PowerMac G3 AIO System Questions...

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My friend was just recently given a couple of odd looking PowerMac units. They look like the predecessors to the original iMac, even though they came out apparently after the iMacs had hit the scene.

The Macs are a PowerMac G3 233Mhz AIO (All-In-One) and a PowerMac G3 266Mhz AIO with 64Mb Ram, 4Gb hard disks, 24x CD-Roms, 100Mb Zip Drives, and the 266 System has the A/V Stereo Line Level in/outs on the back. They both seem to work, and we're going to be working on them tonight, getting them up and running with at least OS 9.2.2. This will be my friend's first, real Mac experience. It's not what I'd like to show him, as I think he'd fall in love with OS X, but you gotta start somewhere.

What I'm wondering is, if it's possible to add USB and Firewire cards to these Macs. Memory and Hard disk upgrades are a snap, but knowing what kind of cards can be put in them has me lost. If there's anyone out there familiar with those two models, I would appreciate any help you may be able to provide me.
 
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Check this link for info:
http://www.lowendmac.com/ppc/g3aio.shtml

If I remember well, there's somebody here on this forum that has an AIO too, and runs OS X on it...I don't remember the name though...
 
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Avalon said:
If I remember well, there's somebody here on this forum that has an AIO too, and runs OS X on it...I don't remember the name though...

That would be me. :D Both of those machines will run OS X nicely (especially Panther by way of XPostFacto) as long as you upgrade the RAM. To answer the original question, you can indeed install a USB/Firewire card in the machines, although I personally haven't done so yet. From my research, most cards will work fine, although some have warned against using Belkin cards because of some issues that sometimes occur. Also, most AIO owners suggest that you install the card before you reinstall whatever OS you'll be running, so that the installer "detects" the card and you don't end up with driver issues.

I'm actually a bit excited to meet another AIO owner here. They're great machines, and I love mine every bit as much as my 1 year old iBook. You're right, they were basically the predecessor to the iMac (the iMacs came later), and they were only available to "education" buyers for a brief production run of roughly 6 months. Some upgrades I'd suggest to get the most out of an AIO for the least cost would be the following:

- Upgrade the RAM to as much as you can afford. Mine ran nicely with 256 MB, but I now have 768 MB. 512 MB would probably be quite sufficient. The machine will accept a max of (3) 256 MB sticks.

- If you want to keep the original video card, upgrade the VRAM. I found my 4 MB VRAM chip on eBay for less than $10 shipped, and it helps smooth things out a bit, especially running OS X.

- Overclock the processor. My machine began as a 233 MHz, and I first OC'd it to 266 MHz. After running for a while like that, I decided to go to 300 MHz, and it is very stable at that speed. The only other precaution I took was to put some Arctic Silver thermal paste between the heat sink and the processor, to help keep the temperature down. However, it ran at 300 MHz without any problems even before I did this. OC'ing is extremely easy to do simply by changing the jumper settings on the mother board.

- Upgrade the hard drive. Mine is a 20 GB, and OS X must be installed on the first 8 GB partition of the HDD.

- Install OS X. I'd suggest Panther, which will require a free application called XPostFacto, but the process is very easy.

That's a quick list for now, and I apologize for the long post. I guess I just got a bit carried away since it's rare to find another AIO owner here. :)
 

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I have the beige G3. It has a 233Mhz processor, 384MB of RAM and 40GB interanl hard drive. I have it running OS X 10.1.5 and OS 9.2.2 at this time. I also have installed a firewire/usb PCI card in it. I have not done what Padawan has done to his. I may upgrade it to Panther, I just don't have the time right now. With the last items on my honey do list.
 
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rman said:
I may upgrade it to Panther, I just don't have the time right now.

You'll be very happy once you do, and also sorry that you waited so long. :D
 
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Ugh, well, the 233 is pretty much dead. It just makes a loud sssshhhhck noise from the speakers over and over again, dark screen, nothing else.

