Resolved Mac Mini OS X Corruption - won't boot up!

[Diogones]

My friend has a Mac Mini '06 Model, with a 1.66 Intel Duo and 1GB RAM installed. The Mac will not boot up at all, although there is power and the trademark "bong!" sound when it is turned on. He was forced to recover his data off of it with a repair disc and an external optical drive. I feel that the OS is corrupted, and while my friend has all the original discs, he couldn't be bothered with it (it is not his main computer), so he left it to me to figure out.

I have a single user Snow Leopard install disc that came with my Macbook - should I try to boot up with that, and possibly install it? He only has Tiger on there at the moment, so I don't think wiping the drive will be an issue. The hard drive wouldn't be bad, would it? He was able to get his data off of it, after all. If the mini doesn't boot from the SL disc, what should I do next? I've never dealt with a Mac that didn't boot before!

 

[bearcatrp]

You have to boot from the original disks that came with the system. Once in, do a repair disc until there is no errors. If you still cannot get in, try to access the drive, through disc utility and pull off what you need and wipe/reinstall. Or, by disk warrior. That usually does the job.

 

[GGJstudios]

The grey install disks that come with Macs are model-specific and will not work with other models. Either use the original disks or use a retail copy of Mac OS X.

 

[SideStepSociety]

I had a similar issue with mine. Same model. Does the mini show the Apple logo at all? Or is it just a blank white boot screen with nothing on it?

My mini would power on and Mac the boot chimes, however, it would just show me the white boot screen. No Apple logo, no spinning gear, nothing. And it would just stay there. I noticed one thing. I couldn't hear the harddrive spin up. But I knew for a fact that the HD was fine and working. After playing around, I tried removing the CD/DVD drive. After I removed the drive, the mini was booting just fine.