Sidebar Sidebar
Become a MacRumors Supporter for $50/year with no ads, ability to filter front page stories, and private forums.

Rebuild of iMac G5

S.B.G

S.B.G

Moderator emeritus
Original poster
Sep 8, 2010
26,907
10,951
Detroit
I picked up an iMac G5 the other day from one of the girls at work. She acquired it from the GoodWill for $15. Apparently they thought it was an old television which is why it was so cheap.

She gave up the G5 to me because it kept powering off suddenly and/or wouldn't power on at times.

2013-03-11%2008-56-50.jpg


2013-03-11%2008-56-58.jpg


I opened it up today suspecting blown capacitors in the power supply. Once I got it opened, my suspicions were confirmed upon opening the PSU. I saw three capacitors who had blown their lids.

2013-03-11%2009-09-12.jpg


I ordered another PSU from eBay and should have it by the end of the week I think. It had a 1GB RAM chip in it from Crucial so it appears that someone had added that at some point during it's life. I ordered a second 1GB RAM chip from OWC today as well, bringing it to it's 2GB maximum.

2013-03-11%2009-05-32.jpg


2013-03-11%2009-05-47.jpg


G5-Power-Supply.JPG


I then removed the 80GB WD HDD and ran Spinrite on it. It only took 2 hours to complete compared to the 80 hours it took on my 1TB HDD from my 2010 iMac. No bad sectors were reported, so the HDD is in good condition.

2013-03-11%2009-14-48.jpg


2013-03-11%2012-04-19.jpg


2013-03-11%2012-04-13.jpg


I'm considering putting an SSD in it, but held off on ordering one until I do some more research on which one I should get first.

I really like how easy this G5 came apart over my 2010 iMac. I much preferred the G5's rear backing coming off rather than the front so that I didn't have to mess around with the display. Plus it was easier to get the panel off as well with just 3 screws to loosen.

Later when the parts come in and I make a decision on the SSD, I'll post more.

Additionally, I was impressed at how clean the inside was for being an older computer. There was next to no dust inside it at all.
 
Last edited:
The G5's are nice machines to work on.

If you're confident, it's relatively easy to solder 3 new caps on the PSU - which will save you a few $$$.
 
SandboxGeneral said:
I picked up an iMac G5 the other day from one of the girls at work. She acquired it from the GoodWill for $15. Apparently they thought it was an old television which is why it was so cheap.
Click to expand...

You are lucky- our nearest goodwill handles all computer donations from the surrounding area, so they're pretty knowledgeable and would never price something like that. On the upside, they have a lot of computers (and parts).
 
Brian Y said:
The G5's are nice machines to work on.

If you're confident, it's relatively easy to solder 3 new caps on the PSU - which will save you a few $$$.
Click to expand...

The new PSU is already ordered and en route. And more importantly, my soldering abilities aren't very good. But I could of course practice on the old one. ;)

MisterKeeks said:
You are lucky- our nearest goodwill handles all computer donations from the surrounding area, so they're pretty knowledgeable and would never price something like that. On the upside, they have a lot of computers (and parts).
Click to expand...

The one's near me are quite small and don't really carry computers or parts very often.

I didn't even have to pay her $15 for giving it to me. I tried to pay her the money but she said I didn't need to because I recently repaired the PSU in her son's HP PC and didn't charge her anything. Aren't friends nice? :)
 
SpinRite?

What is a Mac native OS X equivalent app to this? Just asking as I have to diagnose some drives of mine and make sure they are up to snuff and no bad sectors, and I no longer have Windows XP, only Windows 7 and 8.
 
PowerPCMacMan said:
What is a Mac native OS X equivalent app to this? Just asking as I have to diagnose some drives of mine and make sure they are up to snuff and no bad sectors, and I no longer have Windows XP, only Windows 7 and 8.
Click to expand...

There isn't any other program that works precisely like Spinrite out there. There are other disk utilities that can work.

Here is one I see recommended from time to time. I've never tried it before though.

https://forums.macrumors.com/posts/16864819/

http://www.scsc-online.com/Scannerz_files/Scannerz Demo.dmg
 
I have on old, nonfunctioning G5. I opened it up and did the LED test, which indicated a motherboard issue. Perhaps I will open it back up to eyeball the PSU.
 
eawmp1 said:
I have on old, nonfunctioning G5. I opened it up and did the LED test, which indicated a motherboard issue. Perhaps I will open it back up to eyeball the PSU.
Click to expand...

