20" iMac G4 Pro - Touchscreens

After a break, I am back and have several projects which I am starting to organize for.

1.  First, my apologies for not yet finishing the 17" 1 - 1.25Ghz iMac G4 tutorial.  After requests, I have decided to do a video in order to show how quickly this can be done using the DVI connector and also to have another way for people to visualize this hack.  I have everything laid out and am hopeful to do this sometime this week.

2.  Complete a 17" mod.  As I have the equipment and will be doing the above tutorial, I am thinking about finishing this up in some fashion.  This would not be an all in one, but instead may use wireless DVI and function as a second monitor.

3.  Apple Cube mod.  After searching I have seen some amazing cube mods including newer ones which use the existing heatsink.  This makes me somewhat less enthusiastic, as it has been done already, but it is still something that I would like to do using my core 2 duo ECX board.

4.  The 20" iMac G4 Pro Mod.  As I talked about in an earlier post the features that I would add to this pro mod would include, in order of importance:

A) Touchscreen: Something I have tried to incorporate since my first iMac G4 Mods

- The problems that I've had relate mostly to the fact that 20" 16:10 is no longer a common size.

- Touchscreens often add extra weight and thickness and thus complicate the designs

- Available Touchscreens are often of poor quality and use resistive technology that is not multitouch compatible and often detracts from the image by adding a reflective glare.

B) LED Backlighting: This conserves power and can allow for a much thinner LCD enclosure.

- Similar to the Touchscreen this is complicated by the odd 20" 16:10 aspect ratio.  No commercially available LED LCDs are available in this format.

- This may also allow for brightness control with a PWM control.

C) Upgraded Processor, RAM, and improved cooling: You can't have the first two without the third.

- I tried to make my previous mod as close to the original as possible, with the optical drive, space is somewhat limited and to ensure stability with the existing heatsink I went dual core i5

- To use a quad core, I will have to upgrade the cooling in place of the optical drive.

D) The native PSU: Resourceful readers have incorporated the native PSU.  

- Unfortunately, the native PSU did not fit my previous mod.  Without the optical drive and with improved cooling, I should be able to use the native PSU.

E) An iSight/Mic: Although the mic exists the rotating, tilting LCD makes the G4 ideal for an iSight.

- I do not yet know if a newer iSight will work better than the one from the iMac G5.  I already know how to turn the iSight from the G5 into a USB compatible camera, but I don't know if it will fit.

F) Aesthetic Changes: While rigs with neon lights all over were never my taste, I wouldn't mind some LED lights to differentiate this mod.

To start with, the most important thing I would like to incorporate is a Touchscreen.  Several of my iMac G4 mods have incorporated touchscreens.  I do agree that desktop touchscreens are not ideal, but in certain situations they can be quite useful.  A prerequisite is that the must be able to tilt backwards - newer touchscreen all in ones are doing this and apple's own patent shows that they have considered this approach in a design that is very reminiscent of the iMac G4 (mixed with the current iMac design).

Courtesy of patentlyapple.com

Rear View

Unfortunately, the extra girth and weight of the 20" touchscreens required significant compromise in the design.  I used a shell from an aluminum 20" cinema display and the front bezel of the G4.

At the time I hadn't yet figured out how to use the native inverter, so using the ACD solved both of these problems.  Once I figured out how to use the native inverter, I was able to use the complete original G4 shell and came to prefer the native appearance over my design despite the touchscreen.

Part of this had to do with the 5 wire resistive touchscreen which I found myself having to recalibrate frequently and had an annoying reflective glare.

However, with newer operating systems favoring touch/tablet interfaces over traditional Mouse/Keyboard, having a rotating. bending, tilting, floating touchscreen seems like the best possible type of desktop to try this on.  Lion (and even more so Mountain Lion) is actually touch friendly especially from the Launchpad interface.  Windows 8 Consumer Preview is even more touch friendly in that not using a touchscreen seems wrong.

