# PowerMac G4 Freezes Randomly



## thomasdennis (Dec 25, 2006)

Here is what I have:

POWER MAC G4
Mac OS X
version 10.4.8
Power PC g4 (3.3)
1.42 GHz
L2 Cache 256
2 G MB
Boot ROM Version 4.6 Of1

Heres what it does:
Freezes erratically all of the time. Ten minutes max. does not matter what program I am in or not. 
Sometimes I get an error message like:
SYSTEM FAILURE CPU=0 CODE 00000008 (unaligned stack) 
latest crash for CPU 0: Exception (sv=ox2oc2d780)

OR
a ZERO with a line thru it during startup in the gray screen.

I had this problem before I upgraded the software.
I have removed ram one at a time, then reloaded one only at a time, still crashes.
Mother board replaced by Apple-tech.

applications loaded:
adobe illustrator, in design, photoshop, office x, I E, norton solutions, version tracker,standard apple stuff.

I am a PC user, who was trying to convert, my family on the west coast swear by MAC, I had write this with my eMachines PC 

A couple more things to add, when in screen saver it always crashes (beaches). If the screen is blue with finder up, and no activity it stays on, no crash. If I turn off the screen and leave mac on it will stay on for days, and not crash. Only when in an application and using it does it crash.

have run disk permission utility, and disk repair they check out OK 

thanks for your help


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## chinajon (Sep 30, 2006)

thomasdennis said:


> Here is what I have:
> 
> POWER MAC G4...
> 
> ...


I see two real possiblities: Norton and the screen saver.
Remove the screen saver, and try it. Remove Norton and try it ( IF you can remove Norton.. It is a bear to remove)

Both of them access the disk and have time dependent activities. If Norton is doing a disk access when you shut down, in order to enable a recovery, it can cause disk problems. Sometimes the disk problems can be corrected automatically on start up, but you can try some other disk maintainence procedures if the startup problem continues. You might just have a broken drive.

PS. when you say 'loaded' do you mean installed on the drive, or actually running? You should not have all that sruff going at once.

 Merry Christmas!


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## thomasdennis (Dec 25, 2006)

you may be right and I will try that in a few minutes. I have since tried reloading os x, and it continues to lock up during an install, upon opening up the case and just looking around, there was a piece of plastic between the negative end of the battery, and the terminal. I removed it and the install is going on without a freeze. 30 minutes in, will cross my fingers. once i get it to reboot, i will get rid of norton.
thanks,


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## shyataroo (Oct 6, 2006)

Get rid of norton, break your CD of it, incinerate the remains, than if that doesn't work, re-format, RE-install and hope that its not a logic board problem or something like that.


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## davidanders (Dec 30, 2006)

All computers need monthly maintenance. OSX has built in repair routines that run at 3am daily, weekly, and monthly. IF the machine is ON and NOT asleep. There are (now) 20 or so different utilities to run these routines.

I prefer AppleJack. It runs in single user mode, runs the currently installed Disk Utility First Aid opton, all the built in repair routines, checks preference files and clears caches.
I recommend my clients run it monthly, after application installs or updates, after OSX updates and when things are wonky.
http://applejack.sourceforge.net/
http://www.macfixit.com/article.php?story=2005041817191411&query=applejack

Onyx would be my second choice
http://www.titanium.free.fr/pgs/english.html

With DiskWarrior by alsoft, you are set for 99% of the problems you will see.

If the PRAM battery is dead or not installed, many weird things happen.
Resetting the PRAM or NVRAM is one solution that is often recommended.

(Norton is evil...)


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## jasona5249 (Jan 15, 2007)

Hi Thomas and All,

I just noticed that the piece of plastic was also inserted on the negative terminal of my PRAM battery in the G5. Was you machine repaired at all? My machine had it's logic board replaced and has worked fine since.... However, I was having a problem with my airport card automatically connecting to my wireless network. My powerbook could connect fine but not the G5. I removed this plastic piece from the battery terminal, restarted and that problem was solved!!!! Does Apple put this plastic in there to save the battery life from the time the parts are made to the time that they system is assembled? I did not even think it was possible to boot the machine without the battery installed (even if it were a dying or dead battery)!!!!!! 

Also, I was getting a breif white noise sound come the internal speaker on boot and I am thinking that this was the reason for that.


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## dschouten (Mar 30, 2007)

Hi, I recently had the same problem on my iBook G4 1.2 GHz (768 MB RAM), with OS X 10.4.8 (just upgraded to 10.4.9)

I noticed that my computer wasn't coming out of sleep mode a couple of times, but I just shook my head and thought that I had shut down without remembering it. Then I had a couple of nasty crashes like the one in the attached JPEG. 

I ran the hardware test at startup, and also ran the complete system scan (including a hard drive surface scan) using TechTool Deluxe and nothing showed up. A hard kernel crash like this should not be software related, so I can only guess that there is something flaky on the disk or logic board. I doubt very much that it is related to the software I am using, since I have been using it for years and it is nothing out of the ordinary. I basically just check my e-mail and use a remote desktop connection to my linux box at school.

When stuff like this happens, I suddenly start remembering the times that I dropped my laptop. Anyway, are there any suggestions for good diagnostics? Has anyone actually fixed this problem before without spending a wack of cash?

Thanks!


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## RetroSquirrel (May 22, 2007)

PowerMac G4 "mirrored drive doors"
OS X 10.4.8
1.25Gb RAM
1 x 1.25Ghz processor
80Gb boot drive
160Gb storage drive
5 x USB PCI card
Radeon 9000 Pro AGP graphics

I recently purchased this machine and it ran fine for a couple of days. It's now started to freeze constantly. I can't use it for more than a few minutes at a time  
I sometimes get a crash like the one which describes system failure with unaligned stack. I've systematically gone through replacing the RAM and graphics card and reset the PMU all to no avail. I don't have screensavers running and don't have Norton. To be honest, I don't have a whole lot on there at the moment as the machine is impossible to use.

Has anyone fixed this problem or do I have a dead machine?


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