G4 Powermac (desktop) being a bit moody

[jango]

Hi

My G4 is playing up.

I turn it on, I hear the chord & the power light appears on both my Computer & my Apple display but that's it.

My display stays black, my USB hub does not become active & none of my peripherals come on.

Occasionally when I turn My Mac on & nothing else comes on as described as above I can hear the fan whirring non stop like i've never heard before.

Do these symptoms ring any bells with anyone?

Right now it's only happening about 30% of the time but it's driving me nuts.

Any help would be much appreciated,

Thanks, Jango.

 

[Ric]

Hi there jango and welcome !

Have you run Disk utility on that Mac ?

Run a repair disk and permissions...

Does it still have a problem if you unplug all peripherals (including USB hub) and just leave monitor, mouse and keyboard plugged in ?

regards

Ric

 

[jango]

Hi Ric,

When I open Disk utility I see the icons for both of my hard drives (one internal drive that came with the mac & one external firewire 800 drive where I store all my music compositions).

The thing is It only gives me the options "Repair Disk or Verify Disk" with my external drive. "Repair Disk" is shaded when I select my internal drive & I can only use the "Verify Disk" function.

Is my Mac telling me that there is a problem with my external drive? hence the reason it is giving me the option to "Repair Disk".

Thanks, Jango.

 

[Ric]

Hi there,

to do the Repair on the internal disk you must boot from your Tiger (or other, the latest you have) install DVD.

Then run Disk Utility from that, this will allow you to then Repair it.

Have you tried Verify ? Did it give any comments ?

regards

Ric

 

[jango]

Hi

I've done that & both of my drives passed verification.

I take it this means they don't need to be repaired?

I don't suppose you've had a chance to look for the G4 (FW800) Desktop powermac manual?

I know I got one with my Mac but only god knows where it is now.

I really want to have a tinker around inside my mac (which may be a huge mistake) but I need the Manual to know where everything is.

If you can't find it or don't have it no probs.

Thanks, Jango.

 

[karazelle]

Practical URLs: http://www.apple.com/support/powermac/g4/
Especially the Troubleshoot and How-To tabs, as well as the Discussion forums is worth a quick check.

Manuals: http://www.apple.com/support/manuals/powermac/

 

[Ric]

...well without sending you off to another forum ;-)

Can you have a look and see if the disk is selected as the startup drive...

System Preferences-->Startup Disk

Just finding the manual now, but I wouldn't tinker, the chances are that you may do more harm than good !

It may be a PRAM battery thats on it's way out.

regards

Ric

 

[karazelle]

...well without sending you off to another forum ;-)

Hey, they might have an idea. Just trying to be helpful..

It may be a PRAM battery thats on it's way out.

regards

Ric

I have a Powermac G4 MDD from 2002 with a ATI Rage 9000 display adapter. If I hook a DVI monitor to my graphics card, about 50% of the time, it gives this behaviour of dieing at startup, or not even responding to the power button at all.

I only thought about it now because I was mucking about with this back in spring 2004 before giving up and settling for a VGA flatscreen display, when you said PRAM battery.

I don't know if it helps, but try hooking up another monitor if he has one... err, laying about.

 

[jango]

Thanks to both of you for all the info,

Ric, I recieved that manual, a big help cheers.

Just one thing, if I want to find out whether the pram battery needs replacing do I just get a new one & hope it works or do I get my multi meter out?

Also where can I buy a new pram battery? Are they easy to get hold of?

Cheers, Jango.