Q: Install PPC Panther to external drive on Intel Mac
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Mar 14, 2016 1:10 PMby Kenichi Watanabe,The solution is to figure out why it does not work (as it should) while the drive is installed in the iMac. You're not going to get it to work using the MacBook, because it cannot run software that is for PowerPC Macs.
Is the Panther installation disc a retail disc? That is, a disc sold separately in a box for all supported Mac models. NOT a disc that came with a specific Mac model. If I recall, the retail disc for Panther is black with a big silver X, and it's a disc set, not just a single disc. If you have a grey disc, that is a disc that came with a specific Mac model, and it may not work with your iMac.
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Mar 14, 2016 2:33 PMby Kostsei,Actually I would love to make it work without involving MacBook cause I have to take the hard drive to the office where I can connect it to power cord from the old PC, while connecting IDE to Mac USB via adapter, making all those manipulations under the table cause the adapter cord is too short...
But can't understand what causes this problem. I've read really a lot of topics and discussions and still don't understand. I thought it was PRAM battery, so I replaced it, I thought it was firmware, so I checked it and it was up to date. I reset the PRAM. What else could it be?
Yes, I have a 3 CD retail OS X 10.3 + 1 CD with XTools. And after all it begins to install and proceeds until checking the hard drive consistency (whatever that means). But I don't think that there could be any problem with the HD, cause I was able to install OS 8.5, 9.2 and OS X 10.1 without any difficulties and I've verified it with Disk Utility several times both on iMac and as external Drive on MacBook, so the HD is definitely fine.
One more detail — once when I was physically ejecting the flash from the keyboard USB, the iMac got kernel panic and asked to reboot. Don't know if that's connected to the cause of the topic.
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Mar 14, 2016 3:06 PMby Kenichi Watanabe,When you start up from the Panther installation CD #1, do you get to the Installer screen (where you can run Disk Utility from the menu bar)?
Since you have a large second partition, would you be OK with backing up your data to the second partition, then erasing the small startup partition before installing Panther on it?
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Mar 14, 2016 3:26 PMby Kostsei,It works from time to time, the first several times I've tried to boot from install CD (holding C) it only went light gray screen with the logo and froze, than I started the install from OS 10.1 and it worked fine up to checking HD consistency. Today I've changed one RAM chip (64MB) to new one 256MB (10.1 boots fine and sees 384MB of RAM. But as I try to install Panther it once got kernel panic once again with the text:
panic(cpu 0): Unable to find driver for this platform: "iMac".
The next time it started the installer but froze as I tried to run the Disk Utility, the next several times it froze either on white screen with logo, or white screen or in the language choose...
I have no info on this HD and I've already erased it a few times.
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Mar 14, 2016 3:50 PMby Kenichi Watanabe,Did you previously install the firmware update for tray-loader iMac G3?
iMac Firmware Update 1.2: Document and Software
If the drive is already erased, you may want to lower size of the smaller partition a bit. Maybe closer to 7.5GB. That would have no impact on the problem of not being able to start up from the Panther installation disc reliably.
Visually inspect the Panther installation disc. If it has a small scratch (or smudge), that could cause the problem. The optical drive often goes bad on those iMacs. Does the 10.1 installation disc still start up reliably?
This old article at LowEndMac provides relevant information
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Mar 14, 2016 4:08 PMby Kostsei,Yes, I've tried to install it, had to reinstall OS 9.2 especially for it, but it checked and said my firmware is up to date.
The CD seems fine, no scratches. The optical drive is fine as well, cause I installed 3 different OS from 3 different CDs maybe 5-7 times already. The problem is that everything works absolutely fine except for Panther install. I have installed 8.5 and it worked nice, I've installed 9.2, than upgraded to 10.1 — not a single problem. After I've got this problem with upgrading to Panther, I thought that I need to update the firmware, so I've erased disk once more and reinstalled 9.2, than I've installed 10.1 again — everything worked fine and 10.1 boots and works fine still. But when I try to install Panther the problems begin. The iMac either gets unresponsive or gets kernel panic.
