BIG BLACK SOLID RECTANGLE ON MY SCREEN!! Is it my logic board??

[gracystudios]

I'm a novice when it comes to macs. So please ... be gentle ...

I've looked at quite a few of these threads, but haven't quite found one like my problem ... only one came close ...
http://discussions.apple.com/thread.jspa?messageID=7283014

his had the big solid black rectangle like mine, but i didnt have any video problems prior
here's the pic he posted ... http://www.flickr.com/photos/26871942@N03/2516322894/in/photostream/
and mine looks exactly like that ... (hope he doesnt mind me using his pic, but i dont have a digital camera)
OK. I'm going to put as much pertinent information as I can here.

I'm using a G4 powermac, mirrored drive dual 1.4 ghz, 1 gig ddr, 80gig hd

I started getting the transparent rectangle that said i needed to restart my machine in different languages. i restarted. it worked fine for a while. then happened again. the first 2 times it happened while i was surfing in safari. i had not updated safari for some time prior to this. in fact, no updates at all for at least a month. then the restart rectangle came more often, this time right at boot up. i couldn't get past it.
I've replaced the ram (no change)
it's gotten progressively worse to where now i can't reset nvram, can't boot in safe mode, can't boot as single user, can't boot from disc(ANY disc), never been able to get fsck to work, disk utitility .... nothin. can't do "command+option+p+r" at ALL now. i've opened it up, dusted it out, made sure everything was seated well, and nothing was disconnected or looked burned.

this last attempt i just pushed the power button a few times (for the hell of it) while it was on and got THIS overlayed on my screen:

LATEST CRASH INFO FOR CPU 0;
EXCEPTION STATE (SV=0X2D205500)
PC=0X000ABBF8; MSR=0X00001030; DAR=0X176AFFD0; DSISR=0X42000000; LR=0X000A
BACC; R1=0X176AFEF0; XCP=0X00000098 (SYSTEM FAILURE)
BACKTRACE

BACKTRACE TERMINATED - FRAME NOT MAPPED OR INVALID: 0X176AFEF0

PROCEEDING BACK VIA EXCEPTION CHAIN:
EXCEPTION STATE (SV=0X2D205500)
PC=0X000A4EA8; MSR=0X00001030; DAR=0X176AFFDO; DSISR=0X42000000; LR=0X0002
BACKTRACE
blah blah blah blah blah blah ...
backtrace continues...

(and it goes on like this til the bottom)

KERNEL VERSION:
DARWIN KERNEL VERSION 8.11.0: WED OCT 10 18:26:00 PDT 2007; ROOT: XNV-792.24.17~1
/RELEASE_PPC

 

[apfhex]

What you were getting is a kernel panic. I don't have experience with the black box issue or with MDD G4s in general but from your description it definitely sounds like a hardware problem. You checked the RAM which was a good call. It could very well be something like the logic board, though I don't really know.

 

[gracystudios]

yes, thank you ... anything is a good start ... i appreciate that ...
i really like using a mac ... and i'd like to continue doing so at the smallest possible cost

any more help narrowing it down would be greatly appreciated ...

i'd really rather not pay $125/hr to figure it out

thanks in advance to everybody. i've noticed you guys are all very willing to help ... very cool ...