Ask MetaFilter questions tagged with imac

Sharing Is Caring?

murtagh — Wed, 09 Dec 2009 17:54:25 -0800

Sharing a printer between an iMac (with printer driver installed) and a Windows laptop without installing any drivers on the laptop: can it be done? I have an iMac running OS X Leopard. My sister is using her work laptop. Unfortunately, her company has disallowed (blocked) installation of any new software on the laptop, which includes printer drivers. We need to share the printer between the iMac and the laptop. The iMac, to which the printer is connected, has the printer drivers installed.

Can the printer be shared between the iMac and the laptop without installing any drivers on the laptop?

The printer is a Canon Pixma MP145.

Please tell me this is possible (or any possible alternatives). Any help would be greatly appreciated!

IMac running slow

dougiedd — Sat, 05 Dec 2009 17:04:22 -0800

My Imac has started running slow past week. What is the best way to look into possible causes of this?

Video game suggestions for a preschooler who loves Braid

nanojath — Tue, 01 Dec 2009 09:16:09 -0800

Beautiful, open world platformers for the pre-school set? Does such a thing exist? Also open to general video game recommendations for the 5-7 age range. My 5 year old son spotted me playing Braid and was immediately drawn into the world of this game. He has a budget of "screen time" with various elements of reward and negotiation but I like him to have a decent amount of control over how he spends that time as long as he stays within our set boundaries of content. He's wanted to play Braid a lot but he's pretty much wrung all the pleasure he can out of it.

The thing is, what he seems to like best about Braid is the art, exploring the worlds, and the characters that pop up. Though he took to the platformer mechanics very naturally, he can't negotiate difficult jumps and such, too much enemy danger frustrates him, and of course the time manipulation puzzles are beyond him. Since the focus in Braid is the puzzles rather than the worlds themselves there is not much to explore: the worlds are pretty small and brief.

It made me wish there could be a more open-world sort of platformer game that was focused on exploration and discovery rather than stomping enemies and making tricky jumps. Natural as this sounds to me it seems to be a tall order of the game design world but I figured it couldn't hurt to ask.

I'm generally finding it tough to find good games for him at this age. He is becoming bored with the super-simple point and click and scroller fodder we've found at websites like PBS Kids or for his increasingly dust-gathering Leapster 2 handheld. Too-high difficulty curves and too violent content are my main problems with the next level up. I don't mind a game requiring my assistance (reading, explaining, helping on difficult moments) but he gets satisfaction out of self-motivated success and when the game is too difficult, confusing or text heavy it tends to end up with him sitting in my lap watching me play. I'd really like things with a fair bit of content that aren't so crush-enemies or get-to-the-end-goal-oriented.

In addition to the Leapster 2 (which I've been kind of underwhelmed by the software for, which tends to combine too-easy and somewhat buggy games with too-advanced and pasted-on-feeling educational content) we have a newer iMac, a Wii and a Nintendo DS (which I plan to give him when I upgrade to the DSi by and by). I don't want to buy any more platforms or computers. Suggestions of good games for the younger player on these platforms are welcome.

Dead iMac - How screwed am I?

Bango Skank — Tue, 24 Nov 2009 07:30:36 -0800

My apartment flooded while I was away on vacation now my '07 iMac won't power up. So this is going to be a two-parter with specific questions about my computer and a general question about the nature of battery backups. I came home from an awesome week of vacation only to discover that we had torrential rains while I was gone and my apartment flooded (again) and sat wet for 4-5 days. Before I got home my landlord discovered what happened and did a pretty great job cleaning it up for me. He even paid to have professional cleaners come in and mop the floors and shampoo the rugs. Besides the stink of mildew and damp that will just take some time to dissipate the only main damage appears to be my computer and TV and the battery backups they were plugged into. The TV is an older model and while I'm sad to see it go I can accept that, but the computer is pretty heartbreaking.

The computer was sitting on top of a desk and did not get wet. It was plugged into a combination surge protector/battery backup that was plugged into the wall. The computer and battery backup were both switched off. The battery backup was full of muddy water.

