G4 MDD Users, or people who know about this mac

[galactica]

I know this is off the topic, and there is an off the topic section, but its a mac related question and tends to get faster and correct response for apple/mac related questions

iChat AV is out and is GREAT. Taked directly with people from figi, florida, sweden crystal clear audio. At lease I can hear them. Now, so i go to hook up my powermac microphone (apple brand) to my MDD so I can talk to them. OOPS no jack that looks like audio in.

Only one thats there that I have no idea what it is looks like this >O< where the O is a solid white circle.

Anyone know what that is? Is that my audio input jack? If so what type of microphone is required?

I suppose I could get a USB mic, but my ports and hub are loaded alredy!

Thanks Guys
This is for my G4 MDD Tower

[Mr Zippy]

The Power Mac only has audio line in, which requires a powered microphone.

You either need a USB Mic (which I have) or the new iSight firewire camera which includes a mic.

Neil

[Thargok]

Why didn't you just try it?

That is your line-in/microphone

[galactica]

Guess i should have said that
I have the apple powermac microphone (beige with a slot so it sits on your montor) this is what I used when I had my blue and white g3 tower

This doesn't work in that line in port (it fits so that i can tell, but i get no readback in my sound pannel for line in, nor can anyone hear me when connected with iChatAV. Maybe its not a powered microphone - how can i tell?

Neil - what type of USB microphone do you have?

[Mr Zippy]

You can tell if it's powered by seeing if the mic takes batteries or connects to a mains adapter.

I have the Labtec Verse 704 USB Mic (PC/Mac) - I cannot see it on their site any more, but use google, loads of links.

iSight would be my option if buying a new mic, I may even get one soon anyway.

Neil

[galactica]

You can tell if it's powered by seeing if the mic takes batteries or connects to a mains adapter.

I have the Labtec Verse 704 USB Mic (PC/Mac) - I cannot see it on their site any more, but use google, loads of links.

iSight would be my option if buying a new mic, I may even get one soon anyway.

Neil

Ahhh! well mine's obviously not a powered mic then. I was assuming powered mic ment some sort of special jack that drew power from the comptuer (similar to a usb port)

Thanks, ill look into the mic. iSight would be nice but its a bit $149 is a bit much for a microphone/camera at this moment. Perhaps when it goes down a bit.

[kamikaze]

Finally!

A chance to pay back the most helpful forum user as of yet!
Heh. Actually, a powered mic doesnt have to have a battery, or an adapter, it's just all in the design. Some mics have big enough magnets in them to provide power. In all other cases, the audio in jack must supply "phatom power", or basically supply the power. So i'd assume yours does not.

There are a few options. If you already have a DV Camera, there's always a mic built in on that... but I'm sure you'd have already used that if you had one considering you get audio AND full video-conferencing.
I'm positive there's a mic you can buy that will work with your system.
If you're stuck and you want to go USB Audio...maybe we can work something out. I have an iMic that I bought but never used. I'd be happy to get rid of it for a bit of cash.

Anyways
Good luck!

-kami

[nfasano]

I just thought I'd chime in here because I'm not sure some of the above comments are accurate. The microphone that you are describing is most likely an Apple Plaintalk microphone. This was included with most PowerMacs in the era when voice recognition was built into OS 9. These would be mostly pre-G3 macs. It was, in fact, a powered microphone. If you look closely, you'll see that its jack is slightly longer than a normal line-level plug. This taps into 5 volts to supply a built in amplifier. Therefore, that mic is useless to you, since Apple stopped putting that power connection in their machines years ago. Your MDD G4 does have a stereo line in (the one you described in the first post), and you can get any standard cheapo mic to work.

I just wanted to stress that you don't need additional hardware such as the iMic to get audio into your machine. I'm pretty sure that a decent mic to fit your needs can be had for under $10.

-Nick

[galactica]

I just thought I'd chime in here because I'm not sure some of the above comments are accurate. The microphone that you are describing is most likely an Apple Plaintalk microphone. This was included with most PowerMacs in the era when voice recognition was built into OS 9. These would be mostly pre-G3 macs. It was, in fact, a powered microphone. If you look closely, you'll see that its jack is slightly longer than a normal line-level plug. This taps into 5 volts to supply a built in amplifier. Therefore, that mic is useless to you, since Apple stopped putting that power connection in their machines years ago. Your MDD G4 does have a stereo line in (the one you described in the first post), and you can get any standard cheapo mic to work.

