installing a new hard drive. How to make installer dvd from current OS

Question

Level 3

610 points

installing a new hard drive. How to make installer dvd from current OS

I have a iMac G5 (PPC). 2004 when I got it. And have the original HD. 150 GB. Following Murphy's Law this HD is due for failure. I have bought a 1 TB. new hard drive to install on this machine. I forgot which OS came with it (10.3) I think. My set up is that I back up my iMac G5 (PPC) to a external Hard drive (300GB) with Time Machine. I have updated thru software update to 10.5.8. But have no DVD installer for 10.5.8.

How can I make an installer for my new hard drive? Or should I partition new 1TB hard drive with the same amount of space as my time machine back up? I may not put everything on current system on new drive.

iMac G5, Mac OS X (10.5)

Posted on Feb 3, 2013 8:36 AM

Reply

Answer 1

edex67

Level 4

3,255 points

Feb 3, 2013 9:36 AM in response to Donald Nixon

You can't update "thru software update" to 10.5.8, you must have purchased 10.5 at some point. If you've lost the DVD you have to buy Leopard again from eBay.

Reply

Answer 2

rccharles

Level 6

12,957 points

Feb 3, 2013 2:51 PM in response to Donald Nixon

If the old harddrive is working, why don't you copy the old to the new?

In Leopard, you can resize partitions without loosing data.

Here are two utilities for making a complete backup of your internal hard drive. I've recommend using one of these so that you can create a bootable system on your external hard drive. ( PPC require a firewire connected drive. ) Once created, you can run your system from the external drive. Hold down the option key on your keyboard then power on your machine. This will bring you in startup manager click on the drive image you wish to boot then click on the arrow key to the right.

"Clone, synchronize, backup. Schedule and forget it."

http://www.bombich.com/software/ccc.html

"SuperDuper is the wildly acclaimed program that makes recovery painless, because it makes creating a fully bootable backup painless."

http://www.shirt-pocket.com/SuperDuper/SuperDuperDescription.html

Reply

Answer 3

edex67

Level 4

3,255 points

Feb 4, 2013 12:14 AM in response to rccharles

Actually, that's a good idea. Use a USB or FireWire drive (be aware some PowerPC machines don't support USBbooting but some do).

Reply

Answer 4

MlchaelLAX

Level 4

2,286 points

Feb 4, 2013 11:32 AM in response to Donald Nixon

If you legitimately purchased Mac OS X Leopard 10.5, Apple may sell you a replacement DVD for $17. Call 1-800-SOS-APPL.

My nephew's MacBook Pro's optical drive chewed up my purchased retail Leopard DVD (don't ask; don't tell!) and Apple replaced it with a 10.5.6 DVD which I use and then used Software Update to get to 10.5.8.

BTW: I purchased quite a few iMac G5's from a company that was shutting its American offices, back in 2009. Many of these ultimately failed due to the bad capacitor problem that affected quite a few iMac G5's and Apple had extended their warranty for this purpose.

Luckily for me, my local Genuis bar got them fixed for free, even though the extended warranty had expired and I now doubt that Apple even warehouses this motherboard any more.

My last one required a replacement power supply, which I did in 2010; but when the HD failed in 2011, I decided it was time to retire it and buy a new Mac.

Lesson: don't put too much money into your iMac G5; as it can fail for more reasons than just HD.

Reply

Answer 5

Donald Nixon Author

Level 3

610 points

Feb 5, 2013 7:06 AM in response to Donald Nixon

I appreciate the forums help. Some good info. I do have Leopard 10.5 Install disk. According to the Install and guide instructions on page 12. I can do a clean Install and then use time machine to restore. Now in Time Machine there are options to update the complete disk or just user accounts info. I have complete. And will be up to date when I try this. Is Time Machine in 10.6,.7, .8 ?

Last question. Since I"m upgrading to a 1TB disk (I will never use that much) with 7200, 64mb Cache. And replacing a 150GB drive. Should I partition the new drive? Since my back up is 250 or 300 GB firewire. This machine will only boot from Firewire.

Thanks in advance

Reply

Answer 6

edex67

Level 4

3,255 points

Feb 5, 2013 8:40 AM in response to Donald Nixon

Time Machine is in all versions of OS X from 10.5 upward.

You could partition the drive, this would allow you to run concurrent OS X installs if you needed that, and that would be necessary to back up to the 300GB drive.

Reply

Answer 7

Donald Nixon Author

Level 3

610 points

Feb 18, 2013 1:44 PM in response to Donald Nixon

Update!

I finally got around to installing the new 1TB hard drive for my iMac G5. Partitioned drive with 3 partitions. It has been along day. Hard drive Install went smooth. Loaded Leapord 10.5 disk and hit install. Very early it ask if I wanted to restore from Time Machine or whatever and hit time machine. Worked great moving eveything over. Took about 2-3 hrs. I selected software update and 10.5.8 combo updater available as well as iTunes 10.6.3. AFter that another software update and 8 more items. After that 1 more update. Then I had to reinstall printer drivers (all in one Epson WF 500) as well as wireless apple mouse.

Works like a charm now. Happy I did this even though there was nothing wrong with original hard drive (150GB). It was aged since 2004. I'm glad it is finished. Don't want to go thru this again. Not with this computer.

Thanks for the help folks.

Reply