Hi My Power Center 132 i have installed 3 HD's within the past year, now all three for some reason sometimes work and then sometimes don't. The good mac chime comes on at boot but stays at the grey screen, then after a while boots off the cd-rom that has MacOS 9.1 instalation stuff. Sometimes the mac doesn't even give a signal to the moniter. I have read previous posts had found something about a PRAM battery but i don't get it(if it is the same as the PC CMOS battery and a PC would boot up but saying bad cmos battery or somehing then why would this make this much of a difference?) But then the lucky times the HD's work? Is there a reasoning for this? Also would OS X be good for this computer by teaking it(just for the fun of it and to see if getting a new mac is worth 1,000 dollars) Also before the HD's started messing up my internal zip drive wouldn't read or mount most of the zips I put in. The light would just flash and sometimes something would click. Final thing is it best to buy completely new things from apple like a new ibook than the ons on ebay?

Your HD issue sounds like a SCSI termination/ID problem. Putting X on there isn't going to give you anything like a fair guess at whether a new Mac is worth a grand. Trust me, you put X on there and you'll think you just got dunked in a molasses tank. A new Mac is worth way more than a grand. I would NEVER buy a used laptop unless I was buying it from my mom (or other close family member). And even then I'd be suspicious. I wouldn't buy a new-ish computer *anywhere* without a factory warranty unless I was buying a piece of schieze Walmart PC whose warranty is worth more than the computer. p