I have an image of a broken 20" iMac G4 that will serve as the skeleton of this project.  The previous owner tore the front bezel off.  What you will notice is that the LCD comes right to the front of the enclosure.  Sure, you could put a touchscreen in front and secure it with double sided tape and the tape on the front bezel, but there would be a visible space from the side.  Plus, as you'll be moving and touching this, I worry about keeping it secure.  But, you can see that as is, adding anything in front of the LCD is difficult.

I have gone to great lengths to consider various touch options that are available, even inquired about custom touch screens.  The 20" 16:10 continues to be a difficult size to find.  There is a 20" 16:10 Surface acoustic Wave Touchscreen that I used in the past, but it requires a border that goes beyond the dimensions of the enclosure.  So that leaves these four:

Top Left is a broken 21.5" 16:9 optical touch monitor (LCD is broken by the touch aspect works).  This uses optical sensors in the corners and does require a "gap" in front of the LCD.  Can I adjust this to 20" 16:10?

Bottom Left is a 5 wire resistive touchscreen.  This is the same company that manufactured the screen for my old mod, but they have added an anti-reflective coat.  Its fairly light and thin and the correct size and ratio, but I still have reservations regarding resistive technology in general.

Top Right is an IR 19" 16: 10 touch panel.  The IR sensors are corrected in the corners and it may be possible to extend this connection.  Again, this requires a "gap" and I will likely loose touch sensing in the 4 corners.

Bottom Right is a 20" (approx 16:10) capacitive panel that I obtained from 3M.  Its an older cap active technology, but I have been playing with it on Lion and have been impressed by it so far.  While it is heavy and fairly thick, its active area fits the entire screen and as it is capacitive, multitouch drivers are available for windows (therefore should be possible for OS X).  This seems like the best solution and I feel lucky that I even found it, to be honest.

LCD enclosure

To fit it, however, I have to make the LCD enclosure itself smaller.

Show here is the LCDs enclosure.  There is a front and a back.  The LCD panel itself is quite thin and its control board actually extends outside the main enclosure.  Where it can interface with a JAE cable.

Side profile of LCD panel

Oblique Angle

 Most of the space is actually taken up by the backlight mechanism.
To be continued....

iMac G4 Mod Advice

I hope this doesn't come across as preachy, but I just want to give some advice to those of you new to modding the iMac G4.  I have disassembled and reassembled this computer so many times I could probably do it blindfolded.  There are a few aspects of modding this computer that have led to a lot of frustration for me, a few pointers, hopefully, will help some of you.

1) If your goal is to connect your iMac G4's LCD to modern hardware.  Use the Native LCD with the "TMDS to DVI Method".  Changing all the wires to some other method of connection such as LVDS is very time consuming, less stable, and more expensive.  There is no reason not to use the native TMDS wires that go from the native LCD through the neck.  Apple has already done the work for you! Plus, TMDS is a digital signal that is more stable over distance than LVDS and TTL.  Apple has put the controller inside the LCD itself, with other LCDs, you would have to add one.  I have done this both ways, replacing the screen and replacing/soldering the wires takes hours and likely days.  By using the TMDS to DVI Method with the DVI Connector below, you could get a signal within 30 minutes that is superior in every way.  Which brings me to.....

DVI Connector

2) USE THIS DVI CONNECTOR!!!  (MOLEX PN 74320-4004 - though other variations which work just as well exist).  It is very cheap and makes this mod so much easier.  I can not emphasize this enough. I know a male HDMI may be more convenient (or even a male DVI), but for the price of an adapter you will save yourself a lot of frustration.  Sure you could cut off an HDMI cable and solder it to the iMac G4's pins, but this is a much harder task than you may think.  The TMDS channel wires in the Black LCD cable are as thin as a hair and this is no exaggeration.  If you manage to spare the pins at the end of the wires during soldering this can be done.  But, as the pins are soldered to the ends of the wires themselves, they have an annoying habit of falling off when heat from a soldering iron is applied.  Also, if you make a mistake while soldering there is no going back.  As this is a digital signal, one broken connection can mean no signal at all.  What's more is that even if you do things perfectly, you can still have signal problems.  One mod that I made I had to cut and reconnect again (so I lost all the pins).  Despite a perfect connection, the image was plagued by artifact.  Another time, I had red/green pixels "dancing around" when viewing certain colors.  I ended up having to replace the entire Black LCD cable (with the TMDS signaling cable from an Apple Cinema Display which has thicker wires) to solve the problem.  TMDS uses minute differences between the positive and negative wires (and their shield wire) to communicate.  Altered resistance in the form of a little too much solder or too much wire wrapped around can result in these types of artifacts even if you are extremely good with soldering.  This DVI connector makes this almost plug and play.  The pins fit perfectly,  you don't need to solder at all.  I am not exaggerating when I say that this method saved me 10+ hours of intensive work on my recent mod.  Besides having to put a piece or two of electrical tape over some pins to prevent cross-talk, my image has been pristine every time I have used this connector.  Do not repeat the same mistakes that I have made.

