Early 2008 iMac - Won't stop rebooting

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Level 1

37 points

Early 2008 iMac - Won't stop rebooting

When you turn the computer on, everything looks normal, the apple shows up, then the spinning wheel appears, spins for 15 seconds or so, stops spinning, sits for 30 seconds longer, and then reboots and repeat....

We've tried replacing the hard drive, and the RAM.

The original hard disk works fine, successfuly booted from it on a mac pro.

Last attempt it did not reboot, it's frozen on a screen with apple and frozen wheel.

Any thoughts? Motheroard?

Early 2008 iMac Intel 2.8GHz 24" 6GB Ram 750GB SSD Samsung EV0-840.

Posted on Feb 19, 2014 7:32 PM

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Answer 1

MichelPM

Level 10

80,968 points

Feb 19, 2014 7:35 PM in response to saghi

Where was the RAM purchased from?

Have you tried just booting from an OS X install disc by inserting the disc into the optical drive and holding down the C key at startup?

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Answer 2

saghi Author

Level 1

37 points

Feb 19, 2014 7:49 PM in response to MichelPM

I can't find an OS X disc, but I do have LiveCD disc and was able to boot to that, so maybe there's hope that it's not a hardware issue?

We'll try to get ahold of an OS X CD and do a fresh install.

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Answer 3

MichelPM

Level 10

80,968 points

Feb 19, 2014 8:08 PM in response to saghi

Purchase OS X 10.6 Snow Leopard from here.

http://store.apple.com/us/product/MC573Z/A/mac-os-x-106-snow-leopard

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Answer 4

MichelPM

Level 10

80,968 points

Feb 19, 2014 8:10 PM in response to saghi

When you purchase this install disc, make sure you use the version of the Disk Utility app on that install disc to properly format the hard drive.

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