Saving on Broadband, iBook G4 on the Fritz, and a Pair of Pismos with Problems

• One Way to Drastically Cut Broadband Cost
• Pismo: Can't Clean Install Any OS
• Pismo Won't Boot with a Dead PRAM Battery
• iBook G4 on the Fritz

One Way to Drastically Cut Broadband Cost

From Scott:

Hey Charles, Dan,

Here's my tip for your readers today: If a new broadband competitor moves into your area and offers a fantastic deal, call your current broadband ISP and tell them you want to disconnect. When they ask you why, tell them you're about to accept their competitor's fantastic deal. Your ISP will beat their competitor's deal every time, guaranteed. This information probably won't help readers in areas with no broadband competition unfortunately.

I got a letter from Clear [Wireless Internet] today offering broadband as low as $30 per month. I've been paying $50 per month for Time Warner Cable broadband for many years. I called Time Warner to disconnect, because somebody told me this tip, and Time Warner immediately lowered my bill to $30 per month for a year, after which I'll have to call in again or switch to Clear or whoever is the price leader a year from now (satisfied smile). One phone call just cut my bill by a huge percentage.

Scott

Hi Scott,

Sounds like a strategy that's well worth a shot if one has somewhere to jump should they call your bluff. But as you note, not much help in places like here where I live, where there is one broadband provider (just over Can$50 per month tax-in) and one dial-up provider.

Charles

Pismo: Can't Clean Install Any OS

From Lloyd:

Dear Charles:

Like you, I love the Pismo. However, my wife, recipient of an iPad for her birthday (I wrote previously to let you know that I had it online via dial-up), bought me a new MacBook for mine. (So much for our $50 gift limit...)

To help defray the cost of the new acquisition, I agreed to sell the Pismo. (Our household consists of five people and seven Macs, plus the iPad, a Newton, and several iPods, so I can hardly claim that selling it causes a computer shortage.)

The problem I've encountered is that after wiping the 40 GB hard drive in preparation for a clean install of OS X 10.2 (it had 10.3.9 previously), it will now not let me load an OS.

The DVD drive is spotty, leading to several "target disk" install attempts, as well as several hours of fighting the DVD. Nothing works; OS 9, 10.2, Ubuntu, and Yellow Dog all either fail to load, fail to boot, or, the one time 10.2 worked, with issues - no USB, in the last case.

Short of opening her up and trying another hard drive, if you have any suggestions, they'd be most welcome. Until then, my G4-upgraded, nearly spotless, 1 GB Pismo goes unused - and unsold.

Thank you.

Best Regards,
-Lloyd

Hi Lloyd,

Some of the DVD-ROM drives that shipped with the Pismos were not the best quality, and after ten years of use even one of the better ones could well have developed a fault.

My first inclination would be to suspect the DVD-ROM drive, but it's difficulty to confirm that without trying a known-good drive by substitution. I doubt that you want to lay out the capital for a replacement optical drive.

It could also be a hard drive issue. Actually, diagnosis by substitution is more practical in that instance, as smaller-capacity ATA 2.5" hard drives are usually findable pretty cheaply, and swapping a hard drive into the Pismo is relatively easy. Having done it many times, I can do the swap in 10 or 15 minutes without hurrying.

Check out iFixit's excellent Pismo teardown guide for instructions.

Charles

Editor's note: If the DVD-ROM drive is bad, one option is to use FireWire Target Disk Mode and a second Mac that supports it: Put the install disc in the other Mac's optical drive, connect the two machines with a FireWire cable, restart the second Mac in Target Disk Mode (hold down the T key during startup), and boot the Pismo from the remote disc, as documented in Using FireWire Target Disk Mode to Install OS X on Macs without DVD Drives. If you already have a FireWire cable, this costs you nothing.

A more expensive option is swapping the drive mechanism yourself (see Replacing Your Lombard or Pismo Optical Drive with a SuperDrive) or buying an external SuperDrive that supports FireWire (Other World has one for $88). dk

Pismo Won't Boot with a Dead PRAM Battery

From Clay:

In your article on the Pismo [Low End Mac's Compleat Guide to the Pismo PowerBook], you refer to a Pismo not booting if a battery is dead. Which battery and where? And can that battery be replaced?

Well, okay, this battery thing wasn't in your article, but might you know about the matter anyway?

Sincerely,
Clay
Pismo owner since the beginning of Pismohood.

Hi Clay,

In some cases Pismos are known to refuse to boot if the rechargeable PRAM battery on the motherboard fails. The diagnostic fix is to unplug the PRAM battery.

Check out iFixit's guide to PowerBook G3 Pismo Troubleshooting for illustrations and detailed instructions on how to proceed with unplugging and replacing the PRAM battery.

iFixit notes:

Bad PRAM Battery

If your computer hasn't been started in a while, your PRAM battery might have died. This is easy to test, because the Pismo will start without a PRAM battery. Simply follow our free guide to unplug it. There is no need to remove it (No harm either). If your computer starts with the PRAM battery unplugged, then replace the PRAM battery.

Charles

iBook G4 on the Fritz

Hi Charles:

I enjoy your column.

I have a 2004 G4 iBook. It has been acting flaky for a few months, but nothing serious till now.

It will start up and operate for a minute or two, hangs - then I get a grey dialogue box telling me I must restart the computer.

Needless to say, this is becoming intolerable. Does this sound like the kiss of death ? Or is it reasonable to pursue a repair? Any ideas ?

Thanks,
Kevin

Hi Kevin,

It's difficult to diagnose from afar - or even in the case of this sort of fault when one has the machine in hand.

This certainly sounds like the notorious iBook motherboard failure syndrome, and if that be the case, there's really little sense in attempting to repair it.

It would be prudent to test for such things as hard drive issues or defective RAM. My daughter's G4 iBook developed symptoms similar to what you're experiencing when it was about 3-1/2 years old. My advice to her was to buy a MacBook, which she did rather than spending good money attempting to repair what is now an obsolete computer with a very spotty reliability reputation.

Charles

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