Horizontal lines rolling down the right side of my screen, should I be concerned?

Yes ? Maybe I can help you. Yes.....your problems can be fixed, at least I think they can. As to what could be causing the problem....I have my suspicions: and no it's not necessarily age. For the first problem (wired keyboard not recognized) try doing an smc/pmu reset following by zapping pram. Basically for the first one, you shut down your Mac pro, unplug the power cord, hold down the power button on the front for about 45 seconds, let go of it, plug in the power cord, and press the power button to start 'er up. For the second one, hold down Apple, Option, P and R keys on the keyboard for 3 bongs, then let go and let the computer start up as usual. Also, on the logic board behind the video/graphics card is a little coin type battery (BR/CR 2036) which doesn't last forever. at about 6-7 years they start to go bad. that's the easy and cheap part of this fix. The second part is also easy (really easy) but not so cheap. If you go to the apple icon at the top left of your screen, then go to "About this Mac" then system report, it should tell you what graphics card you have in there, or you could shut it down, pull the latch at the back of the case out, take the side panel off and see what kind of graphics card you do have in the x16 slot (the bottom and fastest one). To remove it is easy, once you know the trick, which I'm going to pass on to you now. there's a button by the fan cage at the front of the Mac, press it, and you'll be able to slide the fan cage forward, which will release a little bar down below which keeps the graphics card locked in. You'll also need to undo the two thumbscrews on the side, and remove 'em, and unplug the two power cables going from the graphics card to the logic board. You should now be able to wiggle out the graphics card and remove it. Check it for dust. it may be failing on you, as they do after a length of time (the card, not the Mac pro) , so the only option is replacement. You can probably scare up a stock Mac Pro graphics/video card from somewhere, but I think you can do much better than that. Depending on the OS that's installed on it, you could start with the Sapphire Radeon 7950 Mac version and go up from there, depending on your budget and needs. If you do decide to buy a replacement card, look for one that says on it "supports Mac Pro A-OK". Apple has a rough list of video cards that'll work with Mojave for sure, and some that ought to work OK. Installing a new video card is easy as well, and it may fix your horizontal lines down the right side of your screen problem. If however, you have an Imac, and not a Mac pro, then all the other stuff I wrote before, ignore it.

anyways, hope this helps you

john b

Yes ? Maybe I can help you. Yes.....your problems can be fixed, at least I think they can. As to what could be causing the problem....I have my suspicions: and no it's not necessarily age.

For the first problem (wired keyboard not recognized) try doing an smc/pmu reset following by zapping pram. Basically for the first one, you shut down your Mac pro, unplug the power cord, hold down the power button on the front for about 45 seconds, let go of it, plug in the power cord, and press the power button to start 'er up.

For the second one, hold down Apple, Option, P and R keys on the keyboard for 3 bongs, then let go and let the computer start up as usual. Also, on the logic board behind the video/graphics card is a little coin type battery (BR/CR 2036) which doesn't last forever. at about 6-7 years they start to go bad. that's the easy and cheap part of this fix. The second part is also easy (really easy) but not so cheap.

If you go to the apple icon at the top left of your screen, then go to "About this Mac" then system report, it should tell you what graphics card you have in there, or you could shut it down, pull the latch at the back of the case out, take the side panel off and see what kind of graphics card you do have in the x16 slot (the bottom and fastest one).

To remove it is easy, once you know the trick, which I'm going to pass on to you now. there's a button by the fan cage at the front of the Mac, press it, and you'll be able to slide the fan cage forward, which will release a little bar down below which keeps the graphics card locked in. You'll also need to undo the two thumbscrews on the side, and remove 'em, and unplug the two power cables going from the graphics card to the logic board. You should now be able to wiggle out the graphics card and remove it.

Check it for dust. it may be failing on you, as they do after a length of time (the card, not the Mac pro) , so the only option is replacement.

You can probably scare up a stock Mac Pro graphics/video card from somewhere, but I think you can do much better than that. Depending on the OS that's installed on it, you could start with the Sapphire Radeon 7950 Mac version and go up from there, depending on your budget and needs. If you do decide to buy a replacement card, look for one that says on it "supports Mac Pro A-OK". Apple has a rough list of video cards that'll work with Mojave for sure, and some that ought to work OK. Installing a new video card is easy as well, and it may fix your horizontal lines down the right side of your screen problem.

If however, you have an Imac, and not a Mac pro, then all the other stuff I wrote before, ignore it.

anyways, hope this helps you

john b

EDIT: I could not read the original, because I kept losing my place. So I had to add some blank spaces so that the paragraphs were different shapes and I could visually find my place again and keep reading.

This is great advice!