Early 2008 with 8800 won't boot

When the machine is post chime.... I get horizontal blue lines that look like tire treads up and down the screen which makes me think video card. In verbose mode it stops in the same spot each time... the drive is reading I can hear it and then it just stops loading. I did FSCK -FY in single user mode and it modified things, ran it until it again until I got the disk was "okay" message. I get the blue lines regardless of the boot device, and no drive will boot all the way in. The funny thing is, this happened yesterday and after doing the FSCK -FY in single user mode everything booted fine, but after sleeping the machine last night it woke up not working, just blue lines on the screen. Things I've done:
Flashed the PRAM many times.
Unplugged everything and let it sit for 15+ seconds, then plugged in display and keyb to clear the SMB
Removed RAM and tried various combinations. No LED indicators to indicate RAM issues
Reseated all drives and the video card, as well as RAM obviously see above
I pulled the trigger on a new video card which will arive whenever it gets here in case it is the card. Got the ATI 5770 which supposedly works on the Early 2008 model. I had been planning on doing this for awhile as playing RIFT has had the video card fan revving constantly so it's been pushed hard, plus I do a lot of video editing. If anyone has any other ideas please let me know. The last shutdown condition = 3 whatever that means. Any other ideas would be apprecated. I'll post back otherwise when i get the new card and report.
Eric

Oh and I had forgot to mention, I'd tried more than one display, and both DVI ports on the 8800 with the same result, so the cause of the lines is not external.

Similar Messages

Early 2008 mac pro won't boot from hdd when ssd is installed

I have Mountain Lion 10.8.3 installed on my 1TB HDD in my early 2008 mac pro. That is the only OS install on my mac. I have an OWC SSD formatted but left as an empty drive that I am trying to use but when it's installed my mac hangs on the blank gray screen.
My mac cold boots fine and runs fine when the SSD is *not* installed. When I shut down and put the SSD into a drive bay the mac does seem to boot ok the first time, but when the computer is off for a while it will not boot. It just hangs on the blank gray screen (no apple logo). As soon as I pull out the SSD, the computer boots fine and runs fine again. I am not trying to boot off the SSD, I am booting off the HDD. The correct drive (1tb hdd) is selected in startup disk.
OWC has been helping me and I have tested 3 SSD's. So it does not appear to be a problem with their drive.
The mac will boot into safe mode with the SSD installed. It will boot if I choose the boot drive with the option key at startup.
Mountain Lion was clean installed.
Could it be some sort of library pref or cache issue?
Any recommendations on what to try?

A HT does not find a lot of errors.
It doesn't look for bad sectors or directory or file problems.
Clone your SSD now that you have a clean OS and has the Apple updates on it. Before you make changes.
Install TRIM Enabler 2.2+ on it and any boot volume, to enable TRIM and so that Disk Utility's Repair Disk will trim cells. Mountain Lion Recovery won't which is a shame, so...
Clone and keep bootable backup clone of your system to use for maintenance.
A really bad directory on a system drive will cause interference from booting.
SSDs really need extra care, and even with TRIM, to be repaired from time to time and couple times a year, to do an erase and restore from a current image.
Of course Mac OS system even iwth apps is small and doesn't need to have any data or media and fits on 120GB usually just fine and still have a good enough amount free so TRIM and Garbage Collection can work properly and not get low on free pages. But 20GB free should be the minimum free, and better to have more, at least whatever total amount is written out in a month.

My Early 2008 MacBook Pro won't boot correctly

alright so I have always wanted a macbook and I finally bought an early 2008 model from my friend due to he lack of cash to buy a newer one, so after a while it started booting slowly, like it would work but it would boot slowly, I tried to format it but I'd always get and error that said "could not validate source - error 254" any help on how I can fix this ? Ive run fsck multiple times and it tells me everything is ok, is there any other way to format my drive ? Oh and booting from the cd just gives me a folder with a question mark soooo yea any help would be appreciated, it runs mavericks and has been fine up until now

The startup drive is failing, or there is some other internal hardware fault.
Back up all data on the drive immediately if you don't already have a current backup. There are ways to back up a computer that isn't fully functional—ask if you need guidance.
Make a "Genius" appointment at an Apple Store, or go to another authorized service provider.
If privacy is a concern, erase the data partition(s) with the option to write zeros* (do this only if you have at least two complete, independent backups, and you know how to restore to an empty drive from any of them.) Don’t erase the recovery partition, if present.
Keeping your confidential data secure during hardware repair
Apple also recommends that you deauthorize a device in the iTunes Store before having it serviced.
*An SSD doesn't need to be zeroed.

