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My First Mac Is A Gutted G5 DC 2.5 - What Do I Do Now?

RadiusProject said:
I've just had a look on eBay and I'm not seeing good prices for PowerPC Macs of this particular model. It looks likely that I can at least get the money back on the RAM and HDD if I do decide to sell. It looks like if I buy Leopard OSX 10.5 on eBay I'll go beyond this "safety budget" that reselling the machine provides.

The RAM has arrived however, now a copy of OSX 10.5 is all that stands in my way!
Click to expand...

Now you got your RAM put it in your G5 and turn it on to make sure it works it will boot to the "Happy Mac" if the mac is working right:) (Even with out a hard drive in it) if it gos to the happy mac your mac is working 100% and is ready for os x:). i don't know if you have a craigslist wear you are? but wear i am i can get a retail Leopard disc on craigslist for $60 or less. so if you have a craigslist wear you are you may want to look:) her is one on ebay for $109 and free shipping world wide but you can make the seller a offer http://cgi.ebay.com/APPLE-MAC-OS-X-LEOPARD-FULL-INSTALL-10-5-DVD-MEGASALE-/180696730629?pt=LH_DefaultDomain_0&hash=item2a125d4c05#ht_9201wt_884 or you might be able to find a cheep sata hard drive on ebay with leopard on it and then copy it over to your new hard drive. i wish i waited to get my G5 Dual 1.8 (June 2004) off of ebay tell after lion came out i paid $120 (4 months ago) with no Hard Drive and only 512Mb Ram then,and now i can get the same thing for $60 on ebay:( but over all it is a very fast and reliable Mac ($85 later 2GB Ram+New Hard Drive) That is:)
 
Ok, serious problems now.

I finally got hold of a system disk for OSX 10.5.

It wont install.

When I turn the machine on, I get the "bing" sound, and the flashing question mark folder. So I turn it off and reboot while holding C, and I get a blank grey screen. I press Option while booting, and get the refresh arrow and the next arrow, but no selectable drives and my cursor is an immovable wristwatch in the top left hand corner.

The fans go crazy and the whole thing sounds like its about to take off out my window. I struggle to get the disk in the machine because the disk tray takes ages to open, if at all.


As a first introduction to Apple, this has been rotten. I know, I know, its old hardware thats unsupported and obsolete. But I have hardware older than this that I still get tech support for, let alone basic help from the company itself. I'm sure the next 500 posts will be in defense of Apple, but it really is beginning to feel like a complete mistake for me to try and do this on a budget.

I'll stop there with how frustrated I am- all I actually want is some help getting the computer I've spent nearly £200 on to boot up.
 
Are you sure the optical drive isn't borked? They're just IDE drives so if have on old windows PC around you could just swap it out and try it.
 
When you put the DVD in the drive, turn it on, and hold C, do you hear the DVD drive accessing the disk? It can take a long time to boot up off DVD.

If you got the "?" everything should be in order.
 
RadiusProject said:
I'm sure the next 500 posts will be in defense of Apple, but it really is beginning to feel like a complete mistake for me to try and do this on a budget.

I'll stop there with how frustrated I am- all I actually want is some help getting the computer I've spent nearly £200 on to boot up.
Click to expand...

I think the mistake was finding the case/logicboard of such an old machine and pumping £200 into it in the hopes it will switch on.

This G5 is obviously causing you a lot of grief and could cause even more if you spend anything else on it. You may be better off selling the items you've already bought, sell the empty G5 for spares/repairs and buy a working one from ebay with the profits (which can be had for around £200)
 
RadiusProject said:
Ok, serious problems now.

I finally got hold of a system disk for OSX 10.5.

It wont install.

When I turn the machine on, I get the "bing" sound, and the flashing question mark folder. So I turn it off and reboot while holding C, and I get a blank grey screen. I press Option while booting, and get the refresh arrow and the next arrow, but no selectable drives and my cursor is an immovable wristwatch in the top left hand corner.

The fans go crazy and the whole thing sounds like its about to take off out my window. I struggle to get the disk in the machine because the disk tray takes ages to open, if at all.


As a first introduction to Apple, this has been rotten. I know, I know, its old hardware thats unsupported and obsolete. But I have hardware older than this that I still get tech support for, let alone basic help from the company itself. I'm sure the next 500 posts will be in defense of Apple, but it really is beginning to feel like a complete mistake for me to try and do this on a budget.

I'll stop there with how frustrated I am- all I actually want is some help getting the computer I've spent nearly £200 on to boot up.
Click to expand...

Mine did not read the retail leopard DVD as well but did read my tiger disc? what i ended up doing is useing fire wire target disc mode with my PowerBook G4 1.5GHZ to install Leopard on my G5, do you know some one that has a mac that you can try fire wire target mode on? that will be the quickest way:) the G5 still has some power left in it my dual 1.8ghz G5 can play 1080p video yours is faster so you can play 1080p video to:) being you see the "happy mac" and get the "bing", once you get your os in it it will work good!
 
@ OP

- the wrist watch is sometimes not or very slooooowly movable, when the Mac is still searching the Volume (DVD).

- not meant to be offensive, but do you have a PPC version of Leopard or a universal binary one?

- firewire target mode is the easiest way, as MacManJW mentioned. connect the two Macs, start up the other Mac, till you can see the desktop. Then start up the PowerMac G5 holding down "T". You should see a purple background with a firewire-sign dancing around. No the G5 is shown on the desktop of the other Mac as an external drive. Insert the DVD in the other Mac, choose install and then choose the "external" G5 as target-Volume.
 
I have never heard of a PowerPC only Leopard install disk. 1 disk carries 4 different installers.

The 4 installers are:
Intel 32-bit
PowerPC 32-Bit
Intel 64-Bit
PowerPC 64-bit
 
zen.state said:
I have never heard of a PowerPC only Leopard install disk. 1 disk carries 4 different installers.

The 4 installers are:
Intel 32-bit
PowerPC 32-Bit
Intel 64-Bit
PowerPC 64-bit
Click to expand...

I actually thought he might have an Intel only or one that came with a machine... if Intel-only versions do not exist, I have learned something, Thank you.
 
Here's another solution - There is a 2.7 DP PPC I have access to. Could I clone this machines internal drive onto an external and then run OSX from that temporarily? My machine is a 2.5 DP, which is why I ask...
 
RadiusProject said:
Here's another solution - There is a 2.7 DP PPC I have access to. Could I clone this machines internal drive onto an external and then run OSX from that temporarily? My machine is a 2.5 DP, which is why I ask...
Click to expand...

Try a program called "Carbon Copy Clone" it's made just for that, if you have a firewire cable you should be able to attach them together and boot your 2.5 into target disk mode and clone it over.

You could also do this with a USB/FW enclosure.

I once tried to boot my Leopard "CPU DROP IN" disk into my PowerMac G4 and it wouldn't boot it. This disk came with my Intel iMac when Leopard first came out. I'm unsure if it's Intel only or not since the Power Mac is only 800mhz and isn't supported by Leopard, though I would still think it boots.
 
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