Mac startup disk question. Can someone help?

[Allbaldo]

I'm having a problem with my G4/500, running Panther and Tiger on 2 seperate drives, and wanted to see if someone could help.

As of a couple of days ago, the computer was working fine. When I tried to start it yesterday, I got the grey screen that would usually have the Apple logo, only the logo wasn't there, and when I waited for a while nothing happened. I turned the computer off, and back on a few times with the same result.

I seemed to remember there being a way to bring up the Startup Disk function on startup for dual boot systems. I tried holding the option key on startup, which brought up a screen I've never seen, with an arrow pointed to the left, and a logo that seemed to be representing a restart or something similar. When this screen came up, there was the little "watch" logo spinning away, but not doing anything. I'm not sure what this screen is, but I'd like to know.

Any ideas on what I can do to get it up and running?

Thanks!

Stephen

[Drew Mazurek]

Holding option boots to the firmware. It will show you any and all bootable partitions or disks. Let it go a bit as it sometimes takes a minute for them to come up. If your normal boot disk doesn't show, it's got problems. You can try booting from a System disk and see if you can use Disk First Aid. Or better yet use Disk Warrior. Although some might say that if there is a problem, messing with the disk could make it worse. Hopefully someone else will have more for you.

[BRH]

Check or disconnect any SCSI drives and restart.

[Rellim]

I had an old G4 Dual 450 that I had upgraded. I had a problem like this a few times. Is the logo a globe or look like the earth? I would disconnect any firewire, usb, and scsi like the post above said. Let the mac sit for a while, maybe 1 hour and try to restart. Also, try to reset the PRAM. It is a small button inside the box. Check apple site for specifics.

Good luck.

[Severe]

Any luck?

I've had this happen to me as well. Don't panic. I think I followed some of the same advice I see posted here. You should be fine.