Restart into OS X from OS 9 fails

[alex514]

Hello, new member here.

I keep a few older Macs around to run legacy applications and maintain old backups, including the one I am having trouble with. It's a Blue & White G3 350 MHz with 1 GB RAM and three hard drives. The upgrade processor and video card failed quite some time ago and I reinstalled the original 350 MHz processor and VGA card. The hard drives are set up as follows:

"Dr Who" - original 6GB Quantum Fireball on the ATA 66 bus. Mac OS 9.2.2 installed.

The other two drives are hooked up to a Sonnet Tempo Trio PCI card, ATA 133
"Mork"          - 80 GB Hitachi Deskstar. Mac OS 9.2.2 and Mac OS 10.4.11 installed.
"Conehead"   - 400 GB Seagate Barracuda. Mac OS 9.2.2 and Mac OS 10.4.11 installed for Classic use. Mac OS 9 will not boot from such a large drive.
 
I am also keeping an OS 9.2.1 installation disk in the DVD drive while I troubleshoot. That's the setup. Now the problem.

I can boot into any OS on any disk (except OS 9 on "Conehead") from a cold start.
I can restart into any OS 9 system from either OS X Startup Disk preference pane.
I can restart from the OS 9 CD into either OS 9 or OS X.
What I cannot do is restart into either OS X system from either OS 9 Startup Disk control panel. The chime sounds, the fans whir, but nothing else. No video, no nothing. I am forced to restart with the reset button on the front, hold down the 'C' key and boot from the OS 9 CD where I can then restart into any OS.

This problem began when I installed QuickTime 6.0.3 in OS 9 on "Mork". At that time, I didn't restart into that OS, but into the other OS 9 on "Dr Who". This may have caused the problem, or maybe it is just a red herring.

These are my efforts to fix the problem so far:

Reseated all four DIMMs. Tried each 256MB DIMM by itself.Swapped out the four DIMMs with some others that I had, two 64MB and a 128. Interestingly, when I tried to restart into OS X from OS9 with just 128MB I got a message saying that OX requires 256MB RAM. That's the most life I have seen after that restart procedure.

Other efforts, following the troubleshooting guide from Apple:
Reseated both PCI cards.
Zapped the PRAM
Reset the CUDA button
Reset the logic board
Repaired permissions in OS X
Ran 5 memory test series with Memtest
Ran complete diagnostics and repair with TechTool Pro 4. TTP found bad bundle bits for files that     look related to startup:  Startup Disk & Mac OS ROM on "Mork" & "Dr Who". Supposedly, these were repaired and the tests were marked "Passed".

I am considering doing a clean install on all of the drives or reformatting and started over, but I really would rather not. I am also considering just living with the issue since this Mac doesn't get much use.

Does anyone have any further suggestions? Is this a hardware or software issue? Does this set of symptoms sound like a harbinger of worse problems to come?

Thank you for reading all this. I look forward to your comments.

TL:dr - Can't restart into OS X from OS 9. Tried almost everything. Help!

Jim

[alex514]

Hello again,

I did a clean install of OS 9.2.1 on both "Mork" and "Dr Who" and updated to OS 9.9.2. This solved the problem, for a while. I could restart into either OS X system from OS 9. But after completing the installation of other system software, like fonts, Acrobat and Toast extensions, ATM 4.6.2, etc., the old problem returned. Restarting into OS X from OS 9 results in a chime, fan noise and a black screen.

Another possible cause occurs to me. I once had an XLR8 G4 500 MHz ZIF processor upgrade in this B & W G3. It failed and I reinstalled the original G3 350 MHz ZIF card. The installation of the G4 500 processor required a firmware update patch supplied by XLR8 which allows a G3 to run a G4 processor. Does anyone think this firmware patch could cause all this trouble when I reverted to the G3 ZIF? There was a prior firmware update from Apple, "G3 Firmware Update" which I applied before the XLR8 patch. Should I apply the Apple firmware update again? Any problems going backwards?

Jim

[Knezzen]

No problems going backwards. Try the official Apple firmware

[alex514]

Thanks, Knezzen. One thing I forgot to mention in my second post - when I started the clean install of OS 9.2.1 on "Mork" the installer checked the HD and put up a message saying, "Problems were found with the disk 'Mork' but they have been fixed." I got the same message when running the OS 9.2.2 Updater. It would seem that maybe there is some disk problem that TechTool Pro couldn't see and that the installer couldn't actually fix.

Jim

Edit:  I should add that I did not get that message during the clean installs on "Dr Who".

[alex514]

I tried the Apple "G3 Firmware Update" and got the message, "Your computer's firmware is up-to-date." The version number of the updater is 1.1.4; the Boot ROM Version reported by Apple System Profiler is 1.1.f4. Are these the same thing? The XLR8 firmware updater is called a patch. Could the 1.1.f4 be a patched version number?

