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iMac G4 USB2 upgraded to SSD and 2GB RAM
- Thread starter Bkxmnr
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Just scanning through that blog you referenced, if I understand it correctly it appears you have set the DVD drive to Slave (which is correct) , but the IDE SATA Adapter also set as slave (should be Master).
I'm doing the same thing to a beheaded iMac G4 20" (display is available if anyone is interested, bad tube or inverter), and both the original HDD and the DVD-RW are set to CABLE SELECT. That might be why your adapter isn't finding the OS.
I realize this thread initially dates from 2010, but I reckon SSD upgrades must still be a great way to rejuvenate these popular and great looking iMac G4's.
It's something I've been wanting to do for some time. Wasn't too sure however what was a good quality PATA-SATA converter to purchase, as some of the very cheap generic versions may be problematic and/or incompatible with some more recent 20015/2016 SSD's.
With reference to this 2010 photo from post #1 here, could someone please recommend a similar but current, good quality converter, available either from Amazon fr or Amazon uk.
It's something I've been wanting to do for some time. Wasn't too sure however what was a good quality PATA-SATA converter to purchase, as some of the very cheap generic versions may be problematic and/or incompatible with some more recent 20015/2016 SSD's.
With reference to this 2010 photo from post #1 here, could someone please recommend a similar but current, good quality converter, available either from Amazon fr or Amazon uk.
I used this https://www.amazon.fr/Delock-62495-Convertisseur-broches-mSATA/dp/B00ELC8GFO converter together with a Samsung mSATA ssd in my iBook G4. As space is limited in laptops and a pata-sata converter wouldn't have fit and pata ssds are really outdated this was a good alternative. And the annoying harddisk noise is now gone as well.
So unless you already have a spare sata ssd lying around, this may be a route to follow.
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Thanks for your comments. For some reason your link was blocked on my system, even after disabling my firewall.
I'm familiar with that Delock 62495 converter (also marketed under the ref LINDY 20937), and have too just installed one together with an mSATA 128GB SSD in a G4 TiPowerbook. However can't see that's it's suitable for the iMac G4 internal connections required.
I'm familiar with that Delock 62495 converter (also marketed under the ref LINDY 20937), and have too just installed one together with an mSATA 128GB SSD in a G4 TiPowerbook. However can't see that's it's suitable for the iMac G4 internal connections required.
I finally completely my iMac upgrade about a month ago. I used a generic IDE to SATA adapter off eBay ($6) with a Silicon Power 240GB SSD. The SSD combined with RAM upgrade from 1.25GB to 2GB has definitely improved performance. It is now more responsive overall than my 15" PowerBook G4 1.67.
As great as the SSD and memory are, I think cleaning it out during the upgrade may have made the biggest difference. There was a ton of dust in there that was on the way into becoming a felt mat. The fan is now almost silent. The gunk must have been affecting power because the screen is now 50% brighter and the Apple Pro Speakers are louder.
Between the upgrades and cleaning, it feels like it did when it was new. I would recommend this for anyone planning to keep and use their iMac G4.
As great as the SSD and memory are, I think cleaning it out during the upgrade may have made the biggest difference. There was a ton of dust in there that was on the way into becoming a felt mat. The fan is now almost silent. The gunk must have been affecting power because the screen is now 50% brighter and the Apple Pro Speakers are louder.
Between the upgrades and cleaning, it feels like it did when it was new. I would recommend this for anyone planning to keep and use their iMac G4.
@zjfroot I followed your blog post along with the iFixit guide to install a SSD into my iMac G4 and can't make it work - always get this '?' error.
I purchased the same IDE to SATA adapter and the SSD as you have.
I've drawn up the following image to show how I currently have the jumpers setup on the DVD drive and the Adapter.
Any help or advice on how to get the mac to read the drive would be fantastic.
Thanks
Oly
Two slaves? And where is the master?
If you have an iMac G4 1 GHz or higher, then it has 2 IDE controllers and you must set both to master.
If you have an lower iMac it has only one bus. Than you must set the drive at the end of the cable to master, and the drive in the mid of the cable to slave.
iMac G4 20" 1,25 GHz and my modifications
1. Change the fan to an Antec Smartcool 9,5 with termal sensor, but the Fan ist a bit to powerful on ~25°C, so I reduced the voltage to around 10,5 Volt with an 15 Ohm, 2 Watt resistor (The value of the resistor is only adjusted for this fan).
