[littlejro1]

I have an iMac G4... I've tried everything from PRAM to DOCS to disconnecting every cord to leaving it and coming back... I can't use the OSX cd to reinstall because my cd drive won't even open. And last night and sometimes today it was making a weird clicking noise.... I just moved into a new house and finally got connected to the internet last night, would that have something to do with it?.... Now what??

[moose_n_squirrel]

Is it one of these noises?
If it is, your hard drive is failing. Your move could not cause this unless you banged up the machine during the move.

[maczan1205]

You should be able to open the CD drive clicking and holding down the mouse while starting the computer.
Hopefully you had a back up - I recently went through a similar situation and was able to recover my data from the drive with data rescue X.
You may want to try it before you reinstall etc. You can download a demo version and see if it can recognize the drive. You will have to be able to boot the computer from a separate drive.
Good luck!

[littlejro1]

Is there anyway to unscrew the bottom of my computer to look at it myself? Or am I better off taking it in some place to have them look at it? Should I send it off to Apple? I moved across country, so my computer may have been shifted around a little bit... still nothing has worked...

[maczan1205]

It is possible to unscrew the bottom of the iMac, but you will only have access to the memory and the airport slot. You would have to disassemble things further to access the drive, which I don't recommend unless you know what you are doing.
Please Note - The drive should open if you hold down the mouse during the start up - did you try this?
Also what is your main concern? the data retrieval? or simply overwriting the drive and starting fresh? - I would be very concerned about using this drive again unless you are certain it is a hardware issue.
For instance you could re-install everything and have the same problem again.
It sounds like you have a drive failure - not a hardware issue - but that's just a guess.

[texas_macman]

You can get your Mac's Service Manual here.
http://www.whoopis.com/computerrepair/


Cheers, Tom
Mac Troubleshooting, Maintenance & Tips
http://www.geocities.com/texasmacman/MacTroubleshoot.html

[littlejro1]

So I got my CD drive to open and attempted to reinstall OSX... when it asked where I wanted to install it to, it didn't give me any options... as if it couldn't find my hard drive. So now I'm not sure what to do next... any ideas???