Powerbook powers on, but doesn't boot

I posted this at the end of another thread with the same title and got no response. Someone please help me!
Okay, this same exact thing has just happened to my Power Book G4. I have some important stuff on there and I haven't had the chance to back up my stuff in the last couple of weeks. For those of you who've has this problem repaired, did it wipe out all the stuff on your hard drive? I called apple and they told me to connect it to another apple computer and using target disk mode I should be able to get my stuff off of it, but this did not work. Why would they even tell me to try this? My computer turns on, but doesn't boot up! Is there anyway to save anything on my hard drive? Apple said I could also go to the nearest apple store, but that's like 150 miles away from me. Am I just screwed?

You might try booting from from the Install & Restore disc that came with your machine by:
1. Inserting the disk, 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.
Joe

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