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Mar 14, 2016 4:54 PMby Kenichi Watanabe,HelpfulKernel panic could be related to RAM. You mentioned adding a 256mb module. I would try starting up from the Panther installation disc and running the installation with just the 128mb module installed. After the installation and initial startup/setup completes, add the 256mb module back, and see if it continues to run properly.
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Mar 14, 2016 4:51 PMby Kostsei,It seems to work so far, thanks!
I could start Disk Utility and it found 2 errors on both partitions. The system partition has "invalid leaf record count (it should be 24 instead of 0)" and the other partition goes "invalid B-tree Header". Unfortunately Disk Utility can't repair these errors. How critical are they?
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Mar 14, 2016 5:06 PMby Kenichi Watanabe,Any error reported by Disk Utility should be taken seriously, especially when you are about to install a major upgrade on the volume. You should erase the partitions (or at least the small partition). Then, run the full Panther installation on a freshly erased volume. Installation on an empty volume is simpler and goes faster.
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Mar 14, 2016 7:06 PMby Kostsei,Before your latest reply I've searched for these errors and found that they could be repaired via fsck in single user mode. But they cannot. After that I decided to erase the disk because anyway I have no info on it, but iMac began to hang again, most of the time I can't even reach the Disk Utility, and those few times I could it also hanged before I could erase the disk... Rebooted about 10+ times already, usually it freezes on white screen with logo. Current OS boots fine.
Buy the way, should the optical drive be so noisy? I think it makes far more noise with Panther install CD than other CDs I've used.
I guess I'll try one more time and if no success I'd go to bed cause it's 5AM here already. Need to sleep.
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Mar 14, 2016 9:12 PMby Kenichi Watanabe,When you start up from the disc, it tends to sound somewhat different, because the (minimal) OS is on the disc so it gets accessed more than when you start up from the hard drive to run some software installer on a disc. However, it's also possible that the disc is not well-balanced, causing it to vibrate when it spins. I suppose that would be a bigger problem in an OS installation disc, because the system is starting up from it. Taking it out of the drive and "re-seating" it may help. It loads on a "tray," but it's not like typical BIG tray-loading optical drives (it's more like older optical drives used in laptops).
I seem to recall putting some tape (like Scotch tape) on the disc (the labeled side of course) at various locations to see if could balance it better, to keep a particular disc from being so noisy.
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Mar 15, 2016 4:01 AMby Kostsei,In the morning I tried installation again, started Disk Utility, re-partitioned and erased disks, than verified and errors were gone. Than the install went fine up to 85% (of the first part?) going slower and slower until it hung again at 85%... I begin to think that this iMac simply cannot run Panther install and the only way is to install it via the other PPC Mac that has 3.5 IDE.
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Mar 15, 2016 3:06 PMby Kostsei,Tried install 2 times more, but the result is always the same — iMac becomes unresponsive during the process of writing files.
I erased and verified the disk before the install, there are no errors. But as the process goes it becomes more and more slower and hangs at 70-85%. The CD stops spinning. Than I tried to uncheck some installation items like printer drivers and additional languages, but that resulted in a message that there were errors in the install and the process hanged at 6%.
Does the install supposed to go slower and slower? Is it normal?
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Mar 15, 2016 3:22 PMby Kenichi Watanabe,Obviously, it should normally work. The installation disc may be bad or "bad enough" for your iMac's optical drive. Since you have an Intel Mac with an optical drive, maybe you can make a copy of the Panther installation disc (#1 only) onto a CDR (CDR would be better than a CDRW for this purpose). Create an disk image of the original, then burn it. Normally, you should not copy the installation disc, but you obviously own an original disc, you are not doing it for the purpose of giving it to someone. See if starting up from the copied disc works any better.