Now my dear, sweet, beloved iMac will not power up, I press the power button and nothing at all happens. I have checked all the connections and I know it is plugged into a live outlet. Any suggestions of what it might be? I know that during heavy rains I get some pretty wicked power surges which is why I purchased the top-of-the-line battery backups in the first place. How would I even begin diagnosing the problem? Would I be a complete idiot to consider cracking this thing open and monkeying around in there myself? If the computer is now a doorstop what are the chances of recovering my data? (I don't have a backup of either my photos or my iTunes library [please don't lecture me I am already kicking myself hard enough!])

To add a degree of difficulty taking the computer to an Apple store is not an option. We do have at least one local computer repair place that claims to work on Macs but they do not have a great reputation. If this is not something I can deal with on my own I will either have to ship it to Apple (all on my dime - the warranty is long since expired) or trust that the local guy's bad reputation is unfounded.

The general question regarding battery backups is this - did I nullify the surge protection/current regulating abilities of my battery backup by switching it off? I was hoping to save some electricity while I was gone but in hindsight I am wondering if I made things worse by turning the power off.

Imac has lost its once strong wireless signal

ranunculus — Sun, 22 Nov 2009 16:25:41 -0800

My girlfriend's imac keeps losing its wireless signal, despite having functioned perfectly for over a year at its present location. How can I remedy this? The wireless router - a linksys wrt 54g - is located at my desk about 50 feet and one wall away, where it is hardwired to my pc. For the past year, her imac received the signal perfectly. And now it's extremely weak. Rebooting her computer, my computer, the router, or the cable modem does nothing to improve her signal. Yet my other computer - a pc laptop - receives a perfectly good signal next to her imac.

She is running osx 10.4.11
I'm on vista

A real Apple TV.

malaprohibita — Wed, 04 Nov 2009 14:14:10 -0800

Is it crazy and/or overkill to consider getting a 27 inch imac to replace my tv? I have a 10 year old 27 inch Sony CRT that still works well, but I'm running into its limits for adding peripherals (DVD player, xbox, etc.). I know I can probably get a mac mini or other small form factor pc plus an HDTV for less, but I'm really intrigued by the imac's possibilities. What little tv watching I do is usually Hulu, streaming Netflix, and dvds. I am not interested in Blu-Ray capabilities, as I see the format becoming obsolete sooner rather than later.

Pros:
--2560 x 1440 resolution led lcd.
--can add a tv tuner via usb if I really wanted to.
--a built-in computer and dvd player (convergence!)

Cons:
--may not be able to connect the xbox without some kind of adapter voodoo (although Crossover+Steam is possible).
--there are some issues reported regarding flash playback( = Hulu problems), which may be indicative of other system issues.
--diy repairs and upgrades may be difficult.

I don't really need a bigger display. My wife and I will be sitting > 8ft away, but not by much, and any HD resolution will be better than what I have now.

I'm looking forward to your pros, cons, and even any alternatives you might have.

RAM all over the place

VikingSword — Fri, 30 Oct 2009 20:10:01 -0800

RAM configurations for the new iMacs - permutations galore! I'm going to be buying a new quad iMac probably sometime in January 2010 (either the i5 or i7, I have not decided as yet, I'm waiting on reviews and tests). I will be buying it with the stock 4GB RAM, and I'll buy more RAM on my own and install that. However, I'm not clear on a few issues with optimal RAM configurations. The new iMacs have 4 RAM memory slots, and the stock configuration is two 2GB sticks (2GB + 2GB). There's a BTO option of getting additional 4GB RAM in one of two configurations, as 2GB sticks, so the end result would be 2GB+2GB+2GB+2GB=8GB, or two 4GB sticks, so the final configuration would be 4GB+4GB=8GB (much more expensive). Now, come January if I'm lucky RAM prices might drop, but regardless, it will still be cheaper to buy RAM myself and install it, instead of buying from Apple BTO. Issues:

1)Is there a performance penalty with 2GB+2GB+2GB+2GB=8GB versus 4GB+4GB=8GB? I realize that there is an expansion difference, in that using the 4GB sticks, I leave myself the option of upgrading to 16GB.

