Classic Will Not Boot

Mac G 4, OS 10.4.11, 1.25g, MDD - my Mac used to start up on OS 9.2.2, but for some reason will now only give me a gray screen with a blinking (?) inside a floppy icon.

I reinstalled OS 9.2.2 from a disc and still get a blinking floppy.

The only modification I have made since the last time I used the Classic environment was a new 160G hard drive.

The start up discs are correctly listed in System preferences>startup disc, but no matter what I do the Classic system refuses to launch. I can hear the drive spinning up and backing off as it tries to launch.

Apple tech support discussions are woefully absent any information on this issue.

Anybody got any ideas?

Recently ran into this issue - seems you will need erase the drive and include the OS 9 drivers to boot of classic.

Here is a pic of disk Utility - sorry about quality as it is a pic of a pic etc;


Click for full size

If that does not work you may need to "bless" the OS 9 system folder. This article explains that and a few other Classic-related error messages. Mac OS X: Classic doesn't start, Mac OS 9 not installed or recognized

I did the "bless" thing, which had no effect.

I used my "Power Mac G 4 software install and restore" to erase and install OS X, again. I also included OS 9. OS 9 now launches.

On the way to erasing and re-installing I copied my User folder to my back up drive on the same computer. It also a folder of 20 movies. Somehow that drive was also erased and a complete OS X and OS 9 (w/o OS9 drivers) was installed. The only important thing was the movie folder.

Anybody have an idea of how to get back my movies?