help upgrading old imac?

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Hi all~

I made an impulse purchase on ebay in the wee hours of the morning last night... And I'm trying to salvage my mistake :)

I have an antiquated ibook G3 that I'm trying to use while i'm returning to school, but my itunes library and photo collection have taken over the 40 GB harddrive. So, I initially planned (can one really plan at 3 am with an impulse buy??) to utilize the extra computer for music storage. But I neglected to notice that the harddrive is only 4 GB. That won't even hold 1/4 of my music.

Is there a cheap way to upgrade the hard drive on a student budget? Also, the imac doesn't come with any software disks. Can I use my old ibook software disks? If not, what kind am I looking for on ebay?

Thanks a ton for any help given... this could be a fun project, but i'm worried about the cost. Is it financially plausible...

Oh, my only experience with the insides of computers is that 10 years ago, I worked as a PC tech assembling desktops. I've never done jack with a mac before.

i've cut and paste the specs from the 'new-to-me' imac below:


Product Family: iMac Memory (RAM): 320 MB
Processor Type: PowerPC G3 Hard Drive Capacity: 4 GB
Processor Speed: 350 MHz Operating System: Mac OS 10.2, Jaguar
Processor Configuration: Single Screen Size: 14 inches
Condition: Used
System Version: Mac OS X 10.2.8(6R73)
Boot Volume: Mac OS X
Kernel Version: Darwin Kernel Version 6.8: Wed Sep 10 15:20:55 PDT 2003; root:xnu/xnu-344.49.obj~2/RELEASE_PPC


Hardware Overview

Machine speed: 350 MHz
Bus speed: 100 MHz
Number of processors: 1
L2 cache size: 512K
Machine model: iMac (version = 2.2)
Boot ROM info: 4.1.9f1
Customer serial number: XA004138-HZA-ff01

Memory Overview

Location Type Size
DIMM0/J13 SDRAM 256 MB
DIMM1/J14 SDRAM 64 MB
 
OP
Paddler123
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I forgot to ask... is there anything else hardware wise I can upgrade in this imac cheaply?
 
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Your Mac's Specs
Quad 2.8GHz Mac Pro, Edge iPhone
eBay is your best bet for hardware upgrades. Really all you will be able to upgrade if wanting better graphics, etc is to buy a whole new logic board (processor and motherboard are one.)
I just got an iMac G3 350MHz from someone at work. Here's the deal...
I'd take apart the bottom of the computer first to see if you can upgrade the logic board. I was told by someone on eBay that you can't use the faster logic boards like 500MHz to 700MHz on the 350's and slower because there is no heat sink pad on the chassis. I took my 350 apart and it had one. The processor is facing the inside of the iMac so you need to remove the logic board to confirm this. If you had the pad, you should be able to upgrade no problem. I haven't tried it yet, nor do I care anymore.
As for other items, if you can find a slot loading drive from other iMacs maybe upgrading that would be good. Upgrading the RAM is possible to 1GB, 2- 512MB of PC100 RAM. The hard drive can be upgraded. Any IDE hard drive works. Try tigerdirect.com They have the lowest prices I can find for hard drives (usually). I shop in their store a lot and haven't had a problem.
Which OS are you using? I assume you will have 10.3 for the latest version of iTunes so go with whatever HD you want but try and spend as much on RAM as you can. It's an old computer and will need plenty to keep iTunes and OSX purring. I think OSX works fine at 320MB of RAM.
hmm, I doubt iBook discs will work on an iMac. PM me if you are interested in the OS 9 discs for this machine. I picked up a set for $3 on eBay. If this machine already has OS X, no worries.
Good luck.
Bryan
 
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Your Mac's Specs
iMac G3 350MHz, 256MB Ram, OS X 10.3.9
If you need easy space, buy one of those external hard drives, they are on sale at Best Buy currently. Always a alternative way to get more space.
 
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the 350 iMac does not have firewire, only USB1.1. I don't know any externals that function that slow.
 

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