Resolved Problem with Powerbook G4 17in

[Magmadragoon]

I have a powerbook g4 that was bought private sale. The hard drive after a while made a loud buzzing noise so I changed it out with a pata hitachi travelstar 2.5 in hard drive. The problem is that hard drive does not recognize at all on the powermac system. I tried to install the Mac OS x software through the dvd drive and the dvd wouldn't release the disc. So I broke the drive trying to get it out. Bought a new dvd drive and that is not recognizing the install disc and now the disc is stuck in the new drive and the dvd drive is not showing up on the mac system. Trying to figure the way the mac operates, long time linux and windows user. Even using the cd eject in open firmware I get the message can't eject device message.

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I swapped the old hard drive back in the system but it takes 45 minutes to boot into the mac os x and each process takes 5 minutes to complete like clicking on system settings or going on safari.

 

[eyoungren]

I have a powerbook g4 that was bought private sale. The hard drive after a while made a loud buzzing noise so I changed it out with a pata hitachi travelstar 2.5 in hard drive. The problem is that hard drive does not recognize at all on the powermac system. I tried to install the Mac OS x software through the dvd drive and the dvd wouldn't release the disc. So I broke the drive trying to get it out. Bought a new dvd drive and that is not recognizing the install disc and now the disc is stuck in the new drive and the dvd drive is not showing up on the mac system. Trying to figure the way the mac operates, long time linux and windows user. Even using the cd eject in open firmware I get the message can't eject device message.

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I swapped the old hard drive back in the system but it takes 45 minutes to boot into the mac os x and each process takes 5 minutes to complete like clicking on system settings or going on safari.

Okaaayyyy. Let's slow this down a bit.

You have a 17" PowerBook. Apple made five models of these. 1Ghz, 1.33Ghz, 1.5Ghz, 1.67Ghz and 1.67Ghz Dual Layer Super Drive.

Do you know which model you have? If you don't, power down and take out the battery. There will be a sticker telling you what you have (or at least what that Mac was equipped with when sold).

Second. I am assuming that you are cognizant of the fact that this is not an Intel Mac. I'm not trying to insult you, but a lot of people who get new Macs (to them) these days think they got an absolute steal on a Mac only to find out it won't run Mountain Lion because it's not an Intel Mac.

This laptop will require that you partition your new drive as APM and not GUID. You can do this by booting from the DVD. And, that's your problem, of course.

You don't say if the ejection system seems to be working or not. Assuming that it works it's sometimes helpful to hold the Mac in your hands and tilt the eject port at an angle to the ground. I have to do this with BOTH of my 17" PowerBooks to get them to eject a disk properly.

You don't say what OS you are trying to install on this Mac. If it's anything higher than OSX 10.5.x Leopard you will not be able to boot from the disk. 10.6.x and above are Intel only and they will not boot a PowerPC Mac (with exceptions that involve an Intel Mac).

If you are trying to install Leopard (or an earlier version) then you need to go to the Utility menu once the installer loads, select Disk Utility and partition your SSD as APM. Then format it as HFS+ Journaled. Go back to the installer and see if the drive is recognizable and that you can install to it.

No 17" PowerBook can take a version of OSX earlier than OSX Jaguar 10.2.3.

As to why the new drive won't read. Is the new drive just like the old? For instance, if your Mac is a DLSD (Dual Layer Super Drive) and you replaced the drive with a standard Super Drive there might be problems.

IDK too, you may have also scratched the disk trying to get it out of the old drive?

Hope something here helps you.

 

[Magmadragoon]

Mac

The mac is a 1.67ghz. I am trying to install 10.4 version of Mac OS X. The dvd drive is originally the model Panasonic UJ-846-C and I replaced it with the same model. The disc I have is the dual layer Mac OS X 10.4 dvd. I actually got another Mac OS X disk for the new drive and the same thing happened.

 

[Magmadragoon]

dvd drive

Ejection system for the dvd drive is not working and the drive is not reading for the new drive but can hear it spinning in the laptop.

 

[boneskid1]

press and hold the mouse "Click" button right after you push the power button and it should force eject the disk. if that does not work try the same method but hold down the eject button.

and you need to take this slowly it is a process to understand these powerbooks as they are so much different from the newer macbooks

 

[Magmadragoon]

got the disc

So I got the disc out I guess I need to invest into a firewire dvd drive to get the laptop to even work.

 

[Berniemyk]

New Hard Drine Installed - Wont work

Hi, Power Book G4 17"

I replaced the hard drive with a NEW one. I have checked and checked that all internal connections are good.

When I power up, all I get is a folder with a flashing question mark in it.

Have tried holding down alt key. I get two boxes, one for try again and one with an arrow pointing right. they both do nothing.

