I thought I would try here for some advice, and probablay a few comments, regarding a problem I am having with my system.

It is a 1.4ghz (upgraded from 733) G4 running the current os 10.4.x. The damn thing crashes/kernal panics all the time I put load on the CPU.

To try to fix it I am trying to reinstall the OS. For some damn reason I do not seem to be able to boot off of the cd to reinstall the OS. I've held down the 'C' key during startup and/or select it under preferences/start disk.

It still boots off of the hard drive but it is kinda weired how the hd's and cd pops up. The cd doesn't pop up until around 10 secs after it has started up.

Any ideas?

6/5/2006 4:16:31 PM

which os 10.4?

normally I would say it's just 10.4.4, which is now notoriously unstable in older towers

the fact that you have an upgraded mac complicates things further.

6/5/2006 4:55:25 PM

Hold down the option key when you boot, it will let you choose from availible drives including (hopefully) the CD.

Also, holding command-option-shift and delete while booting used to (I don't know if it still does) force the computer to ignore the internal HDDs when looking for a boot disk.

[Edited on June 5, 2006 at 5:16 PM. Reason : asdf]

6/5/2006 5:15:51 PM

^
what he said

6/5/2006 7:49:02 PM

Quote :

"It is a 1.4ghz (upgraded from 733) G4 running the current os 10.4.x. The damn thing crashes/kernal panics all the time I put load on the CPU. "

I think you might have answered your own question.

This is a textbook symptom of an overheating processor. Your CPU is running at twice the speed the systems cooling was designed to handle.

Later G4 towers all had variable speed fans. You need to make sure that the fan the aligns with the processor when the case is closed is ramping up its speed as the load on the processor increases. Also remember that the G4 is a lower-wattage processor than a Pentium or Athlon and needs to be kept at cooler temperatures to remain stable.

I had an older PowerMac that I upgraded in a manner similar to this and I had to custom-engineer a new way of cooling the CPU to keep it stable.

Also, Mac OS X 10.4 is on a DVD, not a CD.

[Edited on June 6, 2006 at 9:47 AM. Reason : DVD]

6/6/2006 9:46:25 AM