eMac freezes randomly, open window turns into broken up jibber

Thank you for the head's up in MacTouch. I never would've known I wasn't alone with my emac problem. I roamed other mac sites for more info and almost wish I hadn't. Most disheartening is I thought we'd have some support from other non-emac users, but I was wrong like in

http://forums.macnn.com/showthread.php?t=287974

and

http://www.macworld.com/forums/ubbthreads/showflat.php?Cat=&Board=UBB3&Number=39 4582&page=0&view=collapsed&sb=5&o=&fpart=1

This snotty attitude of powermac users and non-emac users really gets to me. They sure as heck wanted us to band-together outrage and complaints when the G5 imacs had their shoddy component problem, but seems hypocrisy lives in Macdom. I'd expect this uppity attitude from Windows people but not our own kind looking us emac folks down the nose! So I guess the Mac magazines aren't going mention squat about our "poor man" situation. Apple is riding high on the saddle now mostly because of ipods, but when schools start complaining about their emacs caving in that ipod shine's going to dull pretty quick! Will I shell out big bucks to fix my emac or "upgrade" to another Mac? What was it Scotty said -- fool me once same on you, fool me twice shame on me?....

Alex The Screwed



iMac 700 Mac OS X (10.4.5)

Friends,

I believe the problem you are experiencing may be caused by leaking capacitors on the logic board. A relative of mine has a eMac and brought it to me. We replaced the OS, etc. and nothing would clear up our issues. Upon examination we saw 8 swollen caps, with 5 of the 8 leaking. They are 1800 mfd caps. Brown with gold lettering. These caps may be from the same manufacturer that caused a huge issue with several PC motherboard vendors. The end result was a class action law suit where nearly all the motherboard manufacturers paid to fix or replaced the boards. The capacitors were supposedly made using a electrolyte (insulating oil) from a formula that was stolen from a Japanese company and brought by a defecting engineer to China. The problem was that the formula did not include or mention the need for a critical stabilizer. Without the stabilizer, the electrolyte quickly becomes corrosive under the influence of electricity and causes the capacitor to break down and short out. I hope Apple will do the right thing, even though I don't feel they did anything wrong, BUT they are responsible for quality control, etc. Please check your logic board and let me know what you find.

Well, put me on the list of people with this problem. One of the 6 emacs we purchased in june of 2004 has the jibber freeze. At least the fix mentioned with removing the ati extentions seems to be working. I'm gonna give applecare a call and see what they have to say.

Hello again,
I posted up above and I am still sulking-I did remove some of those ATI Extensions- can someone give me a very comprehensive list of what to remove. For now it seems to be working-and I don't understand why. Can someone also explain how an extension can stop a capacitor from leaking?

Regardless-I called APPLE today to share my disappointment and they basically told me I was Out of Luck-Best they could tell me is its a hardware problem...I told them I knew that...they told me to go get it fixed.

This is absolutely disheartening...I don't care if people think EMACS are cheap-as mentioned in the link above....I spent 1600 on mine because we loaded it up with Space and Memory-I am absolutely devastated.

Hello: If your emac is working then you've removed the right ones. As far as fixing a blown capacitor, you have not. From what I understand, removing these extentions stops your computer from accessing the parts of your main board that are damaged.

etherion I think these are the photos you are curios about:

http://www.sells.com/ebay/eMac/1.JPG

http://www.sells.com/ebay/eMac/2.JPG

I am guessing that removing the ATI extensions just cool down the capacitors on the mother board and is only a temporary fix to the jitter problem. I am wondering since the motherboard is presumed toast at this point if the capacitors could be replaced by hand solder efforts? If I remember right there was a fix for an original airport base station that required replacing faulty capacitors.

As for all you eMac owners who feel like the other mac owners are turning your back on you I am here to say that I will be watching this issue closely. I feel you all deserve a break! If these capacitors failed because they were "bootlegs" or a design flaw doesn't matter this is defiantly a ball in Apples court. If nothing else for you non-Apple Care folks they should at least be able to make the repair for around 150 bucks versus 700.

