[Znerole]

Hello!

I'm new to the mac world. Recently I bought a second hand 350MHz B&W powermac to get a bit into OS X and I've run into quite a number of troubles so far. The first thing I did with the machine was to replace the original 6GB IDE drive by a 40GB maxtor drive, but it's only recognized as a 20 (19-something) GB drive. Nevertheless I installed Panther on it, and right after the first reboot the computer would get trapped in kernel panics. The output in verbose mode was not very insightful. I finally succeeded with rebooting the machine in safe mode. After installing the second CD, the computer would boot into OS X (safe mode only, of course). Here I encountered severe stability problems. On first boot programs crashed all the time. Safari - crash, iTunes - crash, etc. After a few reboots it seemed to work fine. I used the software update to upgrade to OS X 10.3.9 and after that the system was more unstable than before. Then I wiped the HD and reinstalled OS X from CD. Now it kinda works, but it still crashes unpredictably (either single applications or the entire system).

I'm not sure where to go from here. I have been googling for a while, but without any definite results. I think there are three possible culprits:

1. HD: highly suspicious. I thought the 20/40GB issue would be a firmware problem, but my mac has the latest firmware available, and I've read it should support drives up to 120GB. Could it be that one HD works and another doesn't? This maxtor drive worked fine in a windows machine.
2. RAM: I have 320MB inside, I think 64MB came with the machine when it left the factory and the other 256MB have been added later.
3. Battery: Perhaps low battery for NVRAM could cause problems, but at least the system time is always correct, so probably it's something else.

The rest inside the computer seems pretty much standard to me (though the dvd drive looks like a replacement), but maybe there's something lacking on my map. OS 9.1 at least runs fine from the 6GB drive (haven't tested it on the 20/40GB drive yet) as well as Ubuntu (live cd).

Any suggestions are welcome!

[OreoCookie]

Did you run the Apple Hardware Test?

It sounds like a RAM problem plus more. More meaning there is no explanation why only a third of the capacity of the 40 gig drive is recognized. Another possibility would be a dying PSU.

(I've seen you ask for a good Linux distro, Linux won't help if the hardware is the culprit.)

[Dr. Wahnsinn]

Another possible culprit here is the ATA controller. The B&W G3s shipped with two differrent ATA controller chips. The first version is notorius for causing problems when the original hard drive is replaced with another drive of greater capacity. If it turns out to be the ATA chip, the only way around it is to buy an ATA PCI controller card.

That being said, I've seen enough problems caused by bad or incompatable RAM. It always worth a try to remove the RAM added after the Mac left the factory and see if the problems persist.

[Znerole]

Originally Posted by OreoCookie

Did you run the Apple Hardware Test?

It sounds like a RAM problem plus more. More meaning there is no explanation why only a third of the capacity of the 40 gig drive is recognized. Another possibility would be a dying PSU.

(I've seen you ask for a good Linux distro, Linux won't help if the hardware is the culprit.)

Nope, haven't tried the hardware test yet, how can I run it?
Well, I'm not looking for a linux distro to get around my hardware problems, it's just that I like linux and I use it for work, and a big endian linux as well is useful to me.

Anyway, the weird thing is that I only have those problems (apart from the HD problem) under OS X. OS 9 seems to run stable and I've used Ubuntu a whole day as remote terminal without the slightest glitch. Ubuntu I've only started from the live cd though, and OS 9 only from the original 6GB drive, that's why I considered the HD (or anything related to it) to be the main problem, though random crashes generally smell a lot like IC troubles.

Another problem I remember now is that OS X won't recognize the on board sound chip. Again it works under Ubuntu and OS 9 and I also get a sound when booting the machine, but OS X tells me that there's no sound device. I think that's a case for the hardware test again... I'll also try to dig out another HD to see if it helps.

[Znerole]

Originally Posted by Dr. Wahnsinn

Another possible culprit here is the ATA controller. The B&W G3s shipped with two differrent ATA controller chips. The first version is notorius for causing problems when the original hard drive is replaced with another drive of greater capacity. If it turns out to be the ATA chip, the only way around it is to buy an ATA PCI controller card.

That being said, I've seen enough problems caused by bad or incompatable RAM. It always worth a try to remove the RAM added after the Mac left the factory and see if the problems persist.

Thanks for the info! Mine seems to be a 1st revision mac (if I've learnt that correctly today), as it has only one slot for IDE drives (no second mounting layer), so that seems to match the ATA problem you mentioned. I also have an SCSI card on board, no clue if that was included since shipping or added later. I think I can get my hands on a 20GB SCSI drive one of these days, maybe that will help. I will also try to install OS X on the original 6GB ATA/IDE drive and see what happens.

