Mac84: Apple iMac G3: The USB Revolution & Legacy Macintosh I/O Adapters (ADB, Serial, SCSI)

As a follow-up to my iMac 20th Birthday Restoration video, I want to take a trip back to 1998 and see how iMac owners handled the transition to USB. This was because all legacy Macintosh I/O ports were replaced by USB on the iMac. We’ll take a look at interesting ADB, Serial, PhoneNet, and SCSI adapters, along with puck mouse accessories and other Bondi-blue covered USB goodness. Huh... what is this port marked "Mezzanine" ?
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My original iMac video:
• Mac84: Original Apple ...
Check out Jay's KZbin channel (TheHouseofMoth):
/ @thehouseofmoth
My blog post on my USB to ADB adapter will be posted shortly!
Here's where I found out about it though: geekhack.org/i...

[@FlanGaming]

The G3 iMac (my brother's was some shade of blue and slot-loading) was the first Mac I ever used, so it's always good to see things about it. I hope I can find one like it someday, but at least I have a G3 Powerbook running 8.6 for when I want to revisit our old software CDs from back then.

[@Mac84]

That’s awesome! It was either a Blueberry (bright blue) or an Indigo (darker blue) model. A google image search may help you remember, they are great machines and ones I’ll cover in another video. Nice, a PowerBook with Mac OS 8.6 is a solid machine. Good luck in your search!

[@keithyakouboff8755]

eBay. I bought a working Rev A iMac about a year-plus ago. Came with the original box, too. Cost about $500 total (incl. shipping?) if memory serves.

[@1magazine]

You gotta find a Voodoo 2 for the mezzanine slot! Would be so cool to see! Would definitely be the only video on KZbin featuring and reviewing it!

[@Mac84]

Yes! The trouble is finding one that doesn't cost an arm and a leg!

[@pseudotasuki]

LocalTalk requires RS-422, but most serial adapter chips only support RS-232.

[@ryanstoddard1803]

Thank you for creating a shopping list for my blueberry IMac G3! Now i can kit it out with some accessories and even my old PCs can benefit from the zip drives.

[@santospoland]

These are from my own archives: Powerprint.sit 4.5MB Powerprint Disks 1,2,3 and 4 (Powerprint Disk 1.image), 321KB, 1.5MB, 1.5MB, 1.3MB respectively. Powerprint 4.0.img 6.4MB

[@Johnathan_Waters]

I bought my first iMac (Gen 2) in about 2001 at CompUSA in "Strawberry" flavor. I had MANY accessories, including the Epson "Stylus 740" in blue (oh well). As well as a Que!Fire Firewire CDRW Drive (also color matched), Color matched floppy drive, and on and on. Memories!

[@St0rmcrash]

Great overview of iMac I/O. Really a trip back in time. Don't know how I hadn't come across your channel sooner. Also hope that beige Western Electric 2500 phone has a nice home near one of your retro computers, it looks like it's in excellent shape

[@Mac84]

Thanks! My brother lent me that phone to fix the phone jack on the back, it is in pretty good shape. It will fit nicely on my Apple modem for my 512K model.

[@jefferyjones8399]

Over 20 years later and we are still living the dongle life lol

[@philippbokrand26]

Looking forward to this!

[@jeffsabados8075]

This is an excellent video essay. Very well put together. I am quite impressed, great video!

[@Mac84]

Thank you for the kind words! A lot of work went into this, so it’s very nice to hear positive feedback. 😊

[@jacobmarzynski7719]

This is just like Apple today when they introduced a MacBook with only USB-C ports, and you needed to buy adapters or accessories

[@Mac84]

At least the iMac had Ethernet, a dial-up modem, and audio I/O built in!

[@brydon10]

Your videos are great man. I love the history of this stuff. It's great to know the past of home computing.

[@somegreenguy]

ah, the mezzanine slot I mentioned it in your last stream but it was such an interesting and underutilized port Definitely oddware in the best sense possible Also yeah, forgot there was an entire Voodoo 2 for it still would love to get my hands on a G3 someday

[@Mac84]

Yes it was! There were some really cool adapters available for it, but unfortunately finding them in the wild is difficult (or expensive... or both!) Stay tuned however... ;)

[@goncalodumas]

That red Maxel clock battery - Remove it at once! I have some macintoshes and old macs ruined by the particular model of battery.

[@shaunspeers2656]

Asante...now that’s a name I haven’t heard in more than 20 years! My grade school has Asante switches in the computer lab.

