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deep-six

macrumors newbie
Original poster
Jun 17, 2010
10
0
Well, I killed my new (used) mac in record time. Only took me a day.
My new G5 has OSX 10.3.8 loaded, I downloaded a combo update from the mac site (10.3.9) and proceeded to upgrade my OS.
Got an error message toward the end but didn't think too much of it. Soon found problems on my next startup.
Machine will only advance to the startup window displaying the message "Waiting for Printing services" and then drops into the command prompt window.
I ran the disk check utility. it found a problem with orphaned something and said it fixed it, ran disk check two more times to be sure, rebooted but still the same.
Got a copy of 10.5.4 figuring I would just rebuild the OS but the machine refuses to see this on startup even when holding down the "C" key.
Pulled the CD drive out to see if there was anything obvious wrong but nothing apparent, was a little dusty on the outside so I removed the cover and peered inside, gave it a light compressed air clean (from my lungs) and put the cover back on.
Still no boot from CD.
Please give me some pointers if possible!!

Thanks
 

g3powerbook boy

macrumors member
Jan 29, 2010
76
0
ok this shouldnt be too serious to solve. do yo have the original disks for 10.3?

if you do reinstall 10.3 panther and then try to upgrade to 10.5 if you have the retail disks. not sure but i think they should be black and not light grey, light grey is machine specific and wont work unless its from the same machine.

after thats done, you should be good to go.
 

MacHamster68

macrumors 68040
Sep 17, 2009
3,251
5
maybe its only a bad copy of 10.5.4 ...seen that happening before on a regular basis here , seems to be the same bad torrent copy like on the other occasions :(
buy a original retail disk of leopard put it in the drive and
hold down the alt /option key until it shows up
then select to boot from the dvd :)
 

zmttoxics

macrumors 65816
May 20, 2008
1,020
1
maybe its only a bad copy of 10.5.4 ...seen that happening before on a regular basis here , seems to be the same bad torrent copy like on the other occasions :(
buy a original retail disk of leopard put it in the drive and
hold down the alt /option key until it shows up
then select to boot from the dvd :)

Torrents? Grrr. Boo warez.
 

deep-six

macrumors newbie
Original poster
Jun 17, 2010
10
0
Hi Guys

Thanks for the feedback. Unfortunately I didn't get any disks with this machine, I asked the guy who sold it to me but he was in no hurry to help out, he said he loaded an image on the machine which to be fair worked quite well til I stuffed it.
I got a mate to download me a copy of Leopard, it was a torrent and could well be bad.
Been searching for an original disk ever since but people seem to be asking a lot for these, especially compared to snow leopard which I have discovered won't work for me.
I have a bid in for a reasonably priced used copy of leopard, well, not that reasonable but it does come with some other macromedia stuff I need so not too bad in the scheme of things.
I was wondering if the CD drive might be crook but how do you access the cd drive from the command prompt after booting in to single user mode??

Cheers
 

MacHamster68

macrumors 68040
Sep 17, 2009
3,251
5
for the price of leopard , there is a reason for it not to drop in price
1) apple does not sell leopard any more
2) leopard is the last version of OSX that runs on ppc Mac's
so the demand is high
3)snow leopard is only cheap if you have a Mac that has leopard already installed for the earlier intels which came with tiger its even pricier then leopard as they need the box set

btw do not buy the grey osx leopard disc's as they are model specific and only work on the Mac they came with
you need the Black retail disc which should look like that

b98e39fd61d9b37a2307efb2bd287.jpg


here in the uk they cost about £80+ on ebay that is in $ 118 + which i think is reasonable
 

deep-six

macrumors newbie
Original poster
Jun 17, 2010
10
0
Good Point on the OSX version, I just emailed the seller and asked if it was a full retail version (black packaging) or model specific (grey packaging)
He replied "Generic Family Pack"
Not sure what this means, is this OK!!!
 

MacHamster68

macrumors 68040
Sep 17, 2009
3,251
5
yes it will load on your G5 and it will load on 4 other Mac's you will own soon too ;)

dont say wont happen , i did only want one Mac last year when i came from windows and now i got 2 mac mini g4, 3 eMac's , 2 iMac g3 ,a Twentieth anniversary mac , a powermac 5500 and a end is not in sight , its a addiction ...
there should be a warning on every Mac ....:eek:
 
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