iMac G3 — a restored family heirloom
This is my Dad’s old iMac G3.
Old technology can induce nostalgia, that a fact. In my case, that’s usually in relation to my experience with the old machine. Maybe the games I used to play on the machine, or the work I did at university and the late nights spent writing assignments. Sometimes it reminds me of happy times on BBS systems at 3am, chatting with people in the days before the internet. In this case, though, it’s a different type of nostalgia.
I was never an Apple user. My first computer was a ZX Spectrum, followed by 2 versions of the Commodore Amiga, and then numerous Windows machines. I didn’t get my first Apple Mac until 2018. My Dad, however, was a Mac fan. He used them at work, and borrowed one that sat on the table in our living room for some years — a beige 68030 based machine. And then in around 1999, he bought his own — this machine, a 2nd generation slot-loading iMac G3, in teal. At the time, it was a lovely machine that baffled me. It came with a quick setup guide (about 6 images, if I remember rightly) and no other manual included because it was meant to be so easy to set up, although I do distinctly remember spending some significant time trying to connect the thing up with an Internet provider called ‘Freeserve’ and failing, because of a persistent error message. We eventually set up an account with Virgin internet. Yes, these were the days of dialup internet and 56k modems.
That sums up my experience with this machine. It sat in Dad’s home office/spare room/art studio for years, and he did whatever he did with it. Eventually, Dad passed away, and frankly I didn’t think much about the machine at all. Until my sister happened to mention she had ‘Dad’s old Mac’ and given I had a collection of old computers, did I want it? Well, yes — although I presumed she meant his MacBook Pro, so when I turned up to collect it I was rather excited, I admit. Although I did put my back out lifting it — genuinely, I forgot just how heavy old CRT monitors are, it’s been so long since I saw one!
This thing had been sat in a shed for some time. I had no expectation it would work. So, I left it for a fortnight to dry, and plugged it in. Yes, it was emitting rather a high-pitched noise, but… it worked! It actually booted up, probably for the first time in years. Which left me a dilemma of sorts because this machine had a lot of Dad’s old personal files. His MacBook Pro (which I had also acquired) had been deleted and reformatted because I wasn’t keen on looking at anything on there, same as I did with my Uncle’s old 2007 iMac which I’d also inherited around the same time. It’s like reading somebody’s diary. It felt like snooping. With this machine, however, there was 23 years of history recorded on the hard drive, so yes, I did have a look.
For the tech-nerds amongst you (and the next bit will be a bit tech-y, there’s no way around that!); It has an old IBM Power PC processor running at 350Mhz, was running Mac Classic OS 9.0, and had Adobe Photoshop installed. Turns out he had numerous photographs of family, nephews, grandchildren, graduation photos. Also on there were all the newsletters for the residential complex where he lived. Fascinating stuff! Best of all, though, was an invoice to Hull City Council. Dad was commissioned to paint a portrait of a councillor (still hanging in Hull’s Guildhall) and the original invoice for the work was still on the machine! An important record of how much he undercharged them, truthfully, but quite fascinating.
So, what to do next? I took a copy of the files. It seems you can open most of them on ‘LibreOffice’ on a modern computer, so I put them all on an SD card. I then set about updating the machine. It was freezing erratically, so I did a strip-down and replaced the parts one at a time to see if I could get to the bottom of what the problem was. First, the hard drive (which was making all the noise) got replaced with a modern SSD, and the machine was now silent. Then came a memory upgrade to the full 256Mb that it’s capable of using. I also replaced the ‘PRAM’ battery, so it keeps a record of the correct date and time. It didn’t stop the freezing issue, sadly, and I do think it needs the capacitors replacing, although it does run VERY hot and I doubt that’s helping. I also stripped the case down, carefully. Old iMac cases are rather brittle, but Dad was a heavy smoker and it was very yellow. I cleaned the lot in soapy water, and polished the plastics with Polycarbonate polish, designed for car headlights. So at least it looks clean and shiny!
The next upgrade was to Mac Classic OS 9.2.2. My plan was to keep it as original as possible, at least in appearance, but after a while I decided to just go for it. Classic OS wasn’t connecting to the internet via the ethernet connection and the filesystem wasn’t compatible with modern Macs, meaning swapping files between machines was a pain. I installed the latest OS it would run, Mac OS X 10.4.11, which required a firmware update. It now has iWork 05, AppleWorks 05, iLife 05 (with GarageBand!) and is as up-to-date as I can get it. It seems to have helped with the freezing issue, but it hasn’t gone away, and eventually I’m going to have to find somebody who can replace capacitors. That isn’t easy on this machine.
What exactly is the point of all this? Yes, it’s slow compared to modern computers. One of the speakers has blown, which is a common issue on 23-year-old iMacs. It’s cost me a few quid in parts. Put simply, it’s Dad’s legacy. It’s his old machine, which he used to write letters, edit newsletters, create invoices, edit photographs. He probably sent emails (I’ve not read any of those, some things are too personal). It was his machine, and it’s as important to me as if I’d inherited a Rolex, or some piece of antique furniture. It’s a link to my past. It’s now my job to look after it. I’m doing my best!
If you have an old Mac G3, I highly recommend (and owe thanks to) the following;
Macintosh Repository — for old software
Mac G3 Facebook group — loads of knowledgable people on here to help with your questions;
