Ask Jacob
Archive for December, 2009
How can I share my neighbors T3 connection among my devices wirelessly?
Networking, Wireless / 1 Comment
Jacob, Maya referred me to you so here goes 
I’m trying to get rid of my slow satellite internet and pick up my neighbors T3 connection wirelessly. I have an iMac, Macbook Pro and an iPhone that I want to be networked in my house and I can’t seem to make it work. I ordered a Hawkins HWUN1 high gain antenna, hooked it up to my iMac and it works great. The problem is to use it I have to turn off my airport and the iMac is the only one that gets internet. I need to find a way to pick up the signal (about 120 yards away through trees) and still network my computers in home.
I tried enabling sharing and plugging my airport extreme into my imac but that messed stuff up and I still can’t use my imac’s airport. I’m not really sure how the routers / repeaters / signal boosters / etc. work and I need some help!
Is there a router out there that I can plug my HWUNI into and redistribute the signal? Or do I need to go a completely different route?
So to clarify…
I want to:
Pick up my neighbor’s signal
Network my home computes
I have:
1 iMac
1 Macbook Pro
1 iPhone
1 Airport Extreme Base Station
1 Hawkins HWUN1 (which has enough amplification to get the signal)
Let me know what your recommendations would be.
Thanks!
Daniel
Because the HWUN1 is a USB network device you can not share it through an Airport Extreme base station. What you can do is connect to the neighbor’s network via the Hawkins USB adapter, and then share that connection with your other wireless devices through your iMac’s wireless card. You do this in the Sharing section of System Preferences.
Apple also has documentation on sharing your internet connection: OS X 10.4 Internet sharing directions and OS X 10.5 Internet sharing instructions.
In both cases your iMac will always need to be on, and not sleeping. You can set the system Sleep to “never” in the Energy Saver section of System Preferences. It is OK to let the hard drive and Display sleep, just set the System slider bare to “Never”.
- Jacob
Can I use an alternate Airport Card in my iMac?
Hello!
I have a problem with my Airport Card and want to change it out. Can I use the card MB363Z/A without any problems? My Mac is an iMac 24″ 2.16 Intel Core 2 Duo and the Airport Card I use is bcm 94321 mc.
Best wishes,
Dimitrios
Although I have not tried it myself, it should work. When ordering Apple service parts for your system it notes the compatible machines as:
iMac (17-inch Late 2006), iMac (24-inch), Mac Pro, iMac (20-inch Late 2006)
You should be fine, just note that it is a very extensive repair that requires the removal of the front casing and shielding. Also the antenna connectors are fragile so work lightly.
Good luck!
- Jacob
Do I need an external mic for my iMac?
Hi Jacob,
I just bought my mother a used iMac desktop 20″ Power Mac, with an iSight camera built in. When we tried using Skype, we could see each other, but I could not hear her. I’ve been reading on some forums and it looks like I may need an external USB mic. Do you know anything about this problem? And does the MacMice MicFlex USB Microphone System have drivers and such or is it basically plug and play?
Do you guys carry the Snowflake mic as well, better? Thanks.
- Jon
There should be a built in Mic in the iMac computer you bought. If you go to the Sound section of System Preferences, you should see an Input tab. Select “Internal microphone” from the input options list and check the levels. Skype should pick up from the Mac’s internal sound system, but you may need to adjust the Skype sound preferences as well.
If after that you still need an external Mic, most USB options will be plug and play. The Cyber Acoustic Desktop Mic is a good choice.
- Jacob
Word is crashing every print job we submit, any suggestions?
G5, Printing / 0 Comments
Hi Jacob,
We have 2 Mac Minis and a G5 networked through a Netgear ethernet box to a Xerox 8500 Phaser wax printer. All computers are running on OSX.4. We use mostly Microsoft Word, the most recent Mac version. Nearly every time we submit a print job, Word crashes. If we haven’t saved just prior, all changes are lost. When we restart Word, we can usually print but if we make any additional changes in the document, Word crashes again.
