iMac OS 9 upgrade to OS X 10.4

Z

zavodovski

Registered
Hi there - I have a friend who has a G4 Power PC 800Mhz flatscreen iMac, circa 2001 or 2002 and she is still running OS 9, though wants me to help her upgrade to OS 10.1 with discs she bought with the original deal (don't ask why she left it till now......)

My question is that I now run LEOPARD, yet still have my TIGER discs which I would be happy to let her use - for me to install TIGER on her machine is it really just as simple as backing up all her files and then inserting the CD into her computer and letting it run, or are there hidden pitfalls here ?

Any help would be appreciated.

Thanks

Z
 
No. Back up all her files to discs, SAN or whatever she's using for her files external storage or backup. Then do a clean install.
Mac OS X is WAY different from OS X. Just like you would not be doing an upgrade install from Windows 95 to Vista, OS 9 and any Mac OS X are waaay different. Upgrade is not possible.

I would recommend she has minimum 512 MB RAM, and to get it fast and usable, 1 GB.
 
Thanks for replying Giaguara, but I am not really sure what you are advising -

I understand OS 9 and X are very different, but also from what I have managed to find I think that her machine should be able to run TIGER [It is 800Mhz and she has 768MB of RAM just now, out of a possible 1GB]

I know to back everything up and have an external drive to do that with, but I am not 100% sure I understand what you mean by clean install though - do I need to wipe her machine and then insert the TIGER discs ? Can I not just insert the install discs into the OS 9 system and then do "ERASE AND INSTALL" ??

Thanks
 
Tiger is running fine in my ibook G3 500mhz, with 320Mb. On a 800Mhz G4 it will work like a charm.

You won't be able to upgrade from Mac OS 9 it will be a fresh install, but the Mac OS 9 data won't be lost. Tiger still includes "Classic", contrary to leopard. So you friend will be able to boot OS 9 in Tiger if she want to run legacy apps.
 
I would backup the data to the external drive. Then when you boot from the 10.4 Installer DVD (see note below), I would choose the "Erase & Install" option and make sure that it sets the drive up as "Mac OS Extended (Journaled)". The Journaling is particularly important. Then install 10.4. Once finished, you could copy back the OS 9 System folder and other files from the backup.

NOTE: You'll want to make sure that her computer has a DVD capable drive since 10.4 comes on DVD. The quickest way to determine this is to stick a DVD in her computer and see if it shows up. Otherwise, you can open the "Apple System Profiler" and check.
 
Thanks Christopher and iTris - it seems I am good to go with your advice. It seems pretty straightforward. As far as I know my friend is not that worried about using any old OS 9 apps, so I am not too worried about that, and she has already backed up her important personal documents to a disc. I'll give it a try on Sunday. Thanks again.

Z
 
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