Question about getting a 1998 iMac to talk to a modern PC

I was trying to move some old family photos off my dad's old Bondi Blue iMac and onto my Windows 11 laptop last weekend. Back in the day, I'd just burn a CD or use a floppy, but that machine doesn't have a standard USB port, just those old round ones. I spent a whole afternoon digging through boxes until I found an old USB to FireWire adapter I bought in 2005. Got it hooked up, but my PC wouldn't see it at all. The trick was I had to put the iMac into Target Disk Mode by holding T on startup, which turns the whole computer into an external hard drive. Once I did that, the FireWire cable finally worked and I could pull the files right off the desktop. It's wild how something so simple now was a whole project back then. Has anyone else found a better way to bridge that Mac to PC gap for really old systems?

2 comments

2 Comments

sean_foster521mo ago

Target Disk Mode saved my buddy too.

mason3611mo ago

Glad it worked! I've only used it to accidentally wipe my own drive.