What we have tried – reinstalling Word from the CD, the printer software, new cables. We’ve tried connecting one computer directly to the printer via USB. None of this seems to make any difference in the crashing effect.
The rest of the networking and computers are working fine, this is our one issue, but it is SUCH a pain.
Do you have any suggestions?
Thanks,
- Mary-Howell
There was a bug in Office 2004 that cased it to crash when printing which was fixed in an Office update. Please make sure that you are running the most recent version of MS Office for the Mac. You do that via the Microsoft Autoupdate program in your Applications folder. If the problem continues after fully updating your Office programs, then you may need to reset your Printer system. Apple has iInfo on the Reset Printing System feature as well.
After you reset the Printing System, you will need to re-add your Phaser 8500. Take the opportunity to see if Xerox has an updated driver before your add the printer again.
Hope that helps,
- Jacob
Which iPods will work with OS X 10.4 and earlier?
G4, iPod / iTunes / 0 Comments
Hi,
I have an iBookG4 with OSX 10.3.9. Leopard. Processor is 1.33GHz PowerPC G4 and with 1.25 GB DDR SDRAM. I went to an Apple store to buy an iPod and they only stock ones that run on OSX 10.4. All I want is an iPod that will store a reasonable amount of tracks to listen to while I am jogging.
Can you recommend a model that will suit my needs and my system?
Thank you,
- Max
If you want to stick with OS X 10.3.9, then you should look at some of our used Fifth generation iPods or used iPods. They are also called an iPod Video in the descriptions. My wife owns one and loves it for video and music. This model is the most advanced iPod that will still work with a Mac OS before 10.4 Tiger. For running though, you may just want to get a used original iPod Nano. They do not weigh much and have no hard drive to get damaged by bouncing around. I had one, but I loved it to death and just have an iPhone now.
If you are interested in upgrading your iBook, it will run Leopard just fine. My teenage daughter has that exact same model iBook running Leopard and she will not let me replace it.
- Jacob
What are my options for upgrading my eMac?
G4, Hardware / 0 Comments
I have an older module eMac-G4 that was shipped to me in the early 2000’s. Now would like to upgrade it but first I need to know if it can be upgraded. The machine has never been upgraded and no changes have been made. Can you please tell me the technical specifications and if I can upgrade it.
Thank you very much for your time.
Well you only have a few upgrade options with an eMac. You can easily upgrade the RAM to 1GB or 2BG, depending on the model. With a little technical help you can also upgrade the hard drive, but it may be beyond the average users skill level to open up that computer. Consider taking the eMac into an Apple Authorized service center.
Your best upgrade option would be to trade-in that eMac and look at getting a new or used Intel iMac. The performance boost to dollar ratio will be much more favorable to you by trading it in.
Hope that helps,
- Jacob
Can I use multiple iPods with one iTunes library?
Can I use two iPods from the iTunes program I have on my computer? My older 4GB iPod was not large enough to hold the data. I purchased through PowerMax, a new 120GB iPod. Can I still load partial data from iTunes on the older 4GB unit?
Thanks
Gregg
Absolutely, my wife and I share a central computer and pool our music and TV shows together in one iTunes library. She has one iPod just for music in her car and another one with her favorite music and her recorded TV shows. I just have an iPhone but they all coexist in one iTunes library. We even have a 1st generation iPod Shuffle to help the person who draws the short straw and has to vacuum.
iTunes uses the serial number of the iPod to keep track of witch iPod has what settings for synchronization. So plug them both in without any worries.
- Jacob
I’ve got 5 devices – which router is best for my home network?
I want a router that is big enough to handle 2 iMacG5’s 24″, 1 iMacG5 20″, 1 HP Pavilion a1430n, 1 Samsung ML2251N Laserjet printer.
I’m not real sharp on this stuff, but I’m assuming the router would be the first thing to hook to the Modem from Comcast, then all the others would hook to the router?