[@Mac84]

Awesome! 😃

[@quayzar1]

I still use an iMate I had no idea how expensive they have gotten.

[@iris46212]

I know this is late, but now that I'm watching more than the livestreams, holy shit I love your content. It's so relaxing and informative

[@Mac84]

🙂 Thank you! I’m very glad you are enjoying the content.

[@SteveChisnall]

ForMac made a SCSI card for the mezzanine slot in the revision A and B models of Bondi Blue iMac, called the iPro RAID, providing UltraWide SCSI through an unusual SCSI-3 connector. They also made a model called the iPro RAID TV which added a TV-tuner and S-video out in addition to the SCSI port.

[@DavidStahlOLDHAPPyMACs]

Nice Job Steve

[@ivangonzalez8765]

Hi Steve, how could I connect a USB stick to the IMac?, it is a tangerine from 1999 (with tray loading disk mechanism)

[@Mac84]

The iMac has two USB ports on the right, behind a door which may be missing. It’s the same place you plug in a keyboard or a mouse, etc. Not all modern USB devices may work on the iMac G3 depending on the OS that is installed. Some bulky USB plugs may need an extension cable.

[@ivangonzalez8765]

@@Mac84 Ok thanks, I´ve got a problem with the iMac G3, sometimes when I am using the iMac, and i restart it, it chimes and stays with the orange light on and dosen´t turn on, I have to leave it unpluged for 30 minutes so it after turns on. When I get it to turn on while startup it says " There was a memory error, please take the computer to technical service" any ideas?

[@Mac84]

It could be a number of things. I suggest visiting the www.TinkerDifferent.com forum. That is a better platform for help and troubleshooting.

[@ivangonzalez8765]

@@Mac84 Ok, thanks I just registerd and made a question on it.

[@patrickm.9822]

I enjoyed your nice video. I also have some of the older G3 Macs in good working condition here too, love it to play with them today

[@Mac84]

Thanks Patrick! The iMac G3s are pretty great starter vintage Macintoshes today. They can run the classic Mac OS, and Mac OS X - nice rounded machines! (pun intended)

[@TechRyze]

I feel bad for those caught up in the transition by buying iMacs at launch, but I was really glad that Apple dropped the floppy drive from the iMac. It was painful trying to move files from one machine to another around 2000, if one was on dial-up, and the other didn't have a CD burner, as was common with machines during the time. USB drives eventually saved the day, but floppy drives remaining in computers, and remaining at 1.44MB was the reason a standard upgrade took so long to happen through the 1990s. My first USB drive was 256MB and cost a bit, but the early 32-64MB ones from the early 2000s were horribly expensive! Interesting times. Thunderbolt, USB-C and PCI-E are godsends nowadays for connectivity and expansion.

[@TheMetalMag]

My imac DVSE got me learning lots of things. I did video and many others it then exploded ahha the crt died and the had didn’t accept all the uses. It was a great time until osX smashed it… seeing all those thing u got got me crazy! I remember all of them.

[@jakebeetham1]

great channel with awesome content! 👍

[@Mac84]

Thank you! :D

[@aa-au]

Hey Steve, I just watched your original iMac video and this follow up video. There is a lot of time and effort put into this, especially finding the old magazines with products and prices! Anyway, happy 6k subscribers... where's the banner?

[@channelite]

I had the Keyspan adapter that worked for a while and has stopped working. I thought it was a software issue, but I've not been able to get it working again on my 9.2.2 G4. I used it for serial midi interface.

[@appleman76]

God the nostalgia in this video is insane! I had that iMac, I had that solid Bondi Blue floppy drive, I had that transparent blue Zip drive(I still have it), I've handled that color matched floppy drive, my middle school had that Imation Super Disk drive, I've handled hundreds of those multicolored floppys, I've experienced the unstable horror that is early Mac OS 8... Never ran 8.6 though, I went straight from 8.1, which was horrendously unstable on that machine, to 9.1, which was much better. Ugh the Pro mouse, my middle school's computer lab had second generation 600mhz Graphite iMacs with those mice. The cable had a nasty way of fraying right were it entered the mouse meaning it would eventually start zapping the person using it. They soon replaced them with the venerable first gen Logitech optical mice. Such a great era of the Mac's history, so many iconic machines and devices.

