[PowerBub]

okay, my father-in-law got his hands on an iMac G3, and here is what he saying about it. No background information about the computer is known:

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I pressed the "power on" button on the front right. There is a quick beep, some normal crackling sounds, and then a stronger beep. Nothing ever shows up on the screen. The power on button momentarily lights up but goes out real quick, and then every 4 seconds lights back up for one second and then flashes off and back on quickly for a split second and then goes off for another 4 seconds. Cycle just keeps repeating itself and nothing ever comes up on the screen. Definitely on but after the initial crackling noise there is no real "chugging noise" like it is processing anything, just the minor humm of being on. When I push the power button again to turn it off the computer won't turn off. Buttom almost seems stuck on. It just keeps going thru the routine above. The only way to shut it down is to unplug it. If I plug it back in I have to push the power button on and the whole process repeats itself. After repeated tries it seemed to me like it was getting pretty hot so I just unplugged it and gave up.
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by "stronger beep" after the quick beep, he may mean the normal startup chime, i haven't had a chance to clarify this.

any ideas?

[tr]

don't know what the exact problem is, but found some threads that might offer some insight:

http://forums.macnn.com/showthread.p...3+power+supply

http://forums.macnn.com/showthread.p...3+power+supply

i'm not sure about the beeps he describes, but here's an apple doc talking about beeps, and what the problem could be:

http://docs.info.apple.com/article.html?artnum=14438

your father-in-law mentions that he can't shut it down using the power button. is he just momentarily pressing it, or is he holding the button down for 3-5 seconds? perhaps he should see if he can shut down the computer when it's in that state by holding down the power button.

tr