Question Apple Power Mac G5 - Diagnosing and Repairs

[SKIPPY PB]

I own an Apple Power Mac G5. I caught a good deal on it a bunch of years ago. Unfortunately it was dropped when it was shipped by the carrier and it damaged the case rails pretty badly. However it still worked and because at the time I bought it for the software it had installed on it I just kept it because it still worked and the software would cost a lot more than what the insurance was playing to pay me as they would need to confiscate the machine. To determine whether it was at fault by them as the shippers.


I decided to try and repair the case as best I could the other day. Which led to a fun disassembly of the PC. Its not perfect but much better. Unfortunately when rebuilding it I forgot to hook up two straps to the processor, which look like grounding straps. It turned on and the fans went full blast and it would not respond to inputs (Holding the power button wouldn't turn it off). So I had to yank the power cord in order to get it to shut off.


So after redoing my repair, it now turns on and will work. Problems are it will freeze when loading the OS (at the gray screen). So sometimes its multiple boots to get the thing running. Once it fully loads the OS and you reach the log in screen all acts well for the most part. And everything has been functioning like normal. It can stay on for days being functional, right now it has been on for 1.5 days. Anyone have advice on what might have been fried during the first attempt to reboot the rebuilt PC?

Any suggestions to maybe remedy its current operation. Reseting nvram?


I know the common suggestion is going to be just throw it out and get a newer Mac. I am playing to get a macbook or Mac Pro eventually to upgrade to something later than OS X 10.6 but for now im sticking with this one as I have other PC's to use.

Thanks

 

[g-unit1111]

Without having your Mac in front of me, if I had to take a ballpark guess I would say it's most likely a hard drive failure. Do you have any spare HDs or SSDs around?

 

[SKIPPY PB]

Without having your Mac in front of me, if I had to take a ballpark guess I would say it's most likely a hard drive failure. Do you have any spare HDs or SSDs around?

I understand where your coming from I work on cars for a living and its like people asking me whats wrong it does this. Its hard to diagnose without having something to run tests on. That is interesting though. What makes you think it could be the hard drive? It seems to run and load pretty much all my software fine once it boots. To me it seems like a corrupted boot system. Like what would happen on a windows computer, you can re-write the boot.mbc I think its called.

I do have a SSD that I am trying to get Windows 7 loaded onto that im having some trouble with. You could see more in my other thread. However I would be willing to test with that, although I don't have a Mac OS installation disk on hand and im not sure how to go about getting a OS onto a new hard drive.

Further more I have read that the Power Mac G5 uses a special type of hard drive that would not work in a regular PC. Id have to do some more research. All other computers I own are Windows Based PC's. Ive been considering getting some retail OS X disks to attempt a hackintosh project but the prices are damn high.

I was suspecting the processor got cooked. But I will take some pictures that better explain exactly what I did and whats going on later.

 

[g-unit1111]

I understand where your coming from I work on cars for a living and its like people asking me whats wrong it does this. Its hard to diagnose without having something to run tests on. That is interesting though. What makes you think it could be the hard drive?

Because if the operating system loaded correctly before the repair but it is not working after the repair, chances are about 90% that caused something to happen to damage the drive. Mechanical hard drives can fail far more easily than SSDs can and if a drive has lots of platters on it, it's very possible that something happened to the drive. Think of it like a needle throwing a record player off course, and you know what happens there. :lol:

Further more I have read that the Power Mac G5 uses a special type of hard drive that would not work in a regular PC. Id have to do some more research. All other computers I own are Windows Based PC's. Ive been considering getting some retail OS X disks to attempt a hackintosh project but the prices are damn high.

If you're using an Intel based Power Mac then Apple switched all the form factors on the drives, RAM and processor to ATX specifications. Which means that it should accept SATA 3GB/s. The older Power PC based systems might use hard drives that aren't SATA 3GB/s. I would have to look at your system specs to be sure.

I was suspecting the processor got cooked. But I will take some pictures that better explain exactly what I did and whats going on later.

