Crash & Burn problem

P

Primavera

Registered
Hi Everyone -
I have had my G5 OS X since the first of the year (switcher) and on two occasions after leaving the computer on all night I have returned to my studio to find it locked up, the red light in front glowing and it sounds like the fans are running at super high speed. The only thing I could do was to turn it off. On one occasion this happened while I was working at the computer. What causes this and why are the fans in high gear? Can this be prevented? If it is in this state for a long period of time could it harm the computer? Any ideas would be helpful.
Thanks
 
Was anything on the screen? Maybe a message in several languages? Kernel panics make the fans run at full speed (I think, although this wasn't the case with my recent panics), and basically lock up the machine so that you can do nothing else other than turn it off and back on again.

Have you installed any new hardware lately (RAM, hard drive, etc.)?
 
Thanks for the reply - I have had a couple of crashes where there was some system type languages on a black field that came up, but the three that I described sent the screen blank (or off) and I could not see anything after that. I have installed additional RAM, but these crashes occurred before and after that. I am worried that i may be away from the system for a long period and this could happen and damaged the computer.
 
Sounds like a kernel panic with regard to the text with the black background behind it. I was getting those the last few days, instead of the "restart your computer" message in multiple languages that I've gotten in the past (when I had Norton AntiVirus installed). Do you have any Symantec/Norton products installed on your machine?
 
As far as I know I do not have any of those products installed. It may be associated with Appleworks 6 - That is the only program that crashes on me in a regular basis. - BTW - what exactly is a kernel panic?
 
as scary as it does sound, the fans are running that fast to be safe. that's the speed the fans are designed to run at, but system slows them so they're not annoying. at that speed, the cpu has no danger of burning out.
 
A kernel panic is the only thing that can really bring down OS X. It's a crash at the fundamental level (the kernel). This SHOULD never happen, since individual apps do not have access to the kernel, and anything living in kernel space should be rigorously tested to ensure that it will never, ever, under any circumstances, crash.

And for the most part they don't. But there are always exceptions, and it seems that to your computer, kernel panics are like potato chips — it can't have just one! And this makes sense, because any time you see a kernel panic, it means something is terribly wrong — something that will most likely not be fixed by rebooting.

The most common cause of kernel panics is buggy third-party kernel extensions. Have you installed any special hardware drivers lately or anything like that?

The other common cause is faulty hardware. If possible, boot up from your OS X Hardware Test CD/DVD and run the thorough test. You might need a new logic board, new HD, or new...something.
 
All I can say is WOW!? Being new to Mac, I have only installed really basic stuff like Photoshop, Iworks, and some widgets. How do you know if it is a kernel crash or something else? I will try the hardware test and see what happens. Thanks for the info....what have I done?:)
 
Thanks for the suggestion, but right now everything is working fine. These carshes just come and go sometimes weeks in between, and after I restart it seems to be fine for a while. I will try to pay mre attention to what is running the next time it happens then maybe I can get a clue.
Thanks again
 
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