Old mac desktop will not turn on

There is a very good chance the PRAM battery has gone dead and needs to be replaced. I would recommend taking it to your local independent Apple Authorized Service Provider to have that fixed if you want to continue using the computer.

However, if you are done with the computer then simply open the computer and remove the HD and put it into an enclosure. Then connect the enclosure to your current Mac and recover your photos.

Opening the old Mac will take about 10-15 minutes and removing the HD, putting it into an enclosure and connecting it to another Mac another 15 minutes at the most. Below are the links you need:

• To open and access the HD on a 21.5" 2011 iMac click https://eshop.macsales.com/installvideos/imac-21-mid-2011-hd/
• To open and access the HD on a 27" 2011 iMac click https://eshop.macsales.com/installvideos/imac_mid27_2011_hd/
• The enclosure I'd recommend please click https://eshop.macsales.com/item/OWC/ME3NH7T00/

Total cost is about $50 for the project.

Maybe, enb5353, could you give us( and me) more info please, like a model number+year/type/kind of Mac ( if you can find one), the model number starts with “A” then 4 numbers/digits… you can also look it up at everymac.com and it’ll tell you what you have… I ( we) have very little info to go on, so I ( we ) can’t help you… you could start out by resetting the smc/pmu followed by 3-4 pram zaps on startup, here’s how : https://www.macworld.com/article/224955/how-to-reset-a-macs-nvram-pram-and-smc.html… if you have a Mac Pro tower, then the cmos/pram battery is on the backplane behind the video/graphics card, it lasts for 5 years, it goes in + side up, either a br-2032 or cr-2032 will do, it’s easy to replace, so do so… if you have an iMac, it has a battery which is hard to replace, eg average user can’t do it so you’d have to take it in…

John B