Next I tried the XLR8 firmware, hoping to find an uninstaller. No luck there, either. I get the message, "Your Boot ROM code is not what we expected, so it cannot be updated for G4 support!"

Any ideas about this?

Jim

[alex514]

Hello

I found a note here (http://www.xlr8yourmac.com/archives/jan04/012904.html) that the PowerLogix "G4 Firmware Updater" can undo the XLR8 firmware update. I can't find it anywhere. Other World Computing used to keep all this upgrade stuff but now it's gone. Dead links have abounded in my search. Anyone know where I can find this PowerLogix "G4 Firmware Updater"?

Jim

[supernova777]

u might try contacting owc via email claiming that you own the product and need the firmware update.

[alex514]

FIXED! A member at http://macintoshgarden.org/ forum pointed me to the PowerLogix Japan support page (http://www.powerlogix.co.jp/support/latest_soft_g4fu.html) where I could download the PL firmware G4 updater. I ran the firmware updater twice, once to update to the PL G4 firmware and once to restore the Apple G3 firmware 1.1. That wasn't enough, though. I also had to do a clean install of OS 9.2.1. I now have a B & W that can boot into OS 9 or OS X from any other OS on all disks.
 
One issue remains, however. When installing OS 9.2.1 on "Mork" I still get the message, "Problems were found with the disk 'Mork' but they have been fixed." The message is repeated when I update to OS 9.2.2. Earlier, I had run Disk First Aid and TechTool Pro 4 multiple times with clean results. Perhaps this is nothing to worry about.

I recommend all B & W owners with G4 processor upgrades get the PowerLogix firmware updater for their troubleshooting toolkit before it's gone.

Jim

[supernova777]

you can upload the updates attaching them to a post by using the "attachments" + below the text entry box on the forums

i encourage anyone with any rare stuff like that, that should be archived, to use this to the benefit of all!! so we have it here.. easily available.

which version of firmeware did u have before when u were having problems?
was it the 1.4? (i think i have v1.4 on my b&W)

couldnt u just skip a step and download the 1.1 firmware directly?
https://support.apple.com/kb/DL1251?locale=en_US

[alex514]

Hi chrisNova777,

I tried the Apple "G3 Firmware Update" and got the message, "Your computer's firmware is up-to-date." No further action was possible. The version number of the updater is 1.1.4; the Boot ROM Version reported by Apple System Profiler is 1.1.f4. I don't think the XLR8 patcher changed this since my freshly restored firmware is the same version.

I didn't quite see how or where to upload the PowerLogix patcher to macos9lives. However, I did put it up at Macintosh Garden:  http://macintoshgarden.org/apps/powerlogix-g4-firmware-updater-11

[supernova777]

you could have used openfirmware to apply the patch in a similar method to our famous thread on downgrading the firmware of the FW800 MDD...

the procedure is outlined in that thread.. however the g3 does have an earlier version of openfirmware which may or may not be able to achieve the same result but i would bet it is possible.

[QuicksilverMac2001]

I have experienced that hard disks from Western Digital and IBM or Hitachi that are branded Deskstar have a dismaying tendency to so very thoroughly "crap out". It happened on 5 different drives from Western Digital and 1 Hitachi Deskstar so far. The common thread is that all of them were used in situations where if the hard drive @ all fails, the computer is useless to the person who needs it. I even have a Hitachi Deskstar 80 GB in my main Mac and am expecting it will crap out when I really need it. It will be easy to tell if it's failing by booting into X Panther or later and selecting the Hitachi drive in Disk Utility (not the partition it has named Mork though.) If you go for the Hitachi listing, it may say "SMART Status: Failing" @ which point you have to get all your data off of it. The rest of the issues I see are gremlins in your firmware which are far harder to work on.

Most of which were fixed by running the appropriate updater set I hear, so that's a little something. Mac OS 9 doesn't natively read the SMART information, so you would need TechTool Pro 3 @ the minimum to get that information on Mac OS 9. Apple should have done better, but I still love Mac OS 9 regardless.

[supernova777]

honestly just buy a new drive.. + order yourself a sata-pata adapter from eBay. ( or a bunch of them) they cost like pennies for about 10-15$ u can have like 10 of them to keep for wheneve ru need them.

u can buy 80gb drives for really cheap now that are sata3 spec.. u can get them for like under 20$ if u look
the performance of newer drives (yes mechanical) blows away the old ones... by like 2-3 times performance

save your hair;)

[IIO]

it happened on 5 different drives from Western Digital and 1 Hitachi Deskstar so far.

how do you guys stand the terrible noise those disks made? it should have been  the first thing you replaced in 2004 IMO.