Re: [MLUG] urgent hardware trouble shooting problem

[Vern Green <EMAIL:PROTECTED>]

In response to Jason. In the PC world, the first thing I would reach
for, when I have determined the hard drives spin up, is the RAM. I
know this might sound odd, but I have had more problems with RAM than
any other piece of computer hardware.

OK, now that I said that, I have to realize that hard drives are the
weakest link and they are the very first thing I check, but you said
you checked it, at least as much as I would have, and you said you
have listened for it to spin up. Number two to me would be RAm.


On Sun, 17 Oct 2004 23:10:37 -0500, Jason McIntosh
<EMAIL:PROTECTED> wrote:
> Few other thoughts to add to Nathan's comments:
> Is the startup chime happening?  If not, the system isn't even posting
> to get to the harddrive.  If you had the machine muted before hand, of
> course you won't here this.  CMD+CTRL+P+R resets the PRAM for a Mac -
> this can fix some things (it might be CMD+OPTION - been a while since
> I"ve had to do it).  There's also on some of those systems an actual
> reset button internally which can reset the settings.  Course, I don't
> remember off hand where the heck it's at, but there are instructions
> online a few places.
> Other than that, I've had bad memory and other funky hardware cause
> similar problems.  I've got a G4 400 that occasionally I have to
> literally drop it while turning the power on to get it to post.  I
> don't know why, but doing so gets it to work.... so, there's always the
> literal "boot" method ;)
> Jason
> 
> /--------------------------------------|---------------------------\
> | Jason McIntosh                       | CELL: 573-424-7612        |
> | Webmaster, thinker, Programmer, etc. | WORK: 573-884-3865        |
> | http://poetshome.com/                |                           |
> |------------------------------------------------------------------|
> |"How should I know if it works?  That's what beta testers are     |
> |for.  I only coded it."                                           |
> |(Attributed to Linus Torvalds, somewhere in a posting)            |
> \--------------------------------------|---------------------------/
> GnuPG Key:
> http://poetshome.com/about/jmcintosh_mlug.missouri.edu.gpgkey
> 
> 
> On Oct 17, 2004, at 9:32 PM, Jonathan King wrote:
> 
> > This is slightly off-topic since it's a Mac OSX box, but I'm in a
> > tight spot.
> >
> > Today is a busy week, with conferences (two of them) I leave for on
> > Wedneday.  Naturally, I have two posters to finish, and one of which I
> > really and truly wanted to finish tonight.
> >
> > But my dual G4 powermac was hung when I came to the office.  "That's
> > odd" I thought, since the sucker basically never crashes.  But I
> > restart it and...it doesn't restart.  After a few repetitions of that,
> > I look inside the case.  The disk is one of those great IBM Deathstar
> > models.  "S-word!" I say.  But, oddly enough, it looks like the disk
> > is spinning up when I try to restart.  It's just that nothing further
> > happens.  "OK", I say.  "I'll boot off of my install CD and find out
> > what's wrong there".  Nice idea, except I can't boot off my CD in a
> > normal way (trivia: hold down C key while booting).  That's good news
> > and bad news, I think.  The good news is that it's less likely it's my
> > disk that's screwed, since I can't boot off of anything.  The bad news
> > is that I can't boot off of anything.  (The helpful icon here is the
> > "barred circle" (don't walk) after many minutes.
> >
> > So what the heck could be wrong?  I think I can rule out hard disk
> > alone, and since the disk spins up, the CD door can open and close,
> > and the fan runs (loudly, as always) I suspect it's not the power
> > supply.  So am I actually looking at something like Mr. Logic Board?
> > If so, *gack*.  Where the heck am I going to find anybody who has one
> > of those guaranteed tomorrow?  Does anybody else have any good ideas?
> > I think I may be reduced to trying to take the HD and install it into
> > a firewire enclosure and attempt a brain transplant.  Anything else
> > you'd try?
> >
> > So far, Google has given me no joy on this, but I might be too
> > panicked to be trying the correct search words.  <Sob.>
> >
> > jking
> > _______________________________________________
> > members mailing list
> > EMAIL:PROTECTED
> > http://mlug.missouri.edu/mailman/listinfo/members
> 
> _______________________________________________
> members mailing list
> EMAIL:PROTECTED
> http://mlug.missouri.edu/mailman/listinfo/members
> 


-- 
Thanks
F Vernon Green
_______________________________________________
members mailing list
EMAIL:PROTECTED
http://mlug.missouri.edu/mailman/listinfo/members