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General discussion

OSX Lion issues

Jan 3, 2012 12:52PM PST

I have a 2.66GHz MacPro Quad Core, Apple installed RAM, 1 x 500GB HDD, 3 x 320GB HDD, Apple upgraded Graphics Card ATI x 1900xt. 2 x Superdrives installed 16x write speed, DVD/CD R/RW. Lion installed. It's probably 5/6 years old, configuration cost almost $5,000.

Since recently upgrading to Lion OSX 10.7.2 from Snow Leopard I have had continuousScreen Freezes, Screen Going Black, or Beach Ball just spinning non stop. This can happen as often as 10 or 15 times in 30 minutes, regardless of programme that's open or in use at the time. With Snow Leopard I did get the very occasional screen freeze. I have run Disk Warrior a couple times and it repaired any faults it found.

At one stage on boot up with Lion installed it went as far as the white screen, and that was it, it would boot no further. I took the machine into my local Apple Service Centre. One problem they diagnosed was a faulty Logic Board, which they said may result in reduction of colours, and a couple of other things they mentioned, cost of new LB $1200. They got everything working again but advised against installing a new Logic Board due to the age of the machine. I'm very reluctant to lay out the cost of buying a new Mac to these specs'. Is it probable that a new Logic Board would resolve the issues or am I still likely to have problems? Is a 5 or 6 year old machine considered a throw away item, or is the problem with Lion itself? I twice carried out a re-installation of Lion. Any advice would be appreciated.

bryanall

Note: This post was edited by a forum moderator to remove unintended HTML codes in post on 01/06/2012 at 11:45 AM PT

Discussion is locked

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Seems suspicious
Jan 3, 2012 10:27PM PST

Seems suspicious to me, considering the Radeon x1900 had a recall program on it. Not sure if it still does or not, but screen freezes and no display are definitely classic symptoms of the x1900.

If this was an Apple retail store you went to, take it back and tell them to look this up, or to go in the back and talk to a TEA about it. If it was a third party repair place, then it sounds like either they are just guessing or trying to pad the bill. Or both.

I can't remember if the x1900 recall program is still going on or not, I'd have to go look and I'm running a bit late, but considering you bought a pretty high end unit back in the day, and they were morons who likely gave you a WAG of a diagnosis, you probably have a decent chance of them eating the cost of the repair just to keep you from making the scene you're completely justified in making. As I recall, they replace it with the nVidia GeForce 8600, which is actually a bit quieter as I recall.

I'm very dubious about the MLB diagnosis here though, so if you were ever given some sort of a case number, if you post that here I can get someone to send me the tech's notes for your unit and find out whether or not they're full of it.

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OSX Lion issues
Jan 4, 2012 2:04PM PST

Thank you for your quick and very interesting response. I will try and check out the x1900 recall. I have attached a copy of the technicians notes who worked on my machine, which may be helpful.

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At least now
Jan 4, 2012 10:17PM PST

At least now I have some idea why they think it's the MLB, but considering you're trying to install Lion and they don't mention what their known good OS was, that could be significant. It is curious that ASD wouldn't run from one of the back ports, but yours uses a rather old version of ASD, that I have found will stall upon loading sometimes. Usually you just reboot and try again, then it loads fine.

You can of course test this if you have your own external HDD. Install a copy of 10.5 or 10.6 onto it, and then try and boot that OS using every USB port on the back of the unit. A less definitive test is to just hold down the option key at boot, when you get the boot selector, you go around and plug your keyboard into each port and then use the arrow keys to see if it's getting and interpreting signals. Assuming you have a mouse plugged into the keyboard's USB hub, you can alternately use the mouse to test whether the port works. Still, one bad USB port isn't necessarily a reason to replace the entire MLB.

I still think your problem sounds more like RAM, and if you have a bad x1900 video card, that won't be helping matters either. That could potentially even explain the APM kernel panics.

Not sure where this FireWire and Audio connectivity bit comes in, unless they're trying to run ASD off a FireWire connection, which is very hit or miss on whether or not it will work. So unless you just neglected to mention FireWire and/or audio issues here, I'm at a loss to explain why that is in there.

Now, the good news is that based on their notes, it doesn't seem like they're intentionally trying to rip you off, but it does read like they are a bit rushed and not really taking a lot of time to investigate. Like why didn't they try other USB ports on the rear of the computer? Why give up after just one and move to the front USB ports? Move the keyboard and mouse to the front ports if you need another free port, or try moving the keyboard and mouse to the "bad" port and see what happens. Let's just say that as a tech, I see certain telltale signs that they are either very busy and/or just disinterested in really digging deep into what's going on.

Anyway, just want to confirm something quickly... When you were running 10.5 and 10.6, you had absolutely no problems? They all started as soon as you tried to upgrade to 10.7?

