Calling Stomachmonkey again...
 

I have an older PowerBook G4 up at the cottage that has not been booted up in over a year, as we have been abroad.

When I switch it on, I get the pale blue screen with the apple in the middle, and the little circling thingy underneath, that just keeps turning. But it won't actually start.

Any thoughts on how to kick start this thing? It's on outlet power, and I've already tried removing the battery and putting it back etc.

As always your kind help is much appreciated!

Sometimes when they have been off for a while they take a long time to boot.

If the internal PRAM battery is dead then it could have lost a lot of settings. It may not be able to find the startup disc.

Hold the Option key when starting, makes it display all boot volumes. If it can't find, does not display one then you may need to reinstall the system.

There is a safe mode same as windows.

Hold the Shift key while booting it up and it bypasses everything but the essentials.

It also clears out crap that may be keeping it from starting.

If you have another Mac laptop and Firewire cable with you then you can try the hold T key at startup for target disc mode and mount on the other laptop then run Disk Utility and see if it can repair the mounted volume.

Tried all of that, but no luck.

So I'm taking it down to town to the Apple shop.

Many thanks though for your response!

Try this link to reset them pram
Resetting your Mac's PRAM and NVRAM