PM G4 Sawtooth Dead?

[ingenious]

A while back I picked up a few PowerMac G4 Sawtooths off of eBay. After finally getting graphics cards from the seller and I power supply on my own, I'm trying to get at least one of them to work.

The power supply i have will only work in one of the two, because of the size of its connector, so i can't try the other one, but i know the supply works, because I tried it in another Sawtooth I had before I sold it.

Anyway, I can't get my current Sawtooth to boot. I believe it's a 400 MHz G4. It has 128 MB RAM (right now), a DVD-ROM drive, a Zip Drive, a 20 GB HD, and a VGA + ADC (is that what i mean? it's been too long! ) AGP graphics card (ATI Rage 128 Pro).

The 055 light is red.

The power button light comes on and the lights on the keyboard flash.

It chimes.

Now, the monitor i have plugged into it changes from power-saving mode to active, but i don't get any picture.

The graphics card has an "extra" (i don't think that's possible, but anyway) piece on it that supposed to fit into a non-existent slot... if that's the problem, i have another card without the "extra" piece, but it won't work either.

I'll attach a picture.

P.S. I've removed the PRAM battery to see if that will help.

 

[SmurfBoxMasta]

Well, if that video card has ADC & VGA connectors on it, it is NOT from a Sawtooth, but rather a Gigabit Ethernet model, however it still should work as long as you are connecting your monitor to the VGA connection. That "extra" tab on the card in your picture, with gold contacts on it, thats the extra power connector to supply power for the ADC displays. The hook shaped one the other end is merely a stabilizer for machines that have the 4 & 8x AGP slots.......

IIRC, older PM's wont boot or chime unless a functioning video card is detected by the OS......so if the machine lights up & chimes like you said, then it is most likely booting. It would then appear that either your monitor OR the cable is bad. Have you verified them as working on other machines ?

And yes,a bad/weak pram battery would cause problems of various kinds, but again, if the machine chimes, it should boot up fine. Have you tried to reset the pram ? (hold down the option+p+r keys at startup for 2-3 chimes then release) The chime is actually the POST (power on self test) that stops the machine from booting if hardware/mobo errors are detected.

just some thoughts ........

 

[ingenious]

Well, if that video card has ADC & VGA connectors on it, it is NOT from a Sawtooth, but rather a Gigabit Ethernet model, however it still should work as long as you are connecting your monitor to the VGA connection. That "extra" tab on the card in your picture, with gold contacts on it, thats the extra power connector to supply power for the ADC displays. The hook shaped one the other end is merely a stabilizer for machines that have the 4 & 8x AGP slots.......

IIRC, older PM's wont boot or chime unless a functioning video card is detected by the OS......so if the machine lights up & chimes like you said, then it is most likely booting. It would then appear that either your monitor OR the cable is bad. Have you verified them as working on other machines ?

And yes,a bad/weak pram battery would cause problems of various kinds, but again, if the machine chimes, it should boot up fine. Have you tried to reset the pram ? (hold down the option+p+r keys at startup for 2-3 chimes then release) The chime is actually the POST (power on self test) that stops the machine from booting if hardware/mobo errors are detected.

just some thoughts ........

Okay, I'm going to borrow a different VGA monitor from church this morning... maybe it will work better. The ones I tried haven't been in use for awhile, but one of them definitely worked the last time I used it.

If that doesn't work, I'll try resetting the PRAM. Do I need an Apple keyboard to do that? If so, I just use the one off of my iMac.

 

[SmurfBoxMasta]

If you can, get different VGA cable as well as the monitor.

And no, you dont need an apple kb to reset the pram, as long as you know which key is mapped to be the option key

 

[ingenious]

If you can, get different VGA cable as well as the monitor.

And no, you dont need an apple kb to reset the pram, as long as you know which key is mapped to be the option key

Yea! The monitor was it. Anyway, I'm going to stick the PRAM battery back in and try installing Leopard.

Thanks for your help.

 

[SmurfBoxMasta]

Good luck, & please post back with a progress report

 

[ingenious]

Good luck, & please post back with a progress report

Well, everything's up and running fine, now. It's running 10.5.(almost 1-it's doing a SWU now) and I have it set up as a file server. I had a second hard drive in it, but the HD overheated and was causing KPs, so now i'm looking for some HD bays...

This thing's REALLY snappy for a 400 MHz G4... probably faster than my PowerBook was on Tiger... and the PM has only 192 MB RAM! It's amazing, and I'm really happy with it.

Of course, I don't have the translucent menu bar, but that's a different story... (i do miss it)

 

[9Charms]

Also, if you want/need a newer, quieter power supply, you can use a regular PC power supply. You have to solder 2 wires to get it to work. The instructions are here.

But I would instead get a power supply extension and solder it. That way you don't mess around with the new power supply and in the future, you can sell the machine with the feature that "any power supply will work" with it.