10.4.4 Ruined my computer

My problem is that my G5 now won't boot from the OSX CD; any ideas how to revert to my earlier OS if I can't reboot from the CD?

MJM

Michael, try restarting holding down the option key. This may give you the opportunity to restart from any bootable OS on your computer. Alternatively you can restart in safe mode holding down the shift key.

ds

I totaly understand the nature to a forum (ref. mac user since '85). True I had not posted here before but have in other places (I, in all my other upgrades, have never had this bad a problem). This upgrade appears to have had a dilaterious effect on several of our family. And not just one type of program or vender. It appears to be accross the board including startup (systems), Mac native programs and Hardware issues (people that can't access drives and the like). If you will look a the postings in this forum (16,000+), the vast majority are having the same type of problems.

I was thinking it was a problem of mine until I came here for help. And to that end, no one has yet offered anything that has worked including repairing permisions, booting from an external drive, verifing and repairing the disk and reinstalling the 10.4.4 combo.

I'm still in the market for help!

I'm sad to be here. I bought my first Mac 128 in 1984 and have been a dedicated Apple person ever since. I use a Mac for the simplicity. I'm "everyman" as stated somewhere in this list.
I NEED HELP

The issue:
- The computer freezes
- Sometimes on the blue screen right after the grey screen with the apple and the spinning gears.
- Sometimes it gets to the desktop and freezes when I use an application (Safars, Firefox, Word, ...)

What I've done:
- Installed 10.4.4. This was an upgrade from 10.4.3. I always do the automatic installs that come from Apple.com and have never had any problems.
- /fcsk from single user mode.
- I don't have the CD. I'm in Spain at the moment.
- Done all of the suggestions in "You see an emply, blue screen (docs.info.apple.com/article.himl?artnum=106464#symp1) and it hasn't fixed it.
- Removed the "caches" folder and deleted it.


ANY SUGGESTIONS:
Please keep suggestions simple, clear, and as concise but detailed as I'm a simple guy with simple needs. All I need is my Mac to work flawlessly as it always had.

I'm sad to have to be learning about all of this. I've enjoyed being ignorant and just expecting my Mac to always be there for me.

Thank you so much!!

I'm sad to be here.

And I'm sad to see you here. I was sad to have to come here (there and everywhere else) too...

- I don't have the CD. I'm in Spain at the moment.

This may mean you have to wait 'til you get home, or wherever your system install disk is... That was the ONLY thing that worked for me.

I did an "archive install" of system 10.4.0 off the disk.
Then I downloaded the "stand-alone" 10.4.4 update and ran it.
The reason I did not use Software Update again is that I wanted to save the updater for later use, if necessary, without downloading again -- about an hour with 256kb DSL.

Things that did not work:
Booting into "safe mode:" Couldn't even get there...
Booting into "single user mode:" Worked, but running fsck didn't help.
Running Disk Utility from the install DVD: Disk Utility reported that my disk was fine, yet it still wouldn't boot.

I'm probably forgetting something else that didn't work, but the real point is: If it won't even boot-up, if you are "everyman," like me, not a "programmer," you probably can't fix it short of installing a whole brand new system. All that stuff about repairing permissions (news to me...) is what should have been done BEFORE running the update -- to make sure (?) it would install correctly.

Thomas, you will likely need to run a more hearty disk repair tool such as Disk Warrior, then probably have to reinstall Tiger via archive and install (you will need your Tiger install DVD), then upgrade via the 10.4.4 combined updater.

ds

Hi, David --

Re: your comment earlier, "Two posts from two people who have never posted in Apple Discussions before don't constitute an outbreak."

Now three...

More telling, I think, is the number of views this thread has generated, as stated on the topic list. Perhaps, lots of lurkers looking here to see if the solution to their problem lies here? That's what I had hoped. It wasn't until I'd fixed things that I decided to come back, register and comment on my plight.

