IMac Disk Utility Prob/Reinstalling OSX?

Hi guys,
I would have been most grateful to you if you could give me some tips on the following situation.
I have got some sort of a bug in my iMac G5 Ambient Light Sensor: it turned off 2 times, and the Disk Utility said I had to repair the volume, well, the usual stuff, you know: 'The underlying task reported failure...' and blablabla... I have tried to startup from the OSX DVD from my MacBook, since it was the closest version to what I have on the iMac [10.4.8], but it gave me the Kernel Panic and asked to restart. Now I am thinking of reinstalling the whole system, since what I've got on my iMac isn't that vitally important and I can backup some files on my Book, but I would like to know what you could advise me. Maybe there's some way round? Is it normal to reinstall the OSX from my MacBook DVD? Will it be fine? The problem is that I don't have an original CD that came with the iMac. :-/
I can also try to startup from another person's MacBookPro and try to fix the problem with the Disk Utility, but perhaps it won't work? Can it be that I'll have more bugs in the future? Probably it's better to reinstall and all the bugs will be erased? Anyone had anything of a kind?
Oh, yes, and I would like to know if the Archieve option in the OSX Install does actually save the programs the way they are, and if they'd need any kind of installation afterwards, after the OSX installation.
Thanx for any possible assistance!
MacBook Mac OS X (10.4.8)

Welcome to Discussions - no, you cannot start up from your MacBook install disc, it has a totally different structure. You need an install disc for the G5 ambient light, Apple will sell you one, or perhaps you can find it on eBay, but it must be for the ambient light, and no other model.
You can start in target disk mode using your MacBook.
If you do an archive and install, and check "preserve user settings and preferences, all your apps and settings (well, most of them) will be saved, here are the instructions.
Pplease let us know how you make out,
Miriam

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I just restarted my mac then suddenly when it boots,disk utility came and says different option like repair disk, get help, reinstall OSX and I tried to click disk repair but it says that I am um able to repair the disk

i just restarted my mac then suddenly when it boots,disk utility came and says different option like repair disk, get help, reinstall OSX and I tried to click disk repair but it says that I am um able to repair the disk

It sounds like your hard drive either has a software problem that Disk Utility cannot fix or that the HD has failed (mechanically).
Your Mac may have booted either to your recovery partition or to internet recovery in an attempt to repair the drive- I can't tell from your post.
I'll assume that it was the recovery partition.
Try to boot into internet recovery (hold down option command R at restart), and see if you can repair your HD with Disk Utility. You should also repair permissions while you're there.
If that doesn't work, try to boot into single user mode (restart, hold down ⌘S until you see a black screen with white text) and repair your hard drive. Here's a reference with directions: Repair Your Hard Disk in Single User Mode | Everything Macintosh
If that doesn't work you have a few options:
If your mac originally came with installation disks, you can try to boot from the installation disk and then see if you can repair the HD.
There is a small chance that Techtool Pro 7 will be able to repair your HD if Disk Utility can't.
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Apr 7, 2013 7:42 AM (in response to daiktsu)
@daiktsu: I wonder why these two are helping you at all.
@sls and Radiation: I admire your patience with this troll.
Unreal ! hahaha , congrats to all 3 - Lex, SSLS and Radiation for taking the HIGH road . Now that is CON"TROL" !

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hi, i have tryed to install os x leopard, (its a old imac) , disk utility is greyed out , my install dvd cant find any hdd to install on , my only way to format and configure is through terminal but dont know what commands to execute...
i tryed diffrent commands such as diskutil eraseDisk JHFS+ Disk1
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when i click the apple in the top left corner the whole menu is greyed out... what to do ? help me please
Sincerly AppleNoob92
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Your HD may be crashed, so you probably should use the oringinal install discs to run Apple Hardware Test in extended mode. If error codes appear this confirms a hardware failure. In addition you cannnot repair the HD using Disk Utility from the startup disk, you have to use the origninal Install discs that shipped with the computer or the most up-to-date version of OS X on a disc that you have.

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So a couple of days ago I tried to bootcamp my mac to install windows 7 while half way through the power went out...
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Welcome to Apple Support Communities
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http://appleusergroups.com/locator/find/locate.cgi?country=17
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I see. Thanks for the info. Sounds like I may have already tried what you suggested, as I mentioned in my original post that, "I've restarted the computer multiple times and also tried from another account and still the same problems."
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Message was edited by: barbara1234567

Still, she should be able to boot from the disks that shipped with the Mac?
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Did you partition the drive?
Extended Hard Drive Preparation
1. Open Disk Utility in your Utilities folder. If you need to reformat your startup volume, then you must 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 or Leopard.)
2. After DU loads select your hard drive (this is the entry with the mfgr.'s ID and size) from the left side list. Note the SMART status of the drive in DU's status area. If it does not say "Verified" then the drive is failing or has failed and will need replacing. SMART info will not be reported on external drives. Otherwise, click on the Partition tab in the DU main window.
3. Click on the Options button, set the partition scheme to GUID (only required for Intel Macs) then click on the OK button. Set the number of partitions from the dropdown menu (use 1 partition unless you wish to make more.) Set the format type to Mac OS Extended (Journaled.) Click on the Partition button and wait until the volume(s) mount on the Desktop.
4. Select the volume you just created (this is the sub-entry under the drive entry) from the left side list. Click on the Erase tab in the DU main window.
5. Set the format type to Mac OS Extended (Journaled.) Click on the Options button, check the button for Zero Data and click on OK to return to the Erase window.
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Ouch! What a mess!
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