2)Is it possible to do: 2GB+2GB+4GB=8GB or is it contraindicated to mix 4GB sticks and 2GB sticks? If it's possible, is there a performance penalty vs 4GB+4GB=8GB?

3)Similarly is it possible to do 2GB+2GB+2GB+4GB=10GB or is there an issue? It is my understanding that as Apple has it configured, both the i5 750 and the i7 860 are dual channel Lynnfields, and the i7 is not 3 channel (1156 socket)

4)And again similarly what about 2GB+2GB+4GB+4GB=12GB

5)Final option, what about 2GB+4GB+4GB+4GB=14GB.

Of course, my decision will be driven by pricing, and this may pertain to quite some time down the road, so I may add gradually over the course of a year depending on prices. Thanks!

At least for once, I have good backups...

tkolstee — Thu, 29 Oct 2009 08:46:01 -0800

iMac drives failing - first external, then internal. Seems to be hardware in both cases. Questions about troubleshooting or replacement inside. My 1TB external media drive (usually connected via firewire, but has USB as well) on my iMac went bad last week, randomly dropping off until it's powercycled. It was a WD MyBook, which I have now come to understand has an overheating issue. The firmware upgrade didn't help. I bought a new (1.5TB Seagate USB 2.0) external and migrated over the files using rsync. Opening the external case and pointing a desktop fan at the drive seemed to help it stay up longer, but SEVERAL times during the process it crashed, sometimes hanging the host computer with it. Several forced powercycles and hours later, I had all my data moved. One of these crashes happened in the middle of a Spotlight index job which I tried to kill to no avail.

I was just about to "retire" the old drive when it crashed once more, again hanging the iMac. I held down the power button on the iMac and forcefully rebooted it, and this time the system came up to the "question-mark-within-a-folder" icon. Booted from Snow Leopard install DVD, and tried to run Disk Utility. Disk Utility was having some problems detecting the filesystem/partitions on the internal drive, so I tried to repartition it to restore my Time Machine backup and found that its capacity was listed as 0 bytes.

I've gotten the drive to (briefly) recognize properly once, but most of the time the drive begins clicking as it's trying to read. When it was recognized I attempted a verify and repair, but the drive stopped working (and again hung the computer) in the middle of the process.

Is there any possible correlation (unstable power, magnetic interference, sunspots?) between the external and internal drives failing so closely together? It seems like this is a hardware failure where both drives are concerned; the external due to heat intolerance, and the internal due to unknown causes but making a telltale click. Could the internal drive have failed due to my powercycling the machine? I would think the machine should have brains enough to gracefully kill off its drive before shutting itself off....

Secondly, is there anything else I can do to save the drive? I'm assuming the click generally means the drive won't ever be good again. I know about the freezer trick and other temporary methods, but I don't care about the data on the drive as it's backed up and easily replaceable.

Third, if the internal drive is permanently dead, how easy is it to replace it with a new one? I have a 3.5" 250GB SATA drive that I can use to replace it, but have never taken apart an iMac before.

Lastly, is there anything I can do with the overheating external? It seems to work fine, so long as I direct a lot of airflow at it, but otherwise it crashes within 30-60 minutes of use. It seems to be getting more intolerant of heat as time goes on.

The receipt lists this as an "iMac 17/2.0/1G/160/SD/AP/BT/WLKBM, Part Number MA758LL/A". It was purchased July 29, 2007 so is not still under any warranty.

How do I rescue files from an internal drive when OS X won't boot?

wheat — Thu, 01 Oct 2009 22:26:26 -0800

OS X won't boot. Time Machine stopped working at noon. How can I nab some files before I reinstall Leopard? Due, I think, to my son playing with the power strip one too many times, my iMac will not boot. I can boot from the Leopard system disc, and I've run Disk Utility. It repaired problems, but it still won't boot.

I run Time Machine, so I'm willing to restore from that and/or reinstall Leopard. But I got a lot done today and would like to copy some PDFs I crated today. The last Time Machine backup was at noon. But I worked until five. I don't know why Time Machine stopped backing up.