[@cleon2267]

Hello, I am looking to upgrade my MIDI rig to a newer mac, possibly to a 2018 or later iMac. I currently have a Power PC 8500/120 that has been upgraded with a Sonnet G3 CPU chipboard. I am running Opcode DSP MIDI software with "Studio 3" & "Studio 4" MIDI interfaces. I would still like to use these interfaces & software on the newer mac alongside newer DAWs (ProTools, Studio One, etc.). Do you know of any possible solutions to use the printer & modem ports on these MIDI interfaces with a newer mac?

[@Mac84]

Hello! I don't have any specific experience in this area (as far as your MIDI interfaces go), but I would strongly suggest you check out the Facebook group LowEndMac. I am sure someone there will be able to help you out directly. Generally speaking, USB to Mac serial adapters have not been supported since the Mac OS X 10.4 Tiger days. And even then, not all of these USB to serial adapters may work with your interfaces, or you may have speed issues. So depending on how "modern" of a Mac you are thinking of, you may need to invest in new MIDI interfaces. However, check out the Facebook group and post your question, hopefully someone with similar interests can help you out. :-)

[@ninja011]

I had on my Revision A iMac, the SCSI adaptor board, it was higher bandwidth than the USB adapter, but it also would cause random crashes. My guess is that it drew more power than the PSU could stably give.

[@Crab_Void]

Can u make a list of all the accessories

[@Crab_Void]

Pls

[@Crab_Void]

And i love your vids sooooooooooooooooooooooo much ❤️❤️❤️

[@Mac84]

I’ll try to make a detailed list, thank you!! 🤓👍

[@jenhodges92]

I second this request-great video!

[@phillee321]

Great video. Thanks for this great content

[@Mac84]

Thanks! :)

[@WarthogRacer]

Oh, man. In the early 00's my Middle School had a computer lab with Bondie Blue and Tangerine G3's (which was amazing, considering my school used Windows 98 and bought PC's from Gateway). They all had USB floppy drives. My school even had those Sony cameras that saved pictures to floppy disks

[@jw02_bey44]

Great video

[@Vanessa_Santillan]

What model of Logitech mouse is that at 3:23? It is soo cute!

[@Mac84]

It's a Logitech Kidz Mouse - I show an unboxing of this awesome little mouse in my video here: kzbin.info/www/bejne/bIi9eHp3dqh-jrM

[@SteveChisnall]

I wonder whether there's a way to build a Mezzanine-slot to PCMCIA/CardBus adapter that'd let one use PCMCIA/CardBus cards on Rev A & B iMacs?

[@Mac84]

Schematics of the iMac G3 would certainly be helpful with this!

[@TechnologyNToys]

Lol that iDock II has been on eBay for 3 years now XD

[@Mac84]

Hah! Doesn’t surprise me… 😂

[@matteocivinini7750]

what's that logitech rat shaped mouse called?

[@Mac84]

KidzMouse - they realized a PC and Mac version, check out the 2017 video I did on Mac mice, it’s in my “Main” playlist. 👍

[@MatchRugz]

@@Mac84 thank you very much! I will

[@SteveChisnall]

You should get a GeeThree StealthPort. It replaces the internal dial-up modem with an 8-pin serial-port that the older classic macs had.

[@puwazatza]

I am still using iMate USB-ADB adapter to hook up my Apple Desktop Keyboard II into my iMac i9

[@3rdalbum]

I had a revision C running 8.5 originally. While USB was pretty cool, the support was flaky at best. I had a MIDI interface where the system would crash on boot if it was plugged in, and it would crash at any time if you unplugged it. Which meant you needed to boot, then plug it in, then unplug it again after you shut down. Uggh. Mac OS 9.1 eventually improved the stability but I remember it still wasn't fantastic. So many of those early USB devices used blue or white semitransparent plastic to "match" the iMac's look! It was a weird craze. Props to the scanner that was completely normal except for a small strip of blue plastic toward the back. Y'know, to indicate that it was iMac compatible. Haha.

[@HenrikVendelbo]

Lucky for you they changed direction. Ports are back yay. Also, have you found a disassembly guide that goes beyond the main board. I’m stuck on trying to detach the speakers. And what about main board schematics?

[@enriquearaica]

excelente video gracias

[@AlexandrTVOfficialChannel]

I just got an iMac g3 yesterday. It has 16gb and MacOS X

[@Mac84]

If it has 16 gigabytes of memory... that's one tricked out iMac G3! haha

[@a4e69636b]

What do you plan on doing with it?

