What have you done with an early Intel recently?

[originaldotexe]

thats awesome! i want to pick up some kind of mac mini, probably a 2009 one, to hook up to my tv once we move. i have my own streaming server w/ jellyfin that has all my tv, movies, anime, etc and it would be nice to be able to watch on the tv using a mac mini

i also got a little hp small form factor computer for free on the local freecycle group. it is only a few years old with i5 6500 cpu, 16gb ram and ssd drive. i am planning to get a low profile gtx 1650 or rx 6400 gpu and put holoiso on it as a pc gaming machine for my tv.

 

[rampancy]

Also looks like the 802.11ac AirPort card (plus adapter) I dropped into my 5,1 Mac Pro will fit this new MacBook 5,2 board...that would be awesome if it works once I get a newer macOS loaded.

Are you talking about this card? (https://www.ebay.com/itm/274475421781 - MODS: This is not my auction!)

If so I'd be really interested in seeing how you get it to work, as the antenna ports are on the underside of the card, which could make fitting it into the A1181 motherboard problematic.

Pity you live so far away from me -- I'd love to take that black 2,1 off of your hands!

 

[zackkmac]

Are you talking about this card? (https://www.ebay.com/itm/274475421781 - MODS: This is not my auction!)

If so I'd be really interested in seeing how you get it to work, as the antenna ports are on the underside of the card, which could make fitting it into the A1181 motherboard problematic.

Pity you live so far away from me -- I'd love to take that black 2,1 off of your hands!

Similar, but the AirPort card itself is slightly different, can't remember the exact model but the antenna ports are on top actually!

I'd probably send it to you for shipping costs but I'm not sure you'd want it. When I swap what's needed over to the newer one, the 2,1 will have a busted LCD, no battery or HDD/SSD, possibly some other stuff missing as well. Not totally sure yet what all I'll be moving over to the newer MacBook.

 

[TheShortTimer]

Shivar me timbars, arrrrr! Avast ye, here lie waters fulla π-r8s! 🧐

All swabby talk aside, have you ever successfully built avidemux for Snow Leopard? If so, what version was the last to build successfully? As with many of the GUI-based open-source stuff these days, they make use of revisions to Qt5 beyond Qt5.3, so the current version of avidemux, via macports, won’t build for Darwin 10.

I've never tried to build it (or any other software for that matter) and the latest version that definitely works on my Snow Leopard running MacBook 1,1 is 2.5.4.

 

[eyoungren]

Late 2009 Mac Mini back up. I've still got some stuff to do, mainly new desktops, drive shares, etc. The enclosure is now 4TB - currently syncing Dropbox.

Nice having dual HDTVs! But oh man, you don't know how bad one is until next to the other. This Vizio is sharp!



Oh…and it would seem that a wired connection is much faster than my powerline adapter.

EDIT: Forgot I was able to control the sound of one Mini through the other. So, E:09 is perpetually connected to the BT loudspeaker while L:09 pipes it's sound (and controls E:09 volume) to the BT loudspeaker through the E:09 Mini.

Which I totally forgot I set up!

 

[Tratkazir_the_1st]

wired connection is much faster than my powerline adapter

Powerline is ****. Ethernet (Cat. 6A especially) always better!

 

[eyoungren]

Powerline is ****. Ethernet (Cat. 6A especially) always better!

Powerline has been useful in that I didn't have to run any wires. It has it's purpose and if you're putting connection before speed it works. I'd still be using it if the adapter had not died.

 

[originaldotexe]

converting games for my wii and listening to music on the tube

 

[B S Magnet]

Powerline has been useful in that I didn't have to run any wires. It has it's purpose and if you're putting connection before speed it works. I'd still be using it if the adapter had not died.

Echoing this, in addition to being a viable workaround in places where running a long ethernet cable isn’t practicable — not only in places where doors close tightly, but also in places where one does not own the dwelling and can’t really run invasive cable routing behind drywall.

I live in a fairly long semidetached, and there’s a part of my home in which my 802.11ac router can’t quite reach — especially so with the weaker reception in my MBP4,1. Powerline ethernet obviates this issue when I need a consistent connection. I use an older, 10/100-rated model from TRENDnet, but have been eyeing a more recent, MIMO, dual-ethernet solution from TP-Link and just waiting for a good sale locally.

