17" Powerbook G4 must sit for hours to boot

OS 10.4.11 1440x900 Resolution 1.67 GHz Power PC Processor 2x512 MB sticks of RAM = 1 GB total RAM I have tried several troubleshooting methods including different startup key combinations to reset power management, etc. The laptop used to only boot up if it had sat for a longtime. If you turn it off and try to restart it wouldn't chime and it would just be a black screen. One of the troubleshooting methods I have tried is booting with just one stick of ram and also swapping the ram into different slots. Ever since I flipped the ram sticks it still has to sit for hours to have a normal boot without just a black screen, but now it chimes every time. One of the other things I tried was checking the integrity of the hard drive and it did have an issue,but I just safe mode booted it (shift + power button) and the hard drive now passes the disk utility test. I have also done many tests to see if the battery is at fault and its not. Please help.