Sorry to have a different opinion from you Moseso, but this number of views doesn't consitute a major problem from my perspective. I don't mean to demean everyone's concerns, but you should have seen the thread two years ago when an update hosed thousands of external firewire drives. As I recall the thread itself (not a count of who viewed it but those who actually posted on the subject) got up to around 600 or more. If this update has caused a widespread problem it will likely be addressed. Typically when a small number of people who have experienced problems try to generate support for their troubles by suggesting a widespread issue, someone will start a thread which will ask those who have not had any problem with the update to post in. As long as the Moderators leave it it on here, dozens if not hundreds would post in that all is well with 10.4.4. There are people who post here regularly who are resonsible for entire banks of Macs at schools etc. and I haven't seen any of them posting on this subject yet.

ds

I have a program installed on my iBook that allows me to get in with out using the install disc when traveling. Its called "applejack" and can be found at the following, http://applejack.sourceforge.net/#top

Won't help you now but I would certainly install it [free] for other sad days like your having now. It has saved me a few times when I didn't have the install disc, it allowed me to get in and fix the problem. "Don't leave home without it."
Take a look when your computer is up, it will save your bacon when you have problems like your having now.

I want to reply to many of you, but directly to BruceBlack. There are not that "many" people having trouble with 10.4.4. Because there are even 54 responses here, or 2000 people who did have trouble, that pales to the 10-20 million who have done the upgrade. Let's not overreact.

I install this update on a lot of machines, because that's what I do. I have 10.4 on a hundred machines. Not one problem. What do I do? Here is my system, with a few comments included:
1. Have a backup (if for no other reason, the newer hard drives do NOT hold up like the old 1-2 GB drives). Start up on that backup, to test it.
2. Start with plain vanilla upgrade when you do an OS UPgrade (forget about the other choices). After it is done, run Disk Warrior.
3. When you do updates, NEVER use software update for OS updates. Use the combo updates from the site. Why? because download streams can be corrupted. Why in the world would you trust it to update your OS. This is not Apple's fault. I have even done downloads that corrupt. Just download again.
4. Run the update from your backup.
5. When it finishes, run Disk Warrior on the new update.
6. Startup on the new Update, and try it out.

Permission Repair is a hoax.
Archive and Install is genrally a waste of time, and breaks a lot of things so they need reinstalled, to work again.
Do not use GUI haxies, nor load a bunch of cutsey software on your machine. Be a "mature user".

Hello Slot Car, nice to see you chime in. This was the quote by Bruce Black that bothered me:

"There is not an app that I have that has not needed a fix, debug, upgrade or just plane wont start."

This sounded more like the postings of a troll than a legitimate user. I agree with most of what you said, but there might come a point where an OS is so corrupted that an archive and install might fix it.

ds

Thanks. Yes, of course there are needs for A&I, but the wholesale use is not necessary.

I figured he was trolling, too.

I'm another person who has just done the Tiger install and upgraded to 10.4.4. As of this moment I'm not having any issues.
I'm posting this so that those who are about to make the jump to Tiger won't be put off. The problems detailed here are not as endemic as they would appear to the casual reader.

Since updating to 10.4.4, I cannot launch Address Book, iCal or Mail. Repairing permissions didn't help. Everything else seems to work, and this update fixed some other annoying things, as well as feeling faster. I'm not too upset about this, as I use Thunderbird and never did like the UI for iCal and Address Book, but I have spent a lot of time entering data.

I haven't a clue as to what to do. I'm loathe to do an Archive and Install, because the extra Previous System files and the like would cause my drive total file size to exceed the amount of room on my cloning backup drive.

Hoping it is something simple. Any info. would be appreciated.
Thanks,
Joe

Not fishing or trolling.

Thanks you two for taking my and others plight so seriously. If you want, do a little investigating for yourself. Just for fun, look at all the posting in the OS 10.4, installation and setup discussions (3,243 topics, 16,912 postings) and just pick five pages. The vast majority of these are problems with 10.4.4. True, there are those who have installed with no problems and great for them (although I would like to hear from them as time progresses). However, even if only 10 percent of these were problems that would already be half of the ones that were reported in the 9.0 problems that were mentioned. And that was on the whole of 9.0 not one upgrade from .3 to .4.

Agian, is there any fix to a serious problem with a significant number of us that have upgraded via an Apple auto upgrade without having to do a clean install or try to jump back to 10.3.9