Have tried to re-boot with OS X disc but the disc rejects itself.

Can anyone help?

 

[rabidz7]

Hi, Power Book G4 17"

I replaced the hard drive with a NEW one. I have checked and checked that all internal connections are good.

When I power up, all I get is a folder with a flashing question mark in it.

Have tried holding down alt key. I get two boxes, one for try again and one with an arrow pointing right. they both do nothing.

Have tried to re-boot with OS X disc but the disc rejects itself.

Can anyone help?

Try another Xdisc.

 

[Berniemyk]

New Hard Drive will not boot

Try another Xdisc.

I did, I have the Tiger version and the Leopard version.

Nothing works

 

[rabidz7]

Try another Xdisc.

I did, I have the Tiger version and the Leopard version.

Nothing works

Burn a new one. Check the old ones for scratches.

 

[Magmadragoon]

Still working on it some updates

So I bought another g4 Powermac to link it to my powerbook. So far through testing I have encountered this:

1.) Old hard drive reads and goes into target disk mode.

2.) new hard drive does not show up in boot options or allow me to boot a cd or go into target disk mode.

3.) Old hard drive was tested Western Digital Data LifeGuard Diagnostic as having too many bad sectors.

4.)new hard drive shows up on powermac g4 when attached as a usb device and was able to format the drive to Mac OS extended journal.

5.)new hard drive does not show up at all on powerbook g4.

6.) bought another new hard drive and run into the same issues as the last drive.

7.) This morning just ordered a new hard drive cable and hopefully that might be the solution.

8.) Still seems weird because only the old hard drive seems to work in the powerbook and they are all 2.5" pata hard drives formatted the same way.

9.) I have a new copy of the retail disk and able to only find the old hard drive in target disk mode.

10.) The two newest drives go through diagnostics fine with no errors when connected by usb.

 

[Nameci]

So I bought another g4 Powermac to link it to my powerbook. So far through testing I have encountered this:

1.) Old hard drive reads and goes into target disk mode.

2.) new hard drive does not show up in boot options or allow me to boot a cd or go into target disk mode.

3.) Old hard drive was tested Western Digital Data LifeGuard Diagnostic as having too many bad sectors.

4.)new hard drive shows up on powermac g4 when attached as a usb device and was able to format the drive to Mac OS extended journal.

5.)new hard drive does not show up at all on powerbook g4.

6.) bought another new hard drive and run into the same issues as the last drive.

7.) This morning just ordered a new hard drive cable and hopefully that might be the solution.

8.) Still seems weird because only the old hard drive seems to work in the powerbook and they are all 2.5" pata hard drives formatted the same way.

9.) I have a new copy of the retail disk and able to only find the old hard drive in target disk mode.

10.) The two newest drives go through diagnostics fine with no errors when connected by usb.

Are you really sure you formatted the partition as APM and not MBR or GUID?

 

[Swampus]

Are you really sure you formatted the partition as APM and not MBR or GUID?

+1

For such a detailed description, I don't see any mention of the Apple Partition Map. This is required to boot a PowerPC Mac. In Disk Utility, click on the partition tab and look for the "option" button near the bottom of the window.

 

[Magmadragoon]

Partition Map

I'm using Tiger 10.4 on my powermac and it is set to Apple Partition Scheme it only gives two options Apple Partition Scheme and PC Partition Scheme.

 

[Swampus]

I'm using Tiger 10.4 on my powermac and it is set to Apple Partition Scheme it only gives two options Apple Partition Scheme and PC Partition Scheme.

And you set the new drive that way before formatting Mac Os Extended Journaled? I just want to make sure that you're looking at the right thing because you should have one more option in Tiger's Disk Utility (but, yes, Apple Partition Map is the one that you want).

Bummer if this is correct. Beyond that, I've got nothing and I agree with you that the new cable seems unlikely to help since you can boot it in Target Disk Mode. I guess we'll see when you get it. Those flex cables are known to break without any obvious visual signs of damage. The question becomes whether or not there is a specific failure that would allow Target Disk Mode, but not normal usage? Or possible weird luck with an intermittent bad connection in the current cable?

Hopefully, someone will chime in with something obvious that the rest of us have missed. I hope you get it sorted out.

 

[mayuka]

Connect both the old drive and the new drive to a linux system or another Mac and try to clone the hd. you can use the "dd" command. You can even write everything to an image, if you have enoug space left.

Something like this:
- on linux or intel Mac with at least so much space left as your old hard disk
- mount the old hard disk
- try something like this (note that the disk1 may be different depending on your mac, on linux it's most likely /dev/sda2 or similar): dd if=/dev/disk1 of=old_hd.img
- then connect the new drive and do the thing backwards: dd if=old_hd.img of=/dev/disk2

If you don't have the space, you need to connect both drives to one Mac or linux system and supply the new hard drive as the output file.

