G4 start up problems

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Hi
I have a G4 power pc dual 867 that has been fine for several years.
Recently I've had trouble booting up. I have bought and installed a new battery
but still have problems. I have a partitioned drive running OS 9 on one side and Tiger on the other.

If I try to boot Tiger I've been getting a grey screen with no windmill.
If I boot with COM+OPT+P+R it will boot into OS9 no problem.
I have run the OSX install disk, repaired permissions, repaired disk.
It won't boot using COM+S or SHIFT either.
I trashed preferences and caches.
I have managed to get it to boot once or twice in the last week and use it but then the next time it won't.

Could it be the drive? Should I wipe and reinstall the OSX?


Thanks
 
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Your Mac's Specs
MacMini 14.3, 8.1 & 4.1, OS 13.5, 10.14, & 10.11 & 10.6; Macbook Pro 8.2, OS 10.12.
Possibly corrupted boot sectors on the drive. If you're thinking about reinstalling the OS's, consider dedicating a separate drive for OS 9. It operates better from smaller drives, so 80 Gb would be ideal, then a larger drive, eg. 250 Gb, for OS X.

You might also consider running Onyx (v 1.8.5) Titanium Software to check for any OS problems, run maintenance scripts, and to repair permissions.

Are you aware btw that Classic (OS 9) is part of Tiger, and you can run Classic apps without having to boot into OS 9? I opted to put another dedicated OS 9 drive in my old b/w G3 because of valuable files created in earlier OS, plus the wealth of wonderful folder and application icons made in the days of OS 9.
 
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Thanks hughvane
Do you think reinstalling the OS will work and should I wipe the drive first ( I have backed up). Given the symptoms is it unlikely to be a hardware problem?
Also, how would I run Onyx if I can't boot into OS X. I can download it from my other mac and whack it on a stick but I presume it won't work if my G4 is in OS9.
 
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Your Mac's Specs
MacMini 14.3, 8.1 & 4.1, OS 13.5, 10.14, & 10.11 & 10.6; Macbook Pro 8.2, OS 10.12.
Are you getting any unusual noises from the HD? Like grinding teeth, or repetitive ticking? That indicates moving parts failure, end of story, get it out of there.

If no unusual noises, the disk misbehaviour may well be repairable, with only parts of it (sectors) malfunctioning. For that you will need to use the Install Disk > Utilities > First Aid > Verify > Repair etc.

Reinstall will wipe the hard drive of everything anyway, unless you use Archive & Install, which I wouldn't recommend in your case. You've backed up - good - so what's left on the HD is now expendable.

If however there is physical damage to the HD, perhaps some pitting of the recordable surface - and it does deteriorate over time with all the deleting and overwriting - then you're better off to replace the HD altogether (as per my previous post suggestion).

I don't think OS 9 will read from a USB stick, so Onyx can only be run once OS X is going - which you currently cannot do :(.

Which brings us back to the Install disk > Repair OR, cut your losses and replace the HD.
 
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Thanks, will try a reinstall first. Not too handy with a screwdriver!!
 

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