When I use the "burn" option in Disk Utility, I can see the files I created, including the ones that are not in the most recent Time Machine backup. Is there a way to get them? This is my only Mac, so target disk mode isn't an option. What should I try?

iMac eats my CD's

sindas — Tue, 29 Sep 2009 19:47:50 -0800

Pseudo broken iMac and boot camp issues: replaced old failing hard drive, and cd-drive subsequently breaks, among other things The computer in question is a 20-inch iMac aluminum 2ghz processor.

I successfully clean-installed snow leopard after formatting the new drive, but the disc refused to come out. After trying everything, I opened up the drive and removed the disc manually.

Windows (be it vista, or 7 beta) refuses to install on the boot camp partition using an external HDD that I imaged, or an external DVD drive. Once I restart so that the installation can begin, it hangs forever at the gray screen.

I also tried installing rEFIt: it allows me to select the DVD, begin to boot from it, and then hangs forever (before the disc even loads), and disallows me from trying to boot from an external HDD.

What should I try next?

Itunes file sharing same IMAC?

dougiedd — Wed, 16 Sep 2009 23:44:30 -0800

Want to share my entire itunes library with another user on the same IMAC I think we used to share them all, but now not... I do almost all of the uploading of files but she cant see these When i go into system preferences>file sharing is on and pubic folders should share everything. Can someone help point me to the likely source of this problem: I suspect multiple libraries got created somehow: can these be merged?

moving my mac

cazoo — Mon, 14 Sep 2009 12:18:26 -0800

Carrying solutions for an imac? I need to bring my 24" imac into the Apple store for a repair. I live in NYC and the Apple store is in walking distance of only a few blocks. What would be the best means of transporting my computer?

I've seen a few nylon carry cases online specifically made for the imac but at a pretty steep price. (over $150)

Does anyone have a more cost efficient and safer idea of transport? Would a luggage cart be a good option? They seem liable to tip over.

Help me MACadamias - this is driving me nuts!

The Light Fantastic — Wed, 02 Sep 2009 17:36:59 -0800

Can I run Adobe CS4 on my iMac? I'm a fairly competent PC user now working in a Mac office. We have the opportunity to get Adobe CS Premium 4.0, but I really don't know the Mac models very well and don't want to get stuck with something I can't use.

System requirements for Adobe CS 4:

Hardware:
PowerPC G5; multicore Intel processor
10.3 GB available hard-disk space
o 1 GB or more RAM
o 1024x768-pixel (or higher) display with 16-bit video card;
o For some GPU-accelerated features
Software:
o Mac OS X v10.4.11 – 10.5.4

I will be installing the software on a iMac with an 2.66 GHz Intel Core 2 Duo processor (2 cores), 4GB of memory. The OS is OS X 10.5.6. The video card is a ATI Radeon HD 2600 Pro with 256MB VRAM.

The system is pretty new (bought last year) - will it run CS4?

Should I buy my mother an iMac?

Joe in Australia — Wed, 02 Sep 2009 00:32:21 -0800

Should I get my aging, computer-clumsy mother an iMac, or just buy her a bigger screen for her Windows machine? My mother uses her computer to play bridge, read her email (via Gmail), do her banking, and occasionally write letters. She is really bad at computer hygiene and I've had to clean viruses off her computer more than once - she will click on things that tell her to click them. This scares me, because she also uses her computer to do her banking.

I've suggested getting her an iMac, and she's cool with the idea. A larger screen would be part of the package, and that would definitely help her. The advantages of getting a Mac are that it comes with Applecare and it's less likely she'll install malware. The downside is that she's not great with computers and she might find the learning curve too steep. I know that the cost of an iMac will pay for a lot of computer support - but would that be as good as Applecare for someone who just needs her hand held?

What are people's thoughts on this?

Please help resurrect my iMac?

mordecai — Mon, 31 Aug 2009 07:52:25 -0800

My iMac's seemingly gone kaput :( I'm getting a flashing folder icon with a question mark on bootup. Please help me save my iMac? It all started when my iMac hung. I got the spinning beach ball of death and I couldn't do anything except do a restart. And then, this flashing folder with a question mark came up and it refuses to boot into the OS.

