Resolved Trouble connecting iMac G4 on Tiger to www/LAN (is hardware broken?)

[Riku7]

I just got a 17" 1GHz 1GB RAM iMac G4 and updated it to the newest Tiger that it can run. Router is a TeleWell tw-eav510.
I don't have much experience with integrating old and new tech and I'm having problems getting the iMac online.
Actually I don't necessarily need it to connect to the internet at all. I'd be content enough with it being a part of my local home network so it could access the iTunes library on my main computer, and I could share files between the two computers.

The iMac has a WiFi card but I faced the issue that it can't join my WiFi because of the outdated encryption protocols. I'm not fluent with network jargon so I'd prefer know what I'm really doing before playing lottery with the router settings.
When I visited the person who sold this iMac to me, the machine joined his local WiFi just fine and Safari loaded some pages, so I know that the WiFi card itself does work.

Because of the WiFi problem at my place, to get some configurations done, I connected the iMac to my main computer with an ethernet cable and shared the WiFi to the iMac via that cable. I managed to share files between the computers, use the internet browser, and use iTunes on the iMac to listen to a shared iTunes library from my main computer's hard disk. But I didn't yet get ssh login to work (using iMac, commanding the main computer to go to sleep when I'm done listening to music from the shared library).

The iMac will be in another room, so the ethernet cable between the two computers isn't a solution. But the router is in that other room, so even if the WiFi can't be configured to work, an ethernet cable from router to iMac should be simple enough. But now the moment that I attach that cable, the iMac just becomes unresponsive and freezes. The cursor will follow the mouse, but the spinning beachball apperas immediately or after a minute or two, and all I can do is a cold reboot. Resetting PRAM didn't do anything. It's a fresh OS install but surely the hard disk is possibly original.

• Why would attaching iMac ➜ Ethernet cable ➜ router cause a freeze every time?
• Is this a symptom of a failing hard disk? (Onyx says S.M.A.R.T is okay, but sure it's old)
• To use WiFi, how could I configure the router settings to make it work for both computers without compromising the safety of my network? (Neighbours)

Edit:Addition: At some point I was considering some of those Apple WiFi repeaters to allow airplay. Is that a completely separate topic or would that device also allow iMac G4 to connect to join the network even if the router itself had WPA2 encryption? Screenshots from router settings.

 

[eyoungren]

Here's what I'd try first.

On the iMac, go to System Preferences>Network. Select your Airport connection. You need to edit the connection. Don't recall what you click on for Tiger but you need to get to the screens where you can set TCP/IP, DNS and so on.

Click on TCP/IP and check that Configure IPv4 is set to 'Using DHCP'. If it's not, if an IP address is assigned that may be why your Mac is freezing when you connect it to the router.

In the DNS tab, make sure that the DNS Server is pointing to the IP address of your router.

Save the setting.

On your router, I noticed in your screenshot that you have WPA with AES encryption.

Try using TKIP. If this is the original Airport card (and it probably is) it does not support AES encryption.

 

[Riku7]

Okay thanks, I will test!

In the DNS tab, make sure that the DNS Server is pointing to the IP address of your router.

In the router settings, device information, there's "LAN IPv4 Address". Is that the IP of the router itself?

Also noticed that in the DHCP tab of the router settings, there's an IP for the iMac G4. So they're not completely blind to one another but, yeah. (I don't actually know what DHCP is as I said that I'm not fluent at network lingo, I'm just following instructions!)

 

[eyoungren]

In the router settings, device information, there's "LAN IPv4 Address". Is that the IP of the router itself?

No, that's the IP address of the Mac.

Here's mine:


The address is coming from my router. Notice how I have it set to 'Using DHCP'

Below that is my router address.

Also noticed that in the DHCP tab of the router settings, there's an IP for the iMac G4. So they're not completely blind to one another but, yeah. (I don't actually know what DHCP is as I said that I'm not fluent at network lingo, I'm just following instructions!)

You just want to make sure that DHCP is set to 'Using DHCP' and not 'Manually' or anything of that nature. We want the router to assign the address, not the Mac.

Here is my DNS tab. You'll notice the first address in there. That's my router address (the other two are Google).

 

[Riku7]

Try using TKIP. If this is the original Airport card (an it probably is) it does not support AES encryption.

