williamdlawrence

Q: can i use any usb optical drive with my g5 as my internal one has died

hello everyone, i have been given a apple imac g5 isight 2005 desktop, but the optical drive refuses to work with dvds or the apple boot disk, it just chucks them out again, its fine with cds. what i want to know is can i use any usb optical drive with this computer, as i want to upgrade it from Tiger osx 10-4-2 to Leopard osx 10-5-2. this is my first foray into apple, as i have built and used windows based pcs for years.

many thanks in anticipation

bill lawrence

iMac, Mac OS X (10.4.2)

Posted on May 28, 2013 7:56 AM

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Q: can i use any usb optical drive with my g5 as my internal one has died

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  • by WZZZ,Helpful

    WZZZ WZZZ May 28, 2013 8:22 AM in response to williamdlawrence
    Level 6 (13,112 points)
    Mac OS X
    May 28, 2013 8:22 AM in response to williamdlawrence

    You should be able to use any. Check out OWC, macsales.com

  • by Jeff,Helpful

    Jeff Jeff May 28, 2013 8:51 AM in response to williamdlawrence
    Level 6 (11,559 points)
    May 28, 2013 8:51 AM in response to williamdlawrence

    If you're adventurous, you could attempt replacing the internal optical drive with one from Other World Computing.  This is an Apple/OEM drive, made by Matshita/Panasonic.  It comes with installation instructions, and there's a link on that page to their installation videos.  The only video I found there for an iMac G5 was for the non-iSight model, but it will give you a good idea of the difficulty involved and whether you'd want to try it.  Otherwise, I'd suggest an external drive - their multi-connectivity (eSATA/FireWire/USB) DVD±RW drive, since it provides the Mac-preferred booting by FireWire.  It has been my experience that some third-party drives don't respond to the keyboard command or the Startup Manager, when attempting to boot from the optical drive.  In addition to the optical drive itself, the controller chip used on the enclosure's bridge board makes a difference, in terms of Mac-compatibility.  OWC chooses and tests their products accordingly.  You could try a less-expensive, third-party USB 2.0 DVD±RW drive from a PC/electronics store and see if it's bootable, but there's no way to tell in advance unless the manufacturer's specs indicate such.  If you buy an optical drive from OWC, I'd take them up on their $29.00 special on the "Toast Titanium 11" software.  For Macs, it's the best choice in CD/DVD burning software.  

  • by williamdlawrence,

    williamdlawrence williamdlawrence May 28, 2013 12:07 PM in response to WZZZ
    Level 1 (0 points)
    May 28, 2013 12:07 PM in response to WZZZ

    many thanks.

  • by williamdlawrence,

    williamdlawrence williamdlawrence May 28, 2013 12:12 PM in response to Jeff
    Level 1 (0 points)
    May 28, 2013 12:12 PM in response to Jeff

    many thanks, i will probably try a cheap one as i cant afford much, and i live in england, so the postage is high. i have already tried to get the mac appart but it is not like the g5, you cant get the back off, the whole front case comes off and it is very difficult to access any of the drives. again many thanks for replying

    bill

  • by williamdlawrence,Solvedanswer

    williamdlawrence williamdlawrence Aug 17, 2013 2:28 PM in response to williamdlawrence
    Level 1 (0 points)
    Aug 17, 2013 2:28 PM in response to williamdlawrence

    i tried a cheap usb drive and it works fine but it wont boot from startup with the c key.i have now purchsed a apple dvd drive from ebay and installed it in the mac, it was much easier than i thought it would be and it is up and running ok. so alls well that ends well.