I tried connecting my iMac to my Macbook via firewire target mode and I can access the drive, so I'm guessing it's not a hard drive problem.

I searched for solutions online and they mostly require me to do a clean install of Leopard, but the thing is, my Superdrive on my iMac is dead. I tried to install the OS via firewire target mode using my Macbook, but the Install Disc doesn't let me install the OS on the drive. My iMac's drive doesn't show up there.

I'm kinda in a fix here. I don't know what to do :( Please help?

Hello Kitty, Hello Crappy!

fantasticninety — Sun, 23 Aug 2009 18:47:17 -0800

My iMac iSight camera is "in use by another application". Can you help me figure this out so I can use the camera again? Hi,

In a moment of utter stupidity I tried downloading a driver from the Hello Kitty website in order to transfer some photos from my digital cam to the computer. Clearly this has affected something on my computer and I don't know how to undo what I've done.

I have an intel iMac, OS X 10.4.11 and when I try running Photo Booth, iChat or anything else the iSight camera is not recognised.

I would seriously appreciate any help here. I have reset the PRAM to no avail.

THANKS!

How to revive iMac keyboard after spilling beer on it?

cahlers — Mon, 03 Aug 2009 05:37:12 -0800

How should I clean my iMac intel 24" keyboard after spilling beer on it? A small amount of beer was spilled on an iMac 24" keyboard, now, 48 hours later, many keys still do not respond. The beer was wiped off when the event happened, but nothing else was done, other than keeping the keyboard in a clean, dry place. Any suggestions on how to have the keys respond again?

How to email full size photo attachments from iphoto 08?

Flacka — Tue, 28 Jul 2009 10:55:00 -0800

When using mail to email a photo as an attachment from iphoto 08, the photo is embedded in the email message and the picture is very small. When selecting the photo from the thumbnails I have selected full size but the picture is still small. I tried attaching the photos several different ways but the result is the same. What am I missing?

2 Macs 1 HD

Aya — Sat, 04 Jul 2009 17:00:45 -0800

How can I connect 2 Macs to 1 HardDrive So I recently bought a new Macbook Pro and I would like to be able to have wireless access to the files in the external 200gbs usb hard drive connected to my old iMac G5.

Noisy 'ol imac

sequin — Fri, 26 Jun 2009 14:21:46 -0800

iMac filter: 1st generation flat screen imac. Internal fan whirring constantly & loudly (1.6GHZ powerPC G5). I just maxed the memory from 256 to 2GB. I thought this might help. It's working much faster (thankfully) but the whirring is relentless. Last resort is to purchase a new one...I'd rather not go this route for now. FTR she has been doing this for quite sometime, so not a recent activity. Any suggestions on how I can silence my old lady?

Looking for a printer without the problems of finicky ink.

blueberry — Sun, 21 Jun 2009 21:36:09 -0800

[MomFilter] Looking for a reasonably cheap, reliable printer (for printing text) for an iMac. Leaning towards laser as the experiences with inkjets have been that bouts of little use lead to still full, yet dry and thus worthless ink cartridges. Looking for a printer for my Mom's iMac. She is wanting to print up a bunch of stories she has written, so the printer will only be used for text.
(No need for color, an attached scanner, or anything else)

She's had two cheap inkjets in the past where they were cheap to buy, but then you got gouged on the ink cartridges. These printers would up being a bit like "disposables" or white elephants—either getting gummed up after a while, or she'd not print anything for a month or two by which time the ink would have dried up or otherwise stopped working.

Fellow MeFites, do you own or know of any reasonably cheap (both pre- and post-sale), reliable b/w laser printers that you can recommend out there? Also, am I correct in guessing that laser toner has a longer "shelf life"?

Or, if lasers are too spendy, do you own or can you otherwise recommend an über-reliable inkjet that, say, you can just buy black ink for, and you've never had gum up or dry up on you?

Thanks all!

iMac G5 swallowed something it shouldn't have. Heimlich maneuver for CD drive?

