Installation trouble OSX on G3 B&W

I

iric

Registered
Hi,

I'm the proud owner of a Mac G3 (I think it's a 333 mhz) and like to have OSX (10.4) so I now have the OSX dvd.
The Mac has got 1GB of memory and worked fine on OS9, but it is time to go forward so I want OSX on it.
Built in a DVD drive as the mac came with a CD drive and it does work.
Built in a new harddisk because the old one was too small, so I now have a 80GB IDE harddisk in it.

I can't get the thing booted at all. Tried to press C, turn the mac on and hold the C for a loooooong time. After a while the little mac icon shows up and switches place with the ? icon.
Now I don't know what to try because the harddisk isn't mac ready yet and it won't boot from the dvd until now. What can I do?

Thanks in advance
 
nixgeek said:
You need to install a firmware update to it before installing OS X. Download the one for your Mac.

http://docs.info.apple.com/article.html?artnum=86117

This firmware update requires you to install it from OS 9. Once the firmware update has been applied, you can install OS X on it.
Click to expand...

So I first need to install OS9 on the new harddisk, upgrade the firmware and then install OSX?
I can't get OS9 installed either on this new harddisk. I did do a firmware upgrade once on OS9 because I had a newer version of OS9 which needed it.

If I look on the site: http://docs.info.apple.com/article.html?artnum=58374 I see this upgrade is dated 1999 and I updated the firmware 2 years ago I guess, so my thought is: the firmware has been updated (is there a way to check it withous installing an OS?)

Thanks!
 
All that would happen if the firmware was already applied is that it would tell you that it's already installed. Remember that when those Macs came out, OS X didn't exist. Because of this, they weren't made to support an OS that didn't exist, hence the firmware update to add the support into OpenFirmware.

Have you checked to make sure that the jumper settings on the DVD-ROM and the hard drive were set correctly? Check the old drives and see how they were set, and make sure that you set the jumpers exactly the same on the new drives.
 
nixgeek said:
All that would happen if the firmware was already applied is that it would tell you that it's already installed. Remember that when those Macs came out, OS X didn't exist. Because of this, they weren't made to support an OS that didn't exist, hence the firmware update to add the support into OpenFirmware.

Have you checked to make sure that the jumper settings on the DVD-ROM and the hard drive were set correctly? Check the old drives and see how they were set, and make sure that you set the jumpers exactly the same on the new drives.
Click to expand...

They were and are both MASTER. But can you just use any harddrive on a G3 or does it need some kind of APPL boot sector or something like that?
The firmware update I did was needed for a newer version of OS9 and I installed it in 2005, but now I don't use the old harddisk anymore because of it's size and I don't know where I put it, so I haven't got an option to install OS9 first I guess.

So if the update is there what to try next?
 
nixgeek said:
All that would happen if the firmware was already applied is that it would tell you that it's already installed. Remember that when those Macs came out, OS X didn't exist. Because of this, they weren't made to support an OS that didn't exist, hence the firmware update to add the support into OpenFirmware.

Have you checked to make sure that the jumper settings on the DVD-ROM and the hard drive were set correctly? Check the old drives and see how they were set, and make sure that you set the jumpers exactly the same on the new drives.
Click to expand...

They were and are both MASTER. (both on another IDE port) But can you just use any harddrive on a G3 or does it need some kind of APPL boot sector or something like that?
The firmware update I did was needed for a newer version of OS9 and I installed it in 2005, but now I don't use the old harddisk anymore because of it's size and I don't know where I put it, so I haven't got an option to install OS9 first I guess.

So if the update is there what to try next?
 
Upon rereading your first post, I noticed that you held down the C key before you turned on the Mac. Try holding down the C key once you hear the Macintosh startup chime after you've turned it on.

As far as the hard drives that you can use, any IDE hard drive should work as it's a standard IDE interface. There is no AAPL boot sector that they need. Filesystems that are put on a drive are determined by the disk partitioner that creates them. I've used hard drives that were once on PCs on various IDE-based Macs and they've worked just fine. The only thing with this model that you have to be aware of is the size of the hard drive, as the controller can only support up to 128 GB maximum.

See more information here:
http://www.lowendmac.com/ppc/g3c.shtml
 
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