After power outage grey screen then shutdown..

Ouch!

Most likely, you saw a progress bar below the Apple logo - that's normal when the system is trying to self-repair a problem.

The issue you have won't be solved by a network server (of course, now that I've made this bold statement, someone will be happy to prove me wrong) - As I understand it, the Mac firmware is searching the local environment (internal drives, plus USB and Firewire ports) for a bootable drive - network volumes won't be detected as bootable drives. Apple eliminated the need for a bootable recovery disk in later versions of OS X, but the newer OS would have to have been installed prior to the disk failure (Editorial: often, the less-heralded features of an OS upgrade can be the most valuable).

You may need to buy all three - the Snow Leopard disk (available for around $20 US from Apple), a DVD drive to read it, and a replacement hard drive. You may be able to borrow two out of three; or someone may have a recovery thumb drive that you can boot from in lieu of disks... And once you can get the machine booted, you'll learn if you need that HDD. (Don't assume that a clean install of the OS will be the next step, there are several other possibilities.)

Is it the drive that came in that 2007-vintage machine? A failure wouldn't be a huge surprise after 6-7 years. The noises you heard could have been indicative of a failing drive, or a failing fan - electromechanical spinning devices have certain failure modes in common. However, your current problem is pretty good circumstantial evidence that the HDD was the noise-maker.

Whether the disk can be recovered/how much can be recovered would be unknowable at this time. You can't attempt a disk repair while booted from the same volume that requires repair (that's why you need that OS X disk). Since it was a power failure-related crash, you may escape unscathed - see this Apple article: http://support.apple.com/kb/HT2711

If the OS X Disk Utility can't resolve it, there are 3rd-party utilities you can get to help with data recovery, and shops will attempt to recover the data for you (using many of the same utilities, plus the expertise that comes with experience). The nature of the failure determines the likelihood of data recovery.

lovehaight77 said:

Thanks for responding. Yes it is the original hd. I dont know anyone with a mac in my area (east London). I'm already feeling lost without my computer! Should I just bite the bullet and go ahead and buy all three? actually my friend has a extra SATA drive, which does fit. I suppose I could take my old hd to a shop and see if its usable/or can anything be salvaged, and since I need a DVD drive already I'll pick up one on ebay.One question, my friend a computer with two hard drives, one windows one Linux, is there any to salvage anything from my HD using these? If anyone has any more suggestions I'd love to hear them. Thanks

Click to expand...

If I were you I would not remove the disk drive until first diagnosing the problem.

It sounds like you will need a snow leopard disk and a DVD drive anyway, so go ahead an purchase those.

In the meantime, the fastest way to diagnose will be to get it in the room with a mac that supports firewire. You can then boot your system in target disk mode and connect the other mac to it via firewire. In target disk mode your system will appear as an external firewire drive enclosure.

If the other computer is running snow leopard you use its disk utility to scan for errors, attempt repair disk, and clone the drive, etc.

I'm south of the river close to the London - Brighton main line and about 20 mins on a fast train from London Bridge. I may be able to assist with certain things, send me a pm with your email and phone number and I'll get back to you fella.

lovehaight77 said:

thanks a lot! two more questions, can i hook a dvd reader from a windows to my mac pro for reinstalling snow leopard? if not, would a external drive do the job? Also, I don't have a mac keyboard, will it let me use my pc keyboard for install? again, thanks

Click to expand...

Either should work fine.

The internal DVD drive is a standard unit which takes a molex plug for power and a parallel ATA data connector. Just take out the old one. Set the jumper pins to cable select, and it should work just fine.

Most external USB2 should work as well. Do not try the Apple USB superdrive, as you need to tweak a boot flag to get some systems to use it.

I think a PC keyboard should be fine, though I have not tried one myself since the NeXTStep/OPENSTEP days. I don't remember how the Windows and alt keys map to command and alt though, so play around with it.

I have all that info, edit your message and remove all your personal info. Will drop you a text or email tomorrow.

lovehaight77 said:

thank you, i will try soon as the discs arrive!

----------

Hi Gav Mac, i don't know how to send a private message, its confusing. my number is 0203 731 1344. email holtansa@hotmail.com. Hopefully the snow leopard will arrive tomorrow and the above solutions will work, but I would love your advice if im having problems! Cheers

Click to expand...

After the discs arrive can you not then boot into disk utility and try and make a disc image of your current drive? I would try this before reformatting the drive so you can possibly salvage some of your data.

This doesn't sound like a dead hard drive to me...

If the hard drive were dead, the computer would hang out forever waiting for a boot disk. You'd have to turn the computer off by hand.

If the computer is turning off by itself, that indicates a deeper fault in the computer hardware.

There are some indications online this can be related to a damaged power supply, which would make sense if this were due to a power outage. Was the computer on a surge protector?

lovehaight77 said:

No, there was no surge protector. my neighbor has had a problem with surges killing his hd. anyway, im waiting for a new copy of Snow Lep, i have another hd, fingers are crossed..

Click to expand...

It's not for sure, but my guess would be that your power supply was damaged. Again, this behavior isn't typical for hard drive damage. If you didn't have a surge protector, there is a good chance there was a power surge and it damaged your machine.

lovehaight77 said:

So snow leopard came, and I put a dvd drive,how can i select boot order using a windows keyboard ? as it stands i keep getting message 'error with OS'. thanks again!

Click to expand...

The only big difference with a PC vs. Apple keyboard, is that they have Windows keys instead of Command, and the location of the Alt/Option key differs. Aside from that, media keys may or may not work, but is irrelevant to getting your system repaired.

Try holding down a key when powering on to select a different boot location.

Holding down 'c' during the initial boot phase should select the CD/DVD drive.
Holding down the left 'Alt' key should display a graphical boot device menu. (n.b. I just realized that I have never tried booting with the right alt key, and don't know if it matters.)