Kernel panic at boot from HD, freezing at boot from external media.

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Level 5

4,225 points

Kernel panic at boot from HD, freezing at boot from external media.

I've got a Mac Pro (2008, 2.8 totally stock) here that kernel panics on boot from internal HD, and just gets stuck at the grey screen with Apple logo when booting from USB et al. In either case, there are blue vertical bars on the screen:

Which leads me to suspect the graphics card. But I don't have another graphics card here to test it with, which leads me to the question... how can I troubleshoot this thing?

I tried removing the graphics card and booting the machine with an ethernet cable plugged in to see if I saw the MAC address show up on the network (using ARD), but saw nothing. I'm not sure what that's indicative of though, as I see where maybe these things can't boot without a graphics card?

Other things I've tried:

Reset PRAM - nothing

Reset SMC - nothing

boot in safe mode - strangely, it tried for a lot longer to boot than it normally would, but still kernel panicked.

Any ideas?

Posted on Oct 17, 2013 9:18 AM

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Answer 1

Klaus1

Level 9

52,749 points

Oct 17, 2013 9:26 AM in response to Trey

Something here might throw some light:

What is a Kernel Panic?

http://support.apple.com/kb/TS3742

and http://support.apple.com/kb/TS1892?viewlocale=en_US

http://developer.apple.com/mac/library/technotes/tn2002/tn2063.html

More details here:

http://www.thexlab.com/faqs/kernelpanics.html

Useful articles on how to avoid and eliminate kernel panics here:

http://reviews.cnet.com/8301-13727_7-10344626-263.html?tag=mfiredir

http://www.macworld.com/article/2027201/how-to-troubleshoot-a-kernel-panic.html# tk.nl_mwhelp

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Answer 2

Trey Author

Level 5

4,225 points

Oct 17, 2013 9:51 AM in response to Klaus1

Thanks for the reply, Klaus. I think I've gone over the trouble-shooting mentioned in most of those articles. I can't do any AHT stuff, because the computer won't boot from anything!

I should have mentioned that I did try booting the comptuer removeing and switching the RAM... nuthin'!

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Answer 3

The hatter

Level 9

60,980 points

Oct 17, 2013 12:41 PM in response to Trey

you said 'stock' that means old FBDIMMs and equally old GPU, and probably not really enough RAM.

AHT is not really a system you boot, as a program. And is only on the OEM DVD it came with.

You can pull all the hard drives and run it.

I would pick up 8GB RAM from Amazon for $60.

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Answer 4

Trey Author

Level 5

4,225 points

Oct 19, 2013 11:02 AM in response to The hatter

Thanks for the reply the hatter. I really didn't want to go spend a bunch of money on this computer in case it was like a dead logic board or something. After discovering the diagnostic LEDs this morning, I was able to confirm that the machine was booting without a GPU, so I made a fresh installation of OS X with ARD enabled to verify... and it boots right up.

So I've tried a couple of ATI Radeon X1900s I had around, but none would work, so I guess maybe they're not compatible? I'll see if I can get my hands on a replacement for the nvidia card that came with the machine.

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Answer 5

Oct 19, 2013 2:28 PM in response to Trey

I'll see if I can get my hands on a replacement for the nvidia card that came with the machine.

The smartest replacement for any of these old graphics cards is the Apple-firmware 5770, about US$250. It works in every model Mac Pro and drivers are in 10.6.5 and later.

Buying a refurbished old card is not recommended.

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Answer 6

Trey Author

Level 5

4,225 points

Oct 22, 2013 12:56 PM in response to Grant Bennet-Alder

Thanks for the advice, Grant. I'll order the card ASAP.

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