I have a beige PowerMac G3 have been running either 8.5 or 8.6, not sure. I bought OS 9.2.2 on Ebay and tried to install it the other night. When I inserted the CD and held down the C key, OS 9 came up like it was going to install, but then it said that it "could not recognize the HD, do you want to initialize?" Heck no I don't want to initialize. I have a lot of files on it, and I don't really have a way to back them all up. Does anyone have any tips or suggestions on how to get OS 9 installed without initializing my HD? Much Appreciated, slimjim5811

Normally it would "just work." Is the 9.2 disc you've got a retail installer, or did it ship with a specific Mac? p

It says that it's retail, please see the closed auction on ebay: http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&category=11231&item=3412777145&rd=1

OK, good. It's a retail installer. Now...when you rebooted from the hard disk, I assume the Mac didn't want to initialise it any more, right? p

Not sure that I understand your question. I inserted the CD and held down the C key, as instructed and 9.2 screen came up. Then I had a message with a picture of the HD saying that OS 9 couldn't recognize it. I looked on apple.com and found the following: "The Installer cannot repair your hard disk." -If you see a message that the disk can’t be fixed because a file is open, quit all programs. If file sharing is on, turn it off. Then try installing again. -If you still get the message, use Disk First Aid, provided on the Mac OS CD, to see if it can repair the disk. -If Disk First Aid is unable to repair the disk, try a third-party disk repair utility, if you have one. Make sure you’re using the latest version of the utility. -If you don’t have a third-party utility, or if that utility can’t repair the disk either, you may need to reinitialize the hard disk. First, back up your hard disk because reintializing erases all the files on the disk. Then use the Drive Setup utility program, provided on the Mac OS CD, to reinitialize the disk. For help with Drive Setup, open the program, then look in the Help menu. After you’ve reinitialized the disk, use the Mac OS Installer to reinstall system software, then reinstall your application programs and your documents from the backup copies you made before you reinitialized the disk. I think I'll try this tonight. Thanks for your help, pickle. slimjim5811

I'm assuming you clicked "no" when it tried to initialise, correct? And that you've since rebooted *without* the CD in the drive? If so, what happened? Did it try to initialise the HD again? p

pickle - I got it to work by installing directly off of the disk. Instead of holding down the "C" key when I booted, I started in OS 8.5, inserted the CD and chose "install" from the CD. Thanks for trying to help. You're one of the good ones! slimjim5811