disk again until you see 'The volume appears to be OK' in green.
4. Quit Disk Utility, quit the installer and attempt to restart into your regular startup volume.
Please update your profile so we have a clearer picture of your particular machine.
Joe
<img src="http://homepage.mac.com/joeuu/.Pictures/groundzero5.jpg"width="20"

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