But the 266 works. Boots up, updated it to 9.2.2 and it works, but for some reason, the CD-Rom stopped working. System Profiler doesn't see it, and I've rebooted numerous time, to no avail. The CD-Rom, which had been working when I updated, now fails to even show up. I've tried restarting off the CD-Rom, but holding down the C key doesn't make it see the CD-Rom either. I'm thinking a zap of the PRAM will work, but who knows. I'll keep you posted.
 
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Did you try to swap the CD-drives from the dead 233? Maybe it's just the drive that's faulty, as it has some age already...
Anyway, keep the 233, for the spare parts, I'm sure some parts may still be used.

@Padawan:
Yes, it was you I was referring to. ;)
Is the G3 CPU on a daughtercard (like in the beige G3) or on a ZIF-socket (like the B&W G3)?
Because in both cases, you can uprade the CPU to a faster G3 or even a G4
 
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Avalon said:
Did you try to swap the CD-drives from the dead 233? Maybe it's just the drive that's faulty, as it has some age already...

That's one of the first things we did. The 233 may not be dead after all. But for now we're going to just concentrate on the 266. After swapping the drives, we still couldn't bring up the CD-Rom, so I decided to contort my fingers and perform the Zapping of the PRAM (Command+Option+P+R+power) and oddly enough, it didn't do the 3 reboots, just one and then it came up to a Rebuild Desktop prompt. I said "what the ****" and clicked OK. After that, Voila! The CD Rom FINALLY shows up. I was at last able to reboot off the install CD, wipe the hard drive clean, and install a full install of OS 9.2.2. Whew!

I have to say, I love the way the inside of the AIO is setup. Other than the cables, it's nicely setup, everything is easily accessible, even swapping the CD-Roms took minimal effort. We're going to look for memory to max this machine out, and we already have a 20Gb drive to use when we're ready to do all the upgrades. Oh yeah, we also popped a dual USB PCI card in there and it saw it right off the bat. My friend, whose experiences with Macs is limited, was very impressed with that. I'm pretty excited to get him using OS X Panther as soon as possible. He's like I was right around when I switched, and hopefully this won't be his last Mac. Time will tell.

Anyhow, That's the latest. I'm supposed to go back over again tonight after work and get some more software up and running on his computer. We'll start searching for the upgrades and get set on the path to Panther. As before, I'll keep you posted. Thanks again for the help, and Padawan, I'll be picking your brain for info over time. :)

Avalon said:
Is the G3 CPU on a daughtercard (like in the beige G3) or on a ZIF-socket (like the B&W G3)? Because in both cases, you can uprade the CPU to a faster G3 or even a G4

It's on a ZIF socket, so yes, you should be able to upgrade the processor. I was thinking of checking Other World Computing for upgrades in that respect, but that's not a primary concern right now.
 
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Padawan said:
- If you want to keep the original video card, upgrade the VRAM. I found my 4 MB VRAM chip on eBay for less than $10 shipped, and it helps smooth things out a bit, especially running OS X.

If we wanted to install a better video card, which card would you recommend? Also, would it be possible to install a better processor for this AIO Mac? My friend is curious as to how you would overclock the current processor (266Mhz G3) and if anyone sells an upgrade processor that would work.

Thanks again Padawan. So far he's having a blast with it so far. We did a clean initialization of the HD and did a straight install of OS 9.2.2. We'll be replacing the current HD with a 20Gb when we add the Max Ram (768Mb) and upgrade the video. He wants OS X soon. :) It didn't take much, he's hooked. hehehehe
 
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imac bondie blue 233mhz 320mb ram 2 meg vram 4gig HD and a Beige G3 A/V 266 OCed to 300mhz 64mb ram
sonnettech.com has upgrades for the beige g3s anything that will work in the mt or the dt will work in the aio i am going to mod my dads that i got him i already oced it and i am working on getting ram and a copy of 10.3.5 from my teach at the local vo tech

i like those All in ones because it confuses people at comp usa when i look for parts i picked one up for about $25 if anyone wants one i can talk to the guy i got mine off of.
 
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Did you check the date of the post?? Why are you bringing that old post up again?
 
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i thought it was fresh i did just join here yesterday
 

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