First of all, I want to thank all the folks who helped me get my 266Mhz G3 and iMac 333Mhz G3 working.

For right now, I have backed off somewhat. I am trying to compile a list of software that will run on these two machines, and trying to find the actual software itself. I've been looking for an office suite, something to help duplicate DVDs, and a program or two to help me with my school teaching. I've downloaded several packages that say they run on these machines, but when I load them and try to run them, I get errors that say they cannot run because such-and-such a program is not installed, or not enough memory, etc.

I know I flooded the forum with LOTS of stupid questions, and for that I apologize.

I HAVE NOT given up on my two little dinosaurs, but for a while I'm gonna read, read, read, and hunt, hunt, hunt.

Thanks for all the help

Microsoft Office X will run on those. There were also free versions of Open Office, which needs X11 installed, and NeoOffice which doesn't need X11, but I can't see where to download them from anymore looking quickly.

With Disk Utility you can make a copy of a DVD and reburn it to a DVD. The problem you'll have with trying to burn DVD's is a lack of hard drive space to house the dmg files you make to burn back.

Toast burns DVD's too but the same thing. You can tell it to copy a DVD but it would need enough disk space to store the temporary file before burning. You'd need Toast version 6.1.1 or earlier, down to 5.2.1, anything before needs to use OS 9.

You'll also need a DVD burner, which neither machine has, and finding an internal DVD burner for the iMac is not possible, they were never made, and finding a burner for the G3 will be a tough one if at all possible that will work with that system and hardware. Your best bet would be an old IDE Pioneer DVR-104, if you can find one. I don't know if the optical bus is SCSI or IDE. If it's SCSI, good luck, I doubt you'll find anything.

You are a king amongst kings. Where exactly do you store all this info/data?

Previous versions of Open Office...
Here

Toast 5...
Here on Ebay for $10.00

On the internet, I'm an idiot without it.

Windows versions.

It has to be able to get to 5.2 for X. I don't know if Roxio still has that update available, probably not. I have a 5.2 around archived on DVD.

I may have a Toast 6 install disk around here, somewhere. It could take days, weeks, even months to find it.

That's right, 6 runs on 10.2, I have that laying around too.

Sorry...



Here.. try this.
http://mac.oldapps.com/openoffice.php

That site is kind of handy, never have seen it, but he needs version 1 of NeoOffice or OpenOffice.

Yeah, neither machine has a DVD player (let alone a burner). The G3 minitower does have a CD reader/burner but the iMac does not.

I'll try the oldest one first and if it works, move up untill I find one that doesn't.

Thanks

The iMac only has USB 1.1 capabilities, so even an external USB burner would be practically useless. No FireWire either. Even if the USB card in the G3 is USB 2, the CPU is probably close to insufficient for DVD burning.

Are you sure about that? Even if he burns at the slowest speed?

It's not impossible, but USB 1.1 is deadly slow. Even USB 2 on the G3 would not be blazing fast.

It doesn't take much processor power to burn data to disc. The best bet would be to get an internal burner for the G3, I'm pretty sure it's an IDE bus, and get patchburn 1.1.

Yeah, I don't think USB 1.1 would be fast enough for DVD burning, I know that USB 1.1 with CD's you had to limit it to 4x I think, so I doubt it would work with DVD's. USB 2 would be fast enough, even with the G3 speed, but I'd say it would be more likely to work, and a whole lot cheaper, to go internal.

I know that USB 1.1 with CD's you had to limit it to 4x I think, so I doubt it would work with DVD's.

Don't DVDs burn the same way, just longer due to more data. Oh, and a different wavelength of laser.

DVD's spin 3 times faster. USB 1.1 can put out enough at best rate with a small amount to spare to burn a DVD at 1x, but that's at best rate. It will work if the data rate isn't significantly interrupted by anything else on the bus.

It will also take well over 2 hours to burn, then you'd have to wait for it to verify the burn which would take another two hours or so. Then during the verify have it say "Mismatch at Sector whatever."

You'd be close to 5 hours to burn a good DVD.

DVDs?? I thought all this thing had was a CD burner.

You can put a DVD burner in it. You mentioned you wanted to duplicate DVD's is why I mentioned it. :-)

Oh yeah... I remember those days.... grrrr

Oops, sorry, I forgot...

Brain-dead, ya know-I wondered why DVDs were being discussed.

LOL. Oh well, we all learned about DVD players anyway.