iMac G5 20" (No isight) Won't Boot

[DJS1234]

Hi Everyone well my iMac G5 has refused to boot today, here's the details-

Basically it appears to have no hard drive, when you turn it on you get a flashing icon on the screen after a while (I can't remember exactly what it was, maybe a question mark and I've got the Apple hardware test running at the moment)

If I boot to the Tiger disc and run disc utility it comes up only with the Tiger DVD, no Hard drive at all!

So far the quick hardware test says everything is fine, the extended test is running now.

I have done control, option, p+r on boot and got 2 chimes (Not sure what that does but the manual said to do it.

Looking like a dead hard drive but I thought i'd ask anyway see if anyone has any ideas.

Thanks for the help!!!

 

[DJS1234]

anyone?

 

[Shadow]

Does holding option on start up do anything?

 

[mad jew]

It's weird for a hard drive to die this way. Usually it just gives buggy feedback and eventually loses its connection. Is the hard drive one you installed yourself? Would you be comfortable jumping into the iMac to check the connections?

 

[DJS1234]

hi there

Option key on boot up brings up the boot menu if I remember correctly, the only boot options available are-

1) OS X Tiger DVD (If Inserted)
2) Macintosh Hardware Test

This is the original hard rive and is coming up to being 1 year old.

I'm a network technician so have no problems getting my hands dirty and swapping the drive out but I thought i'd post here first as although i'm now "quite" an experienced Mac user i've never had one go on me (They're just too damn good!) so have never had to troubleshoot hardware problems. In contrast at work I have probably 8-10 Dell's go up in smoke each week so i'm a dab hand with them

I'm gonna call Applecare tonight and get some parts under warranty, that's why I bought the thing so may as well use it.

By the way after 1hr 25mins the extended hardware test finished with no errors on anything (Including mass storage which is quite odd!)

I've never seen a HDD just die like this, as you say they usually go on and off for a while then just pack up but you usually get a warning!

 

[mad jew]

Yeah, something's not right. Hard drives aren't supposed to die like that. Anyway, don't listen too carefully to the hardware test. Those things are notoriously pathetic at finding fault in a machine. Good luck with Apple and hopefully it is just the drive since that's easily replaced.

 

[DJS1234]

Update

httupdate-

Well I took the hard drive out as I realised I had a spare 40gb SATA hard drive lying around that would at least help me tell if it was the old drive or the drive controller on the logic board.

I swapped the drives out and the new drive was seen by disk utility so its definetly the old drive that had gone.

HOWEVER the interesting part came when I looked closely at the old drive to discover that it was quite 'singed' on the underneath. All the solder points were not silver but an orangy brown colour and some of the drive casing looked a little melted

I have had what sounds like a fan problem with this iMac for some time (Buzzing fans the usual Apple bad manufacturing stuff!) so is it possible do you think that there isn't enough ventilation going through the unit and that as a result the hard drive has cooked itself?

I have booked an appointment to go to the Genius Bar and let someone have a look at it. I don't want to get another hard drive only for it to go the same way and leave me iMac-less for another week or so until I get the drive!

Starting to wish I'd got a Powermac.... (This was a year ago so no Mac Pro then!)

Might think about getting it fixed up and eBaying anyway, upgrade to an Intel Mac...

 

[mad jew]

Interesting. I haven't heard of any other toasted (literally) drives in iMacs and mine's been fine so far. It might be worthwhile keeping an eye on the temperatures with a temperature monitor (I use iStat nano). At a guess though, I'd say this was an isolated incident.

 

[BlizzardBomb]

httupdate-

Well I took the hard drive out as I realised I had a spare 40gb SATA hard drive lying around that would at least help me tell if it was the old drive or the drive controller on the logic board.

I swapped the drives out and the new drive was seen by disk utility so its definetly the old drive that had gone.

HOWEVER the interesting part came when I looked closely at the old drive to discover that it was quite 'singed' on the underneath. All the solder points were not silver but an orangy brown colour and some of the drive casing looked a little melted

I have had what sounds like a fan problem with this iMac for some time (Buzzing fans the usual Apple bad manufacturing stuff!) so is it possible do you think that there isn't enough ventilation going through the unit and that as a result the hard drive has cooked itself?

I have booked an appointment to go to the Genius Bar and let someone have a look at it. I don't want to get another hard drive only for it to go the same way and leave me iMac-less for another week or so until I get the drive!

Starting to wish I'd got a Powermac.... (This was a year ago so no Mac Pro then!)

Might think about getting it fixed up and eBaying anyway, upgrade to an Intel Mac...

I remember BareFeats once pointing out that Rev A and B iMac G5's hard drives regularly hover at around 60C, which is 5C above the maximum recommended temperature. Maybe that's why it appears to be singed?

 

[DJS1234]

I remember BareFeats once pointing out that Rev A and B iMac G5's hard drives regularly hover at around 60C, which is 5C above the maximum recommended temperature. Maybe that's why it appears to be singed?

I suppose that's what happens when you cram all those components into such a small case... The dreaded heat problems!!!

I'm going to take it to the Apple Store with it as it's got 'buzzy fan syndrome' anyway.

I'd rather have someone say 'This was a bad hard drive, it won't happen again', then if in 6 months we're in the same situation I can get some comeback on the whole thing.

As it stands now - I've asked them to send me a new hard drive and if it fails it's my fault so i'd rather a technician says to me that nothing else is wrong and it goes in the case notes.