I just wanted to stress that you don't need additional hardware such as the iMic to get audio into your machine. I'm pretty sure that a decent mic to fit your needs can be had for under $10.

-Nick

You are ABSOLUTELY correct!
I have a friend who works at the Apple store nearby my house. He told me exactly what you said, which clears up a HUGE confusion I had.

The microphone I have is the Apple Plain Talk microphone (which is a powered microphone of its on kind as you described by its length of jack)
I knew this was a powered microphone and was so confused as to why it wasnt working!)

So after much discussion it was made aware to me that that is not the type of powered microphone I need.
However, my friend at the apple store didnt tell me i can just use any plain old microphone in that jack. He told me I can get any USB powered microphone which will work just fine.

I have several standard "cheap-o' microphones laying around so ill try one of those and see if it works. Thanks for the clarification!

[thedogman]

You can NOT use a plain (unpowered) microphone. nfasano is incorrect when he said that. The audio in port on the MDD G4 are for line level only. The only way to get audio into the Mac is to use a line lever device (powered mic, Mini Disc player...) or a USB (or Firewire) device, like a iMic. Get an iMic. Its cheep and works fine for everyday use.

I had the same problem. I also had a PlainTalk mic that I wanted to use. No luck. One other thing. The PlainTalk mic will also NOT work on the iMic. It does not like the longer plug. I did get the PlainTalk to work on an old 600MHz G3 iMac, not that that helps any.

[ZeroSix]

The plaintalk mics were the best i always thought.

Wasnt the actual port called an "AppleJack"?

[galactica]

You can NOT use a plain (unpowered) microphone. nfasano is incorrect when he said that. The audio in port on the MDD G4 are for line level only. The only way to get audio into the Mac is to use a line lever device (powered mic, Mini Disc player...) or a USB (or Firewire) device, like a iMic. Get an iMic. Its cheep and works fine for everyday use.

I had the same problem. I also had a PlainTalk mic that I wanted to use. No luck. One other thing. The PlainTalk mic will also NOT work on the iMic. It does not like the longer plug. I did get the PlainTalk to work on an old 600MHz G3 iMac, not that that helps any.

so i have a mini disc player, your saying my line out cable will hook into this line in (>O<) port and work as an audio in support?

if so, thats wierd cause its just a standard audio jack (like headphones) which I believe is the same jack as a standard non powered microphone.

Either way, it looks like this iMic or a USB microphone is the only way I am going to get a microphone hooked up.

[thedogman]

All the jacks (powered mic, unpowered mic, line in, headphones...) all use that same 1/8 jack. This can cause a bunch of confusion. "Hey, the plug fits so it must work." sorry, not so. The "Apple speaker mini-jack" is different. Its a little smaller (I think) which is good because it can damage equipment if you plug in into this port.

The mini disc should work fine. I do it all the time. I have a full deck in the living room that I can use to record sound clips from the Tivo and then play them back on a portable player with its output going into the >O< audio in on the G4.

[galactica]

ill give it a try and see if it works.

What sort of app do i need to pull the input from my playing mini disc to confirm an audio in is actually being detected??

never done anything like this before.

[theMotoMan]

The iMac comes with Sound Studio which is a nice little recording app. I recently hooked an old cassette deck (line level) into the line input on my MDD 2x867 and transfered an old cassette tape to disk using this app. The file was just under 700 MB. I then added it to my iTunes library and then converted it to a MP3, then burned it to an audio CD. Kinda fun. I'm sure there is a more streamlined way to do it, but this wasn't too bad. You can also use this same technique to convert some old vinyl to CD. Record players can be a bit more tricky because some of them are not line level, in which case you should pass them through another device (I use my cassette recorder).

[galactica]

well i dont have a iMac. any where i can get this Sound Studio?

All i really want to do is to beable to confirm that I can get some sort of external audio source recognized though this "audio in" port

be it microphone, minidisc player, or whatever.

[theMotoMan]

You can find it at: http://www.felttip.com I'm not sure if it's shareware or what, but there is a beta that you can download.

You might also try the open source program Audacity at http://audacity.sourceforge.net/

[galactica]

thanks
will give these a shot