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Price on a used G5, what do you guys think?

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Ben333

Folding for Team 32!
Joined
Feb 18, 2007
Someone local to me is selling a G5. He says it boots a diagnostics disk fine and passes the tests but won't boot from a Tiger disc... or won't install or something like that. He thinks the logic board may need replacing... to me that doesn't make sense. The asking price is $110 which seems like a deal even if it does need a new part. Thoughts? These things go for big bucks on ebay. It has dual 2.5s, a gig of ram, nice cosmetic shape and no HDD.

By the way, I know this is in the software parent forum but I figured it was more of a Mac question than a general hardware question ;)

Update: 11/11/10 - Pics from the day I bought it

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I figured that. Sell the CPUs, power supply and RAM on ebay... and make a slick looking hackintosh out of the case.
 
That's a very good deal. The case alone is worth $110, those are Lian-Li quality cases.

If it boots to a diagnostic disc and passes the tests it is probably user error, I suspect he's using the wrong kind of install disc, maybe a restore disc for a different model mac instead of a retail disc. Or it could be the lack of a HDD. :p

There is a SMC reset button on the logic board if it is genuinely having problems it may just need a reset. IIRC the button is near the lower left corner of the motherboard, near the RAM slots. Try pulling the PSU connector, pull the battery, press that SMC reset button only once, wait a few more seconds, reattach power and battery and try it out.
 
Thanks for the tips Ben... IMO, though I've never owned one myself, I'd like to think the case is better than a Lian Li. If I do the hackintosh route, I'll do a very clean job installing an aluminum mobo tray. I have seen some DUMB G5 mods... mine won't be one of those. May have to do a write up for the main page :)

Unless of cource the G5 works as is and it was a user error... then it will probably make sense to keep it a G5.
 
Well, he was even nice enough to offer delivery. I'll post some pics when it gets here, he said it was in good shape.
 
Cool! One way I have seen to mount an ATX motherboard is to knock off the stock pegs, screw the pegs onto the motherboard, put jb weld on the bottom of the pegs, and place the motherboard in the correct position inside the case. This way is very clean and uses the same mounting system as stock.
 
Sweet deal, if you could keep it with Apple internals that would be a plus.

The correct OS X disc can be found on ebay, plus that G5 would run a ppc version of Linux like a charm. ;)
 
I've got leopard from other macs i've used... this machine is lookin good. I'll attempt an install tomorrow.
 
I posted the following over on a Mac forum, maybe you guys could shoot me some ideas?

I have I think the early 2005 model. It has dual 2.5 GHz Power PC G5s, two 512 MB sticks of PC3200.

I bought the machine from a guy who said he couldn't get an OS on it, but that it also passed all the hardware diagnostics tests fine.

So, when I boot it I get the mac sound, the fans rev up for a second then slow back down to normal, the screen comes on black for a second and then comes off.

On better boots, if that's a good term for it, I get the same as above, followed by my optical mouse lighting up and a happy mac / question mark logo popping up.

If my Tiger DVD is in then it will boot to the apple logo then just sit there. Right now I did that, using command + V and I get the following text:

standard timeslicing quantum is 10000 us
vm_page_bootstrap: 251955 free pages
mig_table_max_displ = 70
Copyright © 1982, 1986, 1989, 1991, 1993
The Regents of the University of California. All rights reserved.

using 2621 buffer headers and 2621 cluster IO buffer headers
Extension "com.apple.driver.AppleSEP" has no kernel dependency.
DART enabled

On one boot, in verboose mode I got several audio "com.apple" related things come up.

And on one boot I actually was able to hit the blue arrow and enter the installer, however I didn't have a hard drive installed!

It eventually gets noisy when it's on too, the fans get up to full speed in a few minutes or so while the machine is either frozen or idle.

So any help is greatly appreciated. I understand these problems can be a pain, so I'm willing to describe everything exactly as it is to get the best help and in return try and help others on this board. I've worked on plenty of PCs and am finding this similar but different... there are some unknowns and of cource I don't just have spare parts kicking around. If possible, could a moderator move this to the apple hardware section?

Thanks,
Ben


Ok, tried again and got past the "DART enabled" line.

