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G5 Snow Leopard (10.6.8): stubborn freeze / BBOD / SWOD

Hi Mac-Elves


I'm new here, and really hoping someone can help...


I've been running Snow Leopard 10.6.8 on my G5 iMac (20 inch, 2008), and after 7 years of pretty much trouble-free performance, yesterday it finally gave up. I now have the spinning beachball/ pizza thing, and have tried everything I can think of to sort it out - to no avail.


The preamble...

I have been getting the spinning pizza/BBOD increasingly of late. I had cleared a bunch of space on the Hard Drive (35gb free on a 320Gb disc), but had been thinking I might increase the RAM from the current 4Gb to the 6Gb that online posters seem to say my set-up could handle.

I had also been planning to buy another external hard drive, and configure TimeMachine. Full disclosure: I have been foolish, and not done this before.


- about a week ago I installed LittleSnitch.

- a few minutes before it went pear-shaped, I had set up a new WIFI profile, having had to change broadband provider recently (I know this new provider works OK as I'm using it to write this on an old work-related Windows Vista laptop!).

- I ran Ookla Speedtest to see what speed I was getting (not bad: about 14Mb download)

- The speedtest then crashed: I got a message saying that the browser (Waterfox) Flash plugin had crashed

- I noticed that my Waterfox was unresponsive, so hit Command+Option+Esc to open Force Quit Applications

- Watched in horror as for the first time ever, all applications progressively became unresponsive (including Finder) over about 1 minute.

- I did a force-shutdown on the machine, then restarted it.

- It booted up to my usual home screen, and seemed OK. Finder seemed to run, and allow me explore folders; Expose worked, and the hidden dock appeared/disappeared as usual when moused-over, LittleSnitch Network Monitor (top right of screen) seemed to be working. However, the GoogleDrive icon in the top menu bar remained 'preparing to sync', and eventually... spinning pizza/BBOD.

- Also: if I tried to open an application, or even a simple document (eg Text Edit) straight away... spinning pizza/BBOD.


I am not particularly techie, but by pushing through the comfort barrier I think I have narrowed it down to a software problem, by doing the following:


Apple Hardware Test:

I found the relevant utility disc, and ran this by pressing 'D' during start-up.

The very first (quick) test gave me a "4MOT/4/40000003: HDD-13**" message. Stupidly, I forgot to note this full message down at the time, so can't remember the last 2 digits). I've found out that this suggests a Hard-drive fan motor problem.

I then ran 4 extended tests, and 2 more quick ones, hoping to get further clarification. In fact, every time, it reported no issues at all!

???


Disc Utility

I then booted from the Snow Leopard installation disk,(pressed 'C' during start-up) and ran the Disc Utility programme. I verified my main hard disk, and it came back with the recommendation to repair what seemed to be 4 missing files. I ran the repairs and got a 'repairs completed' message.

Tried to then boot from the main Hard Drive - with the same outcome as above (booted to usual home screen, seemed OK, Finder seemed to run, tried to open an application, or even a simple document: spinning pizza/BBOD).


I then booted from the Snow Leopard installation disk again,ran the Disc Utility programme, and verified the Hard Disk Permissions. It came back with the recommendation with quite a few to repair. I Repaired the Disk Permissions, and it seemed to work through all the problems successfully.

The only exception was in relation to one message from the Verify Disc Permissions stage:

"Warning: SUID file "System/Library/CoreServices/RemoteManagement/ARDAgent.app/Contents/MacOS/ARDAg ent" has been been modified and will not be repaired.

This was the only permission exception that it stated it had not repaired.

I then ran Verify Permissions again, expecting this to be the only issue - but they had all reverted back to the same state as before the repair.

???


Anyway: rebooted from the main hard drive, with the usual problem (booted to usual home screen, seemed OK, Finder seemed to run, tried to open an application, or even a simple document: spinning pizza/BBOD).


Safe Mode

I then tried to boot in Safe Mode (pressed 'Shift' during start-up). Took a while (seems to be ecpected), entered my profile password when asked, and got the standard desktop (minus my usual wallpaper). Click on a folder... and got the spinning pizza/BBOD. Ie, Finder not working properly. NB: up until this stage, I had been getting my own desktop wallpaper; at this stage that disappeared, replace with the default.


'Cleared the 'P-Ram'

I then booted from the Hard Drive holding Command+Option+P+R to (apparently) clear the 'P-Ram': got the expected double boot-up sound, but it made no difference in the end: got the usual desktop (deafulat wallpaper) and after a couple of minutes, the BBOD.


Other info:

I don't currently have access to another Mac, but could probably borrow a Macbook from a friend

I didn't have the G5 configured for remote access, and obviously now am unable to access either Terminal or Console

I am kind of at the limit of my tech knowhow; am not familiar with command line anyway (Used Terminal to force eject discs in the past, but that's it!)


Question: Is there anything more I can realistically do to resolve what appears to be a software problem?


Am assuming that if I can get hold of another Mac, I can connect mine to it in 'target disk mode', route my data through the other onto a new external hard drive, and then reinstall Snow Leopard on mine from the original disks. The upgrade to 10.6.8 then seems to be a free download from Apple.com

I would then seriously consider buying the extra 2GB RAM, to take mine up to 6GB total( 1x2GB and 1 X4GB ), and then upgrade to a newer version of OSX...


I know I've learned the hard way about backing-up... But I'm hoping, if you've read this far, that you might be able to offer some advice - in which case thanks in advance!