Early 2008 Mac Pro Won't Boot

I have an early 2008 mac pro that will not boot. Power turns on, power LED turns solid, but no display ever comes up and it never chimes. I have tried swapping out RAM, hard drives, disconnecting all peripherals... any other suggestions? Dead logic board?
... and yes, I was too dumb to buy the AppleCare. Stupidest move I have ever made...

Hi I think I have a similar problem.
My Mac Pro 8 core doesn't start up. When I turn it on here's what it does: the boot up sound > the grey/white screen with the apple logo and the little turning gear thing > then it freezes.
Sometimes after that the screen either goes blue with nothing but a mouse pointer that's moveable. but no login window. I can access the hardrive by network and weird enough it's booting on safe mode. I tried setting the SMC firmware but it didn't work. I took it to an apple store and when they plugged it into their displays it worked. When I brought it back, I plugged it into my Cinema Display 30" and the same problem started again. I reset the SMC firmware again and tried different displays I have at home but had the same problem. I plugged the 30" display into a Macbook Pro and it worked fine so I know that the display is not the problem. I've heard the the Nvidia 7300GT has caused problems but why would it work in the apple store? Any help out there?

Early 2008 Mac Pro won't boot after installing 2nd DVD drive

All,
I purchased a Pioneer DVR-117D from Mac Sales and after installing it in my new refurbished 2008 Mac Pro it won't boot. My MP will boot if I remove the drive. According to the Mac Sales website this drive should work fine in my MP. Any ideas as to why this is happening. I literally just got my MP today and installed the drive. Is it the drive or the Mac Pro. Thank you all.

The drive was set to master, I switched it to CS before I left for work but haven't tried reinstalling it. I will try when I get back and let you know if it worked. Thank you again.

Early 2008 MacBook Pro won't boot after Lion 10.7.1 update

My 2.4 GHz 4GB RAM Early 2008 MacBook Pro wont boot after downloaded the Lion 10.7.1 upate. Upon restarting the screen went dead and now the system does not boot, as if the bootloader has been wiped out. Screen appears dead but was known to be working before hand. The hard drive spins up but doesn't sound like it is searching for data.
Can anyone help me?

Okay, I tried everything I can think of last night. I removed every startup process and every tool or programm that goes deeper into the system (GlimmerBlocker, LittleSnitch, Parallels). Cleaned Up every Cache I could find and refreshed every necessary Cache or Database possible. Took me a couple of hours. But still no luck - the machine doesn't boot, just in safe mode. Right now I copy all my personal stuff to a new external harddrive because TimeMachine doesn't work, after this I will do a clean install of Lion.
It's not hardware related, it's the 10.7.1 update that doesn't work properly. By the way, the only errors remaining are:
WindowServer - kCGErrorFailure
ManagedClient - kCGErrorFailure: CGSPackageGetWorkspaceType: couldn't get workspace type
SecurityAgent - kCGErrorFailure: CGSPackageGetWorkspaceType: couldn't get workspace type
and a lot of:
com.Apple.SecurityAgent.00000000-0000-0000-0000-0000000186A7: CoreAnimation: rendering error 506
that's also the last one I get before the system hangs…

