just got an ibook 12" g4 july 2005 that keeps telling me to restart, when I restart the report thats sent to apple says uncorrectable machine check amongst other stuff...but it keeps on telling me to restart,does this mean the machine is useless, i have t

Question

Level 1

0 points

just got an ibook 12" g4 july 2005 that keeps telling me to restart, when I restart the report thats sent to apple says uncorrectable machine check amongst other stuff...but it keeps on telling me to restart,does this mean the machine is useless, i have t

I just acquired a 12" ibook g4 july 2005 model, when it boots up on OS tiger or leopard it gives me an instruction in 3 languages to perform a restart...when I do that if it reaches the main screen there is a window for a report to apple, when I look at the details of that report it starts with 'uncorrectable machine check' then lots of other stuff ...so I send the report but sooner or later it tells me to perform a restart again, the longest I have had it running is with leopard which it came with when it was bought & that was for two hours before the restart instruction comes back again...I cleaned off the leopard system & put a clean install of Tiger 10.4 but the problem is persistent and worse...the machine can't be used with any reliability...does this mean it is defunct and totally past a useful life? or is there some action to correct this malfunction? this is my introduction to apple computers & so far not so good...unless I can get the machine to work as it should.

any relevant suggestions would be very useful...thanks nicmeh

iBook, Mac OS X (10.4), 12" model from july 2005

Posted on Apr 26, 2014 2:32 AM

Reply

Answer 1

dalstott

Level 4

2,639 points

Apr 26, 2014 9:29 AM in response to nicmeh

Sounds like a kernel panic. See links for things to try.

http://support.apple.com/kb/ts3742

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

http://macs.about.com/od/usingyourmac/qt/Troubleshooting-Os-X-Kernel-Panics.htm

Reply

Answer 2

K Shaffer

Level 8

36,112 points

Apr 26, 2014 9:57 AM in response to nicmeh

The machine could be repaired by a company that does circuit board re-soldering, since it is possible a heat-flex solder break on the main board may have caused either the processor or graphics chips to lose connection and that could manifest itself in a few somewhat documented ways.

There is an on-board RAM chip that may also have something to do with a kernel panic, if it no longer is functioning correctly; that is the non-removable one soldered on the board you never usually worry about.

Companies such as powerbookmedic, wegenermedia, and others can take in portable macs of vintage or newer (contact them for details on what they do, and how they accept work orders) for repair and can fix most anything; and have a parts inventory. Modern repair workstations allow the equipped service company to fix complex issues and they do troubleshooting. Sometimes the cost is less than a replacement logic board.

The links above may help isolate the general cause of a kernel panic. There are other articles in Support database including a deeper look into them.

•Technical Note TN2063: Understanding & Debugging Kernel Panics

https://developer.apple.com/library/mac/technotes/tn2063/_index.html

•Resolving Kernel Panics - The X Lab:

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

•Troubleshooting Kernel Panics:

http://www.thexlab.com/faqs/kernelpanics.html#Anchor-Troubleshooting-49575

Usually the issue is caused by hardware, especially if there is an indication of machine failure in the crash log or other screen image text.

A working last model MacBook (mid-2010) would be a better 'first mac' to have.

Hopefully you can sort it out.

If not, there likely are fair parts in it.

Good luck & happy computing! 🙂

Reply