Help diagnose frozen pixelated iMac

My 89 year old mom lives with my sister and brother-in-law and and I just got a message from them describing a problem with her iMac. I think it's has Lion OS. My brother got the computer for her second hand when his office updated their computers. She doesn't remember what she was doing before it happened.

Description of problem is as follows: "She said she turned it off and when it came back on the screen was grey and beige horizontal stripes, like a very elongated checker board. I hard booted, unplugging from the wall and internet for a few minutes. When it came back, the apple icon came on, and then the wheel like it was going to boot up, but after 30 seconds the screen went black for a couple of seconds, then white, then a very low resolution pixilated pink and blue checkerboard."

She doesn't do anything complicated -checks email and Facebook to see the granchildren, reads newspapers, plays solitaire. I recently set up Pandora and iTunes so she could listen to Sinatra and showtunes, but that's the only thing that's been different lately. She lives three hours away and her housemates don't know Macs. The closest Apple store is 50 minutes away and I don't envision anyone following through to take it there soon. (It may be vintage by Apple standards anyway).

Just wondered if there are some simple instructions to follow to see if it's a big problem. Or does it sound like a dreaded motherboard problem. Thanks for any advice.

Sounds like the graphics card is shot. If it's a more recent aluminum iMac (2010+) I think it can be repaired/replaced. Other models would need an entirely new logic board, so not worth it.

I agree with dave. Don't repair a computer older than four years.

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Thanks for all the advice. We advised the person on hand to try misterpeepers' fixes, but that didn't work. Then after some searching we found that the computer was older than we thought (the Lion OS must have been an update) 2008 or 2009. So following sage advice we have abandoned the idea of a repair. We just ordered a brand new iMac for my mom that I will get to set up for her (as I drool over it). I try to make it as easy as possible for her to do her thing but sometimes she still gets confused and then we spend lots of time on the phone trying to get her back on Facebook etc.

It would be great to find software that makes a computer super elder-friendly. I've heard of Eldy (http://www.eldy.eu/en/) but it's only coming out with Mac software soon. I just wish there was a computer that was super simple and mostly elder proof - it wouldn't need all the bells and whistles, but maybe an easy way to help remotely. Maybe some tech genius will come up with it soon.

I have had many old clients, and the same thought came to me. I don't know how to do it profitably. I would love to, though.