Mac Pro Early 2008 crash after gear on boot

Hi. I have a Mac Pro (Early 2008), with Mavericks installed. A couple of days ago, it crashed hard (in Portal, as it happens) and then wouldn't boot. When it was crashing it showed full green in various (dark? or random?) areas of the screen, and then random vertical lines of coloured noise. The cursor went jerky, and then stopped moving at all. Having decided this was a more serious problem than a simple steam error, I forced the machine to shut down with the case button, and then turned it back on again, but it wouldn't come up, and hasn't (with exceptions, see below) since.
The behaviour is:
Boot chime, Apple, Apple-with-spinning-gear, a sensible (it seems) amount of spinning gear, then the gear stops and I get some flashing on my screen (like, a complete red screen, or orange screen – colours vary – displayed for less than one refresh, so I see a brief flash of colour with tearing). Occasionally instead of flashing I get an unexpected reboot: once when this happened I also got the kernel's (multiple language) "Your computer restarted because of a problem" screen.
Safe Mode has the same problem (I get a progress bar, when the progress bar completes everything stops and "screen flashing" happens).
EFI boot volume selector works fine, but when I continue to boot, either from my main partition or the Recovery partition, I get the same problem.
Verbose mode works until the point where the graphical user interface should come back, which gives me a white screen and nothing (except screen flashing). I do get a certain amount of "kSMCBadArgumentError" before that point, but see below.
Single User Mode works as it should, fsck finds no errors, all my data appears to be on my hard drive as expected, but on typing "exit" to continue boot I end up in the same position as Verbose Mode. Trying kextload to load all my extensions gives the kSMCBadArgumentError lines, but no other problems (until I try to boot). I have already tried using SUM to remove all the launch agents/daemons/extensions from /Library/ (leaving only the ones in /System/Library/). This worked (I modified the disk as I intended) but didn't help me boot.
I did get the recovery partition to boot once (seemingly randomly), Disk Utility found no errors. The full Apple Hardware Test doesn't seem to be an option from the recovery partition? (I've moved house a few times in the last 6 years, and I don't know where my physical AHT disk is any more. I do have a friend who would probably be able to burn one if Apple provides the disk image as a download.) I have had a full successful boot once too (maybe on the restart after using the recovery partition?) which let me use my administrator user perfectly (I used it for about 5 minutes?), but then after logging out and while trying to log in as my "standard" user I got full green noise as before, and the machine locked up again.
I've rotated my RAM (I have 2x1GB sticks and 2x2GB, as well as my usual 6GB config I've tried each of the pairs in "two-stick" configuration). No difference, except on one boot I got error lights (full on) on one riser, I assume that was because I hadn't seated it properly during rotation, because I took it out and put it back in again and I've not had the lights before or since.
I've also tried swapping in an older system drive, but that made no difference. (The old drive may have been a little flaky itself, but single-user mode booting reliably suggests, at least to me, that my normal drives aren't the problem?)
Without wishing to privilege a hypothesis, could it be the graphics card? I have the Nvidia GeForce 8800 GT, I believe (it looks exactly like the pictures of that card online, anyway) – installed by Apple at build time. I tried taking it out and putting it back in again, in case it had become poorly seated, but it seemed firmly in place – for example, the PCIe retainer clip was fully engaged before I removed the card – and reseating it didn't make any difference. I don't have a second card to test with, unfortunately. I wouldn't mind getting a new card to keep the machine running, of course, but I'd like to make sure that it's going to solve my problem before buying it!
Thanks for any help you can give!
Edited to correct OS field, which didn't work. I really do mean Mavericks.

RE: Mac Pro Replacement Graphics cards
1) Apple brand cards,
2) "sold in the Apple store" cards, and
3) "Mac Edition" cards ...
... show all the screens, including Boot up screens, Safe Mode, Installer, Recovery, debug screens, and Alt/Option boot screens. At this writing, these choices include:
1) Apple brand cards:
• Apple-firmware 5770, about US$250** works near full speed in every model Mac Pro, Drivers in 10.6.5
• Apple-firmware 5870, about US$450
2) "sold in the Apple store" cards
• NVIDIA Quadro 4000, about US$1200
• NVIDIA Quadro 5000, about US$2500
3) "Mac Edition" cards -- REQUIRE 10.8.3 or later:
• SAPPHIRE HD 7950 3GB GDDR5 MAC Edition, about US$480** Vendor recommends Mac Pro 4,1
• EVGA GTX 680 Mac Edition, about US$600
The cards above require no more than the provided two 6-pin aux power connectors provided in the Mac Pro through 2012 model. Aux cables may not be provided for third-party cards, but are readily available.
If you are Meet ALL of these:
• running 10.8.3 or later AND
• don't care about "no boot screens" etc AND
• can re-wire or otherwise "work out" the power cabling, THEN:
You can use many more cards, even most "PC-only cards"

Problem description: My iMac (early 2008) with OS 10.10.2 runs slow. I have run EtreCheck several times, and I am unable to move beyond Problem System Launch Agents (11 processes killed due to memory pressure) and Launch Daemons (12 processes killed

