Odd G4 Digital Audio Sound Problem

[Mackey]

I have an odd problem with a G4 533 MHz digital audio tower. I bought it used a year and a half ago and everything works fine except for an apparent hardware problem with sound output. Sound output slowly oscillates (around 10 seconds per cycle?) from very loud to very soft and fades back and forth across speaker channels. Volume and mute setting is ignored. All sound out of the internal speaker or headphone jack is affected, music or otherwise. it happens continually.

It has persisted through clean system installs, trashing preferences and progressive upgrades of 10.3, 10.4 and 10.5. I’ve never had an OS lower than 10.3 on it. I've done PRAM and motherboard zapping, RAM swaps and battery replacements to no avail. A while back I found a couple of others with similar problems in G4s on an Apple forum, but I’ve never found a solution.

I can import digital video, edit audio and burn DVD’s and audio CD’s with no problem, so it would seem to be a hardware-related sound output problem.

Any tips would be appreciated. I plan to upgrade to a 20” iMacintel soon, leaving this machine as a music station that can't play music.

Chris

 

[alexprice]

I't would seem to me that there is a hardware fault with the logic board. Maybe you should add a PCI soundcard.

 

[bob benavides]

g4 533 digital audio tower sound problem

in reference to the problem below i have the same problem and would like to know if you solved your problem. Again, when listening to any kind of audio the sound increases and decreases at will also the mute button does not work. I have tried all kinds of things - sometimes it boots up ok and it works then boot up again and back to old problem. Note that it came with 9.2.2 and sound is fine - i can listen to cd music and it is totally functional. I put 10.4 on it and now i have this strange audio problem.

I have an odd problem with a G4 533 MHz digital audio tower. I bought it used a year and a half ago and everything works fine except for an apparent hardware problem with sound output. Sound output slowly oscillates (around 10 seconds per cycle?) from very loud to very soft and fades back and forth across speaker channels. Volume and mute setting is ignored. All sound out of the internal speaker or headphone jack is affected, music or otherwise. it happens continually.

It has persisted through clean system installs, trashing preferences and progressive upgrades of 10.3, 10.4 and 10.5. I’ve never had an OS lower than 10.3 on it. I've done PRAM and motherboard zapping, RAM swaps and battery replacements to no avail. A while back I found a couple of others with similar problems in G4s on an Apple forum, but I’ve never found a solution.

I can import digital video, edit audio and burn DVD’s and audio CD’s with no problem, so it would seem to be a hardware-related sound output problem.

Any tips would be appreciated. I plan to upgrade to a 20” iMacintel soon, leaving this machine as a music station that can't play music.

Chris

 

[Mackey]

Sound Problem Follow Up

Hi Bob,

As you can see, there was little response to my original post. The suggestion of adding a PCI sound card is probably a good one. I never did solve the problem, but it's my third best Mac by a wide margin, so it sees limited use these days.

Chris