G4 laptop won't load up...why??

Hope this is the appropriate thread... think this is a hardware problem, not an OS problem.

I've had my G4 since late '05 (one-year warranty is up, naturally). Last week, I turned it on and my light-blue screen came up, but no status bar to tell me that OSX was loading. Instead, I got a small flashing question mark icon in the middle of the screen. I followed the troubleshooting guidlines in the manual and tried loading disc 1 of the OS disks to resolve the problem. But when I go into disk utilities, it recognizes the DVD drive and the disk, but not the HD. Therefore I can't fix the HD, nor do I have anywhere to send and run a new copy of the OS. And I now encounter a small globe icon in the middle of the screen just before that blasted question mark comes up. Anyone else encounter this? Is it obviously an HD problem?

The only things I did differently recently were 1.) accept an update for my MS Word program and run it (a couple days before my baby refused to load), and 2.) hooked up my new, out-of-the-box iPod to my G4 to transfer music (did this the night before my baby acted up). Could either one of these have caused my current situation?

My apologies if this is the wrong thread or if this has been addressed before-I looked briefly and didn't find it. I'm distressed and already spent an hour with Apple tech support who couldn't figure it out over the phone. Looking like I have to travel an hour to the Apple store Geniuses.

Thanks in advance.

It appears that you may have lost, your system disk. The globe means that your system is looking to boot from a network drive. The flashing question mark means that your system is unable to find any bootable media.

Boot your system using your install media. Look under one of the drop down menu, for disk utility. Run that application, and see if it sees the system disk. If you can see your system disk, run repair disk. Once that is complete, try booting your system again.

If it does not boot, you may have a corrupted operating system. So you will need to reload.

If you don't see your system disk, under the disk utility application, then you may have a bad system disk.

It sounds like the hard drive might be dead or damaged.. I'd suggest doing what rman posted.

You said that the "one year" warranty was up, so I'm assuming you do not have AppleCare. If possible, take it to an Apple Store or other certified Mac retailer and have them check it out.

Most likely it's the hard drive and it might need to be replaced.

rman said:

Boot your system using your install media. Look under one of the drop down menu, for disk utility. Run that application, and see if it sees the system disk. If you can see your system disk, run repair disk. Once that is complete, try booting your system again.

Click to expand...

Did this a dozen times over a few days. My system disk is nowhere to be found. I don't have Applecare, but I'm bringing it to an Apple store Friday. I'm pretty sure my drive is fried (though I'm no expert to make that assumption). If they need to replace the drive, can any info (files, music, documents) be saved or retrieved? Also, is it worth spending the money on a new drive or does it make more sense to just buy a new laptop?

Thanks again for your input.