Problem description:
My iMac (early 2008) with OS 10.10.2 runs slow. I have run EtreCheck several times, and I am unable to move beyond Problem System Launch Agents (11 processes killed due to memory pressure) and Launch Daemons (12 processes killed).
EtreCheck version: 2.1.8 (121)
Report generated April 14, 2015 at 9:50:48 AM EDT
Download EtreCheck from http://etresoft.com/etrecheck
Click the [Click for support] links for help with non-Apple products.
Click the [Click for details] links for more information about that line.
Hardware Information: ℹ️
    iMac (24-inch, Early 2008) (Verified)
    iMac - model: iMac8,1
    1 3.06 GHz Intel Core 2 Duo CPU: 2-core
    4 GB RAM Upgradeable
        BANK 0/DIMM0
            2 GB DDR2 SDRAM 800 MHz ok
        BANK 1/DIMM1
            2 GB DDR2 SDRAM 800 MHz ok
    Bluetooth: Old - Handoff/Airdrop2 not supported
    Wireless: en1: 802.11 a/b/g/n
Video Information: ℹ️
    NVIDIA GeForce 8800 GS - VRAM: 512 MB
        iMac 1920 x 1200
System Software: ℹ️
    OS X 10.10.2 (14C1510) - Time since boot: 4 days 20:29:22
Disk Information: ℹ️
    Hitachi HDS721010KLA330 disk0 : (1 TB)
        EFI (disk0s1) <not mounted> : 210 MB
        Mac iBook HD (disk0s2) / : 999.35 GB (521.60 GB free)
        Recovery HD (disk0s3) <not mounted> [Recovery]: 650 MB
USB Information: ℹ️
    Apple Inc. Built-in iSight
    Apple, Inc. Keyboard Hub
        Apple, Inc Apple Keyboard
    Apple Computer, Inc. IR Receiver
    Apple Inc. BRCM2046 Hub
        Apple Inc. Bluetooth USB Host Controller
Configuration files: ℹ️
    /etc/sysctl.conf - Exists
Gatekeeper: ℹ️
    Mac App Store and identified developers
Problem System Launch Agents: ℹ️
    [killed]    com.apple.CallHistoryPluginHelper.plist
    [killed]    com.apple.CallHistorySyncHelper.plist
    [killed]    com.apple.coreservices.appleid.authentication.plist
    [killed]    com.apple.icloud.fmfd.plist
    [killed]    com.apple.Maps.pushdaemon.plist
    [killed]    com.apple.printtool.agent.plist
    [killed]    com.apple.SafariNotificationAgent.plist
    [killed]    com.apple.sbd.plist
    [killed]    com.apple.scopedbookmarkagent.xpc.plist
    [killed]    com.apple.telephonyutilities.callservicesd.plist
    [killed]    com.apple.warmd_agent.plist
    11 processes killed due to memory pressure
Problem System Launch Daemons: ℹ️
    [killed]    com.apple.AssetCacheLocatorService.plist
    [killed]    com.apple.ctkd.plist
    [killed]    com.apple.emond.aslmanager.plist
    [killed]    com.apple.icloud.findmydeviced.plist
    [killed]    com.apple.ifdreader.plist
    [killed]    com.apple.nehelper.plist
    [killed]    com.apple.nesessionmanager.plist
    [killed]    com.apple.periodic-daily.plist
    [killed]    com.apple.periodic-weekly.plist
    [killed]    com.apple.softwareupdate_download_service.plist
    [killed]    com.apple.wdhelper.plist
    [killed]    org.cups.cupsd.plist
    12 processes killed due to memory pressure
Launch Agents: ℹ️
    [not loaded]    com.adobe.AAM.Updater-1.0.plist [Click for support]
    [running]    com.adobe.AdobeCreativeCloud.plist [Click for support]
Launch Daemons: ℹ️
    [loaded]    com.adobe.fpsaud.plist [Click for support]
    [loaded]    com.adobe.SwitchBoard.plist [Click for support]
    [running]    com.arubanetworks.via.NetworkMonitorLaunchd.plist [Click for support]
    [loaded]    com.microsoft.office.licensing.helper.plist [Click for support]
User Launch Agents: ℹ️
    [loaded]    com.adobe.AAM.Updater-1.0.plist [Click for support]
    [loaded]    com.adobe.ARM.[...].plist [Click for support]
    [loaded]    com.adobe.ARM.[...].plist [Click for support]
    [loaded]    com.google.keystone.agent.plist [Click for support]
    [running]    com.spotify.webhelper.plist [Click for support]
User Login Items: ℹ️
    ChronoSyncBackgrounder    Application (/Library/Application Support/ChronoSync/ChronoSyncBackgrounder.app)
    Dropbox    Application (/Applications/Dropbox.app)
    Canon IJ Network Scanner Selector2    Application Hidden (/Library/Printers/Canon/IJScanner/Utilities/Canon IJ Network Scanner Selector2.app)
    Google Drive    Application (/Applications/Google Drive.app)
Internet Plug-ins: ℹ️
    Google Earth Web Plug-in: Version: 6.1 [Click for support]
    Default Browser: Version: 600 - SDK 10.10
    AdobeExManDetect: Version: AdobeExManDetect 1.1.0.0 - SDK 10.7 [Click for support]
    Flip4Mac WMV Plugin: Version: 3.1.0.24   - SDK 10.8 [Click for support]
    OVSHelper: Version: 1.1 [Click for support]
    AdobeAAMDetect: Version: AdobeAAMDetect 2.0.0.0 - SDK 10.7 [Click for support]
    AdobePDFViewerNPAPI: Version: 11.0.10 - SDK 10.6 [Click for support]
    DivX Web Player: Version: 3.2.4.1250 - SDK 10.6 [Click for support]
    FlashPlayer-10.6: Version: 17.0.0.134 - SDK 10.6 [Click for support]
    Flash Player: Version: 17.0.0.134 - SDK 10.6 Outdated! Update
    iPhotoPhotocast: Version: 7.0
    QuickTime Plugin: Version: 7.7.3
    SharePointBrowserPlugin: Version: 14.4.8 - SDK 10.6 [Click for support]
    AdobePDFViewer: Version: 11.0.10 - SDK 10.6 [Click for support]
    Silverlight: Version: 5.1.20913.0 - SDK 10.6 [Click for support]
    JavaAppletPlugin: Version: 15.0.0 - SDK 10.10 Check version
User internet Plug-ins: ℹ️
    WebEx: Version: 1.0 [Click for support]
    Google Earth Web Plug-in: Version: 7.1 [Click for support]
3rd Party Preference Panes: ℹ️
    Adobe Version Cue CS2 [Click for support]
    Flash Player [Click for support]
    Flip4Mac WMV [Click for support]
    VIA PrefPane [Click for support]
Time Machine: ℹ️
    Time Machine not configured!
Top Processes by CPU: ℹ️
         3%    WindowServer
         3%    Mail
         2%    com.apple.iCloudHelper
         1%    Creative Cloud
         1%    Google Chrome
Top Processes by Memory: ℹ️
    223 MB    Google Chrome
    150 MB    Finder
    129 MB    Google Chrome Helper
    112 MB    Mail
    69 MB    Google Drive
Virtual Memory Information: ℹ️
    35 MB    Free RAM
    1.45 GB    Active RAM
    1.45 GB    Inactive RAM
    888 MB    Wired RAM
    27.01 GB    Page-ins
    851 MB    Page-outs

