Please help me to make this old Mac Pro work again

[hysp]

Hello, recently I've bought this old Mac Pro (2006?), and the owner told me that it was working. However the screen is all black. Any suggestions to know if it is broken or if I am doing something wrong?

Thanks a lot!!

 

[Raz0rEdge]

That's a 2008 Mac Pro and the machine powering up and hearing the chime is a good sign. The manual here tells you how to hook things up and it looks like you've done the right thing as far as the setup goes.

I would, however, also recommend that you grab a regular monitor and DVI cable and try that to see if you get anything. The issue might be with the monitor and this would eliminate that. The next thing to check might be the graphics card, so you should remove it completely and then firmly put it back in place and see if that changes anything.

There are a few members here with Mac Pro's or experience with it, so let's see what they have to add.

 

[hysp]

Thanks a lot for your quick reply, I have already removed the graphics card and put it back with no changes at all. Maybe I'll do it another time just to be sure, (since the guy who sold me the computer said that the monitor was working ok).

If this doesn't work, as you said maybe I should try with another monitor.

Thank you! And thank you for telling me that it is a 2008 mac pro!

 

[rman]

I had to replace the Video card on mine some time ago. It may have gone bad.

 

[hysp]

I had to replace the Video card on mine some time ago. It may have gone bad.

Thank you, how did you know that the problem was in the graphics card?

 

[rman]

It been several years ago, I had the issue. My system would boot up so it seem, but nothing was displayed on the monitor. I believe I found solution through googling that the video card maybe the problem. I replaced it and found that resolved the problem.

 

[Macsolver]

Hi,

The video shows the two memory riser boards in the same orientation so that it is a Mac Pro 2006 or 2007. The top memory riser board in a 2008 was a mirror of the lower riser board. You can use the serial number of the Mac to check this on one of the serial number lookup sites like this:

Lookup Mac Specs By Serial Number, Order, Model & EMC Number, Model ID @ EveryMac.com

EveryMac.com's Ultimate Mac Lookup - lookup Apple Mac, iPod, iPhone and iPad specs by serial number, order number, model number, model ID, EMC number and more.

everymac.com

I have a Mac display that will not show an image if the USB cable from the display is plugged into the Mac. Works fine without the USB connection, maybe worth a try.

Not sure what the GPU is, but I can not see a PCIe power cable in the video. Does the GPU have a socket for a power cable ? If it has one and the cable is missing, it will not work.