Question mark flashes when Mac boots what's wrong?

[Mod_Man_Extreme]

Hey there guys, my G3 iMac (CRT) seems to have spontaneously died on me as all I receive upon booting now is just a Mac face on this tiny folder that alternates with a flashing question mark. I had installed Mac OS X after checking to make sure my firmware was up to date, so I know that wasn't it, so I'm pretty much at my wits end.

Does anyone here know what's wrong with it?

[RyaNtheSlayA]

Hey there guys, my G3 iMac (CRT) seems to have spontaneously died on me as all I receive upon booting now is just a Mac face on this tiny folder that alternates with a flashing question mark. I had installed Mac OS X after checking to make sure my firmware was up to date, so I know that wasn't it, so I'm pretty much at my wits end.

Does anyone here know what's wrong with it?

Sounds like hard drive went caputs.

[supericeboy]

Did you actually update the firmware?

Have you trided booting with the option key down to show a list of bootable drives? Do you see your hard drive listed?

Have you tried booting of the install disc?

[Mod_Man_Extreme]

Ah, that's what I was thinking after all Apple was dumb enough to choose the Quantum Fireball series for their HDD's despite them being unreliable cheap trash.

What pisses me off is that I can't seem to boot CD's or anything either, I know my CD-Rom drive works as if I insert the first OS X CD and reset the Mac tries to boot the CD but simply stalls at the gray apple logo screen with the spinning disc reading indicator.

[Mod_Man_Extreme]

Did you actually update the firmware?

Have you trided booting with the option key down to show a list of bootable drives? Do you see your hard drive listed?

Have you tried booting of the install disc?

I just said in the OP that my firmware was up to date. I did try booting with the Option Key and all I was able to see was the Mac OS X CD, it's as if the HDD's disappeared to my Mac.

[benderx]

Call Apple support, I hope its a guy instead of girl tech. Sometimes girl tech give you a hard time. Head over to macrumors.com forums. for help. look into youtube help video, maybe useful.

[onemanfilmcrew]

Dude, you are in Statesville. Just take a field trip down to Charlotte and to the Apple Store at Southpark Mall. The last time my hard drive did something like that I took it to their Genius bar and they fixed it right up. Also if you wait with it they don't charge you assuming you don't need a new hard drive (granted that was a few years ago but I think it's still the same).

[Mod_Man_Extreme]

Dude, you are in Statesville. Just take a field trip down to Charlotte and to the Apple Store at Southpark Mall. The last time my hard drive did something like that I took it to their Genius bar and they fixed it right up. Also if you wait with it they don't charge you assuming you don't need a new hard drive (granted that was a few years ago but I think it's still the same).

Not an option.

I spent $25 on this Mac, I'm not gonna spend $50+ for some hipster Apple Store dick to rip it open and fix it after first telling me how I absolutely "need" a newer Mac or the latest iPod for twenty minutes. I bought this with the express purpose of using it with my FireWire iPod Mini (modded with CF to 32GB) as at the $25 I paid it was comparable to the price of a PCI firewire card for my PC.

Plus I don't own a car, so there's no way I could get down there easily.

[CRTGAMER]

Do you still have the old drive with OS9?
Maybe boot that first and re-confirm the Firmware?

[Mod_Man_Extreme]

Do you still have the old drive with OS9?
Maybe boot that first and re-confirm the Firmware?

Bah, I purposely wiped OS 9 off of the HDD the second I was able to and just installed OS X onto it. Good Riddance to bad software I say. (Remember guys I'm not a Mac fan, I just want to use this thing to sync my Mac only iPod mini)

I did however confirm the firmware was 4.1.9, it was the first thing I did before I installed OS X and I re-checked it yesterday morning to make sure and still got told that it had 4.1.9 on it. I then reset the PRAM and NVRAM and still got the folder, so I'm sorta at my wits end.