This has been driving me insane for the last few days...

My iMac G5 has started randomly shutting down at what appears to be the same time most days.

Since wednesday I have been working long hours - from 9 till 6. On the first day (wed) when I got home my iMac had restarted about 2 hours prior, around 5pm. Strange I thought, maybe we had a blackout? But no, all my other gadgets were fine.

Thursday morning when I woke up at around 7.30, it had restarted sometime during the night - by checking my uptime it appeared to have done so at around 6am.

This was starting to worry me a little bit...I ran through all my "Energy Saver" preferences, and there was nothing that could be causing this. I turned off "Restart Automatically After a Blackout", I went to work on Thursday, and sure enough when I got back home my iMac was off. Some time during the day it had shut itself down. Blackout? No - my stereo (which has a clock that starts blinking 0:00 whenever there's a loss of power) was showing the correct time - meaning no blackout - it is connected to the same powerboard.

I turned "Restart Automatically After a Blackout" back on.

Friday morning - it had restarted around 6am.

Friday evening when I got back from work...it hadn't gone off! Miracle! Or was it...

This morning at 5.02am I was woken by the all-too familiar sound of my iMac restarting itself. Too tired to get up I let it be...38 minutes later at 5.40am it restarted again. But as with the past times, there was no blackout/brownout/greyout/redout...whatever.

Do I have to take Snowhite for a roadtrip down to Brisbane to get her diagnosed? Or does anyone here have some bright suggestions as to what could be causing this.

Help!

Edit: 8.38am iMac crapped itself and restarted.
Edit 2: 8.46am iMac just crapped itself and restarted again

Q1: What kind of keyboard have you got connected to the G5 ?

Q2: Do you own another keyboard that you can connect to the G5 ?

Q3: In either case, USB or Wireless ?

cheers,

cw

See - the self-start up is an anomaly which has occurred in the past, yet the unexpected shut-downs is more than not, a faulty capacitor in the iMac G5's Power Supply Unit - the fix for which is, unfortunately yes, a little trip down to the Brisbane Apple Pediatrician.

Either logic board - or PMU failure.

cw

Thanks for the suggestions. It did it again at 9.20 this morning, it seems to be getting worse, next time I'm going to Brissy I'll take it with me.

And what kind of keyboard is attached? The one it came with - or another brand? And do you have another Apple keyboard you could connect to what's already there?

See same question in Post # 2 :P

cw

do we see the Macbook problem now starting to show its deadly shut down failure in the Imacs

Faulty connectors are the cause in the Mac book
Could the Imac be suffering the same fault

Will be intesting to see the results


I have uploaded a picture of the faulkty connectors in the Macbook, you may want to take a look and get the Tech to check if they are the same same in the IMac

Photo available in "Latest Macbook Problems" this forum
sorry I have not learnt yet how to make a link

CW: Apple keyboard and wired mighty mouse.

Earlier this year mine needed a replacement power supply. The random shutdowns just starting arriving sooner and sooner, until it became unusable. Repaired under warranty.

Goodbye,

Okay - the start-ups are not being affected by a third party keyboard - but I would - as Wilco has suggested, take it to Brisvegas for repairs.

If you see a small black mole on your heel, and suspect it might just be gangrene, don't wait to see if it will go away all by itself - as chances are - it will - yet only by taking the whole foot with it!

Between now and then, I'd be inclined to turn off AirPort and Bluetooth, and disconnect the Keyboard at night when you are about to sleep.

(but it's wise to act fast - yes)

cheers,

cw

Might just go back to the good old days of Shutting Down when I leave the house or go to bed

You don't shut-down?

I have 5 Macs here and everyone of them gets shut-down if not in use for more than 1 hour.
A good golden rule for most products. If it has an "on" button, turn it "off".

Also - something that not many people think about regarding electrical things being "on" all the time - there are huge turbines, powered by burning vast amounts of coal - a fossil fuel which is both decreasing and poluting as it burns, and here we are - at the top of the first world, burning it - mostly for no other reason aside from: we can.

Offsky when there's no need to have it Onsky.



cheers,

cw

Having a look around the Apple discussions pages, the random shut down issue is a very common one for my age of iMac, with dozens of people experiencing the same issue.

It's the same issue that was affecting Rev A machines, which Apple has an extended repair program for, but nothing has been issued for the Rev B machines, which means I am up for a few hundred $ to get my PSU replaced.

When did you purchase this iMac G5 ? (approximately)

July 05, it's just 3 months outside its warranty period!

oh dear ...