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Major problem with one of my iMac's [SOLVED]


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Today I was working on what I considered a stable machine.

 

I spent hours troubleshooting and did a lot of Google searches and have not found a solution So I turned to you guys because even though I have a lot of knowledge about Macs I know that some of you have much more.

 

iMac 2.66 Ghz 2009 running OS 10.6.8

 

Was on Safari and clicked the Mail window to change to Mail and the screen locked up. Beach ball, Safari still showed in the upper left corner even though I had my Mail main window on top. No top menus responed. Tried to Force Quit with no response from FQ so I shut down by holding the power switch. When I tried to restart I got the Apple logo on the gray screen and the gear but eventually the screen just went blank gray. Tried shutting down and restarting again several times with similar result although sometimes the screen would be black.

 

Next try, long gear time then the screen would go black and then automatically restart over and over again.

 

Next try, perpetual gear on the gray screen.

 

Next try, start up chime then blank gray screen.

 

Then I got the folder with a ? on it on the gray screen.

 

By the way, I tried to reset PRAM early in the process which would not work.

 

So I ran Disc Utility off of my original disk (I believe it was a 10.5.? disc) and both Verify Disk and Repair Disk failed.

 

Message from DU:

Invalid key lenth

Checking catalog file:

Invalid node structure X3

Volume check failed.

 

Ran it again and it said:

Checking Catalog file:

Invalid sibling link

Rebuilding catalog B-tree:

Invalid node structure (over and over again)

The volume HD could not be repaired.

Error: File system verify or repair failed.

 

I appreciate any help.

Thanks!

Edited by Blue Monkey
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That sound like a classic hard drive meltdown.Try repairing the hard drive with DiskWarrior. On OSX 10.6.8 DiskWarrior usually does a mighty fine job in bringing crashed hard drives back to life. Just have an external drive ready to salvage your existing files when the faulty drive has been restored.
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That sound like a classic hard drive meltdown.Try repairing the hard drive with DiskWarrior. On OSX 10.6.8 DiskWarrior usually does a mighty fine job in bringing crashed hard drives back to life. Just have an external drive ready to salvage your existing files when the faulty drive has been restored.

 

Thanks for the reply ExNotator.

 

I read about DiskWarrior in some of my Google searches. Wasn't sure if it would work or not so I'll now look into the cost of it.

 

I have a good back-up system in place so that's not a problem. I'm just trying to avoid having to lug my machine to the Apple store, it's a bit of work in NYC..

 

Do you think that the HD crashed on my original shutdown or after multiple shutdowns?

 

Also, do you think it matters that I used Disk Utility from the 10.5 vs. the 10.6 upgrade? And does Disk Utility even come on a Upgrade disk?

 

Thanks again for your reply.

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If you have all the files on a backup drive I would use this opportunity to reformat the crashed drive and do a clean install. A reformat of the hard drive will disable any bad blocks immediately so there is a better chance that your drive will still work trouble free.

 

I always have a complete clone of my hard drive handy that I maintain with SuperDuper!...if you have a clone you can simply boot from it to fix an ailing drive and re-install the entire OSX with one mouse click if necessary. This way you can also use the Disk Utility that is located in your OSX utilities folder of your cloned hard drive since it was updated for your specific OSX.

 

Either way these things happen from time to time and it's never clear what exactly causes it. Sometimes it's an aging hard drive that needs to be replaced.

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Unfortunately on that iMac I don't have a clone. I do a weekly drag and drop backup of just my files on one drive and I also have Time Machine on a second HD. My two Mac Pros have clones of the main drive.

 

I really rather not wipe the drive if I can avoid it because I have an older version of Quark Xpress on it and it is no longer supported by Quark and my access codes have run out. To install that program again I would need to pay Quark for another access code and I've spent over $800 twice purchasing their software and I would rather not be extorted for more money to use a program that I legally purchased.

 

Disk Warrior question:

Can you boot up on the Disk Warrior disk and does it matter what version of OS X you're currently using. If I can boot up on the disk then I'm going to try Disk Warrior first and hope for the best.

 

Thank you very much for taking the time to reply again ExNotator.

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A few years ago Disk Warrior still came on a DVD so you can boot from it to repair a hard drive. Another option is to create a small rescue partition on a USB drive with Disk Warrior (and Disk Utility). OS X 10.6 is definitely supported. At least I was successful a few times with it whenever I had some issues. Good luck!
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I haven't posted back in 5 days since I had a water heater go bad and had to replace that and I only have access to the internet when my wife brings her laptop home from work.

 

Anyway, here's what happened with DiskWarrior. First it did not see my HD so I restarted the computer. Second time around it saw my HD so I ran the program on repair. DW repaired the catalog but indicated that there is a mechanical malfunction in one of the components in the HD or "something it's connected to." DW also indicated that the problem will get worse. I believe that it is the HD. I was able to boot up the machine after running DW but everything is very slow and there are a lot of screen anamolies.

 

I ordered a new 2 TB HD and I have an appointment to drop the iMac off at Apple on Monday to have the HD installed. Hopefully this will solve the problem.

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I took my iMac to Apple yesterday. The "genius" at the Genius Bar ran some tests right there and came to the conclusion that the hard drive was fine. He said he believed it was an OS problem so he suggested that I do a re-install (archive and install) of the OS which I did when I returned home. So far it appears that that fixed the issues I was experiencing.

 

The tech also said that DiskWarrior is good for fixing catalog issues and things like that but that you can't fully trust DW when it diagnoses hardware issues as some times it suggests there is a hardware issue when it can't fix all of the software issues. Still, DW is a handy program to have in my tool box.

 

Thanks again ExNotator for your replies.

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