Elfen's Rescued Macs

[Elfen]

A couple of years ago it was a Classic II I found in the trash, and after a recap, it works except for low audio.

Today, I found a HP Pavillion DV6 (an i7 core!) Laptop and a Mac G4 Mini. Both were apart and hard drives taken. I think I got all the screws and bits and pieces for them. The HP has a broken screen but plugging it to a monitor it went to BIOS! There is a huge dent on the back (cover side) of the LCD head unit, so I'll replace it entirely when I can. I'm still working on G4 Mac Mini... and believe it or not - WITH Powerpacs for both! The Mac Mini has a DVD Rom Drive but who knows what condition that is in.

The G4 Mac Mini must have had a hard life. The antenna wires are ripped (I think I can solder in some new ones) and there was a layer of dust inside that was caked up thick! I'm almost finish cleaning it but decided to take a break and post it. Both are externally dirty as hell! So I got some 91% alcohol and am cleaning it up and disinfecting it at the same time.

When I can, I'll post pics up.

 

[Macdrone]

Classic II speaker is probably bad.  They get that way.  Uniserver found that out a few years ago.  Fixed a couple in the classics and II's with replacement.

 

[Elfen]

It's the amp chip as the headphones' sound is soft too. But the past posts about it from last year answered a few questions.

But that is not here nor there...

Got the G4 Mac Mini running. the DVD/Combo drive is dead, which is interesting. I got it booted from my G4 PowerBook through FireWire and I have it installing OSX 10.4 through FireWire on a spare 100GB HD I had.

I say that the DVD Drive is interesting... because I removed it and opened it up. Inside was a 10.3 Emergency Boot Disk (A recovery CD that were made for some schools in NYC). Interesting - it was in my handwriting and a brand of CDs I used. Back in '03 - '08 I must have made hundreds of Emergency boot disks for teachers and schools through out NYC and gave them out freely like candy. Nothing special about them - Boots to 10.3, and has some data recovery software if the hard drive was not permanently damaged. Thing is... how did this disk end up in this Mac Mini?

The Combo Drive is dead, useless unless I strip it for its pars to make an Arduino Robot.... and name it Revenge of Mac!

Some things needs to be tighten up in it as well, and the BlueTooth Antenna needs to be resoldered. I found a few pics, on Ebay of all places, that shows how the wire is soldered. So in a day or two, I will have it up and running and installing 10.4 on it as we speak. At least I got the case cleaned - 91% alcohol on the top plastic and Scrubbing Bubbles on the metal sides. It had a lot of crap on it it! Jeesh!

 

[galgot]

So... The recovery cd said to the mini "take me back to Elfen, he'll save you"

These things have souls

 

[Elfen]

Love it, Galgot! Love it! And it brought a friend (the HP Pavillion DV6)!

Got it up and running for the most part. But it needs a new Combo Drive, RAM Expansion to 1GB (has 512MB), and the BlueTooth Antenna fixed. So for now its on a shelf waiting for a Combo Drive and RAM which I will order next month. When I get that done, I might cluster it with the other 2 Mac Minis and... Create A Super Computer and Take Over The World, Pinkie!

It is a A1103 unit with a 1.42GHz G4 CPU. Funny thing..., while cleaning the case, there was a tiny spot that drove me crazy because I could not get it clean off! It was the LED light pipe on the case which I thought was a 'dirty spot.' LOL!

What also gets to me is the HP Pavillion DV6, it is relatively brand new! I know there was a mini price war among the electronics stores during last year's holiday season and prices for many "high end" laptops went for less than $700! And this is a so-called "high end" laptop - i7 CPU, 6GB RAM and according to its labels - Beats Audio system & speakers. And I priced out the repair for this LCD Panel replacement - it is under $200 if I send it out or under $60 if I ebay the panel and do it myself. An except that and the missing hard drive - it works! Somewhere in this crazy house I have a 1TB Drive I can put in there. I was saving it for my PlayStation 3.

 

[Elfen]

Interesting... on Ebay:

1 GB of RAM DDR SIMM - $5.xx + Free Shipping from some guy in Ohio (who I bought RAM from before so I can trust him).

1 Combo RW+ Drive - $9.00 + $3 S/H. from Denver... never hear of the guy but I'm willing to take a chance.

So for under $20, a Mac Mini G4 found in the trash gets a new life.

Q: What are the limits I can push this? It needs OSX 10.4 but can run but not boot from OS9. 1GB RAM limits things but it's the same as the Powerbook G4 12in. that I use right now.

Can it be over clocked? Don't know, probably not.

Can the CPU Heatsink be removed, cleaned up and put back in without breaking it? I tried to blow out the dust inside but I do not know if it was cleaned throughly. New heatsink goop would be nice to throw on it.

Though I already know much of it, what are things I should be aware off? I'm hoping by summer I can throw in a 100GB SSD HD into it.

 

[Elfen]

Got a Combo Drive (CD-RW+ & DVD Reader) off ebay for 5-bucks, it came in today. The G4 Mac Mini is now working nicely. I'll upgrade to a SuperDrive later but right now It's working! Will upgrade to a SSD as well, one day.

BTW - the drive was another guy who offered it for $5 /free shipping from Tx. So for about $10 total I rescued a G4 Mac Mini.