02-14-2005, 11:58 AM

Hey all, I am wanting to get a Imac g4 20" Cause I think they look really cool. Anyway I bought the case off eBay for $70, and now am trying to find the mobo and lcd screen. I did see one on eBay for $175 and the monitor for $299 (is this a good deal?) I have a hard drive and a DVD burner that I will pull out of my windows box. I really want to switch to Mac, and am trying to find a cheap way of doing it while still building my own. Anyway to my question this will work if I buy the components and put everything together or am I forgetting something for this imac to function. Let me know

02-14-2005, 02:40 PM

Hello and welcome to Mac forums.

So a few questions to start with, what did you actually get with the case ? Just a motherboard with nothing else ?
Anyway, putting a different harddrive is no problem but the DVD burner could cause a few headaches as it will have to have a supported driver built in.
Whats a mobo? if its the motherboard then thats going to be difficult to get hold of. You will probably be better off going for a Mac Mini in this case as Macs don't tend to come in bits, certainly sound like a fun project. You could always get a mac mini and put it in the imac case then rig it up to the LCD with the VGA connection. Let us know how you get on and send some pictures, if you can.

02-14-2005, 08:31 PM

Well with the case was the power supply and the back of the monitor housing (not the front which i cant find). I did find the Logic board (which i called a mobo) on ebay and am wondering if i should buy it. I was just going to use a external monitor until i can find a lcd cheap enought to put in it. What dvd burner would work with the mac? I will get some pics 4 u guys also. Thanks for the reply

02-17-2005, 10:41 PM

If I were to just order the logic board and hold off on the lcd, Would i be able to use the imac on a external display using the vga adapter, or will that only work if you have the lcd to switch? I would need to install the os also, so if the logic board doesn't support the external display from boot i guess i would be screwed huh!

02-18-2005, 01:32 PM

I know that when I plug my computer into the TV to watch DVD's that it just starts up at the same time on the Tele, you don't have to click anything to get it working. I have never tried it while booting from an install CD but I will try it out later for you. If it works then I can't see any reason why having the LCD present would make any difference unless the motherboard would be first set up to sense the presence of an LCD display before starting.

02-18-2005, 06:18 PM

Yea please let me know if that cd works. Thanks again

02-19-2005, 05:14 AM

Just tried it out and it works fine from the boot CD and OS9 as well so It should be possible.