02-24-2006, 08:10 PM

Hello,

my wonderful Powerbook, which I've had since September, and has never crashed before, has crashed THREE times this evening.

First & second times it came up with the dark grey box saying I must restart the compter by holding down the power button.

Third time it just did an old-school crash by freezing (even the cursor wouldn't move) so I had to restart.

I love my mac so much and just want it to be OK neye:

Please help.

Anna x

PS Have tried Disk Utility (between 2 & 3rd crash but didn't seem to help.)

02-24-2006, 08:19 PM

did you install any new ram recently.. the first 2 times is what we call a kernal panic, the most comon reason for one of these is bad ram.

02-24-2006, 08:24 PM

No. No new ram, nothing done to alter the system in any way that I can think of. Have been racking my brains

Thank you for your relpy though

Anna xx

02-24-2006, 08:47 PM

1. Back up your important data ASAP. If you can, use flash drives or an external hard drive--your computer may continue to crash if you attempt to burn CD's.
2. Download Applejack immediately. Applejack is a repair utility that can operate in single-user mode even if you can't boot Mac OS X--if you can keep the computer on long enough for Command-S, you can get to Applejack. http://www.versiontracker.com/dyn/moreinfo/macosx/19596
3. Run Applejack to see if it can fix the problem. This is unlikely but possible.
4. Be prepared for logic board failure or hard drive failure. It sounds like you're on your way there, unfortunately. Since you're in the one year warranty period, Apple will fix that sort of damage for free, but it'll take up to two weeks for them to ship your Powerbook out and get it back to you.

02-25-2006, 10:16 AM

Originally Posted by jn4jenny

but it'll take up to two weeks for them to ship your Powerbook out and get it back to you.

I've sent my powerbook in twice, once for display and top and bottom case replacement, and another for another display replacement under applecare. Each time it only took 2 days to send it out fix it and ship it back. Gotta love applecare

02-26-2006, 05:53 PM

Thanks for the warning!

Going to buy myself a firewire drive tomorrow furst thing and back everything up.

Really appreciate this notice or I'd probably have lost everything!

Anna x

03-01-2006, 01:13 PM

Also, occasionally the screen is blacking out and won't come back on until it restarts and also when it does restart it shows the question mark file thing, is it all related?

03-02-2006, 12:40 AM

May be a display related problem, my mate's ibook screen went white for a while for no reason. Sent it in for repair, it all works now.

03-02-2006, 03:32 PM

Thanks