iMac G4 Neck with Cinema Display Wires

3) Although no longer necessary with the TMDS to DVI Mod, if you want to add or change some wires, do not be scared to open the neck.  Its not hard, does not require special tools, and is not really dangerous.  I have written on this blog about the exploding neck because I had read about it myself.  I've had an open neck fall off the table, I've left necks open for weeks at a time, and have never had the spring fly off.  I wouldn't throw an open neck as hard of you can against the wall, but you do not have to handle it like its plutonium.  Just keep in mind that  if you do knock the spring off its moorings it takes a lot of work to pry it back up into position.

4) If you need to add wires to the neck, do not put more/thicker wires into the neck than it can hold.  Just because you can get it through the holes does not make it a good idea.  When you overcrowd the neck, you'll start to hear grinding and some wires will wear down as they are pushed into the hinges of the neck.  The iMac G4 has 4 wires that go through the native neck.  When you replace wires, take out what you're not using and aim to have about the same "volume of wires" as the native neck comes with.

5) Get rid of the Torx-6 screws.  These are the most troublesome screws I have ever worked with.  On the bottom of the 17" and 20" iMac G4's monitor housing you will find 3 screws that require a Torx-6  screwdriver to open.  These are the screws that keep the monitor housing closed.  I have never seen screws that strip easier despite using the appropriate tool.  6 points on a tiny screw is very close to a circle and once you start stripping it - its already too late.  Chances are good that you may have to open up the monitor housing again at some point for upgrades, repairs etc.  Act preemptively and replace these with small phillips screws - it will save problems later.

5) Want an All-In-One? Consider an 3.5" ECX or other small form factor board.  Although mini-itx or a mac mini motherboard are the most popular choices neither of these is ideal from a size/heat perspective.  ECX's can fit at the top of the dome in place of the native HDD where heat won't be as big a problem as it would with a mini itx at the bottom of the dome.  They don't require an atx power supply and come with a variety of additional options including PCI-E mini or x4, Compact Flash etc.  Processors range from Atom to AMD Fusion to Sandy Bridge Core i processors.  This allows you to keep the full 5.25" drive if you want and allows room at the bottom of the dome for ports at the back.  Although not nearly as expandable as a mini-itx mobo, with such limited space in the dome, this isn't likely to matter.

6) Do not sacrifice stability for power.  The mods I've posted usually don't include the mods which failed.  Most of these initially worked but failed because I tried to force things.  If you have to use all your strength to push your mod closed to screw it in, it will not last.  If you cram things in between the motherboard and the air holes, your board will overheat.  Keep expectations in check.  If you have a 17" monitor running at 1440x900 you don't need SLI or Crossfire.  Having it turn on and having a critical problem like this is worse than it not working at all.  If it does not turn on, you can start troubleshooting what went wrong.  These problems (like my 20" TMDS to LVDS with too many wires through the neck) usually require a complete redesign and many of the parts have to be repurposed or replaced altogether.

Hope this helps.

Anniversaries and an iMac G4 "Sandy Bridge Mod" Pro Version?

