Mac Mini G4 will not boot

[RussWWFC]

I recently purchased a G4 Mac Mini off of eBay.

It worked fine initially, I managed to boot up into the OSX (which was Leopard) and it ran fine, at least for a bit anyway. That was until a few minutes in each time, when my TV Screen went blank, and I got a message on the screen saying that the resolution was not supported. It's a UK Samsung Smart TV, and was connected using a HDMI to DVI cable.

To solve this problem, I tried altering the settings in 'Display' but it only had NTSC refresh rate options. Maybe I should have tried something in International settings, thinking back

Anyway, to solve the problem, I inserted my Leopard DVD and tried to boot from it, by holding down the 'C' key when booting. Nothing happened and indeed it spat the DVD out. I put it back in and it the drive just span with nothing happening. I am unsure if the DVD drive works, but I do know that the DVD works, as I was able to see it on my 2011 iMac

Next time, I tried booting without the DVD inserted and with everything but the keyboard (it's a wireless Windows key format one) plugged in, but I got no bong/chime from the machine. Before these problems started, I got this upon startup.

I have also tried booting with a copy of Lubuntu 14.04 inserted, but still no joy. Can anyone help please?

 

[asriznet]

I recently purchased a G4 Mac Mini off of eBay.

It worked fine initially, I managed to boot up into the OSX (which was Leopard) and it ran fine, at least for a bit anyway. That was until a few minutes in each time, when my TV Screen went blank, and I got a message on the screen saying that the resolution was not supported. It's a UK Samsung Smart TV, and was connected using a HDMI to DVI cable.

To solve this problem, I tried altering the settings in 'Display' but it only had NTSC refresh rate options. Maybe I should have tried something in International settings, thinking back

Anyway, to solve the problem, I inserted my Leopard DVD and tried to boot from it, by holding down the 'C' key when booting. Nothing happened and indeed it spat the DVD out. I put it back in and it the drive just span with nothing happening. I am unsure if the DVD drive works, but I do know that the DVD works, as I was able to see it on my 2011 iMac

Next time, I tried booting without the DVD inserted and with everything but the keyboard (it's a wireless Windows key format one) plugged in, but I got no bong/chime from the machine. Before these problems started, I got this upon startup.

I have also tried booting with a copy of Lubuntu 14.04 inserted, but still no joy. Can anyone help please?

Have you tried performing SMC + NVRAM reset?
I would usually attempt to boot to the startup manager(Hold down option on startup)

if boot manager shows up OK, try inserting the DVD again and see if it detects it this time.

Also try booting in Safe Mode

 

[RussWWFC]

All sorted now, as it turned out it was my error and it had Tiger on it.

Looking to update the OS to something more modern, but with a flaky DVD drive, thats easier said than done

 

[donlab]

create a usb boot drive from your imac with OSX leopard. 4GB drive should do. then boot your g4 mini from usb.