iMac Powerpc G5 8,2

[jlrathke]

Someone gave me an iMac G5. I know it's old, but can I run Snow Leopard on it? It has Leopard on it now, but I want to wipe it and reload the OS, but I don't have a Leopard disk...but I do have Snow Leopard.

Thanks,

 

[eyoungren]

Someone gave me an iMac G5. I know it's old, but can I run Snow Leopard on it? It has Leopard on it now, but I want to wipe it and reload the OS, but I don't have a Leopard disk...but I do have Snow Leopard.

Thanks,

No.

You have a PowerPC Mac. Snow Leopard and above is for Intel Macs only. Leopard is the highest OS a PowerPC Mac can run.

I think it's great that you were given this Mac. But just realize that it is NOT an Intel Mac and therefore any expectations you may have for it to perform like a much later (Intel) Mac you should reconsider. Not that it isn't a great Mac, but PowerPC Macs were abandoned by Apple in 2006.

 

[jlrathke]

I need help here...I got the iMac third (or fourth, fifth, sixth hand....I put a new hard drive in and when I boot and hold down the Option key, I am prompted for a password...I have a bootable thumb drive with Leopard 10.5.8, but can't seem to boot from it. If I don't do anything, when it boots, I get a screen with a folder/question mark...Can anyone help me?

Thank you,

Jerry

 

[Intell]

It has a firmware password on it. To remove it, remove one of the ram sticks and start it. Once you hear the chime, unplug it and put the ram stick back in again. The firmware password will be removed.

 

[eyoungren]

The folder/question mark thing is because there is no operating system. The Mac is telling you that it can't find one.

Most PowerPC Macs cannot boot off USB. There are some, and Intell will definetly know which ones, but I don't know if your Mac is one of those.

 

[Intell]

Most PowerPC Macs cannot boot off USB. There are some, and Intell will definitely know which ones, but I don't know if your Mac is one of those.

Most PowerPC Macs can boot from USB. The few that cannot are the PCI PowerMac G4, B&W PowerMac G3, and tray loading G3 iMacs. PowerPC Macs cannot boot from an USB expansion card, only via the internal USB bus.

 

[jlrathke]

I have an iMac powerpc G5 8,2....it all went south when I told it to boot from the CD drive, but I had a scratched up CD with 10.4....so it looks like i'm screwed with this thing. The remove ram and unplug when I hear the chime didn't work, but I'll keep messing with it...

Jerry

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I even tried the hold down X on the old hdd, but it didn't work...

 

[jlrathke]

Got it booting again with the help here...just need to do a clean install with Leopard to get past the old users info....thanks for the help.

Jerry