Nonstarting G4

[jamerican]

After Hurricane Frances, my Quicksilver G4 will not start up. I have it plugged into a UPS and shut it down the day before the hurricane hit my area in Florida. I forgot, however, to switch off the UPS at the same time. I switched it off the night of September 3rd. I think the battery has been drained. This morning, 09/06, I switched everything on. When I pressed the button on the computer to boot up, it lit up, and went dead when I released it. I have not been able to boot the machine. Any suggestions, folks? All help will be greatly appreciated. (I am typing this on a Compaq Presario which is not connected to the UPS).

G4 867 w/Superdive, 896MB Ram, OSX 10.3, 4 FW hard drives, Accusync 19" monitor, USB Zip drive, Umax Astra 6400 FW scanner, Canon i850 printer,Visioneer Strobe Pro scanner, Liteon CD-RW drive,LaCie DVD-RW/R (Pioneer 105) FW Drive.

 

[bobw]

Try resetting the PMU, it's next to the battery.
Press the PMU reset switch (S1) once on the logic board and
then proceed to step 3.
Do NOT press the PMU reset switch a
second time because it could crash the PMU chip.
3. WAIT ten seconds before connecting the power cord and
powering the computer on.

 

[jamerican]

Try resetting the PMU, it's next to the battery.
Press the PMU reset switch (S1) once on the logic board and
then proceed to step 3.
Do NOT press the PMU reset switch a
second time because it could crash the PMU chip.
3. WAIT ten seconds before connecting the power cord and
powering the computer on.

Hi, BobW. Found the PMU switch, depressed it, carried the computer back to where it was connected (took about 10 seconds), Plugged in the power cord, depressed the startup button which lit up but went back to an unlit state when I released it - no startup. Thanks for the advice. Just did not work.

 

[nixgeek]

This might be a silly question, but what the hell..

Was the monitor connected to the UPS??? Does it turn on OK?? Have you tested it with another machine?

Try playing around with the RAM sticks....remove all of them and add them one at a time.

Good luck, my fellow Floridian...I hope Frances didn't cause too much damage to anything else...

 

[jamerican]

This might be a silly question, but what the hell..

Was the monitor connected to the UPS??? Does it turn on OK?? Have you tested it with another machine?

Try playing around with the RAM sticks....remove all of them and add them one at a time.

Good luck, my fellow Floridian...I hope Frances didn't cause too much damage to anything else...

Everything else connected via the UPS works - my ethernet dsl modem, router, etc. I'm going to hook up a B&W G3 that I have here to the setup and see if that works. If it checks out, then my next step would be to transfer the drive in the G4 to the G3 so I can access my stuff. I have a backup on an external drive that is 1 week old, but I need my up to date stuff - banking records, invoices etc. Then I can take the G4 into the shop If I cannot fix it myself.
BTW, I was without power for nearly 3 days and lost a Naseberry (similar to the Kiwi fruit) tree. I can say that am one of the lucky ones who experienced Frances.

 

[jamerican]

Well, I just hooked up the G3 and everything works fine. My next step is to transfer the drive from the G4 to the G3, back up to the external FW drive, reinstall the drive back into the G4 then take it in to the shop for repair. BTW, should I try another reset of the PMU to see if that would fix it or is that too dangerous to do? Any opinions, anyone?

 

[bobw]

No, I would reset the PMU again, but I would try a new clock battery before I took it to a shop.

 

[jamerican]

No, I would reset the PMU again, but I would try a new clock battery before I took it to a shop.

I did it, BobW. I reset the PMU again and now the G4 is happily humming along. Many thanks for your help. I may have been a bit hesitant when I tried to reset it the first time and may not have pressed down hard enough on the PMU button. This time it worked. Thanks a lot for your assistance, guys. This site and the members have helped in quite a few instances. I will continue to support it every year.