Half-dead G4

[jrh29 at alumni.cwru.edu]

On Wed, Jan 02, 2008 at 11:11:20AM -0500, Joshua Coombs wrote:
> 
> 
> Justin Hibbits wrote:
> 
> >I've reseated all data cables.  Haven't reseated the motherboard power 
> >cable, but I've reseated the hard drive power cable, and can't quite 
> >figure out how to remove the CD-ROM drive power cable, as it's enclosed.  
> >I've tried removing the hard drive and CD-ROM drive data cable connections 
> >from the motherboard, but that didn't help.  I'll try pulling out 
> >everything, even the CPU, and see what I can come up with.  I was hoping 
> >removing the battery and resetting the PMU would do the trick, but that 
> >failed as well.
> >
> >Am I right in assuming that because holding the mouse button ejects the 
> >CD-ROM tray, the CPU is functioning because it has to go into openfirmware?
> >
> >- Justin
> 
> Pull the battery and power, and leave it unplugged with no battery for 
> at LEAST 48 hours.  That pesky pram is persistent.
> 
> Josh C

I can do that.  I pulled out the battery again yesterday, and unplugged
everything, and won't touch it again until the weekend.

Related, I tried some boot experiments, and it does appear to boot, or
at least attempt to boot, an OS, since with no drive installed when I
hit the power button it powers off immediately, but with a bootable disk
hooked up (CD or hard drive) it gets to the point where I need to hold
it in for 5+ seconds before it powers off.  This leads me to believe
that perhaps it's switched into some sort of "Apple-only" mode, or OFW
thinks the console exists somewhere else (serial?) in which case I'm
probably boned unless I can find information on setting up a serial
console for a G4, which so far I haven't.

But, I'll try this first.  Maybe 4 days will do it.

- Justin