I hadn't even realized that I failed to acknowledge an important anniversary.  The iMac G4 was introduced on January 7th, 2002 by Steve Jobs at the San Francisco Macworld.  The 20" was released later in November 18, 2003.  Then only 2 and a half years later (August 31, 2004) the iMac G4, with its sunflower inspired horizontal design, was discontinued in favor of the iMac G5's vertically oriented all-in-one.

Many reasons have been suggested to why this was done.  The cost of the neck, the difficulty in supporting increasing LCD sizes, and the cooling needs of the notoriously hot G5 processor.  I have been using one version of this as an external monitor hooked up to a mac mini and now a second version as a modernized all-in-one and it remains one of the most enjoyable desktop user experiences I have know, even 10 years later.

With my sandy bridge "genuine" mod my goal was to be as true to the original as possible, but I have been thinking about doing a version that has some extra features not found in the original.  Some of these may be possible, some of them are not.  To make extra room in the base, the optical drive will be removed.  So, I am contemplating doing a "PRO" version of the iMac G4 mod.  I have enough spare parts and I think this may be a fun alternative.  I will likely use the TMDS to DVI method and not the apple cinema display controller method.  The overall look of the iMac G4 will be changed (something I wanted to avoid in the previous mod).  Things I may add:

3M Touchscreen

• A Touchscreen: One of my favorite mods used a resistive touchscreen and it fits this form factor quite well.  However, I did not like the glare, resolution, or touch accuracy of the resistive touchscreen.  I have however located a capacitive touchscreen that should fit in this mod.  Its flaw is that it is somewhat thick and heavy.  An alternative may be incorporating optical sensors in the bezel.
• LED backlighting: This would be necessary to fit the touchscreen, but something that has been done in similar projects by JL7, and adds improved backlighting and power efficiency.
• Quad Core Processor: I changed from a mobile core i7 quad core to a dual core i5 as a result of both heat production and power consumption in my latest mod.  However, a quad core i7 machine is still something I would love to do.  As well as maxing out the RAM to 8GB.
• Native Power: Increased power needs would require a big power supply and the only one that could fit is the native supply which other modders have used.
• Better Cooling: Use of the native PSU would require shifting of the mobo downwards.  This as well as heat generated by the quad core processor and the PSU itself would require a much more powerful cooling solution.  At the very least a large active heatsink on the CPU and a 92mm case fan.  However, an intake fan at the bottom may be needed as well.  This will use of the space that was previously used by the optical drive.
• iSight Cam: in my G4/G5 setup, I use the iSight cam on the G5, but I have been wishing that there was one on the G4's LCD as it would be much easier to manipulate.  The microphone is already there, modifying the LCD enclosure to support an iSight may be possible.

iMac G4 iSight Mock-up

• Apple Modification: Just to visually delineate this, I was considering altering the apple on the base.  A light up apple or IR sensor are possibilities
• ???Improved Graphics: This one is difficult, although its something I would like to add, most of these small boards do not have PCI-Ex16 slots.  Even conversion of mini pcie is usually only to x1, and this makes it difficult to get much improvement over on chip sandy bridge graphics.  Fitting and powering a full size card would also be difficult.  I will continue to give this thought, but its probably unlikely.  Even if you wedge a mini itx in, you would have difficulty fitting even a low profile card in to the dome.  

Although this mod would involve tradeoffs including louder fans, loss of the optical drive, and loss of the exact iMac G4 appearance, there are clearly advantages as well.  The iSight, LED backlights, and touchscreen in particular are things I would love to add.  Any suggestions would be appreciated.

Apple Cube Mod II

Courtesy of PCMag Article
12 Biggest PC Duds

While the computer did not sell well and was undeniably overpriced and underpowered, it was beautiful.  Similar to the Early iMacs no machines before looked anything like it.  The ports came out from the bottom, the entire computer was removable from its enclosure by releasing a handle.  Impressively, this computer had no fans (though it was designed to have one) and utilized an immense heatsink for its cooling.

