[X4U] Boot Stops on Gray Screen - Never Gets to Spinning Gear

[Rick Gordon]

After a power crash, my primary boot disk on our Power Mac G5 running 10.4.11 stopped booting after the gray screen with Apple, never getting to the spinning gear. (I've given it a LONG time to assure that it's not just a delay needed to rebuild config files.)

The drive mounts normally as a non-boot drive, and Disk Utility registers no error. I also repaired permissions.

I've reinstalled using Archive and Install (twice), and the boot process stops at the same place, before or after updating to 10.4.11 with the PPC Combo updater.

Sometimes after several attempts to boot, it would only get to the gray screen with the Slashed Circle logo, indicating no valid system.

Looking at /System/Library/CoreServices, I noted that the BootX file was missing, so first I tried replacing it from a backup (no luck - got the Apple, but no gear), and then blessed the volume via Terminal (again, got the Apple, but no gear).

The drive continues to mount and show no errors in Disk Utility.

Can anyone offer further insight? Thanks.
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RICK GORDON
EMERALD VALLEY GRAPHICS AND CONSULTING
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WWW:   http://www.shelterpub.com