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Apple iMac G4 restore

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First post, by Intel486dx33

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Here is my Apple iMac G4 restore.

I opened it up and vacuumed out the dust.
Added more ram for a total of 2gb. which I purchased from OWC.net
Applied NEW thermal paste as the old thermal paste was all dried up.

Spec:
iMac G4
CPU - 1.2ghz. PPC
Display - 17"
Graphics - Nvidia FX 5200
Hard-drive - 80gb.
RAM - 2gb.
Network - 100baseT ethernet
Modem - 56k
FireWire, USB-2.0
Speakers - Harman Kardon
Webcam - Apple iSight with LED light.
OS - Triple boot ( Mac OS tiger/leopard/9.2
https://everymac.com/systems/apple/imac/specs … 1.25_17_fp.html

Last edited by Intel486dx33 on 2018-11-18, 20:07. Edited 1 time in total.

Reply 1 of 18, by Errius

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Are you sure this can boot 9.2?

Is this too much voodoo?

Reply 2 of 18, by Intel486dx33

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Actually, You start 9.2 through OS Tiger 10.4
You can configure it to start up automatically.

*This model is capable of using Mac OS 9 applications within the Mac OS X "Classic" environment provided with Mac OS X 10.4.11 "Tiger" and lower ("Classic" is not supported starting with Mac OS X 10.5 "Leopard"). It cannot boot into Mac OS 9.

Last edited by Intel486dx33 on 2018-11-19, 11:15. Edited 1 time in total.

Reply 3 of 18, by zstandig

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If you're feeling crazy you can use an IDE SSD with it

Reply 4 of 18, by oeuvre

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Heh, those lamp iMacs were quite cool. I remember those ads in 2001/2002 in TIME Magazine.

HP Z420 Workstation Intel Xeon E5-1620, 32GB, RADEON HD7850 2GB, SSD + HD, XP/7
ws90Ts2.gif

Reply 5 of 18, by Intel486dx33

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Yeah, I don't know the story behind it all. If the lamp was the bases for the design ?

Reply 6 of 18, by Jo22

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https://youtu.be/HL0RH3x7Zzo?t=2944

"Time, it seems, doesn't flow. For some it's fast, for some it's slow.
In what to one race is no time at all, another race can rise and fall..." - The Minstrel

//My video channel//

Reply 7 of 18, by yawetaG

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Intel486dx33 wrote:

Actually, You start 9.2 through OS Tiger 10.20
You can configure it to start up automatically.

*This model is capable of using Mac OS 9 applications within the Mac OS X "Classic" environment provided with Mac OS X 10.4.11 "Tiger" and lower ("Classic" is not supported starting with Mac OS X 10.5 "Leopard"). It cannot boot into Mac OS 9.

Mac OS X "Classic" is not exactly 9.2, it is an emulated 9.2 environment within OS X... If it also supports booting from 9.2.2, you should be able to actually reboot it into Mac OS 9.2.2 by changing the start-up volume to 9.2.2 and then restarting the computer via the Apple menu...

Reply 8 of 18, by Errius

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Old (1998-2002) games don't run well in OS X for mysterious Apple reasons. (There were lawsuits over this IIRC.) PC emulation also sucks. If you want to play these games you need a machine that can boot the classic OS.

Is this too much voodoo?

Reply 9 of 18, by Roman78

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Errius wrote:

Old (1998-2002) games don't run well in OS X for mysterious Apple reasons. (There were lawsuits over this IIRC.) PC emulation also sucks. If you want to play these games you need a machine that can boot the classic OS.

Indeed. I own some old Games for the Classic OS and those run horrible in the OSX Classic Environment. Like for example in "The Labyrinth of Time" the colours looks strange, or in "Full Throttle" the animation are stuttering like hell.

Therefore I installed OS 9.2.2 on a Mac Mini. Thanks to the guys from OS9Lives. They managed to make OS9 work on the Mini and some not supported Apple G4's. And it also looks like that they have some for the iMac http://macos9lives.com/smforum/index.php/topic,1173.75.html

Reply 10 of 18, by Errius

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I don't remember the details but think it was something to do with the GPU, with the iMac G4 using Nvidia and the iMac G3 using ATI. This should have been resolved by updated drivers but for whatever reason those never got released.

Is this too much voodoo?

Reply 11 of 18, by Jo22

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I'm still learning about Macs, but I remember a few things from when I re-built a G4 from parts..
Mac OS 9 in classic is a virualized/emulated form of OS 9. Several system files are emulated by classic instead of being executed.
Things like file access and memory managment, printer support, etc. are done by Mac OS X then.
However, accelerated graphics may not work properly in classic.
On a pure Mac OS 9, there's Voodoo 2 support (if card or emulator installed), RAVE API, QuickDraw 3D, etc.
I also learned thar that Mac OS or "System" is comparable to the Windows 9x line of Windows,
while OS X (or now macOS) is pretty much like the OS/2 or Windows NT line.
Back in time, you had to boot into old Mac OS (OS 9) whenever you had to perform upgrades,
had to run system diagnostics programs, boot from an USB pendrive of an USB port (on a clamshell, you can do that from OS 9!)
Also last but not least, OS 9 still works on buggy systems, whereas OS X crashs with a kernel panic.