In July 2010, I had intended to begin a project a purchased a damaged cube.  This post was the first and (up until now) the last post I would make on this subject.  My focused returned to the G4 and then somewhat the G5.  One thing that kept me from pursuing this was the amazing work being done by some modders.  Here are a couple examples from tonymacs forum.  This one by 61mg73 and this one by eelmod.  Another amazing one is this one on 123macmini by khisayruou.  The one thing all these talented modders have in common is that they are master craftsmen who in many cases rebuilt their cube's inner structure to suit their purposes.  I did not feel that I could offer any improvements over what they had built. My experience with the iMac G4 has shown me that there may be something I can offer with a different approach.  I'd like to point out that this approach is in no way better (in fact it likely offers non of the amazing enhancements these projectes added).

Most of my iMac G4 mods involved complete rewiring of the neck, alteration of the lcd and its case etc.  Even my current project/variation involves LED backlights and a capacitive touchscreen.  However, my favorite mod actually came about by altering almost nothing.  Only the components of the dome were replaced.  I liked this "minimally invasive" method because it is visually the same as the original iMac G4 and because its simplicity allowed others to reproduce it.  When I started this blog to visually show my ideas, I under-appreciated how enjoyable it is to see others reproduce my work and get to do a project they likely would not have pursued had they not read my blog.  This is even more so when the person is a so called "noob" and I am grateful to the dozen or so people out there that have shown me their completed and near completed works.

Using this "minimally invasive" philosophy I now believe that I now can offer a variation of this mod that others may be able to reproduce without any high level construction or electrical skills.  The Guidelines I am trying to abide are to:

1. As little cutting and alteration of the original structure of the cube as possible.
2. Try to use the general layout and design of the the cube itself as a guide.  In other words, the cube structure will dictate my choice of parts, not the other way around.
3. Keep it simple.

The thing that makes this possible is again small form factor motherboards.  I have been extremely impressed with my two KEEX ECX boards (the Core 2 Duo 4300 and the Core i 6100).  They offer essentially the same power of a mini itx.  The exceptions include the use of mobile chipsets (which are an advantage in these mods).  Most apple computers are designed with mobile chipsets in mind.  The other exception is a lack of expandability.  As there is barely any room in most of these mods, this usually is not a big deal.

As I took the Core 2 Duo ECX out of my original iMac G4 All-In-One (now hooked up to an external mini), its now homeless and I'm hoping to incorporate this into this cube mod.  Although hackintoshing had problems, I think the cube's design and using my current hackintosh may allow me to overcome this.  Although not as powerful as its Sandy Bridge Brother this board has a PCI Ex4 as opposed to the mini PCIe on the 6100.  In addition, the Core 2 Duo Penryn is more than powerful enough to be an all purpose computer or HTPC.

Original Mobo and PCI Graphics Card OnTop

Original Mobo compared to KEEX-4030 with ASUS 5450

Using a similar set up the original.  I am using a ASUS Silent 5450 graphics card with a right angle PCIx4 to x16 (though this card is available in a PCI x1 with DP and I do also have the PCI x1 ION graphics card).  I will likely instead use a ribbon riser to push the mobo towards the back.  The extra room in front I'm hoping can be used to fit a pico PSU and port extenders.  With some luck, major cutting and modification of the cube ports may be avoided.

The other two major components include a slot load DVD.  There is an adapter available that allows use of standard slim DVD slot drives within the cube slot.  A standard 3.5" HDD is contained within one of the large heatsinks.  Although a smaller HDD or SDD can be used, as the heatsink is in place I may simply use a spare 3.5" SATA HDD.

Heatsink below the motherboard area

Obviously cooling is a problem with all these small form factor mods.  The use of the small board allows me to turn it upside down with the northbridge and the cpu facing down.  Behind this is the gigantic heatsink.

To keep the original design and to keep this as quiet as possible, I would love to use this huge passive heatsink.  I do believe that it is possible, but I have never done something like this and will have to research it.  The original motherboard has the cpu on an elevated chip that interfaced with a metal brick that conducted to the heatsink.

Either using a heatpipe or modifying this, I would like to see if its possible to utilize this structure.