Pretty difficult to fry a processor, Intel or Power PC. Especially if Apple has limitations on how the system's BIOS is accessed. Only by changing the voltages beyond what the system can handle will cause a motherboard to fry a processor.

 

[SKIPPY PB]

I understand where your coming from I work on cars for a living and its like people asking me whats wrong it does this. Its hard to diagnose without having something to run tests on. That is interesting though. What makes you think it could be the hard drive?

Because if the operating system loaded correctly before the repair but it is not working after the repair, chances are about 90% that caused something to happen to damage the drive. Mechanical hard drives can fail far more easily than SSDs can and if a drive has lots of platters on it, it's very possible that something happened to the drive. Think of it like a needle throwing a record player off course, and you know what happens there. :lol:

Further more I have read that the Power Mac G5 uses a special type of hard drive that would not work in a regular PC. Id have to do some more research. All other computers I own are Windows Based PC's. Ive been considering getting some retail OS X disks to attempt a hackintosh project but the prices are damn high.

If you're using an Intel based Power Mac then Apple switched all the form factors on the drives, RAM and processor to ATX specifications. Which means that it should accept SATA 3GB/s. The older Power PC based systems might use hard drives that aren't SATA 3GB/s. I would have to look at your system specs to be sure.

I was suspecting the processor got cooked. But I will take some pictures that better explain exactly what I did and whats going on later.

Pretty difficult to fry a processor, Intel or Power PC. Especially if Apple has limitations on how the system's BIOS is accessed. Only by changing the voltages beyond what the system can handle will cause a motherboard to fry a processor.

I do have a Power Mac G5, its not an intel mac. I do some research myself. Maybe I can find a used hard drive pulled with the files intact. And use it to test with. Either way it seems like I would need an OS X installation disk, since I cant find anything about self repairing the boot system like you can with windows. Swapping the hard drive seems like the best way to test this. I do also see some new hard drives with MAC OS X pre installed on them. Maybe one of those would be a good idea.

Ive now found people saying G5s used SATA HDDs and people saying they used IDEs from the configuration it appeared to be a SATA connection.

Theres no where to get a MAC OS for free now is there? Also would load ubuntu or some other linux software be a good test to do on a spare hard drive?

 

[g-unit1111]

I do have a Power Mac G5, its not an intel mac. I do some research myself. Maybe I can find a used hard drive pulled with the files intact. And use it to test with. Either way it seems like I would need an OS X installation disk, since I cant find anything about self repairing the boot system like you can with windows. Swapping the hard drive seems like the best way to test this. I do also see some new hard drives with MAC OS X pre installed on them. Maybe one of those would be a good idea.

I'd be a bit leery about purchasing those if they're not certified and authorized by Apple. You could get a bogus copy of the software license. There's a lot of shady resellers of parts out there, and I'd contact the seller first before purchasing to make sure the license is legitimate or not.

Ive now found people saying G5s used SATA HDDs and people saying they used IDEs from the configuration it appeared to be a SATA connection.

So is the problem with the type of connection being used? Interesting.

Theres no where to get a MAC OS for free now is there? Also would load ubuntu or some other linux software be a good test to do on a spare hard drive?

Nope, you'd have to contact Apple to get a disc. I'm not sure how Linux would work on non Intel Macs. I've seen instances of people running Ubuntu and Debian on Intel based Macs but I doubt the Power PC architecture would support it.

 

[SKIPPY PB]

Thanks for the head up. I guess I should stop being cheap and fork out some dough for a retailed version. I doubt id get any help from Apple seeing that the computer is so old and out of warranty. Also because im not the original owner I doubt they'd help me be able to not have to buy a newer one.

 

[g-unit1111]

Thanks for the head up. I guess I should stop being cheap and fork out some dough for a retailed version. I doubt id get any help from Apple seeing that the computer is so old and out of warranty. Also because im not the original owner I doubt they'd help me be able to not have to buy a newer one.

Huh I'm not sure if that would be a big deal or not, I haven't owned a Mac in 10 years or so, and I haven't dealt with Apple support in that length of time either, but I don't think that should be a factor in getting the license or not.