Repeating Panic Kernels/won't boot

I keep getting the panic kernel that says to restart, it wont' do anything else. I held shift down and it won't boot in safe mode.

I ran a hardware test and got the following error:
4HDD/11/40000004: SATA(0,0)

I'm assuming this means the hard drive has gone bad, is this correct? If so is there any benefit taking the thing to the apple store or should I just buy a replacement hard drive and use the disc that came with my mac (would this even fix the problem)?

I have an '07 Macbook (black model) running Leopard. Any help would be greatly appreciated.

 

Anyone?

 

I have a backup from a couple of months ago, probably has 90-95% of my pictures and all of my music. that's really all I care about.

Is the disk utility an option when I put the actual cd in the drive? I need to find my box/startup disc that it came with.

 

I called the apple store. they said it could be the hard drive, a serial connection, or something with the motherboard. Does that sound right? Maybe I should just take it to the store, have them diagnose it (which is free, right?), then do the work myself if it's just a hard drive issue?

My power cable is once again messing up as well. I had to have the part that connects to the mac itself from the brick replaced a year ago because it stopped charging and would get really hot. the new one is doing that again. Do you think these things are related perhaps?

One last thing. if it's the hard drive, does any 2.5" SATA drive work. Basically anything from this list is OK? Most say 3 gb/s Sata 2.5". Do those work?

http://www.newegg.com/Store/SubCategory.aspx?SubCategory=380&name=Laptop-Hard-Drives




One more thing. I think I have a DVD in the drive. I didn't have time to try to eject it last night. Will I be able to get the DVD out of the drive in order to put my Mac OS X cd without being able to boot up because currently it won't boot.

Thanks again!

 

Anybody have any thoughts?

 

Didn't work. Any other options?

 

If anyone has any solution I would be greatly appreciative.

 

Well I took the entire thing apart to manually get disc out only to find out...wait for it...there was no disc in it to begin with. Good waste of two hours. Hopefully didn't break the optical drive in the process.

Now I'm back to how do I know if the hard drives I linked above will fit?

Also it's looking like I may not have my copy of leopard anymore as it may have gotten lost when I moved. Not having a ton of luck. How do I get a replacement. Will apple just send one for free or do I have to buy a full version?

 

BUMP, anyone? Am I in the wrong section?

 

Before I read this I bought one from amazon that should work. My hard drive was only 160gb and it needed to be replaced either way. I guess here's hoping that the hard drive was the only issue. I also think I have most of the stuff that matters backed up on my external. I'll lose some stuff like school papers (from college) and some photos (hopefully still on memory card) but other than that I have most of the stuff.

If I go buy snow leopard and I try it while the old (broken) HDD is still in the machine, should it still install?

 

Bought a new HDD and bought a snow leopard disc. Installed hard drive but when I try to start the machine it just shows an apple logo and loading icon going in a circle but nothing ever happens. I held the option key down and it recognizes the disc I have in it but won't install. Any ideas what to do now?

 

It just turns on and goes to a gray screen, then has an apple logo start and a progress circle thing and that's all it does. Is something else wrong with machine? I'm starting to think now that I should have just paid apple the 300 or whatever to send away and fix.

 

Anybody have any thoughts on what I should do next? Really could use help.

 

It's a brand new disc bought from apple. I'll try the c command v thing tonight.

How do you make th backup you are talking about to a flash drive.