Problem Booting Up from External Hard Drive

S

samfoxfan

Registered
HI! I'm having a slight problem and I really hope someone can help me out. I have Mac OSX 10.2.8 installed on my internal hard drive and external hard drive. I've been mainly using the External HD to start up my comp and run Mac OSX 10.2.8 Thats where I have all my favorite websites installed and applications nicely set up in the Dock and such. Last nite while I was online, my computer suddenly was getting really slow and stalling a lot. so i just turned the comp off and restarted. I started up and I see the grey screen and the apple and the circle spinning around ( as usual ) but after that, I just go to a blue screen and nothing happens. It just stays on the blue screen. I even left the comp on for a few hours to see if anyhting would happen but it didnt. So I resarted my comp and held down the Option key so I could start up using my Internal HD and everything was fine and i connected and such. But I can't seem to start up using my External HD anymore, and I really would like to.

I even repared the disk in the Disk Utility and that didnt work. Then when i tried to boot up on the External HD again, the screen freezes and something pops up in the top right corner of the screen. It says something like: /etc/master.passwd: No such file or directory

So I booted up using a Mac OSX cd, and tried to reset the password, but when i highlight my external HD and try to reset the password, all the options are greyed out and I can't change anything. So if mabe someone could help, i'd love it thanks and Happy Holidays :)
 
hi! thanks for the reply :) I have actually done that. a few times. and i verified it as well. I just cant seem to reset the password. I hope I can solve this, if anyone may be able to help
 
Basically, MacOS X has corrupted the low level files / structure (volume bit map, etc.) such that the hard disk drive, hdd, cannot be repaired and no longer booted from.

After trying to resolve your external hdd non-boot problem via Apple's 'Disk Utility', Micromat's 'TechTool Pro', Alsoft's 'DiskWarrior', etc., and, with no success - boot from the internal hdd, recover what (items - files and folders) you can from the external hdd, reinstall MacOS X 10.2.x onto the external hdd (using 'Erase and Install' via the 'Options...' button), update 10.2.x to 10.2.8, enjoy reinstalling and reconfiguring all the applications and system.

If anyone suggests you leave your Mac ON, for hours, when the Blue Screen of Death is displayed - walk away from them.

Maybe, just maybe, MacOS X 10.4.4 will resolve such corruption problem(s). However, based on the past MacOS X installations and updates - I would not put much hope behind such.
 
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