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A Lemon?

P

peterj1967

macrumors regular
Original poster
Aug 30, 2002
182
0
I have had a few issues with my PM G4 since I got it, looking for suggestions moving forward.

It wouldn't boot 2 days after I received it. The drive was corrupted, but reformatted, and reinstalled everything, and it was fine after that.

A week later, actually Friday night, my machine turned itself on. That was a first for me, but I was sitting in my kitchen and is simply powered up. I knew that setting in OS 9 but I didn't think you could do that in X.

Saturday morning, the machine wouldn't stay on for more then 10 minutes, the computer would shut down but the light on the studio display would stay on.

Called Apple, the walked me through reseting the PMU, and had me zap the PRAM. That seemed to take care of things.

But when I was shutting down last night, the system crashed during the shutdown.

So I am a little concerned with the timing of everything, Hardware Test runs fine. I am just concerned about the gremlins. Any suggestions for other things to check or suggestions for working with Apple if these things keep popping up. Or do ya think I just got a lemon?

I'm running 10.2.6 with all the current updates.

Thanks
 
Ahhh, your house is haunted! Call a priest!

Well, if you just got it, I'd suggest you return it and try a new one. If the second one does the same thing...
 
you could always try Apple's KnowlegeBase. i've found answers to quite a few of my problems there.

and you can set your Mac to boot up at a specific time? can anyone tell me how to do that?! :D
 
Oh gosh, yeah I'd return it or something....
Setting your mac to boot up at certain times would be awesome! I could just turn it off at night, and then after school at like 3:15 it would just turn on as I walked in the door, that would be sweet.
 
why are you guys shutting down the machine at all? Why not just have it sleep and then in like one second its awake whenever you want it. OSX is not designed to be shut down every day...
 
I am curious why you say OSX is not designed to be shut down every night?

Are their maintenance routines that run or something?

[Answered my own question with a little research....]


Originally posted by Kwyjibo
why are you guys shutting down the machine at all? Why not just have it sleep and then in like one second its awake whenever you want it. OSX is not designed to be shut down every day...
Click to expand...
 
yeah, i leave my computer on all the time. peter, as to your problem, that's some pretty freaky stuff. i would have to agree with Schiffi and say that it's your house. i would reccommend moving. if that's an inconvenience, you could call apple tech support and request a new computer, or the repair of that one.
 
I held of VooDoo ceremony in my apartment, and since then the machine has not turned itself on, or off and other then that one crash (it crashed when I was shutting it down) I've been good.

It's been on since Sunday morning and barring and systems crashed or restarts for software I plan to leave it running for the week.

Any suggestions for good housekeeping utilities for OS X? Anybody have a regular maintenance routine they run?

Living in Manhattan, without a doorman makes returns, pick-ups and deliveries a huge pain in the *ss. So I am trying to avoid it.


Ask me how things are in a week.


Originally posted by beez7777
yeah, i leave my computer on all the time. peter, as to your problem, that's some pretty freaky stuff. i would have to agree with Schiffi and say that it's your house. i would reccommend moving. if that's an inconvenience, you could call apple tech support and request a new computer, or the repair of that one.
Click to expand...
 
Good Grief

It's going back...

Started shutting itself down on its own again.

This time when it booted it came up in a grey screen with dark grey text. "Welcome to OpenFirmwere" I need to type mac-boot to get it to start.

It's possesed and it needs to be repaced
 
That's pretty freaky...

Have you looked inside the computer, to see if there's a timer or something someone left there as a practical joke? That would explain part of it... but I don't think it's possible to start a computer into OF without deliberately doing it from the keyboard.

You don't have any X-10 or similar systems running in your house, do you? Cause that's the only other thing I can think of, unless you have a REALLY dirty power supply (the AC is below 50 or above 70 Hz, not referring to the PSU).
 
Originally posted by beez7777
yeah, i leave my computer on all the time. peter, as to your problem, that's some pretty freaky stuff. i would have to agree with Schiffi and say that it's your house. i would reccommend moving. if that's an inconvenience, you could call apple tech support and request a new computer, or the repair of that one.
Click to expand...
apple wont give him a new computer, they dont do that, they will just fix what he has.

iJon
 
sounds like a motherboard problem to me, since Apple told you to do those things, and they worked for a time, that means it is most likely the motherboard. I would say it could also be corrupted firmware, try talking to Apple about updating the open firmware
 
Originally posted by Schiffi
Ahhh, your house is haunted! Call a priest!

Well, if you just got it, I'd suggest you return it and try a new one. If the second one does the same thing...
Click to expand...
Spooky.

But - what about doing a really hard reset (removing the battery on the motherboard and then waiting for some time)?

I had problems with a PowerMac I borrowed from Apple (self-shutting down), but that was because it was over-heating. It also had the isolation scratched of on one of the IDE/ATA-cables, wich was touching the casing, causing the SuperDrive not to work.
 
This is starting to be a saga...

Anyhow called Apple... Guess what, they think I have bad power and recommend a UPS.

It makes sense.

so...

I'll buy a UPS, if the machine craps out again I'll know there's a machine issue, If it never does it again, I'll know what the issue was.

I ran the Extended Hardware tests, and just double checked the innards for obvious loose cables or connectors. Everything seems fine.

Anything else other then the Apple Hardware test that may be worth running?

Thanks for all the advice

Any suggestions on a UPS make or model? I need something to keep the power clean, I don't need 20 minutes of power backup. I'd like to spend less them $100 if that would fix the problem.



Originally posted by cubist
Sounds like power problems to me. Get an UPS.
Click to expand...
 
Last Steps

So...


Followed Apple's and this board's suggestions. Got a UPS and hooked everything up.

To be safe, I reset the PMU, Zapped the PRAM, reinstalled OSX and ran all the system updates. So it should be good as new.

So, now I leave it on for as long as it will stay up and we'll see what happens.

Thanks for the input
 
My guess is either the power supply, or the proc is over heating and shutting down. Did you check that the cpu fan works, as well that the heatsink is mounted properly?

Also... I think you should call Apple and tell them to fix it now. This is bs that you have to do all of this.
 
yzedf is correct, you need to get this taken care of. If your machine is a MDD, I bet it is your CPU. You won't be able to get a new computer so you should just go get it repaired ASAP. Good luck with that.
 
Originally posted by Mblazened
yzedf is correct, you need to get this taken care of. If your machine is a MDD, I bet it is your CPU. You won't be able to get a new computer so you should just go get it repaired ASAP. Good luck with that.
Click to expand...

When my iBook broke within 4 days of me getting it, apple offered me a repair, or a refund, or a new machine. I chose the repair as I wanted my iBook, and didn't want to have to wait 2 weeks for them to build and ship me a new one! 4 days later is was back in my posession.
 
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