[fobside]

I have a Dual Processor 1.8 Ghz PowerMac that I got, because a customer did not want to mess with it anymore. It has a history of failure. What is wrong with it? I don't know. I am hoping to get some answers here. The company that was supposed to work on it is primarily a Windows firm, so they don't know much/anything about Apple.

This PowerMac had something wrong with it and my friend's IT firm was given the task to fix it or declare it dead. Being a huge nerd, I asked if I could give a go at it. I installed Panther without any problems. I thought they were just idiots not getting the thing to work. Well they ordered two new drives for this machine and asked me if I could give it a go again.

I booted from the Panther install disc and to my surprise, there were no drives that showed up where I could install the OS. After a few more reboots, the drives magically appeared. I can't be certain they just appeared, because I was wiggling cables between booting up. Well, I tried installing to each of these drives, but I would hear a "click" and then the computer would hang. Normally, I would think it was a bad hard drive, but these were both brand new hard drives. At this point, my friend's IT firm said they didn't want to waste a lot of time with it and gave it to me a couple weeks later.

So I have the machine now, and I purchased two new 300GB Seagate SATA drives, which I received today. They were packaged very well, so my assumption is these drives are working properly. Well, I installed Panther first, then used a Tiger upgrade CD. Both of these processes went off without a hitch. I started doing Software Updates and they all downloaded just fine. Upon installing, i heard the same dreaded click. I THINK I am hearing both drives stop at the same time. I can't be certain. It's as if I pulled power to the drives is being cut randomly and instantaneously. The computer hung for a minute and then told me the last two updates failed to install.

I rebooted the computer and I was unable to get into the system. The screen showed me the blinking icon when the computer can't find the system directory in order to boot. The computer will boot to different lengths, seemingly randomly. Sometimes I will immediately get the system not found icon on the screen. Other times I will get to an Apple logo with the spinning "loading" logo. I don't ever get past that.

I booted from the install disc. Booting the install discs works every time, but it takes longer than I think it should, hanging for a moment and then loading. I ran Disk Utility. It saw both drives, and I did repairs on the first one. It was nothing eventful. During the repair on the second drive, I got a popup saying Disk Utility lost connection to Disk Manager and to quit and relaunch it. The drives aren't staying up in this mode either. Now I can't even get Disk utility to see the drives at all.

Although drives are still a possible culprit, I'm really skeptical about having five bad drives. The motherboard is something I would normally blame as well, but I was told this is the third board in this machine. I guess that's what the Apple Store thought would work the last couple times. It's the only thing inside the computer without a layer of dust on it. Could it be the cables connecting the drives, or would those have been replaced with the motherboard? One thing to note is that I am able to firewire boot a PowerBook without any problems.

Does anyone have any ideas or suggestions on what to do? Worst case scenario, I will try external hard drives. Thanks in advance for any help.

[BigBadBiologist]

IMO, I think it could be either a flaky SATA controller (easy enough to put in a PCI SATA card and see if it works) or a bad PSU. If it is as dusty as you say it is, I would make sure to clean it out really well first with a can of air though.

[fobside]

Wouldn't the SATA Controller be on the motherboard, though? I'm shying away from this, because the motherboard is new. If I can't figure it out otherwise, I will try a PCI SATA card. When a motherboard is replaced, are the cables to the SATA drives replaced as well?

I'm thinking it might be the power supply too. It's as if it has the energy just to boot the system, but it can't keep the drives spinning.

[BigBadBiologist]

It probably depends on the tech that does the job if they replace the cables or not. New SATA cables would be something VERY easy to try.

[fobside]

Here is my plan of attack.

1. I am going to pick up some cables from my friend. That should isolate the cable problem.
2. If that doesn't work, I will power the system drive from an external USB caddy. That will isolate a power to the drives problem.
3. Can you boot USB drives in OS X? I would like to try that, but I don't know if it's possible. I will try that to see if it's a problem with the SATA controller. I will also FW disk mode my PowerBook just to see if iit's the controller on the PowerMac as well.
4. I will replace the power supply if it seems to be a power issue.

Does that sound about right? I'm hoping for the cables being the issue, and at most the power supply.

[fobside]

Well, after cracking open the case, I can see that the SATA cables are pretty much impossible to replace without taking the whole computer apart. I could see how someone might even replace the motherboard and not replace the cables.

Right now, I am having no problems booting. Why? I have the power for one drive hooked up to an SATA power from an external caddy. It looks like the caddy only has enough juice going through it for one drive, because when I put both drives on it, it won't boot. When I put the system drive on the caddy's power and the other one plugged into the system, the second drive does not show up. So there is something going on with the power. It sounds like the power supply. That is what I will find out tomorrow.

So, I can boot when the drive is hooked up to an external power source. This makes sense why I can put a PowerBook into FireWire disk mode and boot the PowerMac from it. Also, when shutting down I hear the same click as the drive loses its power as I did when the machine would freeze. It sounds like it would just be the cables if the rest of the computer works fine, except for the drives

Has anyone had the power supply/cables replaced by Apple? What does this cost?

[mduell]

Some high capacity Seagate SATA drives have SSC enabled by default, which the PowerMac G5 drive controller is incompatible with.

[fobside]

What is SSC? Shouldn't it have never worked then? I can always boot with an external power source on one drive.

[fobside]

Okay, I'm sure it just looks like I'm talking to myself in this thread, but I've narrowed it down. I have an IDE power splitter that splits into two SATA power cables. I did a Frankenstein sort of thing and pulled the power from a Dell. That had no problems. It booted fine, and bothe drives were visible. Multiple reboots did nothing out of the ordinary. The machine seems to be working like this.

Now, where do I go and get my power supply fixed? I am in the Los Angeles area. Does anyone have any suggestions?

[Macola]

I just saw this thread so this is in retrospect, but I would have suspected the power supply too.

Anyway, I've had pretty good luck with these guys:

http://www.galaxyhp.com/PMG5/parts_pmg5.html#ps

[BigBadBiologist]

Generally, nobody "fixes" things in computers these days. I'd say look around on eBay for a replacement power supply.

[tooki]

My first hunch was also the PSU, since clinking is a symptom of an underpowered hard drive.

tooki

[fobside]

http://applepalace.com/Scripts/syshe...syshelper=PMG5

I found these guys. They're close to me, but unfortunately only available on weekdays. They look like a decent try. Apple was smart about one thing. Make the PowerMac impossible to fix by yourself. Make it too heavy to carry long distances. Places Apple stores in the middle of crowded malls, so you won't bring it in to fix. Ha! I'll give Mac Mall a call just to see what they will charge me.