Macbook stuck on apple logo

Hello all,

I have a 2008 black macbook running snow leopard. I just changed the permissions of the hard drive to make my user (the sole user) able to read and write the HD. The process became slow after about ten minutes and stopped responding. I shut the computer down. Now every time I turn it on I cannot get past the apple logo and little rotating wheel. I've tried booting in safe mode but it didn't work.

I'm home from college and do not have the disks that came with the computer. Is this just a matter of waiting a few hours, or is this a major problem?

Thanks,
KP

Your internal hard drive (MacIntosh HD) should only be read and write to the system and not to anyone else including you. All others have read only permissions.

You really need your install boot disk to boot with and run a repair permissions from Disk Utility while the drive is not mounted.