Perplexed By My iMac

Question

Perplexed By My iMac

I have been battling with my wife's iMac for about a week, and I think I've come to the end of the road of what I am capable of fixing.

First we were getting a grey screen on and off at start up, lagging,etc. Then it would boot at all. I booted with Disk Warrior CD, and ran it, which resulted in a temporary fix for a day.

Then it was back to the grey screen and no booting.

I removed the Hard Drive, backed everything up, and ran a Disk Utility and a Disk Warrior on it, and it came back as good to go.

I put the Hard Drive back into her machine, and now I don't get anything on startup. No grey screen, just the fan kicking on and a couple clicks.

To me, it sounds like something isn't engaging on startup.

Thoughts? Hardware? Motherboard? Time for a new machine?

Aaryn

Posted on Feb 16, 2012 7:02 AM

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Answer 1

Allan Jones

Level 9

78,740 points

Feb 16, 2012 7:48 AM in response to Aaryn Bechard

Thoughts?

They would come easier if you posted the iMac variant (or at least the processor type from "About this Mac") and what OS version it is running. The iMac name goes back to1998 and each model is different from the next with different potential hardware issues

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Answer 2

Feb 16, 2012 7:55 AM in response to Allan Jones

Allan, I understand the lineage of the iMac, but without being able to boot the machine, it tends to be a little difficult to be more specific than it is running OS 10.4 and it is a pre-Intel flatscreen model (not a half moon).

Aaryn

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Answer 3

Allan Jones

Level 9

78,740 points

Feb 16, 2012 10:30 AM in response to Aaryn Bechard

it is a pre-Intel flatscreen model (not a half moon)

OK. from your original post I thought you could get it to turn of just long enough to grab "About this Mac." My apologies for misinterprting that info.

Your description fits a G5 iMac and they can't run higher than 10.5.8, so you're nicely narrowed the field. When Disk Warrior seemed to help, can you recall what find of errors it reported? Did you make sure the data cable was still seated when you buttoned up the computer after removing it? I fought that issue on an older Mac whose data cable was short--it tended to lift slightly during the wrap-up of reassembly. Took two days to figure out, so I had to ask.

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Answer 4

Feb 16, 2012 11:28 AM in response to Allan Jones

Allan, thanks for getting back to me again. Disk Warrior didn't reveal any errors.

When you say the data cable, which one are you referring to? There are the 2 that plug into the hard drive, but is there another one I should be looking at? Hopefully you can save me 2 days of looking.

Aaryn

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Answer 5

Feb 17, 2012 10:07 PM in response to Aaryn Bechard

Allan, I've tried this.....

http://support.apple.com/kb/HT2173

...... and I'm having the same results. I even tried it with a completely different hard drive, and had the same results.

LED 2 light stays on and does not go out. To me, it still sounds like something isn't engaging on startup. The fan fires up, and the hard rive begins to spin, but nothing else.

What can I deduce from these results?

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Answer 6

Allan Jones

Level 9

78,740 points

Feb 18, 2012 8:54 AM in response to Aaryn Bechard

Aaryn wrote:

When you say the data cable, which one are you referring to

The one that I fought was the ribbon cable on an ATA/IDE drive, but I now see that only the very first G5 iMacs had the ATA drive interface, so that's probably not the issue.

Apparently, the #2 LED being on is good. This article is about the plague of bad capacitors in G5 iMacs, but has extended info on whet the four LEDs indicate:

http://jimwarholic.com/2008/07/how-to-repair-apple-imac-g5.php

While the back is off, you might want to check for bad caps.

I'm better with the G3 and G4 iMacs so I'm quickly running out of ideas here. I hoping someone with more G5 experience can jump in.

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