Just save the screen, OK?

June 13, 2008 8:03 AM

My four year old IMac G4, which is out of warranty, has acquired this nasty habit of shutting itself off. What's going on?

When not in active use the computer goes to a screen saver, after a few minutes of the screen saver, the screen goes black and it shuts itself completely off. Once in a while (but not everytime) the fan goes into high revs before it shuts itself off. Is this fixable by me? The local technicians want $80 an hour to look at it on their time schedule.

posted by Xurando to computers & internet (8 comments total)

Sounds to me like it might be a Power Management Unit (PMU) issue. You can try resetting it by following the instructions on Apple's website. Dust, if it's allowed to accumulate inside the iMac, can cause issues as well. Have you opened up the dome-shaped case to have a look?

It also might be worth posting your question on Apple's discussion forum.
posted by runningdogofcapitalism at 8:28 AM on June 13, 2008

My bad, my computer is an Imac G5 and has no dome.
posted by Xurando at 8:33 AM on June 13, 2008

The computer completely shuts off, or the display does? What are the settings for the display under System Preferences: Energy Saver: Sleep?
posted by Lebannen at 9:44 AM on June 13, 2008

My iMac G5 recently started powering off by itself at random intervals. It originally was infrequent, but got to where it wouldn't stay on more than about a minute.

It ended up being a power supply issue. There is an extended warranty on some G5 models for this issue, though mine was not one of them. You can find info on the warranty here:
http://docs.info.apple.com/article.html?artnum=302181

I paid roughly two hundred dollars to have mine fixed.
posted by uleekunkel at 10:01 AM on June 13, 2008

I was having the same problem with my G4 and was able to buy the part online and fix it myself with minimal direction. And I'm not the most technically savvy person in the world. It basically involves opening the case, grounding the computer against static electricity, detaching/unscrewing the old unit and attaching the new one. About as difficult as hooking up home stereo components. Most power supply units will come with directions, or find them online.
posted by ga$money at 10:48 AM on June 13, 2008

uleekunkel most likely has it. We had the very same issue with the same model with Mrs. Advicepig's Grampa.
posted by advicepig at 2:10 PM on June 13, 2008

Ukeekunkel was right. They extended my warranty to cover the power problem and I'm bringing it into the Apple Store this weekend. Thanks MetaFilter.
posted by Xurando at 2:27 PM on June 13, 2008

G5 you say? The good news about that particular model is that it is very easy to open and to access components (which is nice if you ever wish to drop a larger hard drive or upsize the RAM). The intel model that followed, while similar in appearance, was locked up much tighter.
posted by runningdogofcapitalism at 6:03 PM on June 13, 2008