Here's what follows:

Extension "com.apple.driver.AppleDACAAudio" has no kernel dependency.
Extension "com.apple.driver.Apple02Audio" has no kernel dependency.
Extension "com.apple.driver.Apple02DBMAAudio" has no kernel dependency.
Extension "com.apple.driver.Apple02DBMAAudio" has no kernel dependency.
Extension "com.apple.driver.AppleTexasAudio" has no kernel dependency.
Extension "com.apple.driver.Apple02Audio" has no kernel dependency.
Extension "com.apple.driver.Apple02DBMAAudio" has no kernel dependency.
Extension "com.apple.driver.Apple02DBMAAudio" has no kernel dependency.
Extension "com.apple.driver.AppleTexasAudio" has no kernel dependency.
Extension "com.apple.driver.Apple02Audio" has no kernel dependency.
Extension "com.apple.driver.Apple02DBMAAudio" has no kernel dependency.
Extension "com.apple.driver.Apple02DBMAAudio" has no kernel dependency.

So is the soundcard smoked and that's why it isn't booting?
 
Might just be a loose heatsink. Poke around in it and make sure that it's not getting too hot. It's not like Macs to get loud. They're usually pretty quiet unless you put a load on them.
 
I think I have... and for my model I think it being shut down and unplugged resets it. I've done that multiple times and I've also hit the little button which I think resets the NVRAM a couple times. Did a lot of looking up and tried some linux distros and came to the conclusion the logic board must be bad.

Think I'm going to sell the parts other than the logic board and use the case for a hackintosh. I mean, ideally I would have liked to get it working but I don't see it happening.
 
I think I have... and for my model I think it being shut down and unplugged resets it. I've done that multiple times and I've also hit the little button which I think resets the NVRAM a couple times. Did a lot of looking up and tried some linux distros and came to the conclusion the logic board must be bad.

Think I'm going to sell the parts other than the logic board and use the case for a hackintosh. I mean, ideally I would have liked to get it working but I don't see it happening.

I really want to see how it comes out, every hackintosh G5 case mod Ive seen always starts out looking good then they get lazy in the end. I was thinking of doing this just two days ago, I needed to find out how to get the power button to work and how to make the DvD drive look stock and still work properly. Also the mounting of the PSU. Please post pics!

:attn:
 
Well, I just got a camera 2nd hand off a friend... so now I can document this project. I am indeed disappointed with almost every G5 mod I've seen, so here are my goals / points, if I can't do it cleanly or have the tools to do it, I'll ask someone who can do it correctly. Everything visible will function properly and nothing will be mickymoused. Implementation of the original clear air duct relevant to the cooling system, my goal is to re use the old fans in an effective way and hopefully have them temperature controlled or at least quiet and effective. For those who have looked inside a G5, my idea involves the two original metal separators. I won't get into the software details since this forum frowns upon it but I'll be using hardware that works the best it can. Updates, etc, as close to a retail box as possible for the OS.

So far I found that my old de-cased Antec earth watts 550 is low profile enough to fit in the space where the old power supply fit. There's even room for an extra pair of hard drives or maybe some electrical goodies. My plan to to keep the wiring harnes for the fans and drives and wire it into a terminal strip off the earth watts. I'll mount that unit on either the case bottom with standoffs or on a second aluminum plate to be screwed to the bottom of the case. Heat shrink, soldering, connectors, etc to make it look as pro as possible. Maybe sleeving. So, the only connectors coming up will be for the motherboard power and for the video card and maybe I'll do something fancy like hiding them behind the motherboard or even having them attach on the underside of the board.

The gigabyte GA-G31-ES2L looks like a good candidate because the hardware will be friendly with the OS I intend to load and of course the low price. The main con for this board is the 4 GB RAM limit. I may find a different board... not decided yet. If I do get this board though, I wouldn't have a problem hacking it up to better suit the project. I'd maybe run the power connectors to the backside instead of the front for a clean look and solder on an easy header to use with the G5's front button / led / firewire / usb board. A micro atx board will fit better also, the case has four PCI bracket places. Sure, it's a big case but if I can get good results with a small board and save time then why not. I'd probably also hack off the serial, parallel, vga and ps/2 ports since I won't be needing them. Then I'd only need to cut out the ethernet, USB and audio. For the audio, that's said to work out of the box with the OS... but digital audio IO would be nice. USB... or a higher quality board - I have not yet decided.

So that's the plan with that cheap-o board. But if I decide 4 GB of RAM is just too small a limit I'll probably find something else.

For the cooling system I see either a large passive style heatsink or perhaps an apogee drive with a radiator or heater core in the front of the case. When I see water cooling in G5 mods I think it looks awful... but I plan to use the original air flow system and things would look pretty clean with just a block and a rad. Only two hoses ;)

So, I know this is getting pretty scattered but back to the rear of the machine, I plan to keep it original and just put an aluminum plate over the old IO with ethernet, USB and audio cut out.


If a mod sees this I guess it can go to the modding section with a title change of "Putting an Intel machine in a G5 case"
 
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