EricJD Posted August 16, 2007 Share Posted August 16, 2007 (My quote from another forum) I have two iMac G3's (both DV) here at home, one has a bad screen and the other has a bad motherboard. (or so says the person I got them from) So I took the bad motherboard out of the one and replaced it with the good one from the iMac with the bad screen. It boots up, but it shows a purplish-blue screen with a folder icon flashing between the Finder icon and a question mark. I assume this means there is no operating system installed? So I tried putting in my Panther install disc, and it got to the white screen with a gray Apple logo and the spinning "loading" indicator. Then the Apple changed into a circle with a line through it (like a do not enter sign). It also did the same with my Tiger install disc. Does anyone here have any idea what's wrong? The people at the other forum suggested that I first install Mac OS 9, update the firmware, then install OS X. So I downloaded an OS 9 installer, "Mac OS 9.2.2.dmg" from a Torrent site (not sure if I'm allowed to link to it or not), converted it to an ISO using UltraISO, burned it to a CD, and stuck it in my iMac. Nothing seems to happen, it still just shows the purplish screen mentioned in my quote. I also tried holding C to boot to CD-ROM, still nothing happened. Do you guys have any recommendations? Link to comment https://www.insanelymac.com/forum/topic/60284-imac-g3-problems/ Share on other sites More sharing options...
Colonel Posted August 16, 2007 Share Posted August 16, 2007 Did you burn it at the slowest speed? Link to comment https://www.insanelymac.com/forum/topic/60284-imac-g3-problems/#findComment-428607 Share on other sites More sharing options...
EricJD Posted August 16, 2007 Author Share Posted August 16, 2007 Did you burn it at the slowest speed? Yep. Tried that; same result. Link to comment https://www.insanelymac.com/forum/topic/60284-imac-g3-problems/#findComment-428922 Share on other sites More sharing options...
A Nonny Moose Posted August 16, 2007 Share Posted August 16, 2007 Boot it while holding down the option key. If you can't see any disks, there isn't a system folder for it to boot from or it got yuckified. Link to comment https://www.insanelymac.com/forum/topic/60284-imac-g3-problems/#findComment-429283 Share on other sites More sharing options...
Yaris Posted August 23, 2007 Share Posted August 23, 2007 Was it a .toast file? Link to comment https://www.insanelymac.com/forum/topic/60284-imac-g3-problems/#findComment-433395 Share on other sites More sharing options...
Escape311 Posted August 29, 2007 Share Posted August 29, 2007 The image you downloaded was probably just the OS 9 install disc for installing within OS X. The original OS 9 disc has a boot file located on it. Some of the OS 9 install discs were specific to the machine you were installing on. I used to have the file but have since lost it and can't find it anymore. What OS was on the hard drive initially? If it was OS 9, you may need to get that running before you can upgrade firmware to install OS X. If you keep trying to install OS X BEFORE the firmware is upgraded, you may turn your iMac into more of a brick than it already is to you. You can always "borrow" an OS 9 disc if you know someone that has one or buy one fairly cheap. Otherwise, If someone else you know has a similar iMac that runs OS 9, you can put YOUR hard drive in an external USB enclosure, plug it into their Mac(with OS 9 running), and copy their whole system folder, library, etc over to YOUR hard drive. It should boot your iMac then. I had to do this with an 333MHz iMac I had. Link to comment https://www.insanelymac.com/forum/topic/60284-imac-g3-problems/#findComment-438039 Share on other sites More sharing options...
Recommended Posts