Oh-No, My Mac Won't Start. Now What!?

So I go to the office this morning to wake my G5 PowerMac from sleep and nothing happens. Nothing on the monitor. The light above the power switch is on though. Weird. Monitors work fine.

So what now. What do you do when your Mac won't turn on… or off?

So first thing was to turn it off or make sure it's off. I hold the power button in for 5-10 seconds. That should always turn the Mac off. But it doesn't. Next, I unplug the power cord to make sure it's off. Nope, light still on.

This is now beyond my grasp of all things Mac. At this point I'm seeing thousands of dollars on the AmEx bill in my head to get a new Mac Pro.

Time to turn to the experts. So do I turn right to Apple, or MacOSXhints or call the local shop? This is my thinking: First I type the specifics into Google to see if there's a direct hit. If not, I'll try some specific forums like those mentioned. If I still strike out, I have a couple Apple Stores with Genius Bars nearby who may give me some free help. But my PowerMac is old, so they may also charge me for some real work. Another option is the local Mac repair place. I've been there once and they helped out for a reasonable fee. Those are the steps I would take to escalate the issue.

I typed in "g5 mac power button not working" on my laptop and there was some promising hits. What I'm looking for here is some exact matches of someone having the same problem and then a solution. Fortunately, I found one on e-mpire.com forums. I've never been there, but someone had this problem over a year ago and there were some solutions. This is why I suggest going to Google first because it might dig up some random site that has info specific to your need. Apple's support site has a lot of info, but not always exactly what you want.

In this case I was lucky and I didn't have to try those further steps. I had to crack the Mac, remove the internal battery, push the reset PMU button on the circuit board then replace the battery. No crazy surgery, and it worked the first time. As much as I'd like a new Mac Pro, I ain't got that kind of money.

In the process of searching Google for solutions I came across this page I'd like to share with you: the MacFixIt Tutorials. They've got a nice page of links leading to processes to solve many different problems, including hardware emergencies.

One last note: It happens so infrequently that I forget all about it until I need to do it again. What is it? Computers have little internal batteries that keep the time and date and other stuff when power gets cut off to your Mac. They last years, but so do Macs. So I'm caught off guard when a Mac I have gets to 3-4 years old and the battery dies without any notice. They are easy to change and often have instructions right in your manual.
Waaaay in the back. That wasn't my problem this time, but it has been before.

Do you have any tips to share as well. Spread the love in the MFM forum link for this article below!

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MacFixIt Tutorials

Apple Support

MacOSXhints

e-mpire.com forums

My First Mac's 6 Steps to Solve Your Mac Problem

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