06-17-2009, 02:43 PM

hi,

this is my first post, have a question bout my G4.

was working fine the other day and then froze up and died. will power up and battery still charges, but the OS wont load. when i start the computer it will go to the white screen with the apple and the loading circle thingy will just keep turning. if i let it sit like this it will every ten minutes or so shut down and come back on doing the same thing.

here is a pic of screen it will get stuck on


im running 10.5.7. the HD has died twice in the past and been replaced each time, but when that has happened before ive gotten the little folder with a sad face or question mark on it.

any ideas? is this a hardware or a software problem? dont wanna buy another HD until im sure thats the problem this time.

thanks for any help

06-17-2009, 03:05 PM

motomotard,

Just a quick diag from me .. but looks as though the hard drive may be having a problem

If you can go in to single user mode cmd and the s key when
it dings
.. try fsck -yf

Or boot with your install cd/dvd disk utilities repair permissions.

you could also use a program DiskWarrior but would try fsck first.

06-17-2009, 04:09 PM

thanks csegeek for the tip

i ran the fsck and it said mac hd volume somethin somethin could not be repaired.

then after a bit the screen went all wacky like this

06-18-2009, 01:11 AM

OUCH... screen wacky .. indicative of the BGA (ball grid array) on the video
chip separating .. I have had about 30% success rate of fixing this issue
by my self .. you can send the logic board in to some company's to fix it
for you .. for 50$ plus shipping but you have to send just the logic board..

You can verify that this is the problem.. by putting the iBook on a desk

and pressing pretty hard on the case just under the left command key and
booting up ... as long as you keep pressing it should be fine till your
fingers give out and release pressure. you have my sympathy

06-18-2009, 11:13 AM

so is the BGA thing keeping it from loading the OS? or is that still a HD problem. after it does the wacky screen thing for a min or so itll go back to the regular screen.

06-18-2009, 11:50 AM

Motomotard,

I could be wrong but I do think you have 2 separate problems with that iBook.. the hdd I think definitely has a problem, the screen going to scan lines was a symptom of the BGA .. but if it goes away I'm not sure .. have you tried booting to the install cd or dvd? does that work properly?

06-18-2009, 02:00 PM

Originally Posted by motomotard

i ran the fsck and it said mac hd volume somethin somethin could not be repaired.

My sister's iBook recently had a hard drive issue that couldn't be fixed by Disk Utility or fsck, but DiskWarrior worked wonders and it's happy again.

Originally Posted by csegeek

OUCH... screen wacky .. indicative of the BGA (ball grid array) on the video chip separating .. I have had about 30% success rate of fixing this issue by my self .. you can send the logic board in to some company's to fix it for you .. for 50$ plus shipping but you have to send just the logic board..

You can verify that this is the problem.. by putting the iBook on a desk and pressing pretty hard on the case just under the left command key and booting up ... as long as you keep pressing it should be fine till your fingers give out and release pressure. you have my sympathy

Oh boy, the infamous iBook GPU problem. Forget sending it in for repair, you can easily do it yourself. I haven't seen an iBook G4 with this problem yet, but it's very common with the iBook G3 and I have fixed a few of those. There's good money to be made in this market!