Panther on an old imac?

[xand83]

Hey guys, I was hoping you could help. I have a friend with a rev. B imac (233mhz, 4gb, 96mb ram) and is absolutely fed up with it. She's a teacher and doesn't need a computer for anything but internet and an occasional paper. Not until the other day when I upgraded the ram from 32mb to 96mb did she think her imac could even run internet explorer decently. I'd like to up that to 128mb at least and load panther, as she has OS 8.5 and is not very user friendly.
Panther would make her jaw drop, but there's one problem, her CD-ROM is broken. Is there anyway to transfer Panther over a network from my powerbook lombard and load it somehow? As an .ISO file or something? I'd rather not buy a new CD-ROM because loading panther would be the only use it would ever see. If this wouldn't work, do you know of any solution? I'd really like to reinstate her love for macs.

Thanks!

 

[t300]

Hey guys, I was hoping you could help. I have a friend with a rev. B imac (233mhz, 4gb, 96mb ram) and is absolutely fed up with it. She's a teacher and doesn't need a computer for anything but internet and an occasional paper. Not until the other day when I upgraded the ram from 32mb to 96mb did she think her imac could even run internet explorer decently. I'd like to up that to 128mb at least and load panther, as she has OS 8.5 and is not very user friendly.
Panther would make her jaw drop, but there's one problem, her CD-ROM is broken. Is there anyway to transfer Panther over a network from my powerbook lombard and load it somehow? As an .ISO file or something? I'd rather not buy a new CD-ROM because loading panther would be the only use it would ever see. If this wouldn't work, do you know of any solution? I'd really like to reinstate her love for macs.

Thanks!

You could do a network install, I think...

Also, a little more Ram couldn't hurt as it is a 233. Good luck.

 

[Sly]

This probably isn't what you want hear, I don't want to sound negative.
It is perfectly possible to install Panther on the imac, however you will need the following as an absolute minimum: 128mb ram os9, a licensed copy of os10.3 (don't forget to install the free firmware update) and a working cd drive. In reality for a usable system you will need 256mb ram and a 10gb HD upgrade. Ive recently upgraded my mothers 350mz slot load imac to Panther from os9 put in 256mb of ram and a 20gb hard drive. It is usable but doesn't do os10.3 justice and really bogs down if she runs say itunes safari MS office and iphoto together which isn't asking alot? IMHO save the upgrade money sell the rev B imac and go for one of the first emacs which are dead cheap on ebay at the moment and should come with at least 10.2 pre-installed, your friend will love it

 

[xand83]

More memory, I know, is a must. 128mb is at least what's going in there pretty soon, more than likely more. The fact is, she's still in school and doesn't have money to spend on a new computer. The only thing she really needs a computer for is email and maybe appleworks. iTunes, iPhoto, and Office she doesn't even know exist. She just needs this until she can afford something newer. Thanks for your input though!

 

[jeremy.king]

You could always throw YDL or Gentoo on it until she gets her next mac. Saves you the $50-$100 for Panther, and may run a bit faster. You would still need a working CD-ROM however.

 

[Flynnstone]

It can be done.
I have an iMac here running Panther and it has a broken CD drive.
First do the firmware upgrade. I didn't and rebooting is a bit of a pain.
Since the cd was broken, I pulled the hard drive out and put it in a G4 PowerMac and installed Panther to that drive. I then booted from the drive to make sure everything worked. I then popped the hard drive out and back into the iMac. Rebooted and haven't looked back.
Extra memory is good. I run 192 meg on it. It's perfectly fine for surfing.

P.S. Getting the hard drive out and back in is a little less than trivial.

 

[xand83]

That's Brilliant!! I wouldn't have thought of that. I, however, only have a powerbook lombard. Is that still possible, not to install it into the powerbook b/c i'm sure the hard drives are different sizes, but to just hook it up for the instal? I'm sure I could find a desktop mac somewhere if it didn't.

Thanks!