blue screen after startup and system hangs

Excellent, thanks for confirming that this works, rccharles, I was working towards this solution myself, but I had only disabled a couple of the ATI drivers so far, not all of them. My MacBook Pro's card must have developed some bad RAM, but this allows me to boot normally (aside from the screen having an odd cast or tint). I can't do anything that requires OpenGL, but at least I should be able to get some use out of the computer for the next month or so until I can buy a new Mac (it beats spending $310 for the repair!).

Additional tip: for me, the Extensions and Library folders were locked; I also could not modify them in Single User mode, even though I was root! The solution was to Safe Boot, and use the Terminal to issue the commands:

sudo mkdir /System/Library/Extensions\ \(Disabled\)

sudo mv /System/Library/Extensions/ATI* /System/Library/Extensions\ \(Disabled\)

I was then able to reboot normally.

Edit: Perhaps the reason this topic doesn't show up as readily in Google as it should is that we haven't used enough of the common search terms that people are plugging into Google! For one thing, I was freezing on a gray screen, not a blue one, and Apple's Tech Support article that shows up near the top of Google only refers to it as a gray screen as well.

RCCharles .. thanks for the post .. I follow your advice b/c I was experiencing a "bleed through" or greyed out over lay in some areas. I put the extensions into the folder as you directed and it worked after a restart. I am, however, experiencing an issue with a box of greyed out pixels ( I presume) to the right of my mouse arrow ... note the image below:

^'' '' '' '' '' ''

"" " " " " '

"" " " " " '

"" " " " " '

Do you have a suggestion as to how to fix it? the box i made moves around the screen w/my mouse cursor image ... Thanks in advance

You migh look here:

blue apple > system preferences > universal access > mouse

I suggest posting another questions to ask about the mouse.

Robert

Based on my and others' experiences, that cursor issue is definitely a result of the graphics card failure. I experienced the same issue when booting in Safe Mode, but when I removed all the ATI drivers as previously described, the cursor corruption went away. Not sure why it didn't go away for you too.

Ok, after spending DAYS researching what to do about a G5 iMac that won't boot past the blue screen I have taken the advice of this thread and removed every extension that starts with ATI. I am now finally able to boot the machine, but it seems to be running slowly.

Is there any way to determine if I actually have a video board issue? I've run hardware test, repaired permissions, reloaded the OS, reset the PRAM and the PMU, and done a dozen other things with no result. I also turned off Airport and that didn't help. This is the first thing that has made a difference. I'm surprised this info hasn't been made more readily available to others.

Also, has anyone determined WHICH of the ATI extensions is really causing a concern?

Finally, the instructions call for just pulling the extension out of the folder into another folder. In my experience, this just COPIED the extensions into the other folder. I kept that folder but had to go back to the extension and drag them to the TRASH to actually remove them.

All input is appreciated!

If removing the ATI drivers allows the machine to boot, you almost certainly have a bad card. Those drivers allow the Mac to use the card, so by deleting them, you avoid triggering the defective hardware. As a result of not finding the drivers, OS X then falls back to its software renderer, which is slower than hardware-accelerated graphics. But since your goal was to allow your Mac to start up without crashing, you probably won't benefit from restoring any of the drivers, as they are all designed to work together.

yes Iritscen, am agree with you. I have a imac g5 PPC, and have the same problem. I did copy and paste the driver in another folder, it work and I can boot my imac but the graphic card is not working the same as it has to be. even if you go to system info and see your graphic/ displays info, you can see that the Quartz Extreme is not supported. and if its not supported you cant use iMovie and other programs.

I am trying to find a better way to solve the problem but still no luck, if any one have find any thing plz let us know.

thanks

As with other people replying I used the same procedure to fix a broken GeForce FX 5200 card.

Could not be better for anyone wishing to extend the life of an iMac G5.

As a further life enhancing fix; and if you like watching, for example BBC iPlayer, or any other videos that need the latest Flash player, on an iMac G5 with OSX 10.5.8, watch YouTube for:

Flash Player fix for Mac PPC

Link: http://youtu.be/iCrAKhv3R_c

Combining this Flash player fix, with RRCharles’s broken video card fix, I now have an iMac G5 running 10.5.8 performing the death defying feat of playing live BBC on my iMac G5, with a broken GeForce video card.

How’s that!

Kudos to RRCharles for excellent deduction, the courage to try this and share with the community.

braeburn8, Thanks for the kind comments.

Troubled Imac User: I read some post about reflowing the solder connecting the viedo pins to the logic board. This is way beyond my capabilities. Suggest you try this on some broken board. I'd suspect someother problem than a bad video chip if you do not get a display in safe mode. Seems like some kind of "cabling" problem too me to the video out port.

I also had the problem that I could only boot in the safe mode, or else I would get a blue screen. I removed the ATI files from the Extensions folder, but this alone did not solve the problem. I also removed the GeForce files because I have a NVIDIA card. This allowed me to boot normally. My question is why did this work? and what does this mean about my system?

Glad to hear of your success.

Thanks for your kind words.

Robert

aksCloud: See my second post above. By "bad card" I mean that some of the VRAM, or some other chip, has failed on the graphics card.

You are a savior! I've reinstalled two OS versions already thinking it was a bad install. No where else on the internet gave the solution to my problem! You're a genius!!!

T H A N K Y O U !

Glad you found this discussion. Happy computing.

Robert