The computer may have suffered some damages due to static on removal/installation
of the 1024MB RAM chip, or it may be the chip you had was not supported by the
iBook G4 14-inch 933MHz model. If the RAM chip came from a PC model and is of
known-poor quality or not-compatible with Macintosh, that could also contribute to this.
Built-in Memory 128 MB
Maximum Memory 1.12 GB
Memory Slots 1 - PC-2100 DDR266 200-pin SO-DIMM
(PC-2700 supported; however it will run at only 266 MHz)
{specs according to http://mactracker.ca database}
Without knowing more about other details, including the RAM if damages or incorrect,
there isn't much to say at this point. Given the 512MB chip appeared to work again
once placed back into the computer, says at least the RAM slot and connections there
seem to be working still.
If the system's own Disk Utility can't repair disk permissions, try the booted OS X install
DVD or discs that were used to install the current system; you can 'repair disk' and also
'repair permissions' from the booted OS X installer's menu options. And be sure to choose
the correct option there for restart from the DVD, to have the computer boot from the HDD.
Did you try resetting the PRAM? •About NVRAM and PRAM
On a lesser item, for more general purpose, did you see if a PMU reset may help?
•Resetting PowerBook and iBook Power Management Unit (PMU)
Sometimes information about the system can be found in the Console utility, and in
places such Crash reports, as well as by Date, and Time, odd behavior can be seen
by specific kinds of activity recorded in those Console Logs. Also, System Profiler
has access to some of those logs (from 'about this mac' and 'more info'.)
If the chip was for a way different model Apple portable, then it would not work at
all and could damage the logic board among other things, by the way.
In any event... hopefully it will still work OK.
Good luck & happy computing! 🙂
