Is my logic board dead?

[UPSguy]

I was posting this elsewhere but thought I'd try here.....

 

My Mac will only start from one particular drive, (Corsair Force 3 120GB SSD), in Bay one. So far for the most recent restart I've;

 

Removed everything apart from the minimum of components --

 

Reinstalled original RAM, (in total I can choose between two pairs of 512MB, and a pair 2GB - matched and bought in pairs). I have run testdisk 6.13 as additional RAM test.

 

Tried an alternate graphcs card. I have an Apple branded 5770 and and Apple branded 7300GT.

 

Swapped hard drive bays.

 

Removed both optical drives.

 

Unplugged speaker and headphones.

 

Unplugged all USB and firewire devices. (Keyboard/trackpad/display are all Apple ones).

 

Unplugged ethernet.

 

Running the command, nvram -p in terminal outputs nvram: nvram is not supported on this system.

 

DVDPlayer.app quits silently when any .img file is mounted with terminal code: Error getting a reference to /options.

 

The Start up Disk Pref Pane, will not allow me to make changes. The message I get is 'The bless tool was unable to set the current boot disk'.

 

Here's what I find odd. I can only boot from one physical hard drive. I have a*verified bootable clone of Lion on another drive, but the mac will only boot from the system or its recovery that is on that particular drive that is only about 30% used. If in the wrong bay I just get the spinning gear indefinitely, if in the right bay then after pressing the power button;

@ 8 secs white screen.

@ 28 secs Apple logo.

@ 34 secs spinning gear.

@89 secs can hear the other drives spin down.

@99 secs I get the login screen.

 

I can boot from the original optical disc that came with it and use disk utility but cannot install Tiger from it. It never gets as far as choosing the destination.

 

The original AHT that came will not run, pressing D during start will eventually boot the Mac from the normal system.

 

Any takers out there?

 

Tks.

[3.14r2]

Is my logic board dead?

If you are able to boot (even with one particular derive), it could indicate that the board is alive. Not in the perfect shape (maybe), but alive.

 

It would probably be wise to post which model of Mac you have. Judging from the info given, it is looks like MacPro. I can suggest checking the SATA connectors on the board and bays. Also try using a clone disk in the same slot where SSD works i.e. clone the SSD, remove it, place the cloned drive in place of SSD. If the cloned drive works, then most likely there is an issue with SATA ports/controller on other slots.

 

The other thing that may not be OK is the power supply. Unfortunately it's quite difficult to check it, if you don't have spare one...

[UPSguy]

</p>

If you are able to boot (even with one particular drive), it could indicate that the board is alive. Not in the perfect shape (maybe), but alive.

 

It would probably be wise to post which model of Mac you have. Judging from the info given, it is looks like MacPro. I can suggest checking the SATA connectors on the board and bays. Also try using a clone disk in the same slot where SSD works i.e. clone the SSD, remove it, place the cloned drive in place of SSD. If the cloned drive works, then most likely there is an issue with SATA ports/controller on other slots.

 

The other thing that may not be OK is the power supply. Unfortunately it's quite difficult to check it, if you don't have spare one...

Er...yes. Sorry about that. It's a first gen Mac Pro. I'll check the SATA connectors on the bays next time I have it down. But as to other drives, only that one drive works and only in bay one. I have tried all of two clones of Lion an two clones of Mountain Lion. The PSU I was looking at - it appears to be a right ball ache.