PowerPC will not startup...

[wts]

My 8500 PowerMac ( with a Sonnet G4 processor ) will not startup.

The internal SCSI drive and the internal IDE drive fire up but then nothing shows up on the desktop.

The SCSI drive ( 2 GB ) has OS 9.1.

The internal 40 GB IDE drive is portioned with OS Tiger installed on about 10 GB and OS 9.1 on the second partition of about 30 GB.

The computer was working and then after a shut down would not boot into OS 9 or OS TIGER.

The installation of Tiger was made by using XPostFacto.

Thoughts/suggestions please.

 

[Altemose]

My 8500 PowerMac ( with a Sonnet G4 processor ) will not startup.

The internal SCSI drive and the internal IDE drive fire up but then nothing shows up on the desktop.

The SCSI drive ( 2 GB ) has OS 9.1.

The internal 40 GB IDE drive is portioned with OS Tiger installed on about 10 GB and OS 9.1 on the second partition of about 30 GB.

The computer was working and then after a shut down would not boot into OS 9 or OS TIGER.

The installation of Tiger was made by using XPostFacto.

Thoughts/suggestions please.

Did the drive seize up?

 

[Intell]

Those don't have an IDE bus. Remove the IDE PCI card and everything else. Connect only the 2GB SCSI drive with OS 9. Turn it on and reset the PRAM. It should then boot into OS 9 on the SCSI drive. Turn it off and plug the IDE drive back in. It'll boot from the SCSI drive again. You can then use Xpostfactor to set the boot drive to the Tiger drive.

 

[wts]

Thanks Intel.

I brought the machine back to basics by removing all the PCI cards and the Sonnet processor and still no startup from the SCSI drive.

Put all the parts back then did a PRAM restart and now it boots from the SCSI and can boot from the IDE drive.

It looks as if i will have to re-install OS X Tiger since DiskWarrior shows hard drive partitioned for Tiger was somehow badly damaged.

Any way, at least it now boots.

 

[Intell]

Tiger and Leopard on PCI IDE cards on those like to become corrupt very easily. I know I've had to fix, reimage, and reinstall Tiger and Leopard on my PM 8600 many times because of this corruption. I recall reading somewhere that it is caused by an incompatibility of something. Maybe OS X and older OpenFirmware? I don't recall exactly what causes it.

 

[wts]

I think you're right Intell.

I also conclude that it's hardware related since OS Tiger was installed by XPostFacto. Not sure if you have ever used XPostFacto but it is a scarry process. When you launch XPostfacto the screen goes black and then the screen fills up with a stream of white text giving you details of what is happening. The only thing is that the text is whizzing by so fast you would have to be a computer geek to understand every line. In the end you are presented with the selection of the OS X install in your language of choice. Then it's the same as a normal OS X install.

This "souped" up 8500 is 18 years old. I bought it brand new and it went thru a lot of of those OS 8 and OS 9 crashes, freezes etc. Then when I tricked it into running Tiger there were even more crashes and freezes.

I am really surprised it has last all these years especially the power supply. For me it has been a learning DIY process to work with the insides of a computer. My knowledge of computers has been to replace a battery and add RAM. Those PCI cards and IDE drive were installed for me by a local Apple repair shop when I told them what i wanted to do.

At this point i have no intention of donating this machine to our local land fill or recycle depot. When it finally dies it will rest in piece along with my other legacy Mac's.

Actually, I'm lucky my wife goes along with my silly project.

 

[Intell]

I've used Xpostfactor. It can be a bit daunting at times. If you're up for yet another project, put Leopard onto that machine. That's when the fun begins.