 

[eyoungren]

Swapped out old 20" Cinema Display for new 20" Cinema Display.



The old bite me in the behind came through tonight. One of the reasons I do NOT like messing with cables/devices/computers once I have things working.

Adapter for 55" HDTV came out of the video card on the MP. I was expecting that, it happens any time I move cables around. Fixed.

Once everything was set up, I noticed the G3 server had dropped out from my desktop. Spent two hours troubleshooting that. End result, server removed, RAID enclosure attached via FW800 cable to MacPro. I still have the RAID at least, which was the point of the server anyway.

Done with that (plus cracking my head open on the corner of the desk) I noticed that the NAS has dropped out! No power. So, wiggled cords in the power strip (after finding the one that is for that NAS) and it came right back up.

Anyway, I think I am done with hardware for a while now.

 

[Amethyst1]

Anyway, I think I am done with hardware for a while now.

So the G3 server has been decommissioned?

 

[eyoungren]

So the G3 server has been decommissioned?

Yeah. Even I, with my multiple computers, have a point. I could spend some time to figure out what's wrong with it, but I really don't want to.

I used to love setting computers and other stuff up. The payoff was it all working. But in the last decade or so that payoff hasn't been there as more and more stuff simply fails to work, gets bumped and stops working or just dies. I now dread moving things around where before it was a fun exercise.

Mostly it's the PowerPC stuff that's starting to fail when these things happen. As PowerPC is no longer my daily drivers, I decided I'd just start retiring the PowerPC stuff when it fails. I gave the G3 two hours of unplanned troubleshooting and that was all I was willing to do then.

I suspect the hard drive, but IDK. Most of us know how finicky G3s can be.

The G4 'NAS' is still performing, albeit with a two-channel PCI-SATA card now.

 

[Romain_H]

Tried to install OS X 10.5.4 on my Powerbook G4 1.5. Its weird, it won't install any OS whose install medium is a DVD. No Tiger, no Leopard, no Leopard Server.

Tiger installed from CDs just fine.

It won't recognize media from an USB DVD drive. The Powerbook denies booting from (burned) Leopard DVDs, it boots from the Leopard Server DVD, but install fails claiming a faulty DVD (which is fine, it installed without issues on a 17" Macbook Pro late 2008)

 

[Amethyst1]

It won't recognize media from an USB DVD drive.

Time for a FireWire DVD drive or hard drive to install OSes from

 

[Romain_H]

Time for a FireWire DVD drive or hard drive to install OSes from

Maybe. I‘d still prefer my DVD drive to be functional 🤷🏼‍♂️. I even think of netinstall, now that I do have a Mac OS Server installation

 

[Tratkazir_the_1st]

@Romain_H
Test drive with other computer..?

 

[Romain_H]

@Romain_H
Test drive with other computer..?

The USB drive works with other computers. I cannot test the internal drive with other computers for obvious reasons.

I got a PB G4 1.25 GHz lying around, the logicboard of which has been fried by a faulty battery. Maybe I‘ll swap the drives at some point. If only I had the time….

 

[eyoungren]

What have I done with an Intel Mac recently…?

Well, I solved a long standing issue (by accident) and proved a hypothesis that showed I am an idiot.

Long standing issue: Early 2009 Mini is picky in it's connection to my BT loudspeaker, even with that replacement BT-USB extender I now use. So, it turns out that if I set the INPUT of sound to the loudspeaker ALSO (as well as the output) there is no skipping or choppy playback. And that's all I have to do.

FACEPALM!

Hypothesis: Can I connect BOTH the Late AND Early '09 Mac Minis to the BT loudspeaker? YES!!! Apparently, this speaker that I've had since 2015 ACCEPTS MULTIPLE CONNECTIONS!!!!!

I always thought I had to disconnect one device in order to connect another! It will try and play both streams at once, but it gets choppy. No matter, I can connect more than ONE device at a time!

FACEPALM AGAIN!

So, yeah, because I never tried this I did all the other stuff which was trying to fix choppy playback, send sound through another device and NOT trying multiple connections!

I could have had this remedied a long time ago!!!!