Why am I writing this? I noticed that my old iBook had some odd partitions on it, which aren't really needed and aren't really big. Maybe, some models needed them for whatever reason. Wasn't there also an OpenFirmare which loaded the content from hard drive? Whatever... It is a good idea to clone the partitions and the partition table from the old hard drive and see if it works.

 

[Magmadragoon]

Drive is too damaged to copy

Drive is too damage to copy when I try copying the data to another drive on the powermac or using mac drive in windows has too many bad sectors. Even tried freezing the drive in two zip lock bags.

 

[mayuka]

Drive is too damage to copy when I try copying the data to another drive on the powermac or using mac drive in windows has too many bad sectors. Even tried freezing the drive in two zip lock bags.

When you attached the drive to your Mac, can you please post the output of "diskutil list"? Open Terminal and enter the command. Maybe it is enough not to clone the whole drive, but rather copy just the small partitions.

 

[Magmadragoon]

Update

I bought a 2.5 in PATA to 3.5 in PATA conversion. I installed the hard drive in the powermac G4 and able to put Mac OS X 10.4 onto the hard drive. I put the hard drive in the powerbook g4 then the hard drive will boot to Mac OS X then freeze. The computer will not get to the dock. I put the hard drive back into the powermac and chose repair permissions in diskutility and it says that everything is fine. I can boot into Mac OS X fine on the powermac and use the computer but never get to the dock on the powerbook.

 

[Nameci]

I bought a 2.5 in PATA to 3.5 in PATA conversion. I installed the hard drive in the powermac G4 and able to put Mac OS X 10.4 onto the hard drive. I put the hard drive in the powerbook g4 then the hard drive will boot to Mac OS X then freeze. The computer will not get to the dock. I put the hard drive back into the powermac and chose repair permissions in diskutility and it says that everything is fine. I can boot into Mac OS X fine on the powermac and use the computer but never get to the dock on the powerbook.

fire up console and check on the system logs what's causing it to halt going to the desktop.

 

[RedCroissant]

I bought a 2.5 in PATA to 3.5 in PATA conversion. I installed the hard drive in the powermac G4 and able to put Mac OS X 10.4 onto the hard drive. I put the hard drive in the powerbook g4 then the hard drive will boot to Mac OS X then freeze. The computer will not get to the dock. I put the hard drive back into the powermac and chose repair permissions in diskutility and it says that everything is fine. I can boot into Mac OS X fine on the powermac and use the computer but never get to the dock on the powerbook.

when you say 10.4(Tiger), is it 10.4.1/2/3/11? That PB shipped with 10.4.2 and if that's not what's installed then that could explain why it's not fully booting. Put that drive back into the PM and update it to 10.4.11 if you can and then it should boot fine(I think).

The reason it runs fine on your PM G4 is because the most recent version of OS X that shipped with the PM G4 series was 10.2.3 and that's why the PM can run 10.4.1 while the PB can't.

 

[Magmadragoon]

That's the solution

when you say 10.4(Tiger), is it 10.4.1/2/3/11? That PB shipped with 10.4.2 and if that's not what's installed then that could explain why it's not fully booting. Put that drive back into the PM and update it to 10.4.11 if you can and then it should boot fine(I think).

The reason it runs fine on your PM G4 is because the most recent version of OS X that shipped with the PM G4 series was 10.2.3 and that's why the PM can run 10.4.1 while the PB can't.

I downloaded the 10.4.11 combo update from Apple and installed it on the Powermac. Then transfer the hard drive to the powerbook. The laptop finally works.

 

[RedCroissant]

I downloaded the 10.4.11 combo update from Apple and installed it on the Powermac. Then transfer the hard drive to the powerbook. The laptop finally works.

That's awesome! I'm glad that it's finally done and it's too bad that you had to go through all of that in the first place.

 

[Magmadragoon]

That's awesome! I'm glad that it's finally done and it's too bad that you had to go through all of that in the first place.

Actually, it was a learning experience. Working with PC for so long and trying to understand the power pc architecture was slightly fustrating but informative. At least now I have in 2.5 to 3.5 convertor and a 2.5 pata usb enclosure.

 

[RedCroissant]

Actually, it was a learning experience. Working with PC for so long and trying to understand the power pc architecture was slightly fustrating but informative. At least now I have in 2.5 to 3.5 convertor and a 2.5 pata usb enclosure.

I had to learn the hard way as well. I had an iBook G4 12" that I loaded 10.4.1 on and it didn't recognize the keyboard or the trackpad. Luckily I have a magic mouse and was able to do enough with that to update it. I was even surprised that it booted(even though it booted INCREDIBLY SLOWLY).