G5 is Toast?

Hi All,

We had a series of storms in the past couple weeks, and a few power outtages, some for just a few seconds. My G5 was attached to a surge protector, but not a UPC...

Anyway, the other day I noticed that Time Machine wasn't backing up to it anymore because the system wasn't mounting from my MBP. I tried getting it to boot, but it won't go past the grey startup screen. I tried CMD+CTRL+P+R and it did nothing. I tried CMD+S and it got through to the root prompt, but I couldn't type anything... And after about 2 minutes at that screen, the fans started whirring, and now, as I type this, the system sounds like it's about to take off...

Does anybody have any suggestions of what to try next?

Thanks!

Z

I would try and boot it up from the optical drive and do some disk and permission checks from the boot/install screens menu bar > utilities > Disk Utility

Grr. I can't find my Leopard retail disc, and Snow Leopard won't load on a G5... And Leopard is on Amazon for $200.

Time to tear the office apart, I guess...

IF it won't boot from the Leopard DVD it's toast. Maybe it's just time to move on.

I had the same SYMPTOM. Bad power supply capacitors, well known issue with G5s. Fixed for like $120. I spent a LOT of time and research to figure this out.

BUT I also had a previous iMac, logic board blasted by lightning, garbage heap.

So don't waste your time, take it in for detailed diagnostic.

If you want a little pre-information, somewhere there is a page that tells you how to open your iMac and look at diagnostic lights while it boots to see if the power supply is OK and the logic board mounts.
About the iMac G5 diagnostic LEDs

I use a 20 pound APC backup supply now with a lot of surge filtering. These machines are quite sensitive to surges in my opinion.

That's all good, good assuming it's an iMac. If it's a G5 tower its a whole different story including the price to get it fixed. The PS on those things are a PITA and getting the board fixed isn't worth the money. From the comments about the fan noise I suspect it's NOT an iMac....

Hi guys,

It is a PowerMac G5 tower. And I finally found my Leopard disc after much searching (believe you me, my wife is NOT happy right now). Anyway... I tried a Repair disk and it said the disk was fine, then I tried a Verify Permissions. It found a problem, and then I clicked Repair Disk Permissions.

The attached picture shows the resulting message -- which was the same as Verify produced.

The capacitor issue seems like a possibility, especially given that a recent string of power failures precipitated the problem... But I find it difficult to imagine that a power supply hiccup would end up with machine hanging at startup (or any other kind of software-related effect)... Wouldn't such a problem be more likely to result in the machine simply not turning on?

I'm debating reinstalling the OS -- but I wonder what that would do to my existing data? My iTunes library is on this system and it's rather substantial. I don't relish the idea of running a restoration from the backup.

Shikarnov said:

I'm debating reinstalling the OS -- but I wonder what that would do to my existing data? My iTunes library is on this system and it's rather substantial. I don't relish the idea of running a restoration from the backup.

Click to expand...

Do an Archive and Install. It will move your profile to a clean System for you.

Archive and Install worked. The system is now operating as usual. I need to reinstall some software, but my data is all intact.

Thanks to everybody for their comments, suggestions, and advice. It's appreciated.

Z