My Imac died today and resurrected itself

[ed again]

It just stopped running this morning it seemed like the power was disconnected. the only noise it made was similar to an old 78 record that had just finished and was going round and round. Took it to the local Apple shop and it started up as per normal, the tech a guy i ride with suggested if i haven't done so now would be a good time to start backing up stuff that i want to keep, he didn't offer an opinion of what the trouble could have been. Is this something i should be concerned about or is it just a one off.
Ed

 

[Kropotkin]

Sounds like your hard disk is about to die. Just happened to my PC at work. Makes a kerchink ........ kerchink ...... sound.

Back up your data right now.

 

[shugie]

Sounds like your hard disk is about to die. Just happened to my PC at work. Makes a kerchink ........ kerchink ...... sound.

Back up your data right now.

I would agree with that, a hard disk on the way out sometimes keeps recalibrating itself by going to the edge of the disk - repeatedly. Still new hard disks are not expensive, but how easy is it to duplicate a Mac disk. Apple systems were designed by techies for non-techies, and I do not care for them myself.

 

[Butler]

i thought that was a hair remover for the ladies.

 

[Heston Service]

Apple systems were designed by techies for non-techies, and I do not care for them myself.

You'd prefer something designed by non techies for techies?

 

[Andy80F]

I would agree with that, a hard disk on the way out sometimes keeps recalibrating itself by going to the edge of the disk - repeatedly. Still new hard disks are not expensive, but how easy is it to duplicate a Mac disk.

I've replaced a hard drive on a G3 iMac and it was an awfull lot easier than I thought it would be, just more screws to remove than the tower based PC's. Don't know about the G4 or G5's but as long as you have the right tools, Apple favour Torx drivers just like BMW , there should be little problem. The new G5 iMac looks quite easy to access in the pictures I''ve seen.

Apple systems were designed by techies for non-techies, and I do not care for them myself.

If you were to look at the G5 tower you might find it's design philosophy was for easy user access to items such as the drive bays, memory slots etc and its onl really the processor which youre not encouraged to change.

 

[Stocka]

I would agree with that, a hard disk on the way out sometimes keeps recalibrating itself by going to the edge of the disk - repeatedly. Still new hard disks are not expensive, but how easy is it to duplicate a Mac disk.

Like so:

Open Disk Utility, choose File > New, then choose "Disk Image from <disk name>".

To restore to a new disk:

In Disk Utility, select the new disk image in the list of disks and volumes.
Choose Images > “Scan Image for Restore.”

Carbon Copy Cloner can do bootable backups and clones as well. Free download, donationware.

If you're feeling geeky, try ditto, rsync or dd from the Terminal. Not for command-line virgins though.

Apple systems were designed by techies for non-techies, and I do not care for them myself.

That's not been true since Mac OS X was released 4 years ago. There's a nice GUI for non-techies, and all the UNIXy stuff under the hood if you like tinkering.

Quote from O'Reilly (übergeek publisher) on why they set up the macdevcenter.com website:

"But there are lots, and I mean great numbers, of technically-minded people who love this new operating system."

Article here:

<http://www.oreillynet.com/pub/wlg/1046>

 

[shugie]

Like so:

Open Disk Utility, choose File > New, then choose "Disk Image from <disk name>".

To restore to a new disk:

In Disk Utility, select the new disk image in the list of disks and volumes.
Choose Images > “Scan Image for Restore.”

Carbon Copy Cloner can do bootable backups and clones as well. Free download, donationware.

If you're feeling geeky, try ditto, rsync or dd from the Terminal. Not for command-line virgins though.




That's not been true since Mac OS X was released 4 years ago. There's a nice GUI for non-techies, and all the UNIXy stuff under the hood if you like tinkering.

Quote from O'Reilly (übergeek publisher) on why they set up the macdevcenter.com website:

"But there are lots, and I mean great numbers, of technically-minded people who love this new operating system."

Article here:

<http://www.oreillynet.com/pub/wlg/1046>

Thanks for that info - I might try to get a cheap Mac with OS X, a few customers have them, and I have always avoided having anything to do with them. Could be a useful additional skill for me to know how to furtle them. Had a quick look at OS X and it does seem to be more configurable, even if it does involve cfg file editing a la unix.

 

[ed again]

Thanks guys for all of your help and advice, my wife has given me permission to upgrade from the G3 if i so desire, now only if moving up from a 11 year old GS1100 to a 1150 was that easy.
ed

 

[pineweasel]

Is it one of the old CRT iMacs? Total power cutout - screen and all? It could well be the internal lithium battery; new ones are about £4.50 from Maplin and are reasonably easy to fit.