Hi Dan, I had this same problem on a 1.25ghz G4 emac. The bad caps are on a circuit that connects to the Radeon chip, and it's only when the Radeon chip is active that you get the errors and random freezes. (It gets worse once the chip heats up, which is why you can generally use it for 5-10 minutes after a cold boot but see it freeze a lot faster on a reboot.) When you're in safe mode, OS X emulates all graphic functions in software; since the Radeon chip doesn't get activated, the eMac works fine.
If you don't want to de/resolder the caps on the logic board, the quick fix (that I used for YEARS) is as follows: Boot to Single User Mode (hold down Command-S while booting) run the following commands: (return after each line) -- fsck -ay mount -uw / cd /System/Library/Extensions/ tar cvf ATI.tar `ls|grep ATI` rm -rf `ls|grep ATI` reboot -- (Double check when you run these, the tar and rm lines have backticks, the key to the left of 1, not apostrophes!) What this does is archive and delete the kernel extensions that initialize and load Radeon chip support into OS X. Without those support extensions, OS X goes to a fallback mode and emulates video functions in software (just like safe mode). This is notably slower, but since it never uses the Radeon chip it should be completely stable. You have to re run those commands every time you install an update (OS X will notice the extensions are missing and replace them). Hope this is helpful. I came up with this as an interim measure and ended up leaving it that way for two years. :) -sri On Mar 3, 8:19 pm, Dan <[email protected]> wrote: > At 11:51 PM +0000 3/3/2010, Dan Stobbs wrote: > > >eMac > > memory? > > Does it bong? > > Does it pass AHT? > > >While I can wield a soldering iron I'm not intending to repair it > >but I've been playing with it as a result of email conversations > >with an ebayer who had one up for sale. She said that hers will > >surf in safe mode, so I dug mine out with a view to trying this out. > > Safe Mode is a restricted/limited environment. Many drivers are not > loaded. Many services are not running. It is meant as a > debug/repair type mode, not for regular use. > > Running as you suggest is the equivalent of driving your car on the > rims, with the top down, in a thunderstorm. It will get you home, in > a pinch, but you will get wet and perhaps fried on the way. > > >So now I have an eMac running 10.4.11, and in safe mode it seems > >quite happy. Trying to boot it normally, it sometimes freezes at > >'Starting OSX', sometimes gets as far as a desktop, but then the > >mouse freezes - basically, as expected, no functionality. > > Look in the system log to see what's failing. > > Try booting in Verbose Mode, to see how far the boot process is getting. > > - Dan. > -- > - Psychoceramic Emeritus; South Jersey, USA, Earth. -- You received this message because you are a member of G-Group, a group for those using G3, G4, and G5 desktop Macs - with a particular focus on Power Macs. The list FAQ is at http://lowendmac.com/lists/g-list.shtml and our netiquette guide is at http://www.lowendmac.com/lists/netiquette.shtml To post to this group, send email to [email protected] For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/g3-5-list