First Prototyp with 30 Ohm, but with 9,5 V the fan was toooo slow
2. Add SSD! I have used the mSATA format
Parts:
Samsung 850 EVO interne SSD 120GB
DELOCK Konverter IDE 44 Pin > mSATA 2.5
Laptop PC 2.5 Zoll HDD to 3,5 Zoll IDE (44 Pin-40 Pin) Adapter https://www.amazon.de/gp/product/B00CJ7MDR0/ref=oh_aui_detailpage_o05_s00?ie=UTF8&psc=1
3,5 to 2,5 drive mount
https://www.amazon.de/gp/product/B00G57BN1M/ref=oh_aui_detailpage_o03_s00?ie=UTF8&psc=1
3. 2 GB Ram (simply buy the right one)
4. GPU cooling
I have added a 30x30mm (2mm thick) 5 W/mk thermal pad between the "Bottom Housing" and the "User Access Door" for a better cooling of the GPU. The readings are very promising.
Tested on high load (Age of Empire III WarChiefs, all settings to max., Startscreen for 2 hours)
Bottom Housing (User Access Door removed), direct on the GPU hotspot: 45°C
User Access Door without thermal pad: 28°C on GPU position
User Access Door with thermal pad: 33°C on GPU position
more heat away from the GPU by using the "User Access Door" as cooling element
5. Airport Card added.
1. Change the fan to an Antec Smartcool 9,5 with termal sensor, but the Fan ist a bit to powerful on ~25°C, so I reduced the voltage to around 10,5 Volt with an 15 Ohm, 2 Watt resistor (The value of the resistor is only adjusted for this fan).
First Prototyp with 30 Ohm, but with 9,5 V the fan was toooo slow
2. Add SSD! I have used the mSATA format
Parts:
Samsung 850 EVO interne SSD 120GB
DELOCK Konverter IDE 44 Pin > mSATA 2.5
Laptop PC 2.5 Zoll HDD to 3,5 Zoll IDE (44 Pin-40 Pin) Adapter https://www.amazon.de/gp/product/B00CJ7MDR0/ref=oh_aui_detailpage_o05_s00?ie=UTF8&psc=1
3,5 to 2,5 drive mount
https://www.amazon.de/gp/product/B00G57BN1M/ref=oh_aui_detailpage_o03_s00?ie=UTF8&psc=1
3. 2 GB Ram (simply buy the right one)
4. GPU cooling
I have added a 30x30mm (2mm thick) 5 W/mk thermal pad between the "Bottom Housing" and the "User Access Door" for a better cooling of the GPU. The readings are very promising.
Tested on high load (Age of Empire III WarChiefs, all settings to max., Startscreen for 2 hours)
Bottom Housing (User Access Door removed), direct on the GPU hotspot: 45°C
User Access Door without thermal pad: 28°C on GPU position
User Access Door with thermal pad: 33°C on GPU position
more heat away from the GPU by using the "User Access Door" as cooling element
5. Airport Card added.
Last edited:
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Very cool idea by using the User Access Door as cooling.
But awesome work, Makes me wanna get a iMac G4 and do these myself
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I upgraded my G4 20" to 2GB and a more silent fan. It is not fully able to keep up with getting heat out and the fan is still audible.
So I will do a more complete makeover by removing the entire Superdrive and 3.5" hard drive.
They contribute some heat also. This hardware disappearing won´t be apparent from the outside.
The recipe will be a SSD and a big diameter low profile fan on top of the mother board that whisks along
at low revs so it isn´t audible but still moves heat out the upper vents. Getting the two rectangular blocks
of big HDD and DVD drive out also creates space for air to move upwards.
That should do it and create a super silent G4 for use as music jukebox. The iconic swivel LCD
adds some aesthetics to such a setup that few other computers can match
Then let´s see for how long the Powerpc Mac client for Spotify is going to continue working.
Spotify have abandoned further powerpc upgrades so any future server side API change could render it inoperable.
With luck they will change their web access (play.spotify.com) from Flash (the opensorce flash replacement doesn't work with Spotify) to HTML5 then at least I'll be able to access it in Linux as well - No Spotify client here in Linux land currently and of course the Clementine Spotify plugin whilst appearing to load will not log in...
