I picked up three old PowerMacs over the weekend and the first two that I've tested are giving me pain. Both were very dirty, having being stored in a garage or similar for a prolonged time, so I cleaned them up and allowed them to acclimatise for three hours before trying to use them. Electrostatic precautions were taken during cleanup and both PRAM batteries were replaced (they read 0.00V and 0.01V!).
8200 (boringly stock specification): Power is successfully switched on from ADB keyboard but no boing. The standard Apple HDD performs motor start. I've cleaned the DIMM connectors with pencil eraser, applied contact cleaner to the DIMM slots, reset CUDA, removed new PRAM battery, disconnnected SCSI and floppy drive (power and data) but no success. For now I've put the system on one side until I have time to swap the board into a working 8200 system with reliable DIMMs etc.
9500 (modestly upgraded -- RAM and video): This booted first time but it took me a few more attempts to set the DIP switches on the Mac video/VGA converter. Once booted with video, the 9500 performed well for 20 minutes while I sniffed around the applications left installed on the boot drive. Shortly after, it powered off without warning; trying to restart generated the familiar click of a shorted power supply... I reseated the PCI video card and processor card, reset CUDA, removed new PRAM battery, disconnected all drives, allowed to rest unpowered for 20 hours etc. Still dead with immediate power supply shutdown when trying to boot (single click, no chirping).
I plugged the 8200 board into the 9500 chassis. In the 8200 chassis, the 8200 board had failed to boot but the psu switched on; in the 9500 chassis, the psu clicked off immediately.
So I swapped the 9500 psu for the similar one from the 8200. Using the standard Apple cpu card (604e?/120) and an untested XLR8 carrier G4/450, the psu comes on but no boing (ie no psu shutdown click). I have yet to perform more than a cursory clean up of the 9500 DIMMs but I'll clean them up more thoroughly shortly. However, my suspicion thus far is that when the psu went "pop", it blew the 9500 motherboard at the same time...
Any further thoughts? The 9500 motherboard is not common in the UK -- any board substitutions?
Phil
Quite a situation. The 8200 tower (If I remember, they never made an 8200 in the US) is a PCI PowerMac with a soldered on 601 CPU (like the 7200 for US customers). If that is the case, than the 8200's power supply will ONLY work with 7200 and 8200-type boards, which might be where the problem lies.
I often see 9500 boards for sale on eBay, but I would personally look for an 8500, 7300, 7500, or 7600 board and/or power supply. The afformentioned boards are universal amongst 7x00 and 8500/9500 cases or power supplies. The 8600 and the 9600 boards are NOT compatible, which is unfortunate because I have an 8600 mobo you could have had for the price of shipping.
I don't know what EU's surplus computer situation is like, but out here in New Mexico you can pick up a 9500, 8500, or 8600 Power Mac at auction or at a thrift store for about 5 uk pounds.
Yes, the 8200 is *very* similar to the 7200 but the 8200 has two power connectors on the motherboard. At work I have a 7200 board hanging on the wall, another in a drawer as spares and one full system in production (legacy web client testing). The 8200 psu is interchangeable with the 9500.
The appeal of the 9500 (and 9600) is six PCI slots. The three slot boards are common in the UK and I may buy one if the price is right just to play with this system.
UK/EU pricing: Given local supply/demand and international exchange rates, typical EU price for a 9500 board on eBay (£15) isn't too harsh. As Stuart Bell has commented here and elsewhere, beige Mac stuff has almost no value. Alas this inhibits the sale of "interesting stuff" over here just as much as the boring stuff.
Phil