I still have to finish my G4 Guides so will not be starting this up quite yet.  But to anyone with experience with passive heatsinks on both the CPU as well as the northbridge, any advice would be appreciated.  Thanks for reading!

Afterthoughts and Future Plans

To those waiting for completion of my guides, I apologize.  After completing my 20" mod, I needed an iMac G4 break.  I will be completing the 20" Guide as well as the 1/1.25 Ghz neck 17" Guide as soon as possible.

20" iMac G4 and 20" iMac G5 (Apple Cinema Display LCD Controller Hack)
Connected  to External Mac Mini

Genuine 20" iMac G4 All-In-One Sandy Bridge Hackintosh

Above you see my two favorite 20" mods.  The one on top uses an LCD controller from an Apple Cinema Display for both the iMac G4 (though the iMac G4 uses its native inverter) and the iMac G5.  These are connected to an external Mac Mini.  Although somewhat more complex, the great thing about this method is its stability.  It is really an apple cinema display in the form of an iMac G4 and G5.  The extra room in the in the iMacs is not put to waste.  The iMac G4 houses a USB optical drive (replacing the missing one on the Mac Mini.  The iMac G5's iSight and Mic are converted to USB.  This has become one of my most frequently used computers.

The second picture is my latest All-In-One Sandy Bridge Hackinosh using an ECX board to run Mac OS Lion.  This is very much native and did not require any alteration to the neck or lcd.  The computer, DVD burner, SSD (running lion) and onboard Compact Flash (running Windows 8 Developer Preview) are all internal.  This was a tremendous amount of fun and will make a great all-in-one computer.

Obviously both these methods are viable and both have their advantages.  From the outside, they are indistinguishable from each other or a native iMac G4.  Of course, which ever method you use for the LCD is independent of what you connect it to.

iMac neck connected to Apple Cinema Display

My slightly older 3rd method, used the actual housing from an apple cinema display.  The few extra millimeters this gave allowed the use of the cinema displays inverter (I had previously not been able to get the 20" iMac's native inverter to work).  This method also allowed for the addition of a 20" touch screen.  However, I have retired this mod for a couple reasons.  First, while I thought this was an acceptable work around at the time, I much prefer the look of the true LCD housing.  Second, while the touch screen was great with the iMac's design, I did not love the only touch screen I was able to find in the now rare 20" 16:10 size.  This resistive touch screen was fairly accurate, but its surface was uncomfortable to touch and its glossy plastic surface detracted from the resolution of the LCD.  Third, as a resistive screen single touch was all it could do.

While I now have a functional upgraded replica, I still like the idea of adding additional functionality to the iMac G4 with a touch screen.  There are a couple options that are now available.  Some capacitive screens have become much more reasonably priced.  Although they were originally designed as single touch, new software may be able to make them function with gestures and at multitouch.  Another possibility is optical or IR touch.  Although the available optionals do not come in 20" 16:10, they possibly can be tweaked.

The downside is that the 20" capacitive screen will add too much weight and the optical touch will require extra room between the LCD and the bezel.  One thing that may make this possible is to use LED backlighting which would be much thinner.  A fellow modder JP7 has done a fe amazing mods of apple cinema displays using LED backlights.

In terms of the base, I have no use for either a desktop monitor or an all-in-one.  But, a larger screen for a notebook computer has always been something I have considered for the iMac G4.  Using either wired technology (A thunderbolt dock? - If they eventually come in at a reasonable price) or wireless technology (Wireless DVI and USB adapter?) is something I can definitely see being useful.

Wireless DVI - Courtesy of Amazon.com

After I use my current G4 and G5 spare parts, I will probably move on from this.  And I still have a Cube which has been sitting waiting to be modded.

20" iMac G4 All-In-One "Genuine" Sandy Bridge Mod - Completed (With Video)

Finally, The Genuine 20" iMac G4 - All-In-One Sandy Bridge Mod is complete.  This is as close as I believe its possible to come to modernizing the original iMac G4.  It runs Lion, Mac OS 10.7 with only S3 sleep not working (S1 sleep works fine).  Wifi (using the original antenna embedded below the white plastic dome) and Bluetooth (via dongle on the back) work perfectly.  The power indicator and microphone on the Monitor Casing are also working.

