My mac wont work. Blinking folder with a ?

Sound like you have an issue with either your hard drive or the operating system has lost the plot. Try this OS About OS Recovery

If you are able to access the recovery partition then use the disk utility to check the disk.

If this does not work then take the computer to an Apple repair centre, if it's still covered by warranty the disk might be replaced under warranty.

If it's not covered, you could try using DiskWarrior 4 The Disk Utility for Mac Disk Repair Mac Directory Repair... which has allowed me to recover disks that have not been able to be repaired with Apple's disk utility.

bugged partition...Repair/Reinstall Snow Leopard or another Mac OS

Your Mac is saying it cannot find the operating system. Usually due to corrupt startup files or hard drive death.

I seen a blinking folder with a question mark in the middle in folder, in the middle of a display screen, but not a camera.

Either way, you are not able to access your main desktop so that is where I want to help.

A blinking folder with a ? in middle, is an indication that your bootable Mac OS X volume cannot be found.

If you do, I would first recommend you try this procedure first:
(PRAM Reset)
Normal 0 false false false MicrosoftInternetExplorer4 /* Style Definitions */ table.MsoNormalTable {mso-style-name:"Table Normal"; mso-tstyle-rowband-size:0; mso-tstyle-colband-size:0; mso-style-noshow:yes; mso-style-parent:""; mso-padding-alt:0in 5.4pt 0in 5.4pt; mso-para-margin:0in; mso-para-margin-bottom:.0001pt; mso-pagination:widow-orphan; font-size:10.0pt; font-family:"Times New Roman"; mso-ansi-language:#0400; mso-fareast-language:#0400; mso-bidi-language:#0400;} • First, hold in your power button for approximately 10 seconds to do a hard shutdown, if you have not already turned your Mac off.

• Once your Mac is shutdown, you will need to perform what is called a PRAM reset (Parameter RAM)
• Locate the following keys on the keyboard: Command, Option, P, and R. You will need to hold these keys down simultaneously .

• Turn on the computer.
• Press and hold the Command-Option-P-R keys. You must press this key combination before the gray screen appears.
• Now, hold the keys down until the computer restarts and you hear the start up sound for the third time.
• Release the keys and allow the Powerbook G4 to start up.
------------------------------------------------------------------------------
If this still returns you to a blinking ? folder, try this process:
Normal 0 false false false MicrosoftInternetExplorer4 /* Style Definitions */ table.MsoNormalTable {mso-style-name:"Table Normal"; mso-tstyle-rowband-size:0; mso-tstyle-colband-size:0; mso-style-noshow:yes; mso-style-parent:""; mso-padding-alt:0in 5.4pt 0in 5.4pt; mso-para-margin:0in; mso-para-margin-bottom:.0001pt; mso-pagination:widow-orphan; font-size:10.0pt; font-family:"Times New Roman"; mso-ansi-language:#0400; mso-fareast-language:#0400; mso-bidi-language:#0400;} DISK UTILITYYou can use your Mac OS X install disc to repair your hard drive and Mac OS X volume using Disk Utility. Click the link below to try this procedure.
* Apple Support Link:
Use Disk Utility to Repair Disk

Should neither of these processes work and you still boot up to a flashing ? folder, then your only recourse is to use your Mac OS X installation disc and perform an Archive and Install procedure.
----------------------------------------------------------------------------

Normal 0 false false false MicrosoftInternetExplorer4 /* Style Definitions */ table.MsoNormalTable {mso-style-name:"Table Normal"; mso-tstyle-rowband-size:0; mso-tstyle-colband-size:0; mso-style-noshow:yes; mso-style-parent:""; mso-padding-alt:0in 5.4pt 0in 5.4pt; mso-para-margin:0in; mso-para-margin-bottom:.0001pt; mso-pagination:widow-orphan; font-size:10.0pt; font-family:"Times New Roman"; mso-ansi-language:#0400; mso-fareast-language:#0400; mso-bidi-language:#0400;} This procedure also allows you to save your applications, files and folders without the old directory interferring with you then accessing those files and creating a new Mac OS X Directory.

Here is the Apple Support Link for that procedure:
Archive and Install



This should get your Powerbook G4 back to normally functionality without any serious data loss.



Regards,


-Mactechtrainer

Normally if you reinstall the Mac the files wont be erased and you are just repairing it.

If you dont find the HDD option while reinstallation, it would mean that the Hard Disk is Crashed.

Here is the Answer to the Problem - A flashing question mark appears when you start your Mac by Apple

http://support.apple.com/kb/TS1440?viewlocale=en_US

Hope it helps you!

Hello, The blinking file folder with the question mark can happen when the computer doesn't "see" your System. It can be caused by a faulty hard drive, or by a damaged operating system. You can try to reboot the mac, hold the mouse button during 20 seconds to eject the CD, then insert you installation DVD (leopard). Reboot the Mac again, and hold the "C" key. Select english, the go to the tools menu, and Disk Utility. Go to the SOS tab, select your drive and click "repair". If something red appears, it means that it has found something wrong on your hard drive. Best regards

To things can be wrong

1 the system folder is corrupt
2 The hard drive is bad

Too find out which one it is get the boot disk that came with it and restart holding the C key. If it boots and there is no hard drive image on the desktop it is bad if there is one then reinstall the system and you should be good.

When the "?" mark comes up, it means it's looking for the operating system to boot to. It can be fixed by opening system preferences and in the startup settings, select your operating system as the tarted startup. It should speed up boot up time.

It's a hardware failure. Try reinstalling the OS, otherwise it sounds like apple gave you a LEMON. LOL (little humor there). This also happens when there is no OS installed at all, which doing the above may solve the problem. Also, check to make sure the Hard drive is formatted for FAT~~ and not NTFS, cause for some reason, apple system hate NTFS Drives.

Another alternative is to hold the "option" key as the Mac boots up to force it to recheck possible blessed start-up disks. If your hard disk drive shows up, select it. When it boots into OS X, immediately back up your data and restart the Mac with the OS X DVD (or CD) Install Disk. When you're in the boot menu from the OS X Install Disk, select "Utilities" then "Repair drive" and select your HDD. That should help OS X repair any file permissions or data corruption that may have occurred. I would also look into getting a new HDD. It seems to me that your current one may be failing and need replacement.