What happens to you eMac owners will affect how I buy my new machine.

On a side note: Powerbook 1400 no Apple Care purchase machines graphics died 14 months after buying. iBook clamshell 466 firewire bought Apple Care never needed it still going strong 4 1/2 years later even after installing myself a 40 GB drive and 512 MB on unsupported RAM

G4 custom everything Mac OS X (10.4.5) iBook Clamshell firewire 466

Hello

I guess i am not alone with this problem. I have bought my emac on august 2004 and now its been 2weeks that I have this problem. What happens is that I have lots of jiber on the sceans when my computer freezes. I happened when i open mail, safari, and sometimes randomly. I have called apple's tech support for some help. Since i am out of warrenty it cost me 49$. With the tech support I have been doing disk utiliy (reparing permissions + repairing disk). I have also been told to empty the cash and that was it for the first call. I tried my computer, seemed to go well for one hour and bang! it froze again with that jiber. On my own I ran disk warrior on it. Rebooted and 20 minutes later it happened again. After I brought the emac at my friends house and his mother restarted the PR ram 7 times, reformated my hard drives with zeros and reinstalled mac OS 10.3. It did the same, plus now i could not boot on to osX because it froze on entering my personnal info. I explained my problem to apple and they told me that it was a hardware problem and I was out of warranty, and I should go to an apple rep in my region (Ottawa-Gatineau), so I was on my own. I brought the computer to this guy. He did a BATTERY of tests lots of them and realy did more work for what I was gonna pay him for. He used multiple test utilities and it came to one option the logicboard. now its 170$ no repair done. I informed myself how would cost a logic board for my emac model and the price range was 450 to 700$ (parts only!).

I own a 2004 Emac
1.25 GHZ
80 gig hard drive
32meg videocard
SuperDrive
Airport express
3 USB 2.0 Ports
2 Firewire 400Mps Ports

I am not the only one with this problem! I wonder what will apple do about it ? Are we the ones responsible for the problem even if we passed warranty time? Does the computer whas supposed to be good for about two years or less ? Should we pay for a defect motherboard made by the manyfacturer ? I dont think so!

It would be great if all of you would e-mail me at this email yan_boily@sympatico.ca and maybe we could find a solution to this problem.

Thank you!




Emac Mac OS X (10.3.9)

I would suggest that you (and any others who have not yet done so) contact Apple's Customer Relations and tell them your problem. Perhaps if you are polite but insistent that this is an unacceptable problem that is going to do long-term damage to Apple's reputation, then eventually they will admit the problem and do something to correct it.

There is no question in my mind that this is Apple's problem to correct, but they will continue to deny that it is really an issue until enough people complain. You can even try complaining to MacHome and MacWorld, but I've found them even less responsive than Apple. They are pretty much in Apple's back pocket.