UnclePlayground — Thu, 11 Jun 2009 08:16:26 -0800

How do I manually eject a CD meant for Windows (including XP and Vista) from my iMac G5? Yeah, brain fart. I inserted a CD given to me by my boss without looking at it. It's software meant for Windows. I inserted it into my iMac G5 with the CD slot on the right side. Of course, no icon for the CD shows up. I've tried every method of manual removal suggested on the internet.

Eject button on keyboard.
Restart holding mouse.
Restart holding eject button.
Restart hitting eject button continuously.
Open Firmware (Opt-Cmd-O-F) and typing "eject cd".

And many, many more.

There is no issue with the CD being "stuck", there is no "it seems to want to come out, but then goes back in".
No eject sounds like it's trying to eject.
It's just not recognizing the it's holding a CD, and none of the suggestions so far seem to make the computer spit the disc out.

And no, there is no special paperclip hole that I overlooked.

I need major guru advise here (besides, "take it to an Apple Store").

Cookies and Apple Juice

trueluk — Tue, 02 Jun 2009 13:47:58 -0800

I've been debating with myself for the last week or so about which Mac I should buy and when I should buy it. My brain could use a break from the back and forth, and that's why I'm asking for help. I recently sold my Asus laptop (offer was too good to refuse), and I've been computer-less now for about two weeks. I bought the Asus in December 2008, and during the six months I owned it, I rarely took it out of the house. This is partly due to the fact that I'm a programmer, work on a computer all day at work, and often have free time while there to do my 'browsing.' I don't have a current desktop computer, so anything I buy will be my main computer.

I like the idea of portability, but with a $2500 laptop I can't imagine I'd let myself take it out of the house during the first 6-12 months out of fear of breaking it.

I mention the MacBook Pro for $2,500 because the RAM is upgradable to 8gb in that model, and not in the $2,000 2.4ghz model. However, besides that fact, there is no other reason that I can think of for me to buy the $2,500 model (the extra vram is useless, minimal upgrade in processor speed, starts with 4gb RAM but I can upgrade the 2.4ghz model cheaply).

I've done a lot of thinking and have concluded that I could buy a 24" iMac (2.93ghz, 4gb ram, 512mb vram in the ATI card) for just over $1,800. And then also buy the smaller, 13" MacBook for just over a grand in a month or two if I feel like I need the portability. Or, I could buy a MacBook Pro now, and then buy an external display for that down the road if I feel like I need the screen space and am using the computer mostly at home. Those two options are practically identical in price when buying both components, however, in the first I'd have two computers, and in the second I'd have only one. I've also thought about buying a cheap netbook instead of a MacBook with the iMac, and that seems to make more sense financially.

The thing is though, money isn't an issue. But I am extremely cheap, and have a hard time making myself spend money in excess. And I have a history of being incredibly indecisive. Can anyone help me out here?

Oh, and should I wait until after the WWDC? What's the chance of Snow Leopard being released and for its distribution to start immediately? I don't want to buy a new computer and then have to upgrade the OS if I can help it.

Don't look into the light!

nam3d — Mon, 18 May 2009 10:14:12 -0800

I currently have an iMac 24" (early 2008). If you are acustom to the iMac you'll know that the brightness setting is extremely high. Unfortunately everytime I boot the computer up the brightness settings reset and I have to go through the hassle of lowering the brightness. Why is the keyboard/mac doing this? and can it be fixed?

Best backup options for iMac?

jammy — Wed, 06 May 2009 14:49:34 -0800

iMacFilter: Recommend a good external drive? I have an iMac G5 networked with an iBook G4. Memory on both has been getting a little tight.

I'm looking for two things:

1- a place to backup & store files from both computers

2- a drive that could host & stream my music to both computers to help free up memory on both

Is there a kind of external drive that would serve both these purposes? Or should I be looking to get two separate drives? Or am I going about this all the wrong way? Maybe there's an alternate setup that would work?

Tips on good automated backup software &/or software for streaming music from external drives for iMacs are also most welcome...

Thanks!