See if you can figure out my weird G4

[erikpmort]

So I got a great deal on a G4 powermac 733 mhz dig audio a few years back and it has served me well, but i bought it with one known flaw: after you start up, eventually It locks up and you get the screen that says you need to restart your computer. After I restart, I have never had it freeze, so I simply restart everytime and it works great. I have done a clean install of osx but that didn't solve the problem. Wierd a? I'd love to get it fixed if i could. If you know anyway to help me out that would be great.

 

[FF_productions]

Bad Ram? (not sure if ram would really effect it) I don't know about this one. I would suggest re-installing OSX but that has already been done.

 

[speakerwizard]

that is a bit odd, sounds like logic board except for the fact it works fine after one restart hhhmmm, maybe Pram reset or internal battery needs replacing?, all i can think of

 

[erikpmort]

how do you reset Pram? i did that once on a macbook...

i am swapping out my ram right now... that would be the easiest fix...

 

[erikpmort]

oh and one other thing i forgot to mention... when i go to shut it down, it does so but right as it is finishes powering down it spins back to life and restarts itself.

 

[havokalien]

Wierd G4 problem

Try replacing the 3.6 volt PRAM battery on the motherboard, It will be the best 11 dollars yo ever spent (you do have to reset your clock and stuff afterward)

 

[AlexMaximus]

my guess it's your Hard Drive

I had a problem like you, got a great G4 once but the system crashed from time to time and reboot messed it up. In my case, my hard drive was kind of weard out. Since I replaced it everything worked fine.
My recomendation to you: Try the 3.6 V battery anyways but go only for the original brand! (I bought a different brand in the past -it was emty after 3 months)
On the Hard drive side try to erase everything with disc warrior (if you have that) However if your computer was transported through UPS or USPS your hard drive might got a little kick that caused the problem. The problem gets bigger if the HD was/is mounted vertically! Your bearings wear out faster and the the shut down / park position of the magnetic head of your HD sometimes still get damaged epecially "back in the G4 days"
Your best bet is to go for a cheap SATA card and a new SATA HD. Then you can work around your ATA onboard controller as well, just in case its the logic board. A new SATA HD has a faster bus speed. You can eliminate one big bottelneck in you system. Just in case you want to sell the G4 in year or so, you can take over your SATA drive again.

 

[synth3tik]

Your getting kernel panics which comes when software and hardware fight. A re-install of OS X might help, but I would also check things like RAM and what bot.

 

[erikpmort]

nothin..

well that 7$ battery was a waste... didn't do anything. Changed the ram and that didn't do anything. I'm out of ideas.

 

[volvoben]

So ruled out are:

-OSX
-RAM
-Battery

If the working after restarting really isn't just a random thing, then i might guess it's something related to the bios, but that would be tough to diagnose.

Other possibilities:

-power supply - perhaps after some warming up it functions better?
-i had a cpu fan on a pc once that didn't fire up on cold start, but did start on restart. this isn't likely because there's no dedicated cpu fan (i don't recall there being one at least), but checking to be sure all fans are functioning or if there is a difference in sound between cold start/restart wouldn't hurt.
-hdd - not terribly likely, but hdds have been know to be very odd. switch it out if you have an alternate.
-graphics or other card - probably not driver related since you reinstalled osx, but if you can switch it out for another why not try
-could always be the logic board or processor itself, but these are last resorts of course

If you troubleshoot and come up with nothing except logic board/processor, you could always put it to sleep instead of shutting it down. I don't remember stats on these models in deep sleep, but power consumption is <10w I thought.

Good luck, these problems are very annoying, but if you find the cause it really is a great feeling.

 

[slik]

I bought the first line of Power Mac g4s. It is a dual 833. I have had this problem since I had it. I have also had many other problems with it and have done countless things to try to correct it with no luck. It has served me very well over the years but it has also wasted a lot of my time with trying to fix and diagnose. It also now wil only see my Ipod 30 percent of the time. I cannot get several programs to work on it that work fine on my ther macs. It crashes a lot. Programs such as Itunes, Handbrake, ipodrip rarely work on it. And it is buggy with a lot of others. I have replaced the battery many many times which does help some problems. My g4 restarts itself all the time when I shut it off. Sometimes it would not awake from sleep. Other times it just appeared dead. At least someone else has these problems too and I am not crazy.