When you see a beachball cursor or the slowness is especially bad, note the exact time: hour, minute, second.
These instructions must be carried out as an administrator. If you have only one user account, you are the administrator.
Launch the Console application in any of the following ways:
☞ Enter the first few letters of its name into a Spotlight search. Select it in the results (it should be at the top.)
☞ In the Finder, select Go ▹ Utilities from the menu bar, or press the key combination shift-command-U. The application is in the folder that opens.
☞ Open LaunchPad and start typing the name.
The title of the Console window should be All Messages. If it isn't, select
          SYSTEM LOG QUERIES ▹ All Messages
from the log list on the left. If you don't see that list, select
          View ▹ Show Log List
from the menu bar at the top of the screen.
Each message in the log begins with the date and time when it was entered. Scroll back to the time you noted above.
Select the messages entered from then until the end of the episode, or until they start to repeat, whichever comes first.
Copy the messages to the Clipboard by pressing the key combination command-C. Paste into a reply to this message by pressing command-V.
The log contains a vast amount of information, almost all of it useless for solving any particular problem. When posting a log extract, be selective. A few dozen lines are almost always more than enough.
Please don't indiscriminately dump thousands of lines from the log into this discussion.
Please don't post screenshots of log messages—post the text.
Some private information, such as your name, may appear in the log. Anonymize before posting.

IMac early 2008 with OS X Lion 10.7.5 running slowly. How can I speed it up?

iMac early 2008 with OS X Lion 10.7.5 running slowly. How can I speed it up?

Hello, see how many of these you can answer...
See if the Disk is issuing any S.M.A.R.T errors in Disk Utility...
http://support.apple.com/kb/PH7029
Open Activity Monitor in Applications>Utilities, select All Processes & sort on CPU%, any indications there?
How much RAM & free space do you have also, click on the Memory & Disk Usage Tabs.
Open Console in Utilities & see if there are any clues or repeating messages when this happens.
In the Memory tab of Activity Monitor, are there a lot of Pageouts?

My Early 2008 Macbook Pro will not boot with anything greater than 3GB of Ram.

Early 2008 Macbook Pro 4,1
2.4 GHz Intel Core 2 Duo
3 GB 667 MHz DDR2 SDRAM (PC2-5300)
OS X 10.8.4
Serial: W88450LR1XR
I keep reading mixed reviews saying that 3GB is the max while others say this system supports up to 6GB. I have tried both Kingston and Crucial and PNY and I get the same results. I can have 1x2GB stick and 1x1GB stick but not 2x2 GB sticks. Both 2 GB sticks work independently but they will not work together. They are PC2-5300 667 MHz.
I would really love to have at least 4 GB of ram in this computer. Is it not possible?
Thanks in advance.
Symptoms:
If I put 2x2 GB in the computer and power it up, the little light on the front of the computer comes on but the screen stays black. No post beeps or anything to indicate a failure or that it's running (except the light that comes on when I hit the power button)

Ok - so no one is replying. I just contacted Other World Computing who says that my Laptop will support up to 6GB of ram. I just ordered the memory directly from them. I have 6GB in the mail and should arrive tomorrow. I will report that if their guarenteed ram will work.

Mac Pro 2008 with 8800 GT, hard freezes with screen savers/OpenGL. You too?

