I came to switch on my iMac and all I get is a blank screen with a file icon in the middle with either a question mark or 2 little faces! any ideas?

Su, January 2005

Hve you tried putting in your system CD and restarting holding down the C key, this will cause the computer to start up from the CD. If you are on OS X, you can then use Disk Utility in Application/Utilities to check over your sytem folder.

JP, April 2005

If you are still using OS9 -when booting up hold apple(cmd), option,P,R
after a second or two this should force the computer to reboot. keep holding these keys until the computer restarts 6 times. This will clear the PRAM..if it is a bad setting in the operating system start up this should clear it out.

mrickard72@hotmail.com, January 2005

Su.... the file icon with a question mark shows up when the computer cannot locate the system software on the boot drive (or any other drive attached to the computer for that matter) which would indicate that your hard drive has become corrupted or may even have failed. If the drive has not failed but has become corrupted it may be possible to recover the system and information on the drive using a CD based utility such as Tech Tool or Norton Utilities but I would not recommend using either if you are not familiar with them. Again if the drive has not failed you may be able to recover the drive by reinstalling the system software from the install/recover CD's supplied with your computer. The face icon that appears on the screen if it is a sad face (frowning) as opposed to the happy mac icon (smiling) indicates a problem with the system software. If you are not particularly computer literate I would recommend seeking help from a professional or take it back to your supplier. If you have any more questions on the subject leave a further message or email me at P2000print@aol.com

Chris Fagan, January 2005