G5 spec:

iMac 8.1

(G5, 2008, 20 inch)

OS: Snow Leopard 10.6.8

CPU: Intel Core Duo

CPU speed: 2.66Ghz

L2 CPU cache (shared): 6MB

Boot ROM version: IM81.88Z.00C1.b00.0802091538


RAM:

2 x 1GB RAMs replaced at purhase with the following:

DIMMo/BANK0 2GB 800MHz 256x64M-80F

DIMM1/BANK1 2GB 800MHz 256x64M-80F

iMac, Mac OS X (10.6.8)

Posted on Apr 27, 2016 7:14 AM

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Posted on Apr 27, 2016 8:04 AM

First a G5 is a IBM PowerPC CPU processor. You have an intel processor. So technically you DO NOT have a G5 iMac. Also Snow Leopard 10.6 does not run on PowerPC CPUs.


4MOT/4/40000003 HDD-13** is either a failing disk drive or a fan to cool the disk drive.


Giving the age of your iMac, and the slow performance, even in Safe mode, I would suspect the disk drive is failing.


I would strongly suggest you make sure you have up-to-date backups and keep them backed up. Even better maintain 2 separately generated backups to be safe.


Make an Apple Store Genius Bar appointment (free), or an Authorized Apple Service center appointment and see about having your iMac evaluated. It may come down to replacing the disk or just deciding it is time to replace the iMac with a newer model (much more expensive, but you get a lot more Mac a the same time).

8 replies
Question marked as Best reply

Apr 27, 2016 8:04 AM in response to fleepishUK

First a G5 is a IBM PowerPC CPU processor. You have an intel processor. So technically you DO NOT have a G5 iMac. Also Snow Leopard 10.6 does not run on PowerPC CPUs.


4MOT/4/40000003 HDD-13** is either a failing disk drive or a fan to cool the disk drive.


Giving the age of your iMac, and the slow performance, even in Safe mode, I would suspect the disk drive is failing.


I would strongly suggest you make sure you have up-to-date backups and keep them backed up. Even better maintain 2 separately generated backups to be safe.


Make an Apple Store Genius Bar appointment (free), or an Authorized Apple Service center appointment and see about having your iMac evaluated. It may come down to replacing the disk or just deciding it is time to replace the iMac with a newer model (much more expensive, but you get a lot more Mac a the same time).

Apr 28, 2016 3:00 AM in response to BobHarris

Many thanks for the reply BobHarris. I will definitely make sure about the backups from now on, whatever the outcome of this current mess.

If,as you think, it's the Hard Drive failing: would the Hardware Test not detect that?

If it is the drive failing, would the 'target disk mode' plan be a waste of time? Ie, the same problems likely to occur?

Also: I've read somewhere about removing an (internal) hard drive and mounting it externally. Do you know if this is possible? And would this suffer the same problems?

Thanks again.

Apr 28, 2016 5:58 AM in response to fleepishUK

4MOT/4/40000003 HDD-13** is either a failing disk drive or a fan to cool the disk drive.

I got this information from Google, which can give mixed results. But if it a fan for your disk, then your disk could also be starting to fail as running too hot will not do it any good.


The problem with modern disks is that they do a lot of work inside that is not reported to the operating system. If they have a problem reading a sector they will retry. They may retry hundreds of times, and if they succeed, then just give the OS the data requested and wait for the next request. If you have enough reties on a regular basis, you are going to have really snow performance anytime the OS wants to access anything on the disk.


In any case you should have someone look at your iMac. They have test software that regular users do not, and the training to understand what it is saying.


If you think you also have a software issue as well affecting performance, then that could be 3rd party additions. If you want to post the EtreCheck output, someone can look at it and tell you if they see anything out of the ordinary.

<https://discussions.apple.com/docs/DOC-6174>

<http://etrecheck.com>


but seriously, get the hardware looked at.

Apr 29, 2016 1:37 AM in response to BobHarris

OK; as recommended I've dropped it off at a local Mac repair specialist. They seem to think they can retrieve the data from the Hard Drive, and I've agreed to replacing the shipped 320GB SATA drive with a 480GB SSD drive, and upgrading to El Capitan. I'd been putting this off because Snow Leopard always seemed fine, plus I was a regular user of Final Cut Express which would not work following the upgrade. Apparently iMovie itself now includes most of the features I need for basic video editing, and the recently-discontinued support for Snow Leopard is another factor... I'll give you an update next week once I get it back. Thanks again for your advice.

May 1, 2016 7:28 AM in response to fleepishUK

You could always run an external drive with Snow Leopard installed if you want to keep using the software that you like, or if you find that you don't much care for El Capitan. It would be nice if your repair place could salvage a clone of your old system before they install El Capitan. Also, if you only have 2GB of RAM, you will need to add more if you want to run El Capitan efficiently. People find it slow with 4GB...

May 2, 2016 11:49 PM in response to kahjot

Thanks for the suggestions kahjot. I've already got 4Gb RAM (2x2Gb); will see how it runs with the SSD drive and El Capitan before making a decision whether to upgrade to 6Gb (1x2Gb + 1x4Gb; I've read that anything more than this runs the risk of becoming unstable). And I've asked the repair shop to partition the new 480Gb hard drive (400/80); I'm planning to install and run Snow Leopard on the 80Gb partition. Thanks again though; will let you know how it performs once I've got it back and it's set up.

May 26, 2016 7:08 AM in response to fleepishUK

UDATE: The repair outfit diagnosed the problem as a major buildup of dust/fluff in one of the air vents; I think to the main processor. They gave it a good clean, plus I’d also committed to switching out the Hard Drive for a 480Gb SSD. They then installed El Capitan, and it’s all working very well now (fingers crossed!): swifter and quieter than before.


Thanks for all you advice.

G5 Snow Leopard (10.6.8): stubborn freeze / BBOD / SWOD

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