I have been experiencing random intermittent hard crashes of my "early 2008" model 8-core Mac Pro. Now I have finally found an easy reproducible test case (see below), and hope others will try it and post the results. This is a video-driver related crash that I have now duplicated with two different video cards.
The symptom is that my screen randomly freezes. The mouse moves, but there's no way to use the Mac[1]. Holding the Power button to force the Mac to shutdown is the only way out.
Usually, this occurs when I get to my office in the morning, or after the gym. That's because the screen saver is running. I found that the screensaver, other OpenGL/3D type applications, are what triggers this bug.
The bug seems to be with the graphics driver. Immediately before the freeze, messages like this are printed in the system log:
Mar 26 18:34:14 Mac-Pro kernel[0]: NVChannel(GL): Graphics channel exception!
status = 0xffff info32 = 0xd = GR: SW Notify Error
Mar 26 18:34:14 Mac-Pro kernel[0]: 0000000c
Mar 26 18:34:14 Mac-Pro kernel[0]: 00200000 0000502d 00000470 00000000
Mar 26 18:34:14 Mac-Pro kernel[0]: 00000482 000002ac 00000003 00000003
Mar 26 18:34:14 Mac-Pro kernel[0]: 00000000 00000000 01be0003
Mar 26 18:34:14 Mac-Pro kernel[0]: NVChannel(GL): Graphics channel exception!
status = 0xffff info32 = 0x3 = Fifo: Unknown Method Error
Mar 26 18:34:14 Mac-Pro kernel[0]: 0000000b
Mar 26 18:34:14 Mac-Pro kernel[0]: NVChannel(GL): Graphics channel exception!
status = 0xffff info32 = 0x3 = Fifo: Unknown Method Error
Other errors like these also appear (the actual log output volume is too large for this forum):
Mar 26 21:15:15 Mac-Pro kernel[0]: NVChannel(GL): Graphics channel exception! status = 0xffff info32 = 0x6 = Fifo: Parse Error
Mar 26 18:34:14 Mac-Pro kernel[0]: NVChannel(GL): Graphics channel exception! status = 0xffff info32 = 0xd = GR: SW Notify Error
Anyway, finally I found on another thread about a similar issue[2], a recommendation to run Folding@Home program to trigger the freeze. They were talking about another Mac model, but sure enough, it triggers my problem every time. I downloaded the client[3], installed it, and then launched the app which gets put in the Applications folder. It doesn't even finish bouncing once in the dock before the Mac Pro freezes.
This is not a bug specific to Folding@Home; juding from the log messages and the effect, this is exactly the same crash that is intermittently triggered by the default Mac OS X screensavers (I use Arabesque, but I think any OpenGL screen saver does it). It's just that running Folding@Home is an easier way to trigger the bug than leaving your screensaver running for hours.
So, that is pretty unfortunate, right? I mean, not only can my new Mac Pro not sleep without losing all unsaved data (yes, I have the reboot-instead-of-wake problem[4], too, but that is another issue...) but it also crashes at random whenever the screen saver runs for a while, or somebody uses OpenGL programs. I have set my machine to never use the screen saver, but still.
So, first and foremost, my question for other 2008 Mac Pro owners with the 8800 video card is: does your Mac puke all over itself when you launch Folding@Home?
I just found it a little bit hard to believe that every Mac owner of the most expensive new Mac and the higher end video card will have these crashes. It could be, but it seemed far-fetched. So I tried some troubleshooting:
a
1.) I considered that I had a bad video card, so I got another GeForce 8800 GT and installed that. Still crashed.
2.) I disconnected my second monitor, and tried it with only one monitor. Still crashed.
3.) I booted from the pristine boot disk my Mac shipped with (10.5.1). Still crashed.
4.) I reduced the resolution on my 30" Cinema display to 800x600. Still crashed.
5.) Just to stave off the usual chorus of "try zapping your PRAM" posts, I zapped the PRAM. Of course, this did nothing (I don't think this has really fixed a problem since the 1990s...). Anyway, it still crashed.
6.) In doing all these tests, I disconnected all USB/FireWire peripherals.
7.) My Mac is totally up-to-date with Software Update as of Thu, Mar 27, 2008. Mac OS X 10.5.2.
I don't want to return this Mac to Apple; it is wicked fast and that really helps me with my work. But, the frequent crashing really is a productivity-killer.
So: does every 2008 Mac Pro owner with an 8800 GT have this problem?
(Note: there are lots of similar problems with other Macs and the new Mac OS X 10.5... I hope to specifically address this particular model and crash in this thread.)
If not, I will go to the next extreme step: pulling out some of my RAM. I have 12GB of RAM, and it all seems to work fine, no parity errors or anything. But I know sometimes problems don't happen unless there's "too much" RAM, "too high" resolution, and so on. But I would like to hear from others before I go banging on my precious DIMMs and riser cards.
Thanks for any information!
The next step will be to determine if this is just another unfortunate defect that affects ALL 2088 Mac Pros (in which case I would want to keep my fast Mac and wait for fixed drivers), or if perhaps just a subset of them have defective video cards that cause the driver to crash in this way (in which case I would want a replacement).
---------- NOTES: ----------
[1]: I can connect via SSH on the command line to the Mac. However, the GUI environment seems borked; opening apps or trying to gracefully quit them via AppleScript either does not work or really hard freezes everything, such that SSH no longer works either.
[2]: A similar (but perhaps different) issue affecting notebooks is discussed here, and there are some people with Mac Pros, too: http://discussions.apple.com/thread.jspa?messageID=6786960
[3]: The Folding @ Home client, which can be used to trigger this bug, can be gotten here: http://folding.stanford.edu/English/Download
[4]: The severe defect affecting many (most?) 2008 Mac Pro machines' ability to sleep without losing data is discussed in this other thread: http://discussions.apple.com/thread.jspa?threadID=1353551

