Problem with iMac 21.5 mid-2011

[D4walker]

Hello!

A while ago we bought an used iMac 21.5’’ mid-2011 for my grandfather so he could do light activities (he literally only uses safari and Microsoft word). It originally came with 4GB of RAM and we added another 4GB from OWC so it was snappy. I knew it was a good iMac because we bought it from a close friend and we checked it before buying anyway.

However, now it has a strange problem. Every time we turn it on, the screen lights up and the chime sounds, but like a second later the screen turns black but it’s still on, you can hear the HDD making a sound and if you press the keyboard the imac makes that “error” sound too. We have to forcefully turn it off at least 3 times for it to work, sometimes with a PRAM reset is enough.

I thought it might be the RAM, so I removed the new one and tried turning it on, it still didn’t work. I tried only with the new RAM and I got the same mistake. So I tried booting up from an external HDD in case the internal was failing, it still didn’t work correctly.

Does anyone knows what could be wrong? We sent it to tech support (not from apple) and they couldn’t find what was wrong...

Thank you for your help!

 

[TwoH]

Not sure exactly what you mean by ' "error" sound ' - do you mean the beeps normally related to RAM?

Either way, from what you've said here, this sounds like it could be a GPU problem (the 2011 machines are known to have this fault).

And what do you mean by hearing the HDD making a sound? Sounds a tad worrying.

 

[D4walker]

Not sure exactly what you mean by ' "error" sound ' - do you mean the beeps normally related to RAM?

Either way, from what you've said here, this sounds like it could be a GPU problem (the 2011 machines are known to have this fault).

And what do you mean by hearing the HDD making a sound? Sounds a tad worrying.

Sorry for the late reply, I couldn’t visit my grandfather before to make a tiny video about what happens:

What I meant by the HDD sound is the normal sound it makes when it’s on, you can barely hear it but you know it’s spinning.