[G4] How to check my drive?

[Ronald Steinke]

On 20 Feb, 2007, at 11:20 AM, Celia Lawton-Livingstone wrote:

> At the moment it will boot up, but then I get a flashing question  
> mark on the screen which I know means it can't find the system  
> folder.  I have no backup discs.  Is there any way I can find out  
> if the drive is not being recognised for some reason or has been  
> wiped, short of slaving it to another computer to have a look?

Your drive is empty or has not been initialized as a Mac drive, and  
it has no valid operating system installed on it. That is why you are  
getting the flashing question mark.

Your Sawtooth model is capable of using versions 8, 9, or 10 of the  
Mac OS. Either version of the OS can be installed from a system  
installation disc as long as you have enough RAM and space on the  
hard drive. In order to verify the status of the drive, you would  
have to have a valid operating system CD (or DVD if your machine has  
a DVD drive installed) to start the Mac from.

A major difference in system discs is that version OS 10.4 is NOT  
available on a CD and you have to have a DVD drive in order to  
install from that disc. An external FireWire drive can be used to  
start up and install the operating system if you do not have an  
internal DVD drive.

If you can only find a disc with OS-9, it will be able to initialize  
the drive and install the OS. You could then examine the machine at  
your leisure. If you want to use a newer OS version, all of the  
versions of OS 10 can be installed on your Mac if you can locate an  
installation disc.

To start up from the OS-9 disc, power up the Mac, open the CD tray,  
insert the CD, close the tray, hold the "C" key down on the keyboard  
until you see the desktop appear completely with the CD icon at the  
top right corner.

Once you are booted, check the CD contents for a folder containing a  
hard drive utility program. You can use this program to initialize  
your hard drive if it is not already formatted. After initializing  
the drive in extended format, complete the OS installation procedure.  
You will have an opportunity to do an Easy Install or a Custom  
Install. The easy install puts everything in the OS folder and you  
may not want all of that stuff if you do not need it. I always  
recommend a custom installation to pare down the system because you  
certainly do not need printer drivers for brands that you don't own  
or language packages that you don't use.

To start up with OS-10, follow the same procedure as above to start  
up. In OS-10, you need to check the menu bar for a command to open  
the Disk Utility program to format the drive. If you have to  
initialize the drive, select the extended formatting and enable  
System 9 drivers to be installed.

After the initialization, run the easy installation unless you have  
decided to customize your system by omitting portions that you don't  
need or want, like foreign language packages or printer drivers.  
During the installation procedure, you can investigate the options  
available and make your decisions whether to keep or leave out  
different portions of the system. When you have made your decisions,  
select the install button and watch the fun on screen.

You will have to enter personal information to establish yourself  
with Administrator status in OS-10 so you can be able to install  
other programs later. There will be opportunities to select different  
names, passwords, etc, at the end of the installation process.

I hope this gives you a point to start your Mac experience from  
without all the headaches that Windows can give.