 

[Tratkazir_the_1st]

Apparently, this speaker that I've had since 2015 ACCEPTS MULTIPLE CONNECTIONS!!!!!

RTFM or what?

 

[eyoungren]

RTFM or what?

Well see, that's where it proved I was an idiot. I've had plenty of time to look up a manual for the speaker.

I got it as an 'accessory' from Sprint when I was upgrading phones in 2015 so I never paid attention.

 

[TheShortTimer]

View attachment 2090329
converting games for my wii and listening to music on the tube

Are you using WBFS to convert the ISO files to actual discs that the Wii can boot and run? I have a Homebrew modded Wii and come to think of it, also a Wii-U which I haven't really done much with and should get around to exploring its potential.

What have I done with an early Intel Mac lately?

With the help of my 13" 2011 MBP running High Sierra, I obtained a video but then discovered that the audio track hadn't included and would need to be muxed. My immediate instinct was to use Avidemux because it makes short work of such tasks.

With the video ready for muxing, it's time to add the (AAC) M4A audio file...

A no-go it seems.

Not to worry, where GUI apps fail, FFMPEG via the Terminal prevails!

Let the muxing commence...

A couple of minutes later and the processing is complete.

Let's check out the codec details in VLC.

Everything appears to be ok and it plays perfectly too: with the audio included.

On a side note, this machine is my DD and I can see it struggling at times due to what I suspect is a dire need for more RAM. At present it has the stock 4GB and I'd like to expand this. Can anyone tell me what is the max (unofficial) capacity that it can be expanded to and recommend compatible RAM? Preferably also including an exact brand - because I ran into problems years back when I attempted to do this with my 2012 15" MBP and purchased 16GB of memory that used the correct frequency but still didn't work and caused instant crashes at the desktop.

Thanks a bunch!

 

[theMarble]

I have 12GB (8GB + 4GB) in my 2011 13". The max is 16GB 1333MHz. Even in Snow Leopard, more than Apple's max of 8GB works perfectly fine.

The 4GB stick is a Crucial SODIMM DDR3 1333MHz (PC-10600), and the 8GB stick is a Nanya SODIMM DDR3 1600MHz (PC-12800). The Nanya stick downclocks to 1333MHz so they are both the same.

 

[TheShortTimer]

I have 12GB (8GB + 4GB) in my 2011 13". The max is 16GB 1333MHz. Even in Snow Leopard, more than Apple's max of 8GB works perfectly fine.

The 4GB stick is a Crucial SODIMM DDR3 1333MHz (PC-10600), and the 8GB stick is a Nanya SODIMM DDR3 1600MHz (PC-12800). The Nanya stick downclocks to 1333MHz so they are both the same.

Thanks for the heads up. It gives me peace of mind that if the exact same brand and config works on your machine then it means I'll be fine. I've managed to purchase the Crucial 4GB stick and I'm waiting on a seller to respond to an offer on their 8GB Nanya RAM.

 

[eyoungren]

It's raining today, which is appropriate I guess.

I'm doing my thing and the 23" Cinema Display on the right decides to go black. So, I'm thinking, okay, this display has not done this before, but unplug the cable from the power supply and plug it back in. That's happened with one of my 30" Cinemas (freaked me out the first time). But no joy.

Testing reveals that the power brick is just fine, the display is getting signal but there's no picture. So, it's got to be the display. I don't like it, but I'll deal until I can afford to replace it. There are five other displays.

But, since I added the 20" Cinema, I had not rebooted. So I decided to do that…and that's when I discovered my new 6TB drive is not showing up. DU doesn't see it at all. When I first installed it, SmartReporter was telling me that it had a high number of hours. I thought that odd because this was a seller refurbed drive.

I've contacted the seller in any case, two days shy of their 30day return window. We'll see what happens.

 

[mectojic]

I suspect the hard drive, but IDK. Most of us know how finicky G3s can be.

The G4 'NAS' is still performing, albeit with a two-channel PCI-SATA card now.

I’ve actually invested more time, energy and money into my G3 B&W than any other Mac- and sadly, it still disappoints. I much prefer the G4 Sawtooth in so many ways, especially the reliability. I bet yours will continue to serve you a couple more years.