You didn't say to which setting you fitted the jumper. I presume Master.
Having said that I dismantled a perfectly serviceable iMac G4 recently, and found both HD and optical drive set to Cable Select. I've been in the habit of setting the HD to Master and OD to slave.
Is the Pram battery ok and showing a healthy 3.6volts? Or PMU reset? Button is near the memory slot next to the airport card.
HD is set to master and OD to slave, battery is ok (but i will dubbel check). PMU reset? The machine does turn on but it doesnt find OS X.
Most online instructions fail to mention the PMU reset after hardware upgrade or changes. Over the years I had completely forgotten about it.
I had occasional problems after my RAM and SSD upgrade. A third of the time it would boot and perform perfectly, a third it would boot and function very slowly, and a third of the time it wouldn't get past the Apple logo.
I unplugged the iMac, took the bottom plate off, pressed the little button over the Airport card once to reset the PMU, and everything has been running perfectly ever since.
I had occasional problems after my RAM and SSD upgrade. A third of the time it would boot and perform perfectly, a third it would boot and function very slowly, and a third of the time it wouldn't get past the Apple logo.
I unplugged the iMac, took the bottom plate off, pressed the little button over the Airport card once to reset the PMU, and everything has been running perfectly ever since.
I can't get this to work. I reset the PRAM, no no change. I switch the jumper on the HDD and OD. The OD is the last on the cabel. I might still something with jumper settings....Does anyone have a picture of the OD normal settings?
I used this https://www.amazon.fr/Delock-62495-Convertisseur-broches-mSATA/dp/B00ELC8GFO converter together with a Samsung mSATA ssd in my iBook G4. As space is limited in laptops and a pata-sata converter wouldn't have fit and pata ssds are really outdated this was a good alternative. And the annoying harddisk noise is now gone as well.
So unless you already have a spare sata ssd lying around, this may be a route to follow.
My apologies to dig up this old thread but as I'm in the progress of upgrading my iBook G4 and seem to be unable to find the more popular Kingspec mSATA ssd's in my region , could you post me your benchmarks of the SSD or your thoughts on it ?
What model is it ? I've found this one for purchase in my region :
https://www.ebay.com/itm/NEU-Samsun...e=STRK:MEBIDX:IT&_trksid=p2060353.m1438.l2649
As an Amazon Associate, MacRumors earns a commission from qualifying purchases made through links in this post.
Hi Hagland Iam in the same situation that you describe, I tried everything mentioned here, did you find a solution?
Thanks in advance
I bought a iMac 17" 1.25Ghz Globe a couple of weeks ago off eBay - Cost me around £40 ($50). It only had 256k memory and was running Mac OS 10.3, no BlueTooth or Airport Card, with 80GB Hard Disk.
First step was to add 1GB of Ram and obtain an Airport Card.
RAM was 1GB 200 Pin SoDimm DDR PC2700(PC333) Manufacturer OFFTEK Part No FT128MSD64V3A-1243170 Purchased from Amazon UK
Airport Extreme Card A1027 purchased from eBay UK. Note A1027 is the Eurpoean Spec, A1026 is the US version of the same card. This spec of card is for the USB2 versions of the iMac, if you have an earlier version you need the earlier version of the card 802.11b spec.
I also purchased a copy of Leopard 10.5 (eBay UK).
Then decided to add Bluetooth and replace the Hard Disk with a SSD.
The SSD was a used Samsung 850 Evo 2.5" Internal SSD 120GB SATA III drive from eBay and I bought a VGEBY Parallel ATA PATA IDE to SATA Serial ATA Hard Drive Converter from Amazon UK.
I also bought a Mounting Adapter for the SSD, but the way that the Hard Drive Converter connects means that I could not use it. I ended up using some strong double sided Tape Pads to stick the SSD to the old HDD cradle instead.
The stats for the Hard Disk show a significant improvement to I/O
The SSD also makes watching HD Movies a lot smoother.
I thought about sourcing an Internal Bluetooth module, but found a very small USB dongle on Amazon for less than £3 (NewLink Mini USB Bluetooth Dongle v2.0). Was amazed that I not only managed to connect a Magic Mouse, but also I could use the touch sensitive panel to scroll (once I updated the wireless mouse drivers, through software update)
I have replaced Safari with Webkit, which means that most websites now load reasonably well.