The internal DVD burner can be ejected from te keyboard.  There is a powerbrick which plugs in via 4 pin connector to the center port on the rear of the iMac.  A Griffin iFire is used to connect the original Apple Pro Speakers.  The CPU fan is very quiet except under heavy loads.

This is the culmination of really all my previous mods and I'd like to thank all those who have helped me all the way and encourage all those who are thinking about resurrecting their iMac G4s to do so.

I have included a video on its features and demonstrating its use:

Rear Ports

Thanks for reading!!

Proprietarily Ridiculous - The Apple Pro Speakers

Apple Pro Speakers

There are a few "extra" features of the iMac G4 that I have gone to great lengths to incorporate because I felt that these were important to the design of the iMac.  One of these is the optical disc drive.  Although this is no longer a critical feature and it uses a huge amount of space in the dome, the disc tray emerging from the oval slit in the otherwise featureless dome is something I always associate with the iMac G4.  Similarly, the apple pro speakers, sometimes called the orb or eyeball speakers falls into the same category for me.  Other speakers just don't look quite right next to the iMac G4.  I had always known that the apple pro speakers had a proprietary connector (the apple mini-jack) and lacked an amplifier in the speakers themselves, but I didn't realize exactly how they worked until I was completing my most recent project and decided to incorporate these speakers.  I had been lucky to obtain both a Griffin Powerwave and a Griffin iFire which accept the apple mini jack and never gave this connector much thought.

Griffin Powerwave (External USB Amp)

Griffin iFire Adapter (Powered by Firewire)

One thing that made iMacs appear more elegant was the lack of "cable mess".  Steve Jobs talked about this frequently and this was one of the reasons that he so greatly favored all-in-ones.  Included in this was AC adapters/plugs.  It makes sense, why should computer speakers need another cable for AC power to power an onboard amp (complete with its own powerbrick for DC conversion) when you have a power supply in your computer and a cable already connecting to it. You could either have the amp in the computer and then output the amplified sound to the speakers or keep the amp external, but use the computers power supply to power it.

Cube Speakers

These speakers, designed by Harman Kardon, appeared with the G4 generation of PowerPC Macs.  The G4 Cube seem to contain an external amp in the small box that closely resembles an ifire (likely secondary to space constraints of the cube's chasis).  This then connected to the computer via USB for both power and connection.  The USB port, however, was a special port, with a higher voltage (standard USB is 5V) required to power the amplifier.  This makes sense to me and although these speakers were not compatible with standard USB, this was necessary to power the speakers and still keep the design simplicity that was characteristic of apple.

Apple Mini-Jack

For the Powermac G4's speakers (The Speakers with the Dark Circle) and the iMac G4 (The Speakers with the White Circle) apple introduced the apple mini jack connector.

At first this appears to be a 2.5mm plug.  The 2.5mm is simply a smaller version of the standard (3.5mm) Audio Jack.  These use a TRS (Tip, Ring, Sleeve) method for connection.  Looking from Top to Bottom, the Tip supplies the L channel.  Then there is a separation (see the white band below the tip), followed by a metal band - the Ring, which supplies the R Channel.  Then there is another separation, and then more metal which is the Sleeve.  The Sleeve is the Ground which is shared by both channels.

Apple Mini Jack on top,
2.5mm connector on bottom

However, with the Mini-Jack, at the base of the plastic part of the connector there is another metal piece not seen on the 2.5mm connector.  I had initially thought that this was there to provide a mechanical obstruction for use with other devices.  Similar to the original iPhones headphone jack which was recessed making compatibility with other headphones limited.  However, this is much more than just a physical barrier.  Closer inspection reveals another difference.  There are 4 metal areas on the inner pin for the minijack (separated by 3 white bands) as opposed to the 3 metal areas (separated by 2 black bands) on the 2.5mm which correspond to Tip, Ring, Sleeve.

