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OS X on an iMac 333

2K views 22 replies 6 participants last post by  Gunner 
#1 ·
Hi Folks.

I am having some trouble getting Panther or Jaguar on to an iMac 333. I recently picked this up from sk here on ehMac. Transaction was great and I will leave positive feedback for him.

Here is what I have done.

Checked firmware and tried to apply update but it had an update newer than the one from Apple. I guess that is OK right?

I could not get it to read my panther disks at all. It will read Jaguar though. Actually it did read the panther disk once, for the install, but on restart I got kernel panics, then it would not read the disk at all.

It reads Jag fine and I was able to erase the hard drive and start the install but it continues to hang at different points during the install.

It has 384 meg of ram. Could there be a problem here with the extra ram?

There is also a macally keyboard, not apple. Could this be the problem?

I just finished installing OS 9 with no problems. I would really like to get Panther or Jag on this machine.

Any help is appreciated,

Gunner.
 
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#4 ·
#5 ·
I'm thinking that it may be the ram. It goes through all the motions to install as if everything is all right. Prepares the hard drive, starts to load the software, then hangs at different places during the install. It is getting very frustrating :rolleyes:

I'm gonna try and remove the ram and see what happens.

Sigh,

Gunner.
 
#9 ·
I guess it could be the drive but all other CD's function properly. I just tried the first version of OS X and it also hangs during the install. Just got this on the screen "The installer has unexpectedly quit. (error 0)" WTF

The OS 9 Disk works fine????????

I'm going to bed,

Gunner.
 
#11 ·
OK guys, I have slept on this now, and have thought of some ideas. I would like to know your thoughts on if they would work.

1) Can I load OS X over the network. If I get this machine on my home network is it possible to load OS X from my G4.

2) Take the drive out of the iMac, put it in my G4, load the OS X and then put the drive back in the iMac.

I do have an external CD Burner but it is a firewire one, no USB, so this does not help me.

I also have a CD/DVD drive that I took out of my G4. Would I be able to put this in the iMac, and how hard would it be?

Thanks for the help,

Gunner.
 
#12 ·
I can't really help you out on this, but to answer a few of your questions:

2) Take the drive out of the iMac, put it in my G4, load the OS X and then put the drive back in the iMac.
No. When OS X is installed, it installs specific files for your specific model. If you were to install OS X on the hard drive in your G4, it would install a copy specifically for the hardware your G4 is made up of - if you were then to install the hard drive after that into the iMac, chances are the iMac would fail to boot or give you a couple of nasty Kernal Panics, mixed with freezing and crashes. You need to install OS X on the machine you plan on using it on.

I also have a CD/DVD drive that I took out of my G4. Would I be able to put this in the iMac, and how hard would it be?
Not possible. The tray-loading iMac uses a CD-ROM drive that's smaller than normal 5.25" drives and cannot properly hold these drives in its only optical drive bay (internally). If you had a USB External Enclosure, however, you could take the drive out of your G4, put it in the case, and then use it externally from there... although, through USB 1.1 (11 MBps - which is what your iMac ports are), it'd be a slow install.
 
#14 ·
If it's only the OS X CD's are aren't being read, then chances are it's not the optical drive that is at fault. The sad truth here is, is that tray-loading iMacs, despite what Apple claims they support, just aren't Mac OS X machines. No one of these iMacas are the same; it works great on some and just simply will not install on others. Just like some 256 MB RAM modules will work on some, but only show up as 128 MB DIMM's on others. The tray-loading iMacs are one of the worst built Apple machines in recent years Apple has come out with, hardware speaking.

However-- I'll still try to come up with some suggestions. I do believe the iMac has a hardware reset button some where (not sure where now); if you can find, hold it down for 30 seconds and restart the computer.

RAM-- you mentioned it has 384 MB of RAM; I believe that would be 1 x 128 MB and 1 x 256 MB module, correct? I'm assuming that when you took out the RAM, you took out the 256 module with no luck (in hanging)? This time, take out the 128 MB module, leave the 256 MB module in, and restart - see what happens.

Also - does your iMac have 2 or 6 MB of VRAM? I believe the 333 iMacs came with 6 MB (2 MB on-board + 4 MB SGRAM module).
 
#17 ·
Don't know if this will be of any help, But......
I own a 233 rev.A . I pulled out the original 4gig. drive and replaced it with a faster (7200rpm) 80gig. patitioned it as per web info (ie. first partition less than 8gig.) then installed panther. It has been great running now for months, with the only issue of refusing to wake up if I tell it to sleep!? If it sleeps on it's own it's fine. New HDs are relatively cheap, so that may be a way to go.
Good luck.
 
#18 ·
What did you use to format the hard drive? I have read that some Macs require the OS 9 harddrive utility (or SpeedTools) to prepare the drive for X.

- Terry

P.S. I hope you solve it. I was working on a friends 333Mhz. iMac and was not able to get X on it. I only had a bit of time to try it as he needed it back.
 
#20 ·
Hi Guys.

Thanks for the replies. I have not had time to work on the iMac this weeked. Just got back from the big Cranberry Festival in Bala :cool:

I used Disk Utility when I booted from the install disk to format the drive. Is it possible that it could be the 6 Gig hard drive that is causing the install freeze?

I have an external CD drive that I loaned to my sister that I will borrow on Tuesday. If that does not work I am planning on putting in a 20 Gig drive and seeing if that makes a difference. Don't worry I know about loading OS X on an 8 Gig partition.

Thanks for the help,

Gunner.
 
#21 ·
I did the exact same thing as loughan did. Install a 80 gig, 7200 Lecie and boosted the ram to 384

I partitioned it using the Disk Utlity that came on the Panther disks. The first partition was 7.3 gigs

Works great with 384 mb ram. The stock apple screen saver is a little slow, but heh, it only has 2mb of vram.
 
#23 ·
OK, I tried an external USB CD drive but it did not work. I had to load toast onto the iMac to see the drive, therfore It would not boot from the drive :( .

I am now planning on putting in a 20 gig drive to see if that will work. Can anyone confirm that they were having the same problems that I am experiencing, and that they were fixed once they installed the larger drive?

I did try and clean the lens but that did not work. It is funny that the CD drive will read OS 10.1 and 10.2 disks but not 10.3? It will start the install on 10.1 & 10.2 and then crash at different parts of the install?

Thanks for the help,

Gunner.
 
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