Macbook won't boot

[orlandosanz]

Specs:
-Macbook [black]
-2.0 GHz
-1 Gb RAM

Problem:
I am having trouble with my mac it won't boot all the way.
It get to the blue screen, right after the Apple logo
Sometime in the blue screen I get the reset message, if I reboot the message comes back up but this time dimmer barely visible, if i reboot again the reset message is not there.

Cause:
I blame it on the driver I installed right before I rebooted.
I did an update of the driver
ScreenRecycler

I tried repair permissions and repair disk, this is my first Mac so I don't know how to troubleshoot the problem, please help.

 

[Gee]

Do you have another Mac you can use? Because you could try to connect to the broken one via target disk mode and remove the offending files you installed (possibly).

Otherwise, there's always the drastic complete reinstall.

Anyone esle have a good idea?

 

[orlandosanz]

I don't have a firewire drive or another Mac to use Target Disk Mode.

If reinstalling OSX is my only option please help with this other question.
I have a file [family tree] that I would like to retrieve, how can I do this. The HDD is still good because I has able to load Ubuntu 7.04 Live and browse the drive. But I can't get to the file because I am not the owner while in Ubuntu. Could I move the file to root in command prompt mode and change the owner so I can copy it to a flash drive back in Ubuntu.

Or is there a Live Linux distro that would ignore owner bits.

I can boot into command prompt mode, I tried, but I don't know any commands, besides ls and cd.

 

[lamina]

Have you tried booting from your restore disks?

You can do an archive and install restore from there. Your files will remain intact, and it will just re-install the OS, and likely write over the driver you installed.

Just a thought, but when you boot to the linux cd, are you able to mount USB devices? If so, you could just plug in a flash drive and copy the family tree file over to it.

 

[orlandosanz]

I didn't know that I was able to just re-install to OS without affecting the rest of the drive. How safe is it to do it this way? Has any done this?

Ubuntu live does allow me to mount an USB drive.
"If so, you could just plug in a flash drive and copy the family tree file over to it."
-Ubuntu tells me that I don't have permission to access the folder where the file is stored in.

OSX-HD/Users/[name]/Documents/

"The folder contents could not be displayed.
You do not have the permissions necessary to
view the contents of "Documents". "

 

[lamina]

I didn't know that I was able to just re-install to OS without affecting the rest of the drive. How safe is it to do it this way? Has any done this?

Ubuntu live does allow me to mount an USB drive.
"If so, you could just plug in a flash drive and copy the family tree file over to it."
-Ubuntu tells me that I don't have permission to access the folder where the file is stored in.

OSX-HD/Users/[name]/Documents/

"The folder contents could not be displayed.
You do not have the permissions necessary to
view the contents of "Documents". "

I can say with confidence that you won't lose your family tree file. The file is stored in your home folder, which isn't touched during an archive and install.

 

[orlandosanz]

I did what you suggested early today and it worked like a charm, I lost nothing. All of the my programs are still there with there preferences. I had to reinstall Parallels though.

I did make multiple backups of the family tree, all on different flash drives.

Thanks for the help.