Chosen Solution
My iMac’s hard drive had presumably died 2 weeks ago: screen froze, after manual restart iMac would only display folder with question mark; different tries to locate the hard drive failed. os was tiger upgraded to leopard. bought a new hard drive and followed instructions on ifixit for hard drive replacement. reassembled. no parts broke; a.f.a i could tell all connectors were put back together sufficiently. upon firing up the iMac only the white light turned on but no startup chime or video on the screen. fan does apparently work too as i can feel a stream of cool air. iMac stayed disconnected from power for 2 weeks approx before. i tried connecting the power cord whilst pressing the power button simultaneously and start the iMac thereafter. (resetting smc according to a post on insanelymac.com) as a result the fan blew loudly and the light was gone. after unplugging the cord once more the initial symptom was there again. suggestions for solution please! :0)
Try starting up from the system installation disk. Insert disk hit the start button, push the disk all the way in. Immediately hold down the “C” key. Did you get the new hard drive formatted? Is there a system folder on the new hard drive? Are these the same symptoms as before you replaced the hard drive?
Hello, I’ve got a similar problem to hu kers. Hard Drive was dying, I bought a new hard drive, followed the instructions on ifixit step by step. I’ve been very methodical and I could have sworen that everything was in place and reconnected. Yet, nothing happens though I’ve inserted the system installation disk. When it comes to the volume choice, the new HD doesn’t show. I’d be very very thankful if I could get some help ! =) (I’m a - french- newbee on this, hope you’ll have some mercy…) lapetite
GMA950 died, very common with this model :(
I also have a similar problem. Old HD was malfunctioning but imac would still turn on from time to time. I cloned a new 2TB HD from a different computer with Snow Leopard on it and swapped out the malfunctioning HD from the Imac and added more Ram. After the install I get a light, no chime and a black screen. After reading this post I had hoped that starting the the Snow Leopard install CD would fix it. Now I have a stuck Snow Leopard CD and the original problem. Should I find the original install CD that came with the Mac. If I do then how would I go about getting the Snow Leopard CD out. Please Help.
