Hi, thanks for reading!
Long story short as possible
First things first:
Mac Pro 1,1 2x2.66 16gb OWC ram 3tb stripped raid (3x 1tb WD Caviar) nvidia 7300GT
2 days ago I came after lunch to my desktop and the screen saver was frozen with the spinwheel of death frozen as well. I power it off, restarted it, but it never arrived to the login screen. Tried a few times, same thing: grey screen, mouse visible, when I move it, bum, spinwheel forever.
Start in safe mode? impossible -> I have a striped raid on this mac pro running os x 10.6.6, and as u may know, u just cant.
Started in single user mode, did a fsck a few times till everything was ok. reboot. no luck, same thing, no login window, mouse visible, move the mouse, spinwheel.
Single user again, and checked out the registry and found there was a sintax error in apache 2 httpd.conf so i fixed, restarted, same thing.
Went back to the System.log again, and the apache error was gone, but replaced with something I've never seen before:
"failed to find smbios entry point"
"unable to determine UUID for host. Error: 35"
Last line repeated on every module trying to load during startup (I really mean, on every module trying to load during startup)
This is just a work machine, I actually don't keep files on the hard drives others than the ones I'm working on, so as I had already spent 2 hours on this and my log was filled with errors I called it a day and went for the external hard disk with a fresh install with software and preferences set up. Cloned it in target mode to a fresh stripped raid, 30 minutes later, bum. Same problem: "dong", apple logo, that wheel that runs for a few seconds, gray screen, mouse visible after a minute, move it, spinwheel of death !!! no login screen at all !
This is the first time i felt not so well with all this, I must confess.
I went for the original mac pro dvds to perform an apple hardware test, but I couldn't, as while I'm pressing the D the mac just ejects the original DVD and start booting from the raid (I tried more than a few times)
I thought it might be a problem with one of the 3 hard drives, so I target mode again with a macbook pro, disable the raid and individually perform a diskwarrior test with no problems at all.
So I removed all the OWC ram modules and left only the original apple ones, left in just one hard drive, and popped out the airport and bluetooth card. Also unplugged everything but the mouse, keyboard and the ACD...
Then I tried to install os x 10.6 from the retail dvd, but it just showed the apple logo, and when the wheel above starts moving, after 10 seconds or so, kernel panic. Tried with the other 2 hard drives, same thing. Tried then with os x 10.5 dvd, and then with the original 10.4 (the one that came with this mac), same thing.
It must be the dvd player!! so, target mode again, and cloned os x 10.6 to another drive plug it on bay 2 (the one on bay 1 is formatted and ready to get the new install) took off the dvd player and it went a little better than just before: It passes the apple logo, grey screen, and just stay there doing nothing, until the mac goes to sleep, 10 minutes later or so. Wake him up, same grey screen, no mouse visible at all.
I tried removing the apple ram and trying with the owc sticks, but just the same thing.
I'm kind on the end of the road here I think, as I don't know what else can I do.
I did reset the SMC, PRAM and NVRAM several times. I keep my macs always up to date, so the firmware is the latest as well.
Question 1:
Is it possible that this could be caused by the video card? It has been acting strange lately, showing green lines near dark areas ?? I know it will be dead soon, I've never replaced it in +3 years, but I think if it's caused by the video card it should show me anything, or am I wrong?
Question 2:
Could be the logic board?
Question 3:
There's something else I could try I didn't do?
Thxs for your time !
PD: I'm 200km away from the nearest apple store, so I prefer to talk to u guys before I hit the road
Long story short as possible
First things first:
Mac Pro 1,1 2x2.66 16gb OWC ram 3tb stripped raid (3x 1tb WD Caviar) nvidia 7300GT
2 days ago I came after lunch to my desktop and the screen saver was frozen with the spinwheel of death frozen as well. I power it off, restarted it, but it never arrived to the login screen. Tried a few times, same thing: grey screen, mouse visible, when I move it, bum, spinwheel forever.
Start in safe mode? impossible -> I have a striped raid on this mac pro running os x 10.6.6, and as u may know, u just cant.
Started in single user mode, did a fsck a few times till everything was ok. reboot. no luck, same thing, no login window, mouse visible, move the mouse, spinwheel.
Single user again, and checked out the registry and found there was a sintax error in apache 2 httpd.conf so i fixed, restarted, same thing.
Went back to the System.log again, and the apache error was gone, but replaced with something I've never seen before:
"failed to find smbios entry point"
"unable to determine UUID for host. Error: 35"
Last line repeated on every module trying to load during startup (I really mean, on every module trying to load during startup)
This is just a work machine, I actually don't keep files on the hard drives others than the ones I'm working on, so as I had already spent 2 hours on this and my log was filled with errors I called it a day and went for the external hard disk with a fresh install with software and preferences set up. Cloned it in target mode to a fresh stripped raid, 30 minutes later, bum. Same problem: "dong", apple logo, that wheel that runs for a few seconds, gray screen, mouse visible after a minute, move it, spinwheel of death !!! no login screen at all !
This is the first time i felt not so well with all this, I must confess.
I went for the original mac pro dvds to perform an apple hardware test, but I couldn't, as while I'm pressing the D the mac just ejects the original DVD and start booting from the raid (I tried more than a few times)
I thought it might be a problem with one of the 3 hard drives, so I target mode again with a macbook pro, disable the raid and individually perform a diskwarrior test with no problems at all.
So I removed all the OWC ram modules and left only the original apple ones, left in just one hard drive, and popped out the airport and bluetooth card. Also unplugged everything but the mouse, keyboard and the ACD...
Then I tried to install os x 10.6 from the retail dvd, but it just showed the apple logo, and when the wheel above starts moving, after 10 seconds or so, kernel panic. Tried with the other 2 hard drives, same thing. Tried then with os x 10.5 dvd, and then with the original 10.4 (the one that came with this mac), same thing.
It must be the dvd player!! so, target mode again, and cloned os x 10.6 to another drive plug it on bay 2 (the one on bay 1 is formatted and ready to get the new install) took off the dvd player and it went a little better than just before: It passes the apple logo, grey screen, and just stay there doing nothing, until the mac goes to sleep, 10 minutes later or so. Wake him up, same grey screen, no mouse visible at all.
I tried removing the apple ram and trying with the owc sticks, but just the same thing.
I'm kind on the end of the road here I think, as I don't know what else can I do.
I did reset the SMC, PRAM and NVRAM several times. I keep my macs always up to date, so the firmware is the latest as well.
Question 1:
Is it possible that this could be caused by the video card? It has been acting strange lately, showing green lines near dark areas ?? I know it will be dead soon, I've never replaced it in +3 years, but I think if it's caused by the video card it should show me anything, or am I wrong?
Question 2:
Could be the logic board?
Question 3:
There's something else I could try I didn't do?
Thxs for your time !
PD: I'm 200km away from the nearest apple store, so I prefer to talk to u guys before I hit the road
