target mode - what should I be able to access?

My Macbook OS 10.4.11 won't stay on and keeps shutting down with the "gray screen" that falls over the screen and gives me the "must restart" message", .....so I'm trying to access my Macbook by pairing it with my iMac OS 10.6.3 through target disk mode.

The target disk mode seems fine, i.e. I get the Macbook icon on the iMac desktop......but when I open the Macbook icon, I don't see everything....just certain system files like Applications and Library.

I need to access my Documents files since the laptop won't stay on and I thought I could access them through target disk mode.

Any help is greatly, greatly appreciated.
Michelle

There should be a user folder for your user accounts. If you have more than one user on your computer then you should have more than one folder. The name of the folder is the user account name which you created when you first setup your Mac. Double click on your user account folder and then find your Documents folder.

Thank you. I think the user account is....gone. However, the computer tells me how many gig are used, and that 8gig are left over...so the user account must be "hiding" in there somewhere (sorry to not sound very technical here....)

The MacBookPro did start up, and stayed on...but my desktop pic and icons were gone and so were the documents...

Is your data truly gone or are the icons you are talking about only gone? Try doing a search in Finder and see if you can find the files you are looking for. You never explained how to you got to this situation with the gray screen or did it just show up one day?

You might want to think about making time to take it to an Apple store. If your data is indeed gone without you doing anything then your hard drive might be dying or damaged. Unless someone else on this forum can help you I think your best solution would be to take it to Apple.