Everything keeps quitting...

[LeBeauGarcon]

I have a 15" 3 year old Powerbook that I'm running Leopard on. About a week or so ago I started having problems with my iChat when it randomly started crashing. Then my Yahoo Messenger and Safari started doing the same. I didn't know what to do, but just stuck to using AIM and Firefox instead. And I would occasionally try the other ones... now one of them even finish loading before the program crashes. I deleted iChat off my computer and went to go reinstall it, and the installer quit. Now I'm obviously convinced that my computer has a virus, but I can't download a virus scanner or any sort of antivirus program to help deal with the program because I can't install any programs on my computer. I'm so beyond pissed and frustrated I'm ready to throw the piece through the window.

Is there anything that I can do short of reformatting my entire hard drive?

 

[KingYaba]

Insert your OS X install disk (retail or the gray #1) and reboot your computer holding down the option key. Enter your password if you enabled it and select the disk icon using the arrow keys to boot up from the DVD. Run disk utility. Repair the disk and permissions. It's a long shot but in the end I think you may need to reformat and reinstall.

Back up your important files.