Late 2008 24" DEAD?

[GovtLawyer]

I sold my friend a late 2008 24" around 4 or 5 months ago. He just called and told me it was dead - would not start. It was working perfectly until last night.

I am going over to take a look at it. Are there any troubleshooting steps I can take in order to either start it up or figure out what's wrong with it?

Thanks. Steven

 

[762999]

you can try doing hard reset..
http://support.apple.com/kb/HT3964?viewlocale=en_US&locale=en_US

with mine, it was the HDD, I had to replace it.

 

[GovtLawyer]

Not the answer

The answer given to me above is not for Macs which will not start and appear dead.

Any other ideas?

 

[ReggaeFire]

I would check to see if it's actually powering on, but not displaying anything. The GPUs on many of those had a defect that can result in that.

 

[iTiki]

My early 2008 died about a week ago. Turned out to be the hard drive. Not a big deal to replace and it's back up running perfectly again. I expect to get another year or two out of it.

 

[GovtLawyer]

Probably Power

It doesn't seem to be powering on at all. Just seems dead.

 

[128keaton]

I would check to see if it's actually powering on, but not displaying anything. The GPUs on many of those had a defect that can result in that.

Yeah, mine did that. I put it in the oven for 10 minutes at 400 degrees twice with a 15 minute break in between.

 

[762999]

The answer given to me above is not for Macs which will not start and appear dead.

Any other ideas?

if you bothered to read the page I linked you would have noticed this :

Power
The computer doesn't respond to the power button when pressed.

 

[GovtLawyer]

Tried that

Yes, I guess I sloughed over that. However, unplugging and trying to start it by holding the power button was one of the first things we tried. No response to that.

 

[Fishrrman]

Some years ago, there was a problem with some Macs that was similar to yours.

That is, press the power-on button, and ..... nothing.

The cause was a dead PRAM (motherboard) battery.

Replace the battery, and everything back to normal.

Many folks replaced entire motherboards, when the only "faulty part" was the battery.

I don't know if this might also apply to modern iMacs. Worth consideration...