Right now I have a small router Linksys Ethernet/DSL router and Farallon Starlet 14 hooked to that. Something has stopped working. When I hook one computer directly to the Modem it works with cable and email. When it is the only computer on, and hooked to the Farallon it won’t hook to the internet.
I have gone through the turn this one off, wait a minute, turn that off, wait a minute, etc turn the modem off, wait a minute, turn the electrical outlet off, wait a minute, turn the outlet back on and each item in turn starting with the modem, then the Linksys router, then the Farralon waiting a minute for each, no computers work with internet although they do function.
I do not want wireless, I am even more lost then. I purchased the last iMacG5 from you just a short time ago.
- Harry
When it comes to ease of use, I would recommend the Apple Airport base station over any other router. All the tools needed to set it up are already on all your Macs and you can mix wireless and wired computers.
I would have your Pavilion and Samsung printer connect to it via ethernet, and have all your AirPort enable Macs connect via Wireless connections. I think you will be happy with speed at getting it setup and added ability to share a hard drive on the network will make your computers interact better.
- Jacob
How can I retrieve data from my old 3 1/4 inch floppies?
Hi Jacob,
In the late 1980s/early 1990s I was teaching space technology in England. The school used ONLY Macintosh computers. When I came back to the states I had to buy a PC/IBM and gave away my Mac. Now I have 100+ 3 1/4 floppies that I’m desperate to retrieve my engineering drawings and other documents from.
How do I solve this problem? The iMac computers today don’t even have a 3 1/4 drive port. Can you give me some advice?
- Tom
After you copy those over to your hard drive, keep a copy on your hard drive and burn an archive copy to CD or DVD. Make sure to keep the archive copy someplace safe. The floppy disks will fail over time. The bigger issue will be in reading those drawing files if they are in a proprietary format. I was a big Claris CAD user in my school days and have many of my house blueprints saved in that CAD file format. I keep a copy of Claris Cad running on Mini VMac so that I can read them and create new drawings. It will seem strange, but I have yet to find a modern CAD program to replace Claris CAD.
Check it out and let me know if it works for your files.
- Jacob
My iMac has the famous blue screen since I upgraded to 10.5.6…
System Settings, iMac / 0 Comments
Jacob,
I just installed OS X 10.5 in an iMac (Intel powered 17″) I then did the on-line upgrade to 10.5.6. All went well until the iMac restarted. I get the chime and the gray Apple Logo and below the I see the spinning indicator.
Next I see a blue screen. And that’s it. The screen remains solid blue. I booted up using the OS X 10.5 install disk and was able to run Disk Utilities, which found the hard disk to have no problems. I have turned off power using the switch in the rear then restarting via the power switch. Same scenario with a blue screen as a final result. This iMac has only 512K or RAM. Could this small amount of RAM be causing this problem.
What do you suggest I do next?
Thank you,
Bill
You best option is to boot up off your OS X Leopard install disc and do an Archive and Install of the Mac OS. It will not overwrite your personal data, just the broken System files. Apple provides more information on Archive and Install as well.
Although 512MB is the minimum for 10.5, you should add another 1GB stick of RAM. I find that 2GB of RAM is perfect size for the Mac OS X 10.5 system.
- Jacob
My Mac won’t start up, I just get a grey screen with a restart prompt…
Jacob,
Last week I was running an install of the automatic software updates and was required to do a reset. The reset was taking forever so I shut the computer down and when I went to reboot I could not. The machine turns on, does the start up noise, gets to the grey screen with the apple but after 30 seconds a darker grey screen filters down with an error message, “you need to restart your computer. Hold down the power button for several seconds or press the restart button.”
This does not work, I have tried holding shift to get to safe mode, this does not work either, any advice?
Thanks,
Jim
Your best option is to boot up off your OS X install disc and do an Archive and Install of the Mac OS. It will not overwrite your personal data, just the broken System files. Apple provides more information on Archive and Install as well.
- Jacob
