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Maintaining Mac Labs with an iPod?

B

billiam0878

macrumors 6502
Original poster
Mar 15, 2002
299
0
Winter Park, FL
Hi Everybody,


Here’s the scoop. I’m going to be the Mac Lab Supervisor at my school next year and my duties are going to include reformatting/maintaining about 20 PowerMac G4's (733MHz). I recently purchased an iPod and I was hoping to use the extra space for disk images of the Mac OS updates (9.1, 9.2.1, 9.2.2, and eventually OS X) so that I could update the machines quickly.

My question for you is, if I boot the machines off of an AppleCare Disk, can I then plug in my iPod, mount the appropriate disk image, and install that update as if it were the CD I booted from? All these machines have FireWire, and by using the iPod, I would save bundles of time (as opposed to trying to log onto our old-school Mac server). Thanks so much for your help,

Bill
 
HHhhhhmmmmm...

If you can trick the G4 to think that the iPod is a Hard Drive instead of an MP3 player you might be able to boot from it. If iTunes is installed on the Macs you might have problems booting the G4 from the drive. Now I plan to get an iPod. But I don't know a lot about iPods and thier capabilities. This is just an opinion, seriously I have NO IDEA what I am talking about but I think that iTunes might have something to do with the G4 reading the iPod as an Hard Drive. Try it! It shouldn't do any harm. If it works... HORAY! If it doesn't, eh? Well you might be better off gettin the FireFly (I think it's called) It is 5 GB and it has no power adapter so it is like your iPod! You might want to get one of those, because swaping CDs and downloading files to 20 G4s will take time! Now do any of the G4s have a CD-RW (CD Burner) Then you can burn the updates to disc! That might work. I hope I helped!:D ;) :p
 
You can do it. Here is how: Turn off the computer, turn on the iPod. Then connect the iPod to the computer, and boot up the computer pressing the 'F' key while you boot up. This forces the computer to boot up from a Firewire hard drive (thus the 'F' key). Then all you have to do is update it. There. Simple.




irmongoose
 
What do you mean 'trick' the g4? You can boot of the iPod if you have the disk mode setup. I find it best to use "Apple Restore" (ASR) with the iPod, make a disk image and then just run ASR it will wipe the disk and then reset it up. For more info e-mail me and I will send you the PDF of how we do it.

Ensign
 
...

As I said before "seriously I have NO IDEA what I am talking about!":rolleyes:

:D :D :DI didn't know what to say, it was too early in the morning to start thinking!:D :D :D
 
I wasn't trying to be nasty, its just that its an iPod feature, it would be like tricking OSX to take noticed of what you type in the terminal :)

Ensign
 
Thanks for all your help guys! Irmongoose, I'll try your suggestion and report back (only complication I see is that the disk images for the OS's are in a folder inside the iPod). Thanks again,

Bill
 
Wouldn't it be safer and faster, but not as kewl, to use a standard 3.5 inch hard drive in a FireWire enclosure? I've seen the enclosures locally for $50-$130 and 3.5 inch ATA hard drives are cheap in smaller sizes, especially compared to the 1.8 inch units in the iPod.
 
Originally posted by bousozoku
Wouldn't it be safer and faster, but not as kewl, to use a standard 3.5 inch hard drive in a FireWire enclosure? I've seen the enclosures locally for $50-$130 and 3.5 inch ATA hard drives are cheap in smaller sizes, especially compared to the 1.8 inch units in the iPod.
Click to expand...

First off it would not be as cool ;) and second, I just don't have the cash (spent it all on the iPod :)).

Bill
 
Originally posted by billiam0878


First off it would not be as cool ;) and second, I just don't have the cash (spent it all on the iPod :)).

Bill
Click to expand...

I'll trade you my 80 GB FireWire drive for the iPod. :D If you want, I'll even paint flames or something else on it. How about a fake headphone jack? Ummm... :D
 
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