Getting G5, ( the one that looks like a Heater ) : to be continued

[Ludwig Von Cookie Koopa]

I browsed, and was unable to find any topics on this. I am getting a G5 and it has problems. The current owner said, When I try to use the internet it freezes up" " It keeps asking me for a key something" "I searched and somebody said to push a reset button on the G5 machine, it sloved the problem temporarly"

" It even freezes on booting sometimes ".

The owner also brought a 4gig memory stick for the machine. The store people said it is for the G5 series. They tried the stick and it still had the same problem? The stick also worked for the Windows series.

The machine is most likley a home edition of the G5??. It looks like a heater/toaster, I see them all the time, in the glass center at my college. I was told that it is so powerfull, that it uses a cooler to keep the insides from over heating. Even if the room they keep them in, is already ice pick cold.

I believe there is a virus in the computer, that is preventing the computer from going on the internet, and booting. Since I have exprienced simular problems with Windows. The person beleives all they have to do is upgrade the OS to slove the problem. The person also beleives it might be a over-heating issue, and cooler is damaged.

So what could be the problem. Since there is so many pages, describing the same thing. I beleive it freezes when something is not wrong as a failsafe. Since I see Apple machines freeze all the time.

1. Is it a virus?

2. Is the memory?

3. Is is the cooler?

4. Is the age of the computer?

5. will upgrading the OS ( which I really, really hate doing ) slove the problem?

6. If it is a hardware problem, how much would it cost to replace?

From my exprience with Apples, it is common to see them, crash at some point during the day.

Thank you for responding.

Edited March 15, 2010 by Ludwig Von Cookie Koopa

[bonestonne]

The Apple G5 series is a very touchy beast indeed.

1) If it's an Apple Virus, I'd love to know how it works. I've never seen an apple get a virus. I've seen plenty of other problems though.

2) The G5 series uses DDR RAM (I don't know exactly which speed) But unless I'm severely mistaken, they need very specific Mac RAM. You can't just buy PC RAM and put it in a Mac (with the older G4 series, which used SD-RAM, this was different, but once DDR came out in the Mac, you have to buy Mac RAM. You don't have to buy it specifically from Apple, online stores such as www.mac-pro.com have much better prices.

3) The cooler is most likely absolutely fine, but there is probably a lot of dust in it. I would strongly suggest taking it outside with a can of compressed air, and cleaning it out very carefully. If you have a larger air compressor, that would work even better in cleaning it out. The power supply is located under a panel in the bottom of the system, I would strongly suggest using compressed air to get dust out of that.

4) The G5 series came out in late 2005, so at the very oldest, the computer is 5 years old. The Intel version Mac Pro came out in mid 2007, so the youngest the G5 could be is 3 years or so.

5) With a Mac, not necessarily. The OS it has is most likely Tiger (10.4.xx). I'm still running Tiger on all of my Macs (and at my old school, only the newest computers that were shipped with updated OSes have Leopard). I would say it's not important to update to Leopard if the machine runs fine (once it gets fixed).

Leopard has many update bugs, but I would say if you're going to do anything with it, do a clean install of the OS from scratch for better performance.

6) If you're looking at a real hardware problem, it would be with the Gigabit network controller (G5's and Mac Pros actually have dual ethernet) and this is located on the Logic Board (that's what apple calls a motherboard). Logic Boards are very expensive. If it's truly a fault with the Logic Board (which is entirely possible) it's going to be between $200 and $500 to fix, and finding the correct Logic Board is going to be a hassle as-is. Used boards will sell closer to $200, and new or unopened ones will be closer to $500.

Macs are nice computers when they work, but are otherwise only good for burning a hole in ones wallet.

My guess is that if the user is trying to connect to a private wireless internet connection, it's asking for the password to the access point, and that might freeze the system if it's wrong. It's also very possible the machine has bad RAM in it, or the Logic Board is simply dying or bad.

[Ludwig Von Cookie Koopa]

Well the problem was never the logic board. It was the password issue. It is a 10.3 model, therefore no Java 1.5 ( at the moment ).

The only other problems is random. The computer turning off by itself, and blasting it's fans at high speed ( sounds like a plane on the runway ). Then is the random "No smoking sign boot screen". It is like watching windows, loading but without the repeating fractorial colors.

Edited March 15, 2010 by Ludwig Von Cookie Koopa