[nmglug] someone with a broken iMac

[Don Thornton Jr.]

try this before wasting money on witch doctors:

http://support.apple.com/kb/ht1343

1) zap the PRAM

hold down the Command-Option-P-R keys while booting at least 3 times  
consecutively

2) boot into verbose mode

hold down Command-V keys while booting and look for errors

if you are unfamiliar with BSD boot messages then either get familiar  
or call a friend who is

3) login as "Administrator"

if you don't have a "clean" administrator account then you should  
create one that has no startup items, no desktop doo-dads or any other  
malarkey.

login as "Administrator" and run "Disk Utility" select the boot disk  
on the left and select the "First Aid" tab then click "Verify Disk"

it is preferable to boot from an alternate source (install CD or boot  
disk) but this should run to completion although it might lock up the  
desktop for a while.

let it run!  - it might take a while depending on how bad the disk is...

if there are any errors then click "Repair Disk" but this may not work  
while checking the boot disk (see below)

rinse/repeat - run the check again

once everything looks good then click "Repair Disk Permissions" and  
when that's complete...

reboot

4) create a clean boot disk to boot from and run diagnostics from

I suggest using the install CD and an external (USB/Firewire) disk to  
get a clean install then run "Software Update" and apply all of the  
updates.

keep it up to date.

this is just for starters but I hth




On  2010_07_29, at 08:23, Mark Galassi wrote:

>
> Someone with a desktop iMac (the ones that have the 19in LCD screen  
> and
> all the CPU stuff inside) told me that it's crashing all the time.  It
> freezes up and they have to power cycle several times/day.
>
> They have reinstalled the MacosX and nothing changes.
>
> I'm thinking of stopping by and seeing if I can look at some files in
> /var/log and see if it has memory or disk errors that get logged,  
> but I
> was wondering if someone on this list could either:
>
> a. point to a diagnostic path for this on a mac
>
> b. point to someone here in town (preferably downtown) that they can
> take it to for repair
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