Hello guys, thank you for the replies.
I do have more data at this point.
ujeezy: Those posts on MacNN and others like them did give some clues.
Jon BWFC: I think you are (partly) right that it's (partly) an issue with the driver. But I have confirmed with a fair degree of certainty in my case that it is a hardware issue too, likely with the video card and not the Mac Pro itself.
cmcom: I think it sounds like you problem is different than the one we're talking about (although who knows, the driver could be causing that too). The freeze we are seeing locks up the whole Mac, and no application crash report is produced.
I had another GeForce 8800 card, so I went through some exhaustive troubleshooting. I tested each card, installed in each of the 16x slots, booting from either my normal 10.5.2 boot disk or a clone of the pristine virgin system disk that shipped with the Mac, and tried to see if the Mac would crash.
Unfortunately this was harder than it seems, because:
a.) both my GeForce 8800 cards appear to be defective, but in different ways (see [1] and [2] below)
b.) In my testing, I thought I was seeing the crash sometimes, but later I discovered that there are different ways to make the Mac crash like this. That is, there are bugs in Mac OS X 10.5.x (probably in the NVIDIA driver) that cause similar crashes, and these bugs occur on all Mac Pro units and even other Mac models, without any hardware defects. Unfortunately, the Folding@home exercises one such bug.[3]
So the upshot is, all those times I was using Folding@home to test this issue were bogus, because Folding@home crashes any Mac Pro with the NVIDIA card, and crashes MacBook Pro machines with NVIDIA chips as well.
Argh! So I had to retest. It took a couple of days but I found another reliable way to crash my Mac Pro, more quickly than just leaving the screensaver on for a day or two: run this OpenGL virtual fish tank simulator[4] for 2-3 minutes. Unlike the Folding@home test, this did not crash any of my other Macs, and after exhaustive testing I found that it ONLY crashed the Mac Pro with one of the GeForce 880 cards installed, and not the other one. This was regardless of what slot it was installed in or what boot disk was used.
Whew! So, I concluded that indeed, there is a hardware defect in one of my GeForce 8800 cards which causes the machine to lock up. [2]
What made this problem much harder to deal with was the fact that Mac OS X (specifically the graphics driver parts of the OS, perhaps NVIDIA-specific) crashes with these same symptoms in other cases too. Like when you run Folding@home, or in some of these cases people are talking about with their MacBook Pro machines.
So, when there is a bona-fide hardware defect, it is really hard to isolate. (It took me like four days.)
The thing is, the defective NVIDIA card that crashes the Mac[2] was a REPLACEMENT card for the 8800 card that shipped with my Mac. I called Apple about the video artifacts I was seeing and they replaced the card.
I am now running the original card (and suffering the ugly video artifacts, but no crashes). At my own expense, I ordered an ATI card (the RADEON HD 2600 XT) and I will install that.
I hope someday to have my Mac work without graphics glitches or crashes. For now, operating (mostly) without crashes will have to do.
The original problem with this Mac continues, though: the video doesn't work correctly; it starts displaying visual artifacts after 1-72 hours of use[1]. That could either be because:
a.) a hardware defect in that video card
b.) a software problem with the driver/OS
c.) a hardware defect in the Mac itself
I strongly suspect A, but hopefully my buying a different card and testing with that will help further isolate what is wrong.
I am marking this thread "solved" because the specific issue I originally posted about has been resolved: the GeForce 8800 card causing the crashes is defective, and using another card fixes that issue.
[1]: The original GeForce 8800 card that shipped with my Mac Pro exhibited annoying-but-not-deadly video artifacts, which can be seen here: http://masonmark.com/wp-content/uploads/2008/04/bogusvideoartifacts.jpg
[2]: Apple replaced the video card, and that is when my deadly video-corruption-plus-frozen-Mac crash problem began. A screenshot example of that problem can be seen here: http://masonmark.com/wp-content/uploads/2008/04/crashedmac_pro_akashitball.jpg
[3]: The red herring in this case was the Mac OS X bug (seemingly specific to NVIDIA-equipped Macs including Mac Pro and MacBook Pro) that causes a very similar full system crash. This bug can easily be triggered by running the Folding@home version "6.10beta2" demo application. That is a serious bug, and since my employer is a Mac software company I reported this bug to Apple via the official channel. It is Apple bug number 5830772.
[4]: The OpenGL fish tank simulator I found, which would trigger the system crash caused by my defective 8800 video card (but would not crash any other Mac, or crash my Mac Pro with the other 8800 video card installed) can be found at: http://uri.cat/software/Fish/

