sleep of death? on iBook G3

when it boots up, as soon as everything is up and ready, it goes to sleep with a blank screen.
Dennis Clark wrote on :

I have an iBook G3/300 I recently got that has vanilla OS 9 on it. I installed Netscape 7.02 and now when it boots up, as soon as everything is up and ready, it goes to sleep with a blank screen. I hear the fan going, but it won't awaken. I can "hard power" it off, do the 3-finger solute reboot, etc. but it still goes right to sleep. If I start up with all extensions off, it still boots up, then goes to sleep, if I boot from the CD-ROM (to restore the original system), it boots up and goes back to sleep. I've zapped the PRAM and done the PMU reset, no dice. I've searched for this on the web and at Apple's site; I've found lots of references to the "sleep of death" on the web, but no solutions and there isn't even a mention of it on the Apple support pages that I can find. Is this just the best known bug that Apple refuses to admit to or am I looking in the wrong places?

How can I fix this thing?!

thanks, DLC

matt neuburg replied on :

Dennis Clark dlc@redacted.invalid wrote:

I have an iBook G3/300 I recently got that has vanilla OS 9 on it. I installed Netscape 7.02 and now when it boots up, as soon as everything is up and ready, it goes to sleep with a blank screen. I hear the fan going, but it won't awaken. I can "hard power" it off, do the 3-finger solute reboot, etc. but it still goes right to sleep. If I start up with all extensions off, it still boots up, then goes to sleep, if I boot from the CD-ROM (to restore the original system), it boots up and goes back to sleep. I've zapped the PRAM and done the PMU reset

Any chance the pram battery has gone? m.

Dennis Clark replied on :

matt neuburg matt@redacted.invalid wrote: : Dennis Clark dlc@redacted.invalid wrote:

: > I have an iBook G3/300 I recently got that has vanilla OS 9 on it. I : > installed Netscape 7.02 and now when it boots up, as soon as everything : > is up and ready, it goes to sleep with a blank screen. I hear the fan : > going, but it won't awaken. I can "hard power" it off, do the 3-finger : > solute reboot, etc. but it still goes right to sleep. If I start up with : > all extensions off, it still boots up, then goes to sleep, if I boot from : > the CD-ROM (to restore the original system), it boots up and goes back to : > sleep. I've zapped the PRAM and done the PMU reset

: Any chance the pram battery has gone? m.

: -- : matt neuburg, phd = matt@redacted.invalid, http://www.tidbits.com/matt/ : Tiger - http://www.takecontrolbooks.com/tiger-customizing.html : AppleScript - http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0596005571 : Read TidBITS! It's free and smart. http://www.tidbits.com

Sure, there is a good chance that it is "gone", but why would that cause the iBook to constantly go to sleep and be unrecoverable? I mean, it has just booted up, then it just "goes away" and won't come back - which I've interpreted as the much reported (and apparently ignored by Apple) "Sleep of Death" bug. I have to reboot a half dozen times to get it back and it can just decide, at any time, to go to sleep.

Recently I got it to stay alive long enough to get OS9.1 update run on it, disable ALL non Apple extensions and completely turn energy saving modes off. When I rebooted from that, I did the PMU reset sequence. It has not gone to sleep since, but that has only been about 3 hours of testing, so I'm crossing my fingers.

Has anyone EVER come up with a reliable solution? I've seen thousands of bitches over the last few years, but not one single solid fix. What the heck is this?

regards, DLC

matt neuburg replied on :

Dennis Clark dlc@redacted.invalid wrote:

Sure, there is a good chance that it is "gone", but why would that cause the iBook to constantly go to sleep and be unrecoverable? I mean, it has just booted up, then it just "goes away" and won't come back - which I've interpreted as the much reported (and apparently ignored by Apple) "Sleep of Death" bug.

Okay, sorry about that. Sounds like you know far more about it than I do. I've seen various proposed solutions, including throwing out energy saver prefs etc; you might try that. The problem just seems to happen to some machines, and not just iBook's either; my parents' iMac has it as well (so I just tell them not so sleep it). m.

nospam replied on :

In article 1h0sct9.vyszef1wt1bseN%matt@redacted.invalid, matt neuburg matt@redacted.invalid wrote:

Any chance the pram battery has gone? m.

ibooks do not have pram batteries.

Michael replied on :

nospam wrote:

In article 1h0sct9.vyszef1wt1bseN%matt@redacted.invalid, matt neuburg matt@redacted.invalid wrote:

Any chance the pram battery has gone? m.

ibooks do not have pram batteries.

bzzzt. Just because they are buried deep within the system soldered onto the motherboard (like my Father's Blueberry IBook Clamshell) doesn't mean they're not there

Dennis Clark replied on :

matt neuburg matt@redacted.invalid wrote: : Dennis Clark dlc@redacted.invalid wrote:

: > Sure, there is a good chance that it is "gone", but why would that cause : > the iBook to constantly go to sleep and be unrecoverable? I mean, it has : > just booted up, then it just "goes away" and won't come back - which I've : > interpreted as the much reported (and apparently ignored by Apple) "Sleep : > of Death" bug.

: Okay, sorry about that. Sounds like you know far more about it than I : do. I've seen various proposed solutions, including throwing out energy : saver prefs etc; you might try that. The problem just seems to happen to : some machines, and not just iBook's either; my parents' iMac has it as : well (so I just tell them not so sleep it). m.

Well, I've tried resetting the energy saver in the control panel to NEVER sleep under any circumstances (which seems pretty drastic) and STILL the confounded thing will occasionally power up, then go to sleep. It seems to be associated with having the USB trackball plugged in when either I shutdown or boot up, that is unclear. What is clear is that it is the hardware - since I've totally re-installed the OS9 from CD-ROM and then updated to OS9.1 - STILL the problem occurs, just not as often.

Is there anyone out there that has cured this? Or did everyone just throw their Mac off the roof and buy a Windoze box? I have a iBook G4 1.33GHz and a Sawtooth G4 tower, one on OS9.1 the OS10.4.2, neither of them do this.

Anyone ever fix this? I'll get rid of this monster if I can't fix it, I sure can't hand it over to my son and have to be there every time he boots to make mystical signs over it to get it to run!

thanks, DLC : -- : matt neuburg, phd = matt@redacted.invalid, http://www.tidbits.com/matt/ : Tiger - http://www.takecontrolbooks.com/tiger-customizing.html : AppleScript - http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0596005571 : Read TidBITS! It's free and smart. http://www.tidbits.com