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Does anyone know what it means when...

T

ThatGirl

macrumors regular
Original poster
Nov 19, 2003
189
0
California
... instead of starting up, my iMac G4 just has a small square in the middle of the screen, with the network symbol in the middle? This happens often. I usually power it all the way down. Sometimes when I start it back up, it is o.k. Other times, instead of starting up, it shows an arrow going in one direction, and another arrow on a circular path. Sometimes it also shows the harddrive icon in the middle of the arrows.

Does anyone know what is going on with my computer?

Thanks!
 
Duff-Man says....when you see the network icon at startup it means the iMac is looking for network to boot up from as it has lost its Startup disk setting. The other screen you see - with the circle, arrow and hard drive icon can be invoked by holding the option key at startup and lets you select which volume to start from (if for instance you had a CD in the drive and it had a bootable system, it would show on that screen as well). It sounds like you have lost your startup disk setting - go into your system prefs app and reselect your local startup disc...normally that will fix the problem. If it doesn't and you find the problem returns after you've done a complete power off, then it is possible the battery inside the iMac needs replacing.....oh yeah!
 
ThatGirl said:
... instead of starting up, my iMac G4 just has a small square in the middle of the screen, with the network symbol in the middle? This happens often. I usually power it all the way down. Sometimes when I start it back up, it is o.k. Other times, instead of starting up, it shows an arrow going in one direction, and another arrow on a circular path. Sometimes it also shows the harddrive icon in the middle of the arrows.

Does anyone know what is going on with my computer?

Thanks!
Click to expand...

Your computer is looking for a Network to startup from.
Go into System Preferences
Click on the Startup Disk icon
Click on your Mac OS X folder
Then click the lock to on the bottom to prevent further changes
 
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