UPDATE

Seagate ST19171N, 1 5/8", 10 pairs of jumpers, 4 pair block on first four pair, skip one and a jumper, four bare pair, standard SCSI external box with two 50 pin centronics. No terminator block on box. Cable is a 50 pin to 25 centronics. PCI SCSI II Apple brand card

⟐ Answered June 25, 2011 at 12:36 MST

Sorry for the delay, just had world wind of unexpected etc..

Here is the pictures of the psu now finally removed from G4 MDD

add'l zoomed in pictures

do I need to remove fans so I can

lift up housing to get other view?

----- went ahead and unscrewed fans to get other views

⟐ Commented May 12, 2021 at 3:39 MST

I have cleaned all dust and fluff out of the machine, checked that all fans are working and replaced the heat sink grease and still it happens.

If I open the side door and use a small external fan to blow cool air over the heat sink the G4 operates normally for hours with the CPU temperature at a steady 35°C and the HD at a steady 26°C.

The technician (Apple Genius) at the local Apple Shop said they did not have the gear to check everything on such an old model

Mac, but all the sensors checked out OK and he thought the problem may be an ageing CPU. What do you think?

Roy Clark

rclark@bigpond.net.au

Sydney, Australia

⟐ Commented July 31, 2019 at 20:16 MST

Thanks

⟐ Answer accepted January 30, 2010 at 20:58 MST

I mean, it might be some specific component that burnt out?

I haven't open the power supply, but am hoping it can be something as simple as a capacitor.

I've been searching and found the next cheapest way (If it works in the long run) is running a external modified ATX PSU based on http://atxg4.com

⟐ Answer deleted May 29, 2012 at 6:41 MST

I've replaced:

(2) Hard Drives.

Battery

Logicboard

DP CPU

I've reseated or unplugged and plugged back in:

Computer speaker

RAM in all 4 slots

Graphics Card

Battery

I've reset the:

PRAM

Battery

Logic Board

⟐ Answered November 04, 2015 at 10:37 MST

this is about the same PowerMac G4 MDD I asked about before here .. 867 DP .

I did some diagnosing today. This is what I found.

Power On :

Chime sounds, fans go, harddrive on the ATA100 won't spin up when on all other ATA channels it does spin up. Screen remains black. Graphics card is working, tested in other Powermac. No keyboard recognition (caps lock led does noch light up). CUDA / PMU reset performed couple of times, removed the battery for 24h. No change.

With the CPU removed it wont even get to get the fans moving or chime up.

After some time in this state after chime and fans going CPU heat-sink is warm. As are graphics card, memory, some chips on the board.

Conclusion :

Either CPU and/or LogicBoard are bad.

How can I determine which one to replace?

Best regards Jan.

⟐ Answer accepted September 01, 2010 at 9:49 MST

⟐ Answer accepted December 08, 2013 at 4:27 MST

⟐ Commented January 14, 2020 at 4:41 MST

⟐ Answer accepted February 17, 2010 at 20:14 MST

I then tried booting into Ubuntu (which is on a different drive then Leopard) and it worked fine, and I could access the disk from ubuntu. I then tried to boot into Panther (Which is on annother drive), and that also worked fine. In panther, I used disk utility, and Used the "Verify Disk Permissions" option, and it gave me a bunch of permissions that needed to be repaired, so i told it to do that (and it took about 3 Hours) After that I also used the "Verify Disk" option, and it said "Block Count Invalid" so I repaired that, and it told me that the repair was successful (I actually did this before the permissions verify, i think).

After that was done, i rebooted the computer, and was relieved to see the progress well spining as the computer began to boot into leopard, unfortionatly, after the progress wheel spun for about 25 Seconds (The ususual boot time for this machine) it went to a black screen, as if it was logging into Mac OS, and then the computer chimed, and rebooted.

