eMac Startup Problem

quarkboy · Jun 21st, 2010, 11:16 AM

We recently upgraded my eMac to an iMac...transition went very well. The other computer in the office being upgraded was a G4 but we found no 'active' firewire ports. So, the tech opened up the G4, took out the HD and put it (temporarily) into the eMac to make the migration of files to the new MacBookPro. All went well...

everything was put back together, but when I took the eMac home and booted up all I got was a dark screen, fan noise and a high tone and blinking indicator light. I shut down, rebooted and this time got usual start up sound, fan running but a dark screen.

I shut down, rebooted and everything came up properly.

Last night, I shut the eMac down, but when I booted this morning I went through all of the above again and once again, on the third try all came up fine.

Anyone got any idea what might be happening? - it would seem to have something to do with the messing around the eMac took during the transition.

John

rgray · Jun 21st, 2010, 11:41 AM

I used one of these for many years in my lab. Since the machine is getting kind of long in the tooth, the first thing to check is the PRAM/clock battery. I forget the details of doing this as I think I only had to do it once but you should be able to Google how to check the voltage. I think there was a post here a while ago on the subject. When in doubt just replace.

quarkboy · Jun 21st, 2010, 01:31 PM

Thanks rgray...I'll begin the search for a voltage test.

It's been a great machine...and even still, runs like a dream (fan's a little noisy) but other than the startup thingy, it's been super. I've only 384 Mg RAM in it, so I'll have to pump that up somewhat. I can crank it to 1 gig of RAM, I'm led to understand.

John