[reader50]

The Apple Hardware Test CD didn't come out until after the G4s had been on the market for awhile. He won't be able to find one for a B&W G3.

The B&Ws without the 2nd mounting location will have problems with a 2nd drive on the HD bus. Like others have said, the early B&Ws had an ATA controller that wasn't stable with two drives on the HD bus - but it was fine with two drives on the optical bay bus.

Try putting just the new Maxtor on the HD bus, move the original 6 GB to the Zip drive bay - this assumes there is no Zip drive installed. If you try the Zip bay, make sure the optical drive and the 6 GB drive are jumpered as Master and Slave. The Maxtor alone on the HD bus should be jumpered as Single or Master-without-slave.

DO NOT USE CABLE SELECT. Only the last G4 models started supporting that, earlier G4s and all G3s do not support CS.

I seem to recall that the half-a-drive showing is a Maxtor jumper issue. Move a jumper and the drive will show up at full size. Without the drive model, we're not able to look up the jumper block key, which will be on the Maxtor site. It may be printed on the HD's label as well.

[Znerole]

Originally Posted by reader50

Try putting just the new Maxtor on the HD bus, move the original 6 GB to the Zip drive bay - this assumes there is no Zip drive installed. If you try the Zip bay, make sure the optical drive and the 6 GB drive are jumpered as Master and Slave. The Maxtor alone on the HD bus should be jumpered as Single or Master-without-slave.

DO NOT USE CABLE SELECT. Only the last G4 models started supporting that, earlier G4s and all G3s do not support CS.

I seem to recall that the half-a-drive showing is a Maxtor jumper issue. Move a jumper and the drive will show up at full size. Without the drive model, we're not able to look up the jumper block key, which will be on the Maxtor site. It may be printed on the HD's label as well.

I didn't try to use the drives at once. I'm not sure now about the m/s configuration, might be set to cable select. I will try toying around with the jumpers a bit.

Thanks for all the info, everything seems to point towards the HD controller. If nothing else helps, hopefully an SCSI drive might solve the issue.

[Znerole]

I couldn't resist and went to office to check out the HD. First of all I was fooled, it was just a 20GB drive, so that was okay. But still the drive was the thing that pulled my system down, even though it was configured as master. I replaced it by the original (noisy) 6GB drive and OS X installed flawlessly. No kernel panics and also the performance problems are gone. The UI is now surprisingly fast and sound works as well. I'm very satisfied so far! Now for the X11 remote desktop. ;-)

Thanks for the support guys!

[OreoCookie]

Originally Posted by Znerole

Nope, haven't tried the hardware test yet, how can I run it?
Well, I'm not looking for a linux distro to get around my hardware problems, it's just that I like linux and I use it for work, and a big endian linux as well is useful to me.

Anyway, the weird thing is that I only have those problems (apart from the HD problem) under OS X. OS 9 seems to run stable and I've used Ubuntu a whole day as remote terminal without the slightest glitch. Ubuntu I've only started from the live cd though, and OS 9 only from the original 6GB drive, that's why I considered the HD (or anything related to it) to be the main problem, though random crashes generally smell a lot like IC troubles.

Another problem I remember now is that OS X won't recognize the on board sound chip. Again it works under Ubuntu and OS 9 and I also get a sound when booting the machine, but OS X tells me that there's no sound device. I think that's a case for the hardware test again... I'll also try to dig out another HD to see if it helps.

Linux won't help at all if you have a machine with hardware problems. Linux will crash with faulty RAM as does OS X.

[OreoCookie]

How's your RAM? You could install memtest and run it for a day or so.

[Znerole]

Originally Posted by OreoCookie

Linux won't help at all if you have a machine with hardware problems. Linux will crash with faulty RAM as does OS X.

Yeah, that's why I ruled out the RAM, as OS 9 and Linux ran well (from a different HD and a CD respectively).
Haven't tried memtest yet, but today the Mac ran for hours like a charm.
Funny thing though is that the HD affected the sound output. Well, weird stuff happens when computers are involved. ;-)

Now my last problem is the small and noisy original HD, but as it seems I won't be able to replace it just like this. I have an SCSI controller sticking in one of the PCI slots though, and another option would be an additional IDE controller card. What is recommendable there?

[OreoCookie]

You can run memtest on Linux, too. It's a Unix app.

SCSI drives are noisy and to have a philosophical discussion about performance benefits/hits, I would say: go for ATA drives.

[Znerole]

I have the same thoughts about SCSI drives. What ATA controller card would be recommendable for my machine?