So the issue still remains. After booting into panther again, i checked the disk, and all of my files were still there, but that disk had a lot of disk images (For Backup over 10GB of older drives i used to own, and I cannot copy these onto my external hard drive since when i bought it and first set it up, I forgot to re-format it in NTFS, and now it uses the FAT filesystem so no files over 4GB, and it has more space used than any other drive I own) so I cannot wipe the drive. In panther, i can acess the disk, but the computer can't boot off of it.

Here are some pictures of the Babble in verbose mode, and it looks as if it's trying to boot an Intel Mac.

Any Ideas?

Thanks,

Chris

⟐ Edited February 09, 2010 at 18:12 MST

⟐ Answered July 27, 2017 at 6:34 MST

I'm going to college now and I'm planning on purchasing a MacBook Pro 15" (non-retina display) for school work (Graphic Dsign/Art Major).

So my question is:

A. Is there an easy and cheap way to transfter all my data from the broken computer's Hard Drive to my new MacBook? (I know, pretty stupid of me not backing up my data!)

B. Any ideas on what's wrong how to fix the broken computer? Is it the power supply? (If it is the power supply, what information do I look for to search for a working power supply?) I know it may not be worth fixing it, but if it's a cheap fix, I would like to keep it.

⟐ Commented March 19, 2016 at 16:54 MST

⟐ Edited January 07, 2010 at 12:53 MST

This eliminates the problem of a sign for my business in a residential neighborhood.

Looking at the bottom box in the images here:

⟐ Commented March 04, 2018 at 12:15 MST

⟐ Answer accepted May 12, 2016 at 21:39 MST

Hard drive removed and tested good & able to read on another computer. G4 will not find CD w/ "C" held down and start up cd installed. I Reset PMU button. Installed another hard drive to attempt to reload software. Still cannot boot from CD Drive holding the "C" key during power on.

I used IFIX IT USB device to run removed hard drive on another computer. The USB adapter is a beautiful thing!

Any ideas. I bet new logic board is in my future. JOHN

⟐ Commented March 20, 2016 at 7:48 MST

⟐ Answer accepted January 12, 2015 at 5:05 MST

This is an add to what I written below. I carefully opened the computer and turned it on. It has been running for over a 1/2 hour and it does not go into sleep mode. Fans that are running are the: (1) over processor, a Verax system; (1) System optical fan; (1) System fan on end of Hard Drives is not on at all;

if there is a fan in the power supply it does not appear to be generating much air flow.

My Computer:

Power Mac G4 867 MHz DP with 2 GB Ram, OSX 10.5.8. It has (2) internal ATA bays for Hard Drives, and (2) for Ultra ATA Hard Drives. (2) USB and (2) firewire ports on Computer.

(2) USB on Cinema 23" display, (2) USB on keyboard.

Problem:

This all happened within a matter of weeks.

Started having problems when i plugged in a lot of devices, including: on keyboard, camera and mouse USB; on Display, USB Keyboard and USB headphone jack; on Computer - firewire (2) LaCie 500GB HD; and on Computer - USB printer and scanner (never run at same time), and sometimes another USB HD.

First USB's did not always work, such as headphones. Then firewire might not be recognized, then computer with firewire plugged in started to go into sleep mode. Now fan runs very fast and loud, and then goes into sleep mode: if shut down for awhile takes a while; if using a lot maybe within minutes.

So then I replaced one HD that had been non-functional for long time,with 120 GB new, and made it the master, and things worked fine.

Then ran with firewire, started having problems again.

So replaced old 60GB HD with new 500 GB, from Memory X, they confirmed compatability, was constantly going into sleep mode.

Left computer off for 2 days and it has been on for about a half hour, internal fans ran really fast

and loud, and now has gone into sleep mode. If woken up wants to go back into sleep mode. If I leave it for a while can keep it out of sleep mode longer.

Questions:

Is this a power supply problem or a motherboard replacement

or something else?

If the motherboard, can I upgrade from 867MHz to 1.25 GHz?

Is there a way for me to test this? Link?

Thanks so much.

Michael Olexo

⟐ Edited October 18, 2010 at 17:06 MST

⟐ Commented August 22, 2025 at 11:15 MST