How to get a PC hard drive to fit a Mac G5

steveo77

New Member
Hello people,

Just after a little help and advice.

I have bought a hard drive for my G5 Apple Mac from PC World (which they recommended would work), however when i tried to fit it the connectors are the wrong size. I've also got a PC which has the same type of pins etc as that hard drive, so it appears that the guy at PC world has sold me a hard drive to fit a PC not an Apple Mac.

A friend has spent alot of time and effort installing data on this hard drive so i can't just take it back and swap it for one that will fit.

Can i simply buy and adaptor to make it fit ?

Thanks in advance
Steve
 
Do you have a link to the hd you bought?
I was never really aware that there was a difference in mac and pc hd's, but I havel also never installed an extra drive in a G5, so there could be a difference in cables compared to a G4
I just installed a 120gb drive from my pc to my mac with no problems.
Is the drive external or internal?
How many internal devices do you have installed right now?
 
Every time I've bought a hard drive, they always said it would fit in an Apple or in a PC... of course, we're talking parallel IDE hard drives. Perhaps there was a mistake made and you got a SATA or SCSI drive?
Tom
 
Can you post a picture of the drive and the cable from the mac? It should be IDE as OvenMaster said... Unless it's some 2.5" drive, which I doubt.
 
I went back to PC world. apparently the G5 uses smaller cables to connect to the hard drive. there is an adapter but pC world do not sell them.

I got round the problem by buying a "External Drive Enclosure" and fitting the hard drive to that and then plugging it in the usb port.

...so far so good.

However, the next problem.... i bought a USB 2-Port PCi Card (again recommended by staff at PC world) cos i'm running low on USB ports, i went to fit this and the slots available in the G5 again are the wrong type !!!!!!! poxy G5, nothing fits !!!

I know i can just buy a 4 way adaptor to increase the number of ports but i'm already using far too many plugs for the one main plug socket near the computer desk - looking a bit dangerous!

I've learnt 2 things recently

1 = nothing is compatable with G5's
2= PC world needs to retrain its staff
 
At my work one of our computers has a external USB port, which adds an additional 4 USB ports.
I cant believe they would sell you that card. On the packaged did the card mention anything about being Mac Compatible?
 
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