troubleshooting: Power Mac G4 Yikes, hard drive sticking?

Question

troubleshooting: Power Mac G4 Yikes, hard drive sticking?

I inherited this G4 "Yikes" loaded with Tiger, upgraded with lots of Ram and a speed of 1 GHz, DVD-RW etc...
It has been sitting for a few month, the small battery is OK but all I get when I start it is a blank grey screen.
After starting on the OS X CD and opening disk utilities I'm told the hard drive needs repair althought it was working well 4 months ago but has not been used since then..
Is it worth it to purchase a new drive and if so which one would anyone recommend?

Thank you all for your advice.

power mac G$, Mac OS X (10.4.1)

Posted on Dec 9, 2006 10:38 PM

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Answer 1

Dec 10, 2006 11:40 AM in response to Francis Johnstone

Francis,
The fact that you can boot from the CD implies that the Hard drive is dead. Unfortunately this does happen. Fortunately, replacing it is very easy. You can fit up to a 120GB drive on the internal bus. I have used Seagate and Western digital. Look for 7,200rpm and 8MB of buffer, it gives you a faster system.

One thing you can try, as you have nothing to loose, is to tap the HD with the handle of a large screw driver. It may just free it up. If so, still get another drive and get the inforation of the one you have.

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Answer 2

Dec 10, 2006 3:23 PM in response to Francis Johnstone

Hello! The drive may in fact be just fine and only needs some minor repair. The S.M.A.R.T. shown in Disk Utility is a good indication of the drive's physical state. The fact that it needs some directory repair may just mean that the last time it was shut down something didn't go just right. If SMART shows good (will show verified or failing) I wouldn't worry assuming that the repairs go ok. Personally I recommend DiskWarrior for keeping the disk's directories in good shape. Below is a diagram showing where to look for the SMART Status. Tom

[IMG] http://img509.imageshack.us/img509/8159/diskutilitype0.jpg[/IMG]

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Answer 3

Dec 10, 2006 3:41 PM in response to Francis Johnstone

Get a new HD & install it as a Slave. Then if you can revive your existing HD, copy the files to the new HD. You can use the Restore function which is part of Disk Utility or Carbon Copy Cloner (freeware). Note - You cannot use Drag 'n Drop in OS X to transfer all your files.

This link may help you on the install.
Power Macintosh G3 and G4: IDE Master and Slave Support and Configuration
http://docs.info.apple.com/article.html?artnum=24342

 Cheers, Tom

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