Mac TV Driving me nuts

[CompactMacLover]

I just got a Mac TV..

So far the issues I have are

Every hard drive I stick in spins down right after startup.

Gives the dreaded X when trying to boot from a known good startup disk

CD-ROM refuses to eject- Seems like there is no power going to it

Any ideas on this. This thing is driving me nuts.

any ideas

 

[classic]

Dunno about the CD-ROM drive, but you could try booting from an external HDD, zip drive or even a floppy disk with appropriate system?

 

[CompactMacLover]

She wont boot from the floppy drive or the cd rom drive.

 

[CompactMacLover]

And now she wont power on at all.. Looks like the power supply is dead

 

[CompactMacLover]

This thing is moodier then a pregnant woman.. after pulling the pram battery, holding the cuda reset for about 25 seconds. I finally am able to get her to come back on. Cant get it to boot from the hard drive yet or a floppy but at least its back on.

 

[techknight]

hmm... sounds like some caps on the mainboard need inspecting.

 

[notcrazy_iminsane]

I'd check out the logic board. Make sure there aint any corrosion or, by some off chance, a leaking cap.

I had a similar problem with the cd drive on my 580. It would either not work at all, or it would open, take a disk, then not read it. Once I put in my Apple Legacy Disk and updated the software, it fixed itself. :-/

 

[onlyonemac]

I had a *similar* problem with my Performa 475. So far I have been recomended to try, but have not yet tried, replacing the PRAM battery. That could work for you, however, particularly if it's not powering on at all now.

 

[Charlieman]

The Mac TV was not sold over here in the UK so I am completely ignorant. What PSU does it use?

 

[Scott Baret]

I think it uses the same one as the LC 500 series, but I'm not sure. I should go check...have a TV I'm thinking of unloading at the moment (which I know has some issues that would need fixed or at least acknowledged).

 

[onlyonemac]

I had a *similar* problem with my Performa 475. So far I have been recomended to try, but have not yet tried, replacing the PRAM battery. That could work for you, however, particularly if it's not powering on at all now.

Sorry, after trying that, my mac is still dead .

 

[krye]

I'm in the same boat. I picked up a Mac TV that's dead as a doornail. I was told in another post here that the power LED should at least illuminate when the logicboard is not inserted, if it doesn't then the analog board is dead. With that advice, I picked up another analog board on eBay. I popped it in and still, nothing.

I then recently picked up an LC 575 of unkown condition for $5. For so cheap, I figured I'd drive the 30 minutes and pick it up. I was hoping that at minimum, I'd be able to pull the analog board out of that and try it. But that machine doesn't power on either. It's driving me nuts. 3 dead analog boards?

I've tried multiple power cords and keyboards to rule those out as culprits. When I plug the power cord in and turn on the mains from the back, I can hear a slight chirp come from the tube. So something is getting power. It just doesn't turn on. The logic board does look like the caps are all leaky, becasue there's white streaks all over the board. But again, the LED on the front should still illuminate when plugged in without the logicboard attatched, but it doesn't. I may have 3 dead analog boards and 2 dead logicboards. But it seems unlikly. I guess I'm just missing something.

 

[CC_333]

Krye:

Here's my experience:

There is a switch on the back which cuts off all power to the machine. Switching on that alone doesn't turn the machine on (at least not the Performa 575 I have). To turn it on completely (and therefore illuminating the indicator light) requires that the power button on the keyboard be pressed, which signals the logic board to do it's thing by activating the power supply. Without a logic board (or with a dead one), that's not possible, so no matter what you do, nothing's going to happen.

I will check out my Performa tomorrow to confirm all this.

Also make sure the edge connector inside (the thing the logic board plugs into) is undamaged and making good contact with the edge connector on the logic board. Mine went intermittent for awhile (the video would go blue or red, and occasionally go out altogether) until I slid the logic board in and out a few times, which apparently cleared some corrosion off those connector pins, because it's been working fine ever since.

As a last resort, you could try cleaning the logic board. Sometimes when one doesn't work or works intermittently due to capacitor leakage, cleaning it alleviates the problems (at least for awhile) by removing the electrolyte, which is a conductive and corrosive material that shorts out and corrodes any components it comes in contact with. It's already dead, so there's not much to lose by cleaning it.

I hope this helps!

c