I recently bought a firewire 800 dual 1.42 GHz G4 power mac, which didn't have a hard drive or memory. I bought some memory from OWC and I threw a hard drive in it. When I press the power button I hear the startup sound however there is no video on the monitor. I'm trying to figure out whether it's a bad motherboard, video card, or if it could possibly be something else like the power supply. I have reset the PMU to no avail. Does anyone have any suggestions on what I could do to figure out which component is bad? Any help would be greatly appreciated.
Got a tip for us?
Let us know
Become a MacRumors Supporter for $50/year with no ads, ability to filter front page stories, and private forums.
Having trouble starting up Dual 1.42 GHz Firewire 800 G4
- Thread starter rflail
- Start date
- Sort by reaction score
Have you installed a Fresh install of OS X? I imagine you already did since you put in a new HD?
Sounds to me like its just a bad video card. I would start the computer wait five minutes, then try hitting the volume keys up and down, and if you can hear the clicking for when the volume is changed, it should mean that you OS is ok/or running.
Sounds to me like its just a bad video card. I would start the computer wait five minutes, then try hitting the volume keys up and down, and if you can hear the clicking for when the volume is changed, it should mean that you OS is ok/or running.
thanks a lot for the response. I haven't installed OSX yet because there's no video to see what's going on, but I should at least get the screen with the little icon saying there's no os right? I don't have a mac keyboard so I have no volume keys to press. Anyone have any other ideas?
if you have and OS X disc, you could pop that in the optical drive after you first hit the power button, then quickly hold down the "C" key. this will make the computer boot from the Disc.
If the video card works you should see the installer window.
BTW: if you don't have a Apple keyboard, two of the "F" [F8, F9?] keys by default are volume keys, i just can't remember which ones.
If the video card works you should see the installer window.
BTW: if you don't have a Apple keyboard, two of the "F" [F8, F9?] keys by default are volume keys, i just can't remember which ones.
What is the video card? Is it possibly one that has to be selected between DVI and VGA or ACD and VGA?
Also do you have the resources to do firewire target disk mode to bring up the drive on another Mac and install an operating system on the drive?
Also do you have the resources to do firewire target disk mode to bring up the drive on another Mac and install an operating system on the drive?
Pull the PRAM battery out, short across the now-empty battery socket terminals with a paper clip for about a half hour, then install a new PRAM battery.
Does the monitor work on another computer?
Does another monitor work on the Mac?
Does the video card work on another Mac?
Does another video card work on the Mac?
The startup sound = POST. Good sign. Unlikely to be RAM or Logic board. The most likely place to start is the video card / monitor.
Thanks for the responses. I've pulled the PRAM battery and checked it with a multimeter and it is charged. I've never heard of the paper clip trick. I've tried it with 2 different monitors and an lcd TV, all of which work on other computers. It has the stock ATI video card, which has both the acd and dvi connections. How would you switch between the two? The only other Mac I have is a MBP. I could try putting the drive in a USB enclosue that I have and installing OSX on it through the MBP, but the fact that I don't even get a screen showing that there's no operating system installed makes me think this isn't the cause. I've got a couple agp video cards laying around, but they're all for PC's....would they even work on a Power Mac? Again thanks for all the help, I really appreciate it.
A view things I would check..
Hi,
You mentioned it's an ATI card, so assume its the Radeon 9000 most likely with 64 MB. The G4 MDD 1,42 uses an AGP port. Try to reseat the card again. Now this time bevore you reseat the card pull all other PCI cards out and try the system with the graphic card only. (Throw out the other cards like USB 2.0, Firwire extension cards, TV tuner .. stuff like that)
Once reseated make sure the card is locked in, sometimes they have a small lock handle on the end of the AGP port.
Check on the motherboard if it is mounted on the right spots. Your preowner may dissasembled the whole thing and did a crappy job putting it back together.
If this doesn't help the card is either damaged or your monitor has some settings you didn't look at. (Damaged video cards are seldom) Do you have an original Apple screen? Does this screen work on you MBP ? Try this to make sure your monitor works on Apple machines. The different monitor cable standards are sometimes problematic. Try the computer on an original Apple screen (CompUSA, Applestore, Friends). Check the cable for bent or broken pins on both connectors. Is it a VGA standard cable or do you use a version with 5 seperate smaller cables (BNC cable).
You mentioned you hear the sound when powering up. Thats usually a good sign, meaning your motherboard most likely is ok.
Also ckeck on the On-screen menue of your monitor if you have one. Sometimes you can switch between differend graphic modes, especially if you have multiple connection ports on the back of your monitor.
Regarding the buffer battery mentioned earlier in that thread; measuring the voltage doesnt tell you anything because you would need to know how many mAmps are flowing. A half, or almost empty battery could still be indicated as almost new on your meter, because voltage is going down once the computer runs but may get back to normal once computer is shut off.
Good luck!
Hi,
You mentioned it's an ATI card, so assume its the Radeon 9000 most likely with 64 MB. The G4 MDD 1,42 uses an AGP port. Try to reseat the card again. Now this time bevore you reseat the card pull all other PCI cards out and try the system with the graphic card only. (Throw out the other cards like USB 2.0, Firwire extension cards, TV tuner .. stuff like that)
Once reseated make sure the card is locked in, sometimes they have a small lock handle on the end of the AGP port.
Check on the motherboard if it is mounted on the right spots. Your preowner may dissasembled the whole thing and did a crappy job putting it back together.
If this doesn't help the card is either damaged or your monitor has some settings you didn't look at. (Damaged video cards are seldom) Do you have an original Apple screen? Does this screen work on you MBP ? Try this to make sure your monitor works on Apple machines. The different monitor cable standards are sometimes problematic. Try the computer on an original Apple screen (CompUSA, Applestore, Friends). Check the cable for bent or broken pins on both connectors. Is it a VGA standard cable or do you use a version with 5 seperate smaller cables (BNC cable).
You mentioned you hear the sound when powering up. Thats usually a good sign, meaning your motherboard most likely is ok.
Also ckeck on the On-screen menue of your monitor if you have one. Sometimes you can switch between differend graphic modes, especially if you have multiple connection ports on the back of your monitor.
Regarding the buffer battery mentioned earlier in that thread; measuring the voltage doesnt tell you anything because you would need to know how many mAmps are flowing. A half, or almost empty battery could still be indicated as almost new on your meter, because voltage is going down once the computer runs but may get back to normal once computer is shut off.
Good luck!