Dropped iBook G4 (no damage), Now Kernel Panics

Question

I recently dropped my 4 year old iBook G4 (while it was sleeping) onto a wood table from about a foot up. When I tried restarting it, I kept getting kernel panics. So I completely reinstalled the OS (Leopard). Now I can do most tasks on the computer, but I still get kernel panics on a regular basis. I think there is clearly a hardware issue, although there is apparently NO physical damage to the machine. There is nothing wrong with the hard drive, which is the only mechanical device that could possibly be damaged by a drop, right? Reinstalling Leopard didn't really solve the problem. (I'm looking for an Apple Hardware Test disc to see if that will help diagnose the problem...)
Any words of advice? Suggestions would be greatly appreciated. Thank you!
Here are the details for the kernel panic (after I reinstalled 10.5 -- I haven't updated to 10.5.6 yet):
Sat Jan 17 10:06:16 2009
panic(cpu 0 caller 0x000AE584): "Uncorrectable machine check: pc = 00000000319D0E88, msr = 0000000000149030, dsisr = 42000000, dar = 00000000067E0000\n" " AsyncSrc = 0000000000000000, CoreFIR = 0000000000000000\n" " L2FIR = 0000000000000000, BusFir = 000000000000ff00\n"@/SourceCache/xnu/xnu-1228/osfmk/ppc/trap.c:975
Latest stack backtrace for cpu 0:
Backtrace:
0x0009AD18 0x0009B6BC 0x00029DC4 0x000AE584 0x000AE804 0x000B22F8
Proceeding back via exception chain:
Exception state (sv=0x30a6d500)
PC=0x319D0E88; MSR=0x00149030; DAR=0x067E0000; DSISR=0x42000000; LR=0x319D0F70; R1=0x305CFBA0; XCP=0x00000008 (0x200 - Machine check)
Backtrace:
0x00000000 0x31A29B18 0x31A2A484 0x319CA3D0 0x00355B40 0x003547BC
0x00354E58 0x000AFE54
Kernel loadable modules in backtrace (with dependencies):
com.apple.driver.AirPortBrcm43xx(302.25.10)@0x319c0000->0x31aecfff
dependency: com.apple.iokit.IO80211Family(200.7)@0x300ee000
dependency: com.apple.iokit.IOPCIFamily(2.4)@0x29e84000
dependency: com.apple.iokit.IONetworkingFamily(1.6.0)@0x3000b000
Exception state (sv=0x29d94500)
PC=0x00000000; MSR=0x0000D030; DAR=0x00000000; DSISR=0x00000000; LR=0x00000000; R1=0x00000000; XCP=0x00000000 (Unknown)
BSD process name corresponding to current thread: kernel_task
Mac OS version:
9A581
Kernel version:
Darwin Kernel Version 9.0.0: Tue Oct 9 21:37:58 PDT 2007; root:xnu-1228~1/RELEASE_PPC
Message was edited by: geoffmyers1
Message was edited by: geoffmyers1

Answer 1

A drop could damage the motherboard causing a break or intermittent break. As the iBook heats and cools the connection can be intermittent causing it to work and fail randomly.