I haven't had the 'jibber' problem, not since I gave up drinking, but the **** (oh dear, not allowed to write ****, **** it! I'll be ******, if this isn't a **** Sunday school, or what) freeze ups have been getting worse for weeks. I won't repeat what has already been said about the problem and our seemingly vain efforts to effect a cure, suffice to say we are all in the same boat, which might be weirdly comforting.
I have been checking the Japanese forums about this issue, but have found almost no discussion of the problem. However, many eMac owners have reported screen problems after having the mother board replaced, so I guess those replacements were due to similar operational issues; but most Japanese will willingly pay up without question, or just move on to the latest model (or Windows).
According to my wife, who is a director of a high tech electronic components manufacturer, manufacturers worldwide have a liability beyond their standard warranty period for components such as mother boards (which is probably why Apple are being so cagey on the subject). In fact, the mother board is almost the last thing that should go. I've had my eMac for just two years, many of you for less than that, and it is not acceptable for Apple to sit back while we put right their mistakes out of our own pockets.
The longer Apple leave this issue unresolved, greater is the chance of a localised class action compelling them to compensate customers, and given that many of us use our machines in making a living, such compensation could amount to much more than the simple cost of recalling defective mother boards.
I am amazed this thread has reached such epic proportions without Apple taking more positive action to investigate an obviously commonly shared problem.
After contacting Apple Care Japan I am told that there is a flat rate, all inclusive charge for repair (Y50k, approx. 500US) irrespective of type of fault, which kind of suggest to me that Apple know exactly what kind of fault is likely to turn up. It was also apparent that Apple Japan were well aware of the mother board issue, but at the same time seem to deny there is an issue to be addressed. Familiar stuff.
Well, I do not know yet how Apple might respond to more dogged complaining, but complain I will, and loudly, for this is a passive and tolerant society not used to hostile consumer ranting (maybe they'll compromise just to see my back). If all else fails, I may create a web site devoted to this single issue (a tactic I have used previously and successfully to 'encourage' errant service providers to take responsibility for their inadequacies).
I am not anti-Apple as a result of this situation, not yet anyway, but I am very disappointed and a lot less inclined to trust their products. I have a dear little orange iBook, the first of its kind, keys dropping off, power cord all patched and taped, but when I start it up, it runs just as fresh as a daisy. Six years old, never been serviced and its only defects the result of a lifetime of physical abuse. Now, that's Apple.

eMac (1GHz) Mac OS X (10.3.9) 640MB SDRAM

eMac (1GHz) Mac OS X (10.3.9) 640MB SDRAM

Freaky Fridge:

I am not anti-Apple as a result of this situation,
not yet anyway, but I am very disappointed and a lot
less inclined to trust their products. I have a dear
little orange iBook, the first of its kind, keys
dropping off, power cord all patched and taped, but
when I start it up, it runs just as fresh as a daisy.
Six years old, never been serviced and its only
defects the result of a lifetime of physical abuse.

I have my sick eMac's files backed up on my Performa 6320 -- which hasn't missed a beat since 1996 when I got it, and before my eMac it was on 24/7! Remember how folks used to snigger at Performas? I also have a beat up PowerBook 190 which outside a power socket problem runs just A-Ok. None of my older machines knows what the inside of a repair shop looks like -- except my eMac if Apple does the right responsible thing. Your post's points were extremely informative and if there's a class action suit pending I want to be in the front row if not launch one myself. I am genuinely p.i.s.s.e.d because indications are that Apple KNEW these eMacs were tainted with corrupted capacitors since the iMac G5 debacle and let them ship anyway, knowing they'd fail outside the warranty and that (?) relatively less eMac users grab AppleCare compared other models. I sincerely think Apple believes this will all "blow over" because they're riding high hog due the iPod, but they've another thing coming from this dude. I wonder whether Apple abruptly cancelled the eMac so they'd a backlog of motherboards to patch their reputation in addressing all the schools who'll soon be experiencing dying eMacs. As I said, swear on the bible, if Apple expects me to cough up the dough to fix their design flaw, I'll "upgrade" to a Dell laptop and won't look back. They need to know that not all eMac users are automatically Mac product upgrade cattle.

James Greenidge

From MacAddict emac forum

Re: EMac: Do I really need another new logic board?

***** to them and get it replaced for free. Threaten to sue. That is unacceptable.

#8 2006-01-16 1:12 pm

cpellett

Member

Registered: 2004-07-10

E-mail PM

Re: EMac: Do I really need another new logic board?

Ironhawk - holding down the mouse button does nothing either. Try as I might, that installation disk stays put, the computer boots straight up to it, and my mouse and keyboard appear to be nonfunctional when I try to navigate through the menus.