Final stage will be to replace the internal memory with 1GB, so that the iMac has 2 GB total.
The iMac is an iconic design and its great to have the 'lickable' Aqua UI back again. Amazing that the machine still looks good and operational after 15 years. There is new life in this old Mac yet!
First step was to add 1GB of Ram and obtain an Airport Card.
RAM was 1GB 200 Pin SoDimm DDR PC2700(PC333) Manufacturer OFFTEK Part No FT128MSD64V3A-1243170 Purchased from Amazon UK
Airport Extreme Card A1027 purchased from eBay UK. Note A1027 is the Eurpoean Spec, A1026 is the US version of the same card. This spec of card is for the USB2 versions of the iMac, if you have an earlier version you need the earlier version of the card 802.11b spec.
I also purchased a copy of Leopard 10.5 (eBay UK).
Then decided to add Bluetooth and replace the Hard Disk with a SSD.
The SSD was a used Samsung 850 Evo 2.5" Internal SSD 120GB SATA III drive from eBay and I bought a VGEBY Parallel ATA PATA IDE to SATA Serial ATA Hard Drive Converter from Amazon UK.
I also bought a Mounting Adapter for the SSD, but the way that the Hard Drive Converter connects means that I could not use it. I ended up using some strong double sided Tape Pads to stick the SSD to the old HDD cradle instead.
The stats for the Hard Disk show a significant improvement to I/O
The SSD also makes watching HD Movies a lot smoother.
I thought about sourcing an Internal Bluetooth module, but found a very small USB dongle on Amazon for less than £3 (NewLink Mini USB Bluetooth Dongle v2.0). Was amazed that I not only managed to connect a Magic Mouse, but also I could use the touch sensitive panel to scroll (once I updated the wireless mouse drivers, through software update)
I have replaced Safari with Webkit, which means that most websites now load reasonably well.
Final stage will be to replace the internal memory with 1GB, so that the iMac has 2 GB total.
The iMac is an iconic design and its great to have the 'lickable' Aqua UI back again. Amazing that the machine still looks good and operational after 15 years. There is new life in this old Mac yet!
There's a benchmarking thread here: https://forums.macrumors.com/threads/post-your-ssd-cf-sata-pata-powerpc-benchmark-results.2063361/
it's ata-6, so the theoretical maximum is 100 MB/s.
Just wanted to say, this info is still invaluable in 2023! Thanks.
I got this working after much frustration, and I appreciate the information in this thread, and maybe could help others.
I bought a SSD HD off OWC for an iMac G4 1.0. The pins on the original drive and CD-ROM are set to cable, but the SATA to IDE adapter that came from OWC was set to Master. I set it to Cable, reinstalled everything, when I'd boot a 10.4 CD to install it would crash when looking for the drive, or when using Drive Utility from the menu. I reset PRAM, no luck, just crashes. I went back in and set the adapter pins to Master, then booted to the same result. However, I could see the drive with System Profiler, so using Terminal I formatted the drive and it worked. Do driveutil list, then driveutil unmount /dev/disk0 (or whatever number it is) then driveutil eraseDisk HFS+ HardDrive /dev/disk0 and then if you go back into Drive Utility or the installer, it will see the drive and you can re-format and install. Hope that helps someone out there... long live PPC and OS 9 in Classic!
I bought a SSD HD off OWC for an iMac G4 1.0. The pins on the original drive and CD-ROM are set to cable, but the SATA to IDE adapter that came from OWC was set to Master. I set it to Cable, reinstalled everything, when I'd boot a 10.4 CD to install it would crash when looking for the drive, or when using Drive Utility from the menu. I reset PRAM, no luck, just crashes. I went back in and set the adapter pins to Master, then booted to the same result. However, I could see the drive with System Profiler, so using Terminal I formatted the drive and it worked. Do driveutil list, then driveutil unmount /dev/disk0 (or whatever number it is) then driveutil eraseDisk HFS+ HardDrive /dev/disk0 and then if you go back into Drive Utility or the installer, it will see the drive and you can re-format and install. Hope that helps someone out there... long live PPC and OS 9 in Classic!