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Screen crashes on 8-core Mac Pro

K

kjeld

macrumors newbie
Original poster
Oct 27, 2007
7
0
Hi all,

Since a couple of weeks I am facing weird crashes on my 8core Mac Pro (May 2007). They happen from time to time. Sometimes directly after starting up, sometimes there are no crashes for a couple of days.
crashboembeng.jpg


• I get some seconds to make a screen capture, then need to do a hard reset.
• You see a small iTunes window, but crashes do also happen when iTunes is closed.
• It doesn’t seem to be related to specific software, however: the problem occured not long after I installed some CS3-apps (Illustrator, Acrobat, Indesign)
• Did the latest software updates (OS 10.4.10) and firmware update for the videocard (ATI Radeon X1900 XT).
• Monitor is a LaCie 22"
• Repaired permissions couple of times
• Did a PRAM reset.

None of this seems to help, is there anybody with some suggestions?
Thanks,
Kjeld
 
does the screen then go all black after a bit?


idk if its your problem, but the computer in my sig did that to me. sometime with different color of lines etc. I had to get the logic board replaced. Fixed the problem right up.

Good Luck
 
No, the screen doesn’t go black. But I never waited that long. Usely did a restart after 1-2 minutes.

Added the monitor, which is a LaCie 22"
 
Sounds like the videocard, Not sure if there is a way to test the videocard under OS X. A Video RAM check etc..
 
Nope. No other videocards to try.

Forgot to mention that I ran a (extended) hardware test for about 15 hours, but did not notice anything wrong.
Or does the hardware test don’t test any videocards?
 
I don't suspect it could be the monitor, if screen capture is showing you the distorted image, then it must be something going wrong pre-monitor.

I'd also guess video card, though it could be the logic board messing things up.
 
Got the MacPro back from the repair centre yesterday and I am going to bring it back again tomorrow. They replaced the videocard and logic board, but after 15 minutes of some copying: boom! It’s back again.

Getting sick and tired of these expensive stuff which won’t work.

Maybe there’s somebody with other suggestions?
 
kjeld said:
Got the MacPro back from the repair centre yesterday and I am going to bring it back again tomorrow. They replaced the videocard and logic board, but after 15 minutes of some copying: boom! It’s back again.

Getting sick and tired of these expensive stuff which won’t work.

Maybe there’s somebody with other suggestions?
Click to expand...

Thats very odd....because thats almost the whole machine replaced! power supply maybe? or the CPUs themselves but that seems odd?
 
Hi,
I don't know if this is any help to you at all, as I have nothing like the setup you have (yet, although I'm planning to buy the same one).
However, i experienced something very similar on my G4 with Apple Cinema display. The problem for me was in the Apple DVI adapter that I used for the monitor, do you use one of these? After a lot of trial and error, I found that it was something to do with the cabling in the DVI adapter, and how it was situated. I had it crammed into a space behind the Mac, and the cabling was squeezed together a bit too tightly. Simply by moving my Mac forward, giving the adapter a bit more space, and loosening the coils of the cable, solved the problem. I'm not techie enough to know why this worked, but it did. The only analogy I can think of is if you imagine the cabling was a hosepipe carrying water, and it got a kink in it :D Which is probably way off the mark, but at least the problem was solved.
Good luck.
 
Graphis said:
The problem for me was in the Apple DVI adapter that I used for the monitor, do you use one of these?
Click to expand...

Thanks for your feedback Graphis. And yes, I am using adapters. But I tried on two different monitors (the LaCie 22 and a 20" cinema display) with different adapters and cables. There is enough space and no kinks in the cables. But both setups give problems.

That said, I doubt it will be the cabling or adapters.
 
Any Success?

Hi, did you get any success with this in the end? My Mac Pro purchased around the same time as you - has just started to do the same thing to me!!
 
It ended up with probably software issue; might be Quark 7.3 (after replacing graphic card and logic board).
Then the dealer updated this to 7.3.1 and the problem was gone.
 
Thanks. I think the only thing ive installed is mozy back up so I will try and uninstall that to see if it mKes a difference.

The only other thing i thought it maybe is that my mac is in my garden office and that gets really warm later on in the day when its sunny. Like 90 degrees hot - it has lots of glass and faces west as the sub sets. As we are now in spring and since we moved into this house last September this is the first time we've noticed it.

Time to get zircon in the office I think!!!

Anyway, will uninstall mozy to see if that helps.
 
Me Too!!

kjeld said:
Hi all,

Since a couple of weeks I am facing weird crashes on my 8core Mac Pro (May 2007). They happen from time to time. Sometimes directly after starting up, sometimes there are no crashes for a couple of days.
crashboembeng.jpg


• I get some seconds to make a screen capture, then need to do a hard reset.
• You see a small iTunes window, but crashes do also happen when iTunes is closed.
• It doesn’t seem to be related to specific software, however: the problem occured not long after I installed some CS3-apps (Illustrator, Acrobat, Indesign)
• Did the latest software updates (OS 10.4.10) and firmware update for the videocard (ATI Radeon X1900 XT).
• Monitor is a LaCie 22"
• Repaired permissions couple of times
• Did a PRAM reset.

None of this seems to help, is there anybody with some suggestions?
Thanks,
Kjeld
Click to expand...

Taking my Mac Pro 8 Core 2nd Gen in this morning.. this is a real problem! Tested everything.. They are swaping out the Radeon 2600 Video Card for another one to test and I will run the new one for a day to see it it crashes my machine at shutdown
My file looks like a wire mesh on the whole screen at startup sometimes. It's intermitant! Oh Yeah! I seeing this right after I updated to Mac OSX10.5.5. iTunes was updated a while back to Ver 8 but did not see anything there with the older OS. Also, no sunny in the room or temperature changes. Freezes at shutdown.
 
Did you ever get this problem sorted out??

My machine is now doing the same thing??

Please help
 
It just stopped doing it - i think it was over-heating on the Samsung monitor. I replaced the monitor with an Apple 30 inch cinema display and never had the problem since
 
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