That's a good place to start and a likely suspect. However, as I'm told, the motherboard's in these models also had capacitor problems. So be sure to look at those too.
 
SandboxGeneral said:
It came this way, no cleanup required! ;)
Click to expand...

Thats lucky, i managed to find a G5 one of the last models made but it literally looked like it was sitting beside a highway for a couple of years and inside it was even worse :eek: and it had a failing graphics card. It was fun while i had it though.
 
SandboxGeneral said:
I'm considering putting an SSD in it, but held off on ordering one until I do some more research on which one I should get first.
Click to expand...

In case it helps, I put a Crucial v4 128GB SSD in my iMac G5 (which was a 2.0GHz with 2GB RAM) and it did not make any difference at all to me. Only thing I noticed was that there was obviously no HD noise. But speed was very, very close to the standard HD and the boot time was not improved.
 
Jessica Lares said:
Probably has to do with the fact that a majority of Macs are ventless and they have to make special design choices so that things wouldn't melt and explode. :eek:
Click to expand...

My Mac's have cheese graters or vents..

Honestly I thinks it's the use of grey plastic and attractive CPU covers. In an iMac most would never see it, attention to detail and pride in workmanship.
 
I have an old G5 iMac that was being flaky about powering on. I'll have to pop it open and check the caps. It also wont power on when a firewire iSight is plugged in. The iSight's led will light up for a second, though, so its getting power from the firewire bus, maybe just not enough
 
Maybe because PowerPC Macs are what gave new meaning to the expression: "Think Different"? While I enjoy my Mac Pro a lot, I will always have a special heart for my other kids as well, the Quad G5, PowerBook 1.67 DLSD, and the big brother of them all and oldest: The Pismo which is a G4 550.

GermanyChris said:
It never ceases to amaze me how nice Mac's look from the inside, probably more-so in the PowerPC days..
Click to expand...
 
The Samsung 1GB RAM chip arrived today from OWC and I put that in. Now I just need the PSU. I checked the tracking and I'm not sure if I'll get it this week or next. It's still in San Diego and needs to make it's way to Michigan.
 
The PSU arrived today and I've installed it. I now have that, an extra 1GB RAM chip bringing it to 2GB total and a HDD that has been checked over for bad sectors and has passed.

I put it all back together and powered it on for the first time. It booted into Leopard and I went first to System Information to see what it had to say. I briefly looked at it and had to walk away for a couple of minutes. As soon as I returned to and sat down a kernel panic overlaid itself on the desktop talking about some mds problem.

I powered it down then started it back up and inserted the Leopard disc and told it to boot to that. All it did after that was go to the gray Apple screen and stay there. The fans also spun up to full speed.

I thought maybe the HDD sensor cable came loose when I put the HDD back in so I powered it down and opened it back up to double check. Upon inspection, I found that it was connected tightly as it should be. I looked at every connection in there and everything is solid.

I looked again at the capacitors on the motherboard and inside the new PSU and they all appear to be good as well.

Again I put it back together, powered it up and booted to disc. This time, the fans spun up again and went to the gray Apple screen and I got the [gray] spinning progress wheel. It spun in circles for maybe 5-10 minutes and then stopped. It's been this way for probably 15 minutes now: stopped spinning wheel and fans at maximum.

At this point, I'm not sure what to do next. I think I will remove the new RAM chip and see if that makes a difference.
 
Hmmmm... I took the new RAM chip out and powered it up again and this time the fans spun up briefly and then went back down. Booting to the Leopard disc succeeded and now OS X is loading on it. All this in a matter of a few minutes since my last post.

Perhaps the RAM chip is bad or I purchased an incorrect one. What I don't understand is when I started it up the first time and looked at System Information, it had registered and displayed 2GB of RAM. The chips were seated properly and tight because I checked them twice.
 
I believe spotlight caused (at least part of) the kernel panic, as mds is the process that shows up when it's indexing a new hard drive. Good luck on the Leopard install & keep us posted!
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Register on MacRumors! This sidebar will go away, and you'll see fewer ads.
Top Bottom
Back