[@AlexandrTVOfficialChannel]

@@a4e69636b I just use it for playing chess and typing, I’ll have more videos about it on my channel.

[@AlexandrTVOfficialChannel]

Also I like daily driving old tech even though I have modern devices.

[@d3adman404]

A lot of Conversion Technology!

[@thaisara]

Could you introduce me easiest way, how to transfer files and data out from Mac G3 to USB drive with low cost solutions. Thank you in advance

[@Mac84]

If the iMac boots up and works you can use a blank USB hard drive and format it to use to copy data too. It’ll be over USB 1.1 and super slow, and the disk needs to be under 128GB, but it should work.

[@thaisara]

@@Mac84 how about USB flash drive? Would able to use?

[@the_master_of_beans]

This video made me get an iMac.

[@Mac84]

Awesome, which model did you pickup?

[@the_master_of_beans]

I am not really sure just yet. All I know is that it is an iMac G3 Blueberry from 1999. Edit: Nevermind! It is a 1999 iMac G3 Grape!

[@RaysGamingChannel2003]

@@the_master_of_beansNice!

[@gamepad3173]

One idea I may have yet to try is trying out a USB super disk for the Platinum Pi a Raspberry Pi 4B in a 1993 Apple IIe platinum. I'm also going to use two Floppy drives. The idea is to transfer files from one computer to another (say from an Apple II to a Commodore 64 with 3.5 disks).

[@padawanmage71]

I love the imate and still use it from time to time with my Apple keyboard. The one you use is one I’m looking for. What’s the model?

[@southernmostrebel]

i had a Flower Power iMac: the Early 2001 model, now all I have is the clunky metal hard drive, which is quite a bit bigger than the new hard drives, but a lot smaller than the computer like a small book, what cable do I need and hardware in order to take that hard drive and put the information on my new MacBook Pro? The new MacBook Pro I have is 2021 , thank you so much for your time. This has very important family photos on it of ones I have lost and I really appreciate any effort. Do you sell any of the hardware or cords that I need? Or could you please indicate with the Çarp and refer me to a place? Thank you so much again.

[@Mac84]

A modern Mac won’t be able to read the file system on these hard drives. The process can be different depending on the OS on the iMac. Please make a post on www.TinkerDifferent.com and I can reply with more info.

[@southernmostrebel]

@@Mac84 OK I will try. Lol. I have had injuries and these things are extremely difficult for me. Is that a site that is associated with you? I registered. Some of the work I am doing is also really important for persecuted minority in Iraq that have lost family members to terrorists and even lost their home to Isis. I would really appreciate you giving my help consideration and your advisement. I don't know if I should have them sign up for your site to they have been directed to use macs by me because of the firewalls. I am actually worried about them signing up for anything because they are so vulnerable but they use Macs and I need to get advice for them as well

[@Mac84]

Yes, I'm one of the founders of the site. If you post a question there one of us can give you some tips on copying the data to a newer system.

[@southernmostrebel]

@@Mac84 I sent the stuff on the form that you told me to and signed up. I'm still having difficulty getting the information I need. Thank you.

[@steftrando]

Can you make a video where you install the voodoo 2 in the mezzanine slot, and show how fast games like Unreal are with that card?

[@Mac84]

If I can ever find an affordable voodoo 2 card I sure will!

[@steftrando]

Mac84 you would make the first KZbin video about that if you did.

[@Mac84]

@@steftrando That would be cool. If you ever find a card, let me know, haha.

[@steftrando]

Mac84 the future happened!

[@fredgu4960]

Hello, I have a Macintosh plus. Can I send it to you?

[@Mac84]

Hello, I removed your personal information so you don’t get spammed. I’ll reach out to you to see what I can help you with. 👍

[@AceHardy]

🍎

[@keithyakouboff8755]

It's a shame these old iMacs can't effectively do the thing they were originally intended for: internet access. You can get to some websites, and some you can reach with limitations, and many you cannot. E-mailing I have found impossible.

[@TheDukeOfZill]

idock is too flipping expensive these days... could totally use one though

[@Mac84]

Ignore the eBay prices, those people are silly!

[@donovandelaney3171]

Time to remove the hard drive and add an SSD.

[@gregthompson7793]

Sorry I missed it. :(

[@sbrazenor2]

This must be fake news... Apple would never make a handicapped computer without legacy support and require the use of dongles. j/k 🤣