Almost a Basket Case (G5)
I retrieved my G5 PowerMac from the Apple Service provider and hooked it up to one of my 20 inch Apple Cinema displays and couldn’t believe what I was seeing. The Dock, which I normally place on the right side of my screen, was nowhere to be found. Other files on the desktop were there, right where I had left them. Opening System Preferences/Dock, I clicked on the buttons to put the Dock on the bottom and left sides of the screen; and the Dock jumped to each place dutifully. But when I selected the button that put the Dock on the right, it would immediately disappear.
Opening the Displays preference pane (also in System Preferences), I noticed that there was an extra “Arrangement” tab. That meant the software thought it was hooked up to a second display. Checking what display the operating system had selected, I found it was optimizing for a “Color LCD”. The “Apple Cinema Display” normally in my list of displays was nowhere to be found. I clicked on the “Detect Displays” button, the display blanked and went black, and then returned. But “Apple Cinema Display” was still not one of the selections. The G5 normally would automatically recognize it and select it.
Did I have a hardware or a software problem? I wasn’t sure. I hooked the display up to my G4 PowerMac and it worked just fine with it. Thinking it might be something in my operating system software, I hooked up the two PowerMacs with a Firewire (400) cable, booted the G5 in Firewire Target Disk mode, and booted the G4 PowerMac normally. The G5’s hard disks were nowhere to be found! I disconnected and reconnected the Firewire cable from the G4 to force it to reinitialize, but nothing changed. Pulling out a 2.5 inch Iomega hard drive from a closet, I hooked it up to the same Firewire port on the G4, and it saw the hard disk right away! Not only was my desktop screwed up (NEW FAILURE), but the G5’s Firewire 400 didn’t seem to be working, either (NEW FAILURE)! Time to get BACK on the phone with Apple Support. GRRRRRRR!!!!!
During the twenty minutes of waiting on the phone, I asked myself what else I could do to try to fix the thing. It dawned on me I hadn’t reset the PRAM. So, cradling the phone on one shoulder, I clicked on the commands to Restart the G5 PowerMac and held down the Command-Option-P-R keys. The machine rebooted, saw the keys, rebooted again while zapping the PRAM. I held the keys down until I heard the third set of chimes. Then, when the machine booted, the Dock was back where it was supposed to be. Still cradling the phone, I hooked up the Iomega drive to the front port of the G5. The G5 saw it! I hung up the phone and checked the G5’s rear Firewire 400 port, and it saw the drive there, too.
KPLAH! (Success! – in Klingon)
Opening the Displays preference pane (also in System Preferences), I noticed that there was an extra “Arrangement” tab. That meant the software thought it was hooked up to a second display. Checking what display the operating system had selected, I found it was optimizing for a “Color LCD”. The “Apple Cinema Display” normally in my list of displays was nowhere to be found. I clicked on the “Detect Displays” button, the display blanked and went black, and then returned. But “Apple Cinema Display” was still not one of the selections. The G5 normally would automatically recognize it and select it.
Did I have a hardware or a software problem? I wasn’t sure. I hooked the display up to my G4 PowerMac and it worked just fine with it. Thinking it might be something in my operating system software, I hooked up the two PowerMacs with a Firewire (400) cable, booted the G5 in Firewire Target Disk mode, and booted the G4 PowerMac normally. The G5’s hard disks were nowhere to be found! I disconnected and reconnected the Firewire cable from the G4 to force it to reinitialize, but nothing changed. Pulling out a 2.5 inch Iomega hard drive from a closet, I hooked it up to the same Firewire port on the G4, and it saw the hard disk right away! Not only was my desktop screwed up (NEW FAILURE), but the G5’s Firewire 400 didn’t seem to be working, either (NEW FAILURE)! Time to get BACK on the phone with Apple Support. GRRRRRRR!!!!!
During the twenty minutes of waiting on the phone, I asked myself what else I could do to try to fix the thing. It dawned on me I hadn’t reset the PRAM. So, cradling the phone on one shoulder, I clicked on the commands to Restart the G5 PowerMac and held down the Command-Option-P-R keys. The machine rebooted, saw the keys, rebooted again while zapping the PRAM. I held the keys down until I heard the third set of chimes. Then, when the machine booted, the Dock was back where it was supposed to be. Still cradling the phone, I hooked up the Iomega drive to the front port of the G5. The G5 saw it! I hung up the phone and checked the G5’s rear Firewire 400 port, and it saw the drive there, too.
KPLAH! (Success! – in Klingon)
posted by Andy Foster at
3:25 PM
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