Hey this alone seemed to allow the iMac to join the network. Type in password and it doesn't complain about encryption anymore, the Airport symbol changes to depict full signal.
Unfortunately, that's where the fun ends. I don't know why the iMac is so incredibly touchy! After joining, the only responsive thing I can really do is use the cursor to drag 'selection squares' across the desktop. Click on anything in the top menu bar or anything in the dock, and there goes the spinning ball again. No normal computer was ever that touchy, surely?

///Edit to avoid having to double-post; Your message had appeared there between page loads so I didn't see it. The "LAN IPv4 Address" in the router settings has the same IP on it as the "router" in the system preferences window that you demonstrate. Not an identical number with yours of course, but mine match. When I'm talking about router settings, I mean that I'm going to an IP address in my internet browser to access them. Actually that address itself already is the router's IP, matching these other two that we've been talking about.

'Using DHCP' has been activated all the way, apparently.
Added the router IP to the DNS list now.

 

[eyoungren]

Hey this alone seemed to allow the iMac to join the network. Type in password and it doesn't complain about encryption anymore, the Airport symbol changes to depict full signal.
Unfortunately, that's where the fun ends. I don't know why the iMac is so incredibly touchy! After joining, the only responsive thing I can really do is use the cursor to drag 'selection squares' across the desktop. Click on anything in the top menu bar or anything in the dock, and there goes the spinning ball again. No normal computer was ever that touchy, surely?

No something else has got to be wrong.

Just not sure where that would be. Perhaps someone else could chime in.

 

[Riku7]

Yeah... HD, RAM or the Airport card....
I don't understand why the guy managed to connect to his home WiFi though... We installed the OS right there and then so it was fresh. The only stuff that I've done meanwhile has been the iMac+MacPro sharing via an ethernet cable, installing of just a few small applications, and doing the recommended updates.

 

[lostmyshoe123]

I don't know if this is relevant, but to get my iMac G4 to connect to my router without freezing up, I had to configure the IPv6 setting to off in network preferences.

 

[Riku7]

I don't know if this is relevant, but to get my iMac G4 to connect to my router without freezing up, I had to configure the IPv6 setting to off in network preferences.

From the iMac's preferences, or the router's settings? Sorry I feel silly, but that's because I understand very little of how networking protocols practically work.

I restarted the iMac in safe mode but then the AirPort is off and it seemed that it wouldn't be possible to change the settings so that the computer would NOT automatically join the specific wifi automatically on startup... Now it just freezes immediately when it gets to the desktop.

Because this happens whenever connected to this internet connection regardless of whether I use a cable or wifi, it would seem that there's something about the settings that the iMac hates so much.

 

[lostmyshoe123]

From the iMac's preferences, or the router's settings? Sorry I feel silly, but that's because I understand very little of how networking protocols practically work.

I restarted the iMac in safe mode but then the AirPort is off and it seemed that it wouldn't be possible to change the settings so that the computer would NOT automatically join the specific wifi automatically on startup... Now it just freezes immediately when it gets to the desktop.

Because this happens whenever connected to this internet connection regardless of whether I use a cable or wifi, it would seem that there's something about the settings that the iMac hates so much.

I'm running Tiger, so enter System preferences, Network, on that page click Configure IPv6 button, then set configure IPv6 to Off. Press ok then apply now. This worked for me, but you may have a different problem, hope this helps.

 

[Riku7]

I'm running Tiger, so enter System preferences, Network, on that page click Configure IPv6 button, then set configure IPv6 to Off. Press ok then apply now. This worked for me, but you may have a different problem, hope this helps.

Hey, reporting back. This tip worked for me too! Thank you so much! I disabled IPv6 for both WiFi AND Ethernet, since it was both of the means that would crash the iMac.

First, I tested with WiFi and managed to do everything I want from that iMac, except for listening to the iTunes library located on my main computer. Yes it would show up and play, but it would stop to buffer every 15 seconds or so, making it unusable.
I got some extra ethernet cable today so the iMac could permanently have its router-to-dome wire connection, and everything's great now! The cable doesn't crash the computer either, I can use the browser, Adium, terminal to command my main computer, and iTunes to play the other library remotely without interruptions. All smooth, I'll mark this post as solved.