Welcome to the MacNN Forums.

jegiesek · Apr 19, 2006, 02:27 PM

I just got my hands on an old G4 that has been sitting around in a storeroom, not being used. When trying to start it I got a grey screen with a flashing question mark, I then tried starting it with an OS X 10.2 disk in the drive. The Mac then starts and displays the install dialog. I can go though the initial steps (though slowly), but when I get to choosing the destination for the installation there are no drives to choose from. What could be causing this? Is the hard drive damaged (or missing!)?

BigBadBiologist · Apr 19, 2006, 03:10 PM

Is there a harddrive in the system?

jegiesek · Apr 20, 2006, 03:30 AM

To be honest, I'm not sure. I don't know where it would be or what it looks like. I couldn't see any obvious spaces where it might have been. The only obvious thing that I thought might be amiss was a ribbon cable going from the motherboard to knowhere. I goes from next to where the power goes in (I think).

reader50 · Apr 20, 2006, 04:47 AM

Assuming that this is older than the last G4s (the Mirror Drive Door models), then this will be an accurate answer. The drives are installed on the bottom plates. The rearmost location is the default location, and can take two drives stacked.

jegiesek · Apr 20, 2006, 05:02 AM

Thanks reader50
I'll have to have another look later, but after looking at that pic I think the hard drive is probably missing

Do you think it's worth me trying to get a replacement, maybe on ebay?
I have a spare PC, don't suppose the hard drive from that could be used?

reader50 · Apr 20, 2006, 05:08 AM

Any 3.5-inch parallel ATA drive will work. Unless it's from another Mac, you will need to format it. Most of the possible models that you have cannot fully use drives larger than 128 GB. They would ignore the space beyond that limit.

Jumper the drive to Single (sometimes called Master Without Slave) for fastest bootup. Master or Slave will work too, but will result in a boot delay if only one drive is present. The system will figure two drives are present if you use either of those settings, and will search for the 'other' drive before continuing the boot process.

If you put two drives in, definitely use Master and Slave. Most of the models you might have do not support Cable Select.

jegiesek · 01:33 PM

Ok, I’ve taken the hard drive out of the PC (unfortunately its only 9GB), I don’t really understand the master and slave thing, but I do know I have an option of P3 and P5 on the connectors, which should I use?

BigBadBiologist · Apr 20, 2006, 02:50 PM

P3 and P5 don't really mean anything. For some reason apple (like old PCs) liked to number their power supply connectors.

On the drive itself, there should be a jumper block either next to the IDE cable or on the bottom of the drive. There should be settings for master, slave, or cable select (and sometimes also "master with slave present"). There should be a legend on the top of the drive to tell you where the jumpers should be to select the setting you want.

jegiesek · Apr 20, 2006, 03:09 PM

oh right, i see
Should I be looking at 16 heads, 15 heads, 2GB clip or Autospin disable?
(If I do have to move them, how do I get them out?)

reader50 · Apr 20, 2006, 04:17 PM

Your 9 GB is a very old drive, from the sound of those jumper options. I wouldn't touch any of the settings you mention. Assuming this will be the only drive in your G4 (for now anyway), just connect it as-is. If it's misconfigured, the worst that will happen with a single drive is your G4 will take a bit longer to boot.

In the future, if you have two drives installed, you will want to read up on HD configuration jumpers.

It sounds like you have never messed with hard drives before. So here are a few notes. Ones that are too obvious, just ignore. You haven't told us what model of G4 it is, or what your experience level is, so we're having to guess on the safe side.

The drive does not sit loosely on the bottom of your G4, there is a mounting plate. It fastens down with a single screw at the front, and lifts out. You use 4 screws to fasten the HD to the mounting plate from underneath. If a 2nd HD is added later on top, that one will fasten via 4 screws from the sides. In either case, you remove the mounting bracket in order to mount the hard drive(s) to it, then put the mounting bracket back in again.

It is a good idea to use an antistatic wrist strap whenever doing parts work inside a computer case. You can get one from Radio Shack (cat# 276-2397) for only a few bucks. Clip the ground lead on the strap to any metal part of the computer case.

After the drive's mounting bracket is screwed down into the case again, connect the data cable. It will only fit one way, and will be bent the right way already. Use any of the power cables. It doesn't matter which one, though an end one will be easier.

When you close the case, don't let any of the cables get pinched in the door hinge.

Considering how old the 9 GB HD is, it will be noisy and slow, along with being small. A newer drive will improve the system performance considerably.

Let us know how it goes.

reader50 · Apr 20, 2006, 05:50 PM

Note: if the data cable doesn't fit (too many pins) then don't force it. 9 GB was a common SCSI drive size, while ATA drives more typically came in the 10 GB size.

Your system will only accept ATA drives on the motherboard connector. A SCSI drive would require an interface card.

jegiesek · Apr 21, 2006, 03:11 AM

Thanks for all the information

The drive is ATA. It was showing just over 9GB while in the PC, but in the mac shows just under 10, so I guess it's actually 10GB.
I've booted the mac from a cd, and the drive is recognised, just waiting for a connector to arrive now so I can plug my PS2 keyboard in and erase/rename the drive.
Looking like it should work though..