Early 2008 macbook pro will not boot

Good morning! Last night I was working on compiling some video footage from a DVD on my early 2008 MacBook Pro. I put the computer to sleep with a DVD in the drive. This morning it will not wake up and it won't boot--I never make it to the apple logo. I do hear either a fan or the DVD drive for a moment.
Any ideas? I'm kind of stuck here. Thanks,Robby

http://support.apple.com/kb/ht3964
Also hold the trackpad button down when you reboot so the DVD ejects.
If it doesn't eject, see this tip:
https://discussions.apple.com/docs/DOC-1015
And note, any attached USB device may not support Energy Saver. Keep those removed until you reboot, after putting the machine to sleep.

Right-click on Macbook Air (early 2008) with Windows XP?

I just bought a refurbished MacBook Air, early 2008 edition. I installed Windows XP Pro SP3 using Boot Camp, and everything is working perfectly, except tap-to-click and right-clicking using the trackpad. Both do not work at all, I've tried two-finger tap as well as three-finger tap for the right-click. I tried downloading the update driver from the Apple site, but it said "This update is not intended for this computer and will not be installed." Obviously, the update is meant for the late 2008 edition MacBooks.
One other interesting point is that Control Panel - Boot Camp does not have a "Trackpad' tab.
Anyone have any idea on how to fix this?

On reflection, all I probably need is the previous Trackpad driver; a prior version that is compatible with early 2008 edition of the MacBook Air. I have been unable to find this driver on the Apple site, would anyone know how I can go about getting this driver?

MacBookpro Early 2011 graphic issue won't boot

Hello,
My Early 2011 MacBookPro suddenly suffered from graphics issues for a few days then it won't boot at all.
The hardware test says it is ok and my hard drive too. But when I want to boot, the apple appears and the dong too, but then blank screen. It is the same with a bootcamp boot, but with a blue screen with lines all over the screen. The recovery partition doesn't start either. But I can access boot from my hard drive with another Mac on target mode.
Anyway Apple doesn't admit there's a problem a want me to pay the reparation, because they don't report it as a real problem, saying that I damaged the computer. But there are threads here and all over the internet, and they don't want to do anything.
On the phone, the apple guy told me that I had to pay 80$ to see if there is any problem , and " maybe if we see there's a fabrication problem, we'll fix it for free ". Do I have to trust them ? What can I do to ?
Thank you

This thread may be helpful -> https://discussions.apple.com/thread/4766577?tstart=0.
You should at least add your experience and see if those who have come up with 'quick fixes' can help you with your problem.
Good luck,
Clinton

8800 won't boot, tried wiping and reinstalling OS to no avail....

I have an 8800 that won't boot! The red led stays solidly lit for a few seconds after putting in the battery and then nothing else happens...
I've tried using JL_Cmder to reinstall the OS but it wouldn't connect so I went about it the alternate way and it goes thru the first couple steps and then when it tries to reconnect it fails and gives me the message, "could not reconnect during multistage load operation".
Is there anything else I can do to try to get this thing to boot up?

That error is in regard to a low power USB port.
Keep trying, or try another PC.
EDIT, eh, it looks like you have bigger problems anyway:
http://www.blackberryforums.com/general-8800-series-discussion/159157-8800-won-t-turn.html
Message Edited by JSanders on 11-13-2008 11:47 AM
1. If any post helps you please click the below the post(s) that helped you.
2. Please resolve your thread by marking the post "Solution?" which solved it for you!
3. Install free BlackBerry Protect today for backups of contacts and data.
4. Guide to Unlocking your BlackBerry & Unlock Codes
Join our BBM Channels (Beta)
BlackBerry Support Forums Channel
PIN: C0001B7B4 Display/Scan Bar Code
Knowledge Base Updates
PIN: C0005A9AA Display/Scan Bar Code

Early 2008 with 8800 won't boot

Similar Messages

Maybe you are looking for