For my project, I wanted to make it as similar to the original iMac G4 as possible.  To do this I had intended to internalize the griffin powerwave's board with the DC power hooked up to the an internal 12V line.  However, this board was a tight fit and I already had a USB audio adapter for use with the internal microphone and did not want to add a second.  So I opened up and tried internalizing the smaller Griffin iFire which connected via a standard 3.5mm audio jack and FireWire.  Although my computer did not have a firewire 400, this is used only for power.  So I connected this to the internal 12V and hooked the iFire to my turtle bay usb audio adapters headphone port via a 3.5mm cable.  Unfortunately the shape of the board did not lend itself to sit flush against the round rear ports of the iMac.  Although Griffin made an extension cable for these speakers, it seems to be long extinct.  So, using the port on the original iMac's motherboard, I fashioned an extension cable.  I cut the connector from a broken set of Pro Speakers and was surprised  to find 6 wires, instead of four wires. It seems that the ring on the base (the black wire) and the extra connector area on the pin itself (the red wire) are used to send some "signal" in addition to the 2 channels (white/blue and brown/yellow).  I then used a multimeter to find where on iMac's port each wire connected to (I used the connections at the bottom of the picture.  The solder points on top in the picture that I labelled indicate where these connections were routed next.

I noticed that above the "Circle" only 4 wires exit, 2 to each speaker.  But 2 wires terminate in this circle (blak and red).  Inside of this plastic circle is a very small chip from which the wires to the orb speakers themselves emerge.

"The Circle"

This seemed way too small and simplistic to be any type of circuit necessary for alteration of the audio itself.  After some research I realized others had come to the same exact conclusion that this is simply a "gatekeeper".  If the proper signal from the 2 additional wires does not reach this chip, the audio signal in the other 4 wires will not be allowed to pass through. 

 Cutting the circle off and connecting the individual speakers to a small amplifier, 10 - 20 watts, then connecting the amplifier to the computers audio out port resulted in crystal clear audio which is indistinguishable from the audio that is produced by sound that went through the "circle" and mini jack.

It turns out that due to power limitations of my power supply, I started to see signs of strain (USB ports not working etc) when I hooked up the ifire to a 12v molex (via the power cables in the firewire) internally, so I decided to scrap internalizing the speaker connection.  I thought it was interesting that this $20 mini amp pictured here sounded exactly the same as the sound from these speakers when the iFire or Powerwave provided the amplification via the minijack connector.
When I looked to see what the cost of these long discontinued items are online, I found that the asking prices are even more outrageous than when I grossly overpaid for these several years ago.  Used iFire's (initially $40 or so) seem to go for as much as $300 and the Powerwaves $200+.  For anyone who wishes to use these speakers with a different computer, simply cut the speakers free before the "circle", strip the 2 wires, and connect it to a mini amp.  If you already have an iFire or Powerwave, there is no reason to do this, but buying one for as astronomical amount is not worth it.

In retrospect, this is one of most unnecessary, frustrating, proprietary features that I have seen apple incorporate for very little reason.  It seems that apple went to a lot of trouble to make sure that people could not use these speakers with non-apple hardware.  I completely understand why they did not add an amplifier to these speakers. By keeping the amp internal they simplified the setup allowing for completely translucent speakers to be connected via one cable to the computer without the need for another AC plug.  Putting the amplifier in the machine itself makes a lot of sense, but for the few owners who wanted to connect it to an external amp to use in some other fashion, why create a whole new connection, add an unnecessary chip etc to stop them? Its not like Apple felt that these belonged only with the iMac G4 as they were incorporated into the Powermac G4 and Apple Cube as well, both radically different designs.  These were even designed outside of Apple and whats more - Apple itself stopped supporting the MiniJack in its very next generation of computers, the G5's.  A simple google search reveals countless forums and discussions where people from 2003 til now search for ways to reuse their apple pro speakers.  In addition, most people just want to use them with their new iMac or Macbook.

For those interested, however, a cheap amplifier and stripping 4 wires is all you need to free your apple pro speakers from its ridiculous proprietary mini jack.