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OSX Lion issue
Jan 5, 2012 7:51AM PST

<span id="INSERTION_MARKER"> When I was running 10.6 I had the very occasional screen freeze but nothing even remotely like it has been since upgrading to 10.7.2...this morning I have had 7 screen freezes in around 40mins. requiring a reboot. It has now been running for 25mins. with no problems so it is not consistent.<span id="INSERTION_MARKER">

<span id="INSERTION_MARKER">In my original posting I failed to mention the dud ports in the Technicians notes, my apologies. The rear Firewire port, rear Audio port, and one front USB port had developed connectivity problems prior to the 10.7. upgrade. When I took the machine to the Mac Centre with the "failing to boot past the white screen" problem I mentioned the faulty ports to them. When I collected the machine they said the ports were working but only occasionally, and needed several attempts before they would function. They put this down to the faulty Logic Board.
<span id="INSERTION_MARKER">

<span id="INSERTION_MARKER">I have just been advised that the X1900 recall has now ended. The "known OS" the Mac Centre used for the reboot was 10.6

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Hmmmm
Jan 5, 2012 11:28AM PST

Hmmm... Well, this is kind of painting a picture the likes of which you're not going to like.

Assuming you're fine with the bad ports on the MLB, a lot of this seems to be pointing at the video card. I can't say as I've ever tested it myself, but as of at least a little while ago, Apple was selling a Radeon 5xxx series card on their website. It was about $200US, and at least some people claimed it was working on their original gen Mac Pros, so you might want to give that a bit of thought. Double check the Australian return policies, but assuming they're similar to the US return policy, you should be able to buy that card, and have 30 days to return it for a full refund. So in that time you should be able to find out whether or not that will resolve your issue. You pop it in, give it about a week (though in your case it sounds like you should know within hours), and if it works you keep it, otherwise you just send it back. Assuming, of course, that the return policies are along the lines of 30 days, no questions asked, full refund. Unfortunately with Macs you can't just toss in any random video card you want.

Otherwise, it really might just be best to write your system off and get a new one. You do need a new MLB, but I don't think that's going to fix your current problem. I'm thinking you also have a bad video card, and for whatever reason Lion is using some function that seems to reliably trigger a failure in the video card. If a repair shop tries ordering another x1900 card, it'd add probably another $400US onto the price. Do the currency conversion and figure it's probably something similar where you are. It's ridiculously overpriced, but like I said, you can't just toss in any random video card to a Mac, so they've kind of got you. If they're still selling the above mentioned card, that might cut the price down a little bit, but it's still a lot.

They quoted you $1200 for the MLB, then figure another probably $200-$400 for the video card, then there's probably a hefty labor charge on top of that because replacing the MLB on a Mac Pro is a right PITA. It's one of the only repairs that is a PITA on those things. Assuming prices are roughly 1:1, you're looking at probably 50-60% the cost of a new unit with considerably better specs, plus a warranty so if something breaks, it's on Apple's dime. You can even pull the two drives you have now and slap them into a new Mac Pro. Not sure about the DVD drives. I think those would be IDE, and I want to think they went to SATA with the 2010 Mac Pros. Whatever you have left over you can put on ebay or some such site to help offset the costs of a new unit that much more. I just can't see it being all that cost effective to repair this thing though based on the details that are coming out.

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OSX Lion issues
Jan 5, 2012 12:02PM PST

I really have appreciated your help and excellent advice on this. It looks as though investing in a new Mac will be the way to go. I'm sure there will be other problems with this one in the long run.

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This time around
Jan 5, 2012 10:07PM PST

This time around, you may want to consider investing in the AppleCare (APP) extended warranty. Think it's only something like $250US for the Mac Pro, and that means you're covered for three years. It also tends to mean that should something happen just a little outside the coverage window, they are much more likely to give you an exception and fix whatever the issue is. There have been multiple times where I'm talking with some of the people who hand out those exceptions, and they have made comments that clearly indicate APP as being a factor in the calculations they do to decide whether or not to cover something outside of normal warranty periods.

And, if you get three years out of a unit, that's usually a pretty good run. It's around 60% or so of the average lifespan of a Mac Pro, so definitely worth a look. You can probably get at least that much for your current unit, since there's bound to be someone out there who might be interested in the enclosure or maybe the memory riser cards, even the RAM since it's FB-DIMM RAM which as far as I can tell, was really only used by the Mac Pro and maybe some high end server systems that most people will never have any direct contact with. There's bound to be someone else with a busted up Mac Pro who'd be interested in buying some of that stuff, or as you say, if they'll give you some kind of trade-in value for it, that works too. If you can cover the cost of APP, I'd say you're good, and if you can manage more than that, even better.

Sorry the news wasn't better, but you're right, that thing is slowly dying and the problems are likely only going to get worse. In the short term, you could try loading 10.6 back on to see if that lets you limp along at least a little longer. Maybe scrape together just a little more cash before pulling the trigger on a new unit.