"Time, it seems, doesn't flow. For some it's fast, for some it's slow.
In what to one race is no time at all, another race can rise and fall..." - The Minstrel

//My video channel//

Reply 12 of 18, by yawetaG

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Jo22 wrote:
I also learned thar that Mac OS or "System" is comparable to the Windows 9x line of Windows, while OS X (or now macOS) is pretty […]
Show full quote

I also learned thar that Mac OS or "System" is comparable to the Windows 9x line of Windows,
while OS X (or now macOS) is pretty much like the OS/2 or Windows NT line.

Back in time, you had to boot into old Mac OS (OS 9) whenever you had to perform upgrades,
had to run system diagnostics programs, boot from an USB pendrive of an USB port (on a clamshell, you can do that from OS 9!)

This is wrong. Mac OS X has its own set of diagnostics programs, and some third party system utilities included the ability to fix both Mac OS 9 and Mac OS X boot volumes (which is not that remarkable because they both use the same file system on dual-boot machines...). OS X is basically a Unix system with a Apple specific front-end (at least, the older versions are; in the newest versions more and more files are Apple-specific).

Also last but not least, OS 9 still works on buggy systems, whereas OS X crashs with a kernel panic.

That will depend on the versions of OS 9/X and the kind of hardware issue. Having had such a buggy machine, I can assure you OS X was the more stable one...OS 9 was faster, but the number of lock-ups that took down the whole system instead of just a single program was equally impressive.

Also, avoid OS X 10.0 and 10.1, they are pretty disastrous compared to later versions.

Reply 13 of 18, by Errius

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A lot of these lampshades have broken audio sockets, presumably due to the speakers falling off the desk. It's something to watch out for if you buy one on fleabay.

Is this too much voodoo?

Reply 14 of 18, by Jo22

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yawetaG wrote:
Jo22 wrote:
I also learned thar that Mac OS or "System" is comparable to the Windows 9x line of Windows, while OS X (or now macOS) is pretty […]
Show full quote

I also learned thar that Mac OS or "System" is comparable to the Windows 9x line of Windows,
while OS X (or now macOS) is pretty much like the OS/2 or Windows NT line.

Back in time, you had to boot into old Mac OS (OS 9) whenever you had to perform upgrades,
had to run system diagnostics programs, boot from an USB pendrive of an USB port (on a clamshell, you can do that from OS 9!)

This is wrong. Mac OS X has its own set of diagnostics programs, and some third party system utilities included the ability to fix both Mac OS 9 and Mac OS X boot volumes

Oh come on, don't be so picky about these details please. Relax. 😀
What I was refereing to was the time period between old world Macs and new world Macs (pre G4).
To name an example, the upgrade for my '98 iMac (tray loading) required a firmware update that was available for OS 8/9 only.
Mac OS 9 has a lot of relationship to Windows 98SE. Both are quirky, have single core support, are single user OSes, can use old ROM code, just like Windows 98 can use DOS drivers or BIOS code. Both allow manipulating RAM and ROM space, allow direct port access, etc.
I would even go so far as to compare System 7 to Windows 3.1 and System 7.5 to WfW 3.11.
They share so many things, like then new networking features, True type fonts, colour screens/high resolutions,
accelerated graphics and so on.

Speaking of the USB pen drive boot.. I guess you missed what I was refering to.
Old Clamshells and iMacs did not officially support USB boot yet, only boot via internal CD (they hadn't got firewire ports yet)
However, it was possible to boot via USB unofficially by using the start-up panel in Mac OS 9's Finder.
(The code was in their Open Firmware, but it was not meant to be used at the time.)
In contrast, Mac OS X didn't now allow choosing an USB drive for booting on that very same hardware.

Edit: Never mind.. Hope what I wrote didn''t come over too -uhm- offensive. 😅
It's difficult to "hit the right tone" on the net, if there's only text.

"Time, it seems, doesn't flow. For some it's fast, for some it's slow.
In what to one race is no time at all, another race can rise and fall..." - The Minstrel

//My video channel//

Reply 15 of 18, by Intel486dx33

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I use a TP-link wireless extender device that I hook the Ethernet cable to to give this computer Wireless internet access. It’s still good for playing music cd’s and playing old games.

Reply 16 of 18, by GordonFreeman

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Intel486dx33 wrote:

Yeah, I don't know the story behind it all. If the lamp was the bases for the design ?

I think the design was inspired by a flower pot.

By the way, I have a few PPC Macs. I have these: iMac G3, Power Mac G4, and Power Mac G5.

Reply 17 of 18, by Intel486dx33

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If anything it still makes a nice display piece and music player. It has iTunes music player.

Reply 18 of 18, by dr.zeissler

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If you are really interested in OS9 (gaming) then forget about "Classic-Environment"
Though it's better/compatibler on earlier OSX-Versions, but it's not very good.

Retro-Gamer 😀 ...on different machines