Thanks for the info. There was only a 3-month warranty on the part replaced in June, and it's been 6 months. Back about a week after I had it replaced and got it back from the shop, it started freezing upon waking up. The manual restarts led to constant kernel panicking. I called the Apple store and they said I'd have to call Apple Care. By now my computer was off warranty, so I paid $49 for 3 people in 5 days to trry to fix it. Not even erase and install fixed the freezing on wake, so I set my computer to never put the hard drive to sleep. An aside: I told all 3 Apple Care people about the newly replaced logic board and point blank asked if that could be the problem. They mostly ignored it. Maybe it wasn't, but if I'd gotten an inkling it was, I'd have toted it back. But who has time to lug a 50-lb eMac to the store every three weeks?

I did call Apple and got Paco Cortez, supervisor of repairs. I was told I should have gotten Apple Care and my only choice is to pay them the $700 to fix it or get a new computer. He played semantics with me - "The logic board didn't fail twice in six months, It was replaced after one year, then diagnsed as needing to be replaced 6 months later." He was rude and unhelpful and refused to admit any wrongdoing or dropping of the ball on the part of Apple. He also refused to give me his supervisors name and repeated attempts to reach anyone above him have been stonewalled by various operators.

Sorry to rant, but I'm so fed up. I'm taking it to an authorized reseller nearby that my friend has used for repairs before to get a second opinion. I realize some of this on me as personal responsibilty, but truthfully I've been less than impressed with Apple's repair and support services.

Thanks for listening, and the advice. You've all been really helpful!





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iMac 700 Mac OS X (10.4.5)

I don't think this has anything to do with your failing with regards to 'personal responsibility'. Why the holy **** should we have to pay $150 for AppleCare to ensure that a design flaw - a design flaw that they've recognized and have subsequently offered to fix for free on the iBooks, might I add - can be fixed?! If we're sold a defective piece of equipment which has failed because of something that Apple did (namely, put in a piece of defective equipment), then Apple should fix it. This is a failing on Apple's part, not yours or mine or anyone else who happened to purchase a computer, thinking that it would actually perform as claimed by Apple.


ibook Mac OS X (10.3.6)

Spotted at Macfixit.com March 10, 2006

Late-breakers@macfixit.com
eMac logic board failures ...
eMac logic board failures

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Late-Breakers
Friday, March 10 2006 @ 08:30 AM PST
eMac logic board failures (#3): More reports
We continue to report on failure of the logic boards in some eMacs. eMac models introduced in 2004 appear to be the most commonly afflicted.

The problem generally starts with series of system-wide freezes -- not kernel panics or unexpected applications quits, but rather incidents where the cursor freezes and any operations grind to a halt; and/or visual distortion on the display.

One reader writes:

"I also have repaired numerous eMacs with the capacitor problem. This is the same issue as the G5 iMac and the PC motherboards but so far there has been no response from Apple in regards to this. While Applecare is fine when purchasing one or two machines when you are part of an organization that purchases thousands of computers putting Applecare on each and every one is not an option. Hopefully Apple will see the light and start crediting for repairs done as they did with the video problems on the iBooks a couple of years ago."

Jeramey Valley adds:

"We also have numerous eMacs with the described symptoms: random hard freeze/lock up. Same purchase time frame, summer of 2004. Logic boards have the blown capacitors, we are in process of repairing, notifying Apple (to hopefully get a repair extension program rolling, we have a couple hundred of this vintage eMac) and documenting. Serial range for one lab is: G8425 **** through G8427 ****. Hopefully Apple will address and resolve this shortly."

Feedback? Late-breakers@macfixit.com.

Previous coverage:

eMac logic board failures (#2): AppleCare reminder; Blown capacitors
eMac logic board failures





eMac logic board failures (#3): More reports | 1 comments | Create New Account
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eMac logic board failures (#3): More reports
Authored by: raneil2 on Friday, March 10 2006 @ 02:48 PM PST
I purchased 4 new eMacs (1.25 Ghz, combo-drive) in August 2004. Until about a month ago, they all worked perfectly. But now 3 of them have started hanging up randomly. No kernel panics. Occasionally, the hang-ups will be immediately preceded by obvious display corruption, and with one machine, the symptoms were preceded by several days with flickering "dots" or very short (say, 10 pixels or so) dark lines that intermittently flickered all over the screen. The problem certainly appears to be display-related.

