What kind of symptoms will a one-foot-in-the-grave logic board produce?

[techound1]

And how could I test it against faulty RAM (without having another sodimm to drop in place of the RAM in question)?

It's a buggy pismo that was given to me, so I have no "before" experience to compare it to. And I'm just curious what everyone's thoughts are in general (rather than specific to the pismo).

 

[pknz]

Lots of unexpected quits (kernel panics).
To test the RAM use MemTest

 

[techound1]

I read through the thread last year where you were going through the same thing!

Do kernel panics always give an error message or is it just a freeze up?

 

[mad jew]

Kernel panics don't always give you the warning message. Sometimes they don't get the chance to display it.

As for the original question, it's very difficult to answer. Since the logic board is so heavily embedded in the system, it can cause quite a few different problems. Signs of a failing logic board can range from strange colouring on the display to complete failure to boot up.

The memory testers are very limited. I'd say the best way to test memory is with trial and error but since you don't have the RAM available, I guess that's not possible.

So in short, what are the symptoms exactly?

 

[techound1]

So in short, what are the symptoms exactly?

Intermittent everything.

Seriously, it will hang in the middle of a variety of programs. Sometimes it won't finish booting. Sometimes it won't find the hard drive (once it gets to that point, I have to reformat the drive starting back with 9.2). Grasping at testable straws, I swapped out a known-working drive and got the same issues (after putting the drive in another machine, the drive worked normally).

 

[mad jew]

Okay, well when it struggles with the booting, at what stage does it fail?

 

[techound1]

It doesn't fail in the same place twice (maddening, really). It's:

hung up just after the bing,
double-booted (bing, hang for 20 seconds, bing and into boot)
it's hung up just after displaying the apple in os x
it's hung up after displaying the happy computer in os 9 (which was really heart breaking )

Once it hangs, I leave it be for 15 minutes before declaring it hung.

 

[mad jew]

Tricky. I reckon it'll be a failed logic board but hopefully I'm wrong because the RAM would be easier to replace.

 

[techound1]

Yeah, that was my fear. I hate to spend money on a sodimm to test the RAM when the scales are really tipping for the failed logic board...

Many, many thanks for the assist!!