Looking for someone experienced with Power Mac G4 MDD and Digital Perfomer 3

[henrybatista]

Hello everyone,

I’m looking for someone with experience restoring vintage Power Mac G4 systems, particularly those used for professional audio production.

My recording studio consists of a Power Mac G4 Mirrored Drive Doors (Dual 867 MHz) running Digital Perfomer 3.Over the years I added Waves Platinum, Bomb Factory Classic Compressors (LA - 2A and 1176), and several other professional plug-ins from that era. I used this system for approximately 16-18 years to record my original music and have completed more than 5 CDs worth of material.

Recently the computer began freezing and became increasingly difficult to start. I eventually took it to a local Mac computer shop, but they were not familiar with these older Power Macs and couldn’t determine the exact cause. They suggested it could be the startup hard drive, RAM or the logic board.

The good news is that the Mac still chimes when powered on. A complete clone of the startup drive was made, and I also have a copy of my backup audio drive. I still have all three original internal drives, As well as the original restore CDs that came with the computer.

My goal is not symply to recover data. I’d like to get this Digital Perfomer 3 working again so I can finish several unfinished recording projects. Eventually I plan to migrate everything to Digital Perfomer 11 on my new Mac Studio, but first I’d like to preserve and, if possible run my original recording environment.

I’m located in South Florida, but I’m willing to work with someone elsewhere if shipping the computer is the best option.

If anyone here has experience with Power Mac G4 MDD systems, Digital Perfomer 3, Or maintaining vintage Macintosh recording studios, I’d be very grateful for your advice or recommendations

Thank you for your time,
Henry

 

[herd]

Welcome to the forum! These machines are pretty affordable now, so the easiest solution may be to get a second one. You should be able to clone your disk to the other machine and be back in business. Then, you could always trade parts between them to diagnose the fault. A general cleaning and re-seating of various connectors may help. Also, the power supplies are showing their age and replacing capacitors in them can solve problems too. Good luck and let us know how it goes.

 

[Phipli]

Does it start and run OK when you boot holding down shift to disable extensions? Digital Performa won't run without extensions, but if it is stable when you boot like that then it points towards something in the System.

That would be my first suspicion regardless.

 

[MOS8_030]

As a vintage MDD G4 I would suspect the power supply is getting weak.
These models did not have robust power supplies and PS failure is pretty common.
I replaced the power supply in my Dual G4 MDD twice before finally installing a standard PC ATX PS.
The good new is it's not terribly difficult to do the conversion.