I've taken two of them in for repair (two different shops). In both cases, the logic board was declared bad, with no further details made available, even upon request. One machine was repaired at my expense, the other I declined to have repaired because the technician claims that Apple refused to exchange the motherboard and so he wanted nearly $600 for a replacement (non-exchange) motherboard and another $100.00 for labor.

Since then, I discovered this thread. I now intend to contact Apple about the problem and add my 3 eMacs to the list of complaints. Hopefully, we can generate enough noise about this to get Apple to do something equitable about it.


---
Rick Neil
Grapevine, TX
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They can't dismiss us forever!


Catherine


emac Mac OS X (10.3.4)

Well, I'm sad to report that I have the same problem with three different eMacs. My post to MacFixit is included above, but I feel compelled to add my voice to the chorus here anyway. Hopefully, something productive will come of this thread for everyone affected.

I purchased four eMacs (1.25 Ghz) in August, 2004 from a local CompUSA. Three of them have begun showing the symptoms described in detail throughout this thread. It's eerie reading so many posts that so accurately describe what my machines are doing... clearly these are not isolated incidents. I can only wonder how long it will be until the 4th one starts doing the same thing.

Having read all of this, I will definitely gather the serial numbers Monday when I return to the office and call Apple. I have already paid to have one machine fixed (motherboard replacement), but I will experiment with removing the ATI drivers as described above on the other 2 and report back. If that fails, I will absolutely open the two other machines and look for visibly bad capcitors. Judging from the pictures referenced above, it looks as thought it MIGHT be possible to simply replace them. Has anyone attmepted this? Does anyone know if the motherboad is a multi-layer board?

Will advise.


G5/2.7 DP, iMac G5, multiple eMac g4s, powerbooks Mac OS X (10.4.4)

G5/2.7 DP, iMac G5, multiple eMac g4s, powerbooks Mac OS X (10.4.4)

Well, I'm sad to report that I have the same problem
with three different eMacs. My post to MacFixit is
included above, but I feel compelled to add my voice
to the chorus here anyway. Hopefully, something
productive will come of this thread for everyone
affected.

I'm not holding my breath.

I am, however, putting out the word with every post I make to Apple's discussion fora. (See below.)

I purchased four eMacs (1.25 Ghz) in August, 2004
from a local CompUSA.

Doomed. Doomed, doomed, I say.

Three of them have begun
showing the symptoms described in detail throughout
this thread. It's eerie reading so many posts that
so accurately describe what my machines are doing...
clearly these are not isolated incidents. I can only
wonder how long it will be until the 4th one starts
doing the same thing.

Mine went from behaving perfectly to dead meat in under two weeks.

Having read all of this, I will definitely gather the
serial numbers Monday

Prediction: somewhere in the G8429 to G8439 sequence.

when I return to the office and
call Apple.

Good luck. Do you need the number for Customer Relations? I posted it upthread somewhere.

I have already paid to have one machine
fixed (motherboard replacement), but I will
experiment with removing the ATI drivers as described
above on the other 2 and report back. If that
fails, I will absolutely open the two other machines
and look for visibly bad capcitors. Judging from the
pictures referenced above, it looks as thought it
MIGHT be possible to simply replace them. Has anyone
attmepted this? Does anyone know if the motherboad
is a multi-layer board?

It seems to be a triple-layer wave-soldered board. You're not going to be able to just yank the caps.

Will advise.


G5/2.7 DP, iMac G5,
multiple eMac g4s, powerbooks Mac OS X (10.4.4)

G5/2.7 DP,
iMac G5, multiple eMac g4s, powerbooks Mac OS
X (10.4.4)