G4 powermac into a media center help

mmbarthezmmbarthez
Posted:
in Genius Bar edited January 2014
I own a dual 1 ghz Powermac that I have been working on turning into a media center computer, I have finally found a cheap TV (Sylvania from Sam?s club, I am poor because of college) with s-video inputs. I also have the DVI to S-video adapter, I thought hooking up the computer to the TV through the adapter and s-video cable would have been easy, but it seems that it isn?t. Am I over looking something here? Can this powermac not display to a TV? The set up my parents mac mini is a very similar one and it worked out of the box hooking it up to the TV, I thought this would be similar.



I am running 10.4.4 with 1.25 gigs of ram and 2 80 gig hard drives if anyone can come up with some suggestions I would appreciate it. Thanks for your help.

Comments

  • Reply 1 of 4
    mr. hmr. h Posts: 4,870member
    Quote:

    Originally posted by mmbarthez

    I own a dual 1 ghz Powermac that I have been working on turning into a media center computer, I have finally found a cheap TV (Sylvania from Sam?s club, I am poor because of college) with s-video inputs. I also have the DVI to S-video adapter, I thought hooking up the computer to the TV through the adapter and s-video cable would have been easy, but it seems that it isn?t. Am I over looking something here? Can this powermac not display to a TV? The set up my parents mac mini is a very similar one and it worked out of the box hooking it up to the TV, I thought this would be similar.



    I am running 10.4.4 with 1.25 gigs of ram and 2 80 gig hard drives if anyone can come up with some suggestions I would appreciate it. Thanks for your help.



    I'm assuming that all the adaptors/cables/plugs/sockets physically fit together? It's just that you are getting no picture out of you mac?



    When you try to do this, is the TV the only display connected to the mac?
  • Reply 2 of 4
    mmbarthezmmbarthez Posts: 40member
    Yes everything fits together, and yes the TV is the only monitor. I have tried starting up with the TV attached, going to sleep then waking up with it attached, even trying different resolutions each time and i cant get the TV to adjust. Have i over looked something?
  • Reply 3 of 4
    mr. hmr. h Posts: 4,870member
    Quote:

    Originally posted by mmbarthez

    Yes everything fits together, and yes the TV is the only monitor. I have tried starting up with the TV attached, going to sleep then waking up with it attached, even trying different resolutions each time and i cant get the TV to adjust. Have i over looked something?



    Do you have a computer monitor? You could try this:



    Connect the computer monitor and start up. Open system prefs and go to displays, and reduce the resolution to 640 x 480. Now, position the mouse pointer over "detect displays", but don't press it. Making sure not to move the mouse, turn off the monitor and disconnect it. Now connect up the TV, turn it on and set the tv to the s-video input. Now, assuming you have no picture on the tv, hit the mouse button. Hopefully, OS X will detect the display type and adjust accordingly.



    If that does work, the thing is that I don't know if the settings will hold across restarts. Let us know how it goes.
  • Reply 4 of 4
    mmbarthezmmbarthez Posts: 40member
    nope, it doesnt seem to take, dectect displays, waking from sleep, even restarts, all of it does nothing... i am thinking about breaking down and getting a really cheap DVD player for it... i dont know what to try next.
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