Power Mac ONLY boots in safe mode

1,1 Power mac. running os 10.6.8. i use it for my pro tools system. Ran fine for years. Then one day screen flickered, computer froze, and I've yet to be able to restart it EXCEPT in safe mode. Did all the basics, including target disc mode where i ran diagnostics and it tells me the drives are fine. Brought it to a tech who said they too could only get it to boot in safe mode using their startup disc. So at this point we are assuming something in the processor is shot. Any thoughts? If this is true I'll just buy a later version of a power mac and swap in the drives and cards. I don't think this should pose any issue up to mid 2010 computers, but any insight appreciated.

Or can I send this out to get it upgraded?

Posted on Jan 3, 2020 11:43 AM

Top-ranking reply

Grant Bennet-Alder

Level 10

140,249 points

Posted on Jan 3, 2020 5:54 PM

If it's not "something you added, the other thing that could take out your Mac's ability to show a good display is a display card that works in the "simple mode" (without the accelerated display drivers) used in Safe Mode, but does not work in regular Mode.

In that case, the thing to be doing is one of:

• Trust that your Mac is working, other than accelerated display. All indications are that it working, just won't display properly.

upgrade in Safe mode if you want to upgrade.

• start searching for a new display card.

drivers for the very well behaved Apple-firmware 5770 are in 10.6.5 or later. The GT120 is also a simple and reliable card, but not very strong if you need video editing.

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Power Mac ONLY boots in safe mode

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