Uh-oh

[dmd3x]

I am a Windows and Linux user so i don't know much about Macs. I have a fairly decent one at home that is Mac OS 8.5. When i turn it on, there is a picture of a happy Mac, then a picture of a disk with a flashing question mark (?). Is there a way to get into sort of a "BIOS" for Mac? How do i fix this? My CD-ROM drive is broken so i can't insert the Mac OS cd. I do not no sh** about macs, but this is a Power PC, i think it has 64 megs RAM? I mostly use it for games and word processing. but i am sure the CD-ROM drive is busted.

[ritsuke Veteran]

Considering you have 8.5 loaded, I'm assuming you have a PowerPC.

'Flashing Question Mark (FQM)' could mean any number of things. Most common is that something happened to important system files or it somehow can't mount the hard drive with the system files located on it. (ROM errors, deletion, damage, etc.)

First, before you do anything, reset pram (you wouldn't do this first if your cd-rom was working):

1. Shutdown (locate command-option-p-r keys)

2. Startup the computer and immediately hold down command-option-p-r before the gray screen shows up.

3. This will restart the computer two times. After this happens, release those keys.

If you still get the FQM, you may have disk damage because of age (or something else) and the disk needs to be reinitialized (in a sense, formatted) to be mounted.

Also, please give more information about the computer - It would be very helpful if you gave some background and model information on the computer. Hopefully, the above works (usually doesn't)

(you could also try to hold down the 'D' key on startup - probably won't work, but who knows...lol)