G3 won't boot

[printmonger]

I have a beige G3 desktop running 9.2.2. It shows the ? at startup. When I boot from the system disk or Norton, it reads the disk, boots to the OS window and then a message appears saying the disk cannot be read. I have zapped the pram and threatened to swap its harddrive to my G4. Any (constructive) suggestions would be appreciated.

Thanks,
mark

[Tech]

It's been a while since I last worked on OS 9, sounds more like a hard drive issue than system. If neither boot disc and Norton can't recognized the drive, swapping out the hard drive is you next option.

Hope you have the data backup elsewhere.


Good luck.

[eskopdl]

Can you hear the drive spin-up as the computer is trying to read it, is it getting power ? I would certainly try re-seating the connections, if that does not work then attaching the to another computer. Good luck.

[zgraph]

This Is going to sound funny, but replace the lithium battery and I think you will be fine.

[Tech]

You can try, but if I recall correctly, replacing battery only helps if you find date and time resetting by itself.

[TBjammin]

That's right, the date and time coming up as 1970 every time you lose power is indicative of a dead battery on the motherboard. I don't see how replacing the battery will make the motherboard revert back to the old settings that used to recognize the hard drive......usually the default motherboard settings will recognize everything, especially on a mac. Is the drive something out of the ordinary for this G3? I mean, is it something different than what shipped with the box when it was brand new??

[devo]

I actually had something similar happen to mine years ago. Got so frustrated with trying to boot it that I stuck a Blue Rodeo CD in and started it up. The G3 spit the CD out and then booted off the hard drive without any problems.

Everytime I started I had to put a music CD in, but seemed to trick the G3 into finding the Hard Drive again.

It's a long shot but I hope it works!

-d

[WiseGuy]

I think the suggestion of replacing the battery is the right one. I've seen the older Macs do some weird things when the battery finally goes. I would start there especially if you swapped drives and it still won't boot. Otherwise, I would look at RAM memory and swap that out... maybe something went wrong there????

Good luck!
Michael

[G_Town]

I agree with the battery I've had G3s not boot but then did after the battery was changed.

Once had a G3 where it wouldn't boot up every time after it was powered down, so we used to take it out (but left it plugged in) and tried different oreintations and it usually would boot, some guy called it "sticktion" but I'm pretty sure he was full of it.

[rbailleu]

I had a hard drive cage one time that was slightly bent, yet very solid. if I screwed the drive in tightly it would not spin up. so I left the screws loose. I put tape on them to keep them from vibrating out. would spin up great every time.

? = can't find the drive. if you do get it going. I would back it up.

try the battery first, but if you zapped the pram that should get bios to rebuild.