• Updated 2023-07-12: Hello, Guest! Welcome back, and be sure to check out this follow-up post about our outage a week or so ago.

Snatched a Quicksilver. Unsure why.

Aeroform

Well-known member
Couldn’t resist picking up this Quicksilver as it was only $10 and in great (working) shape. I’ve always considered this case design to be incredibly cool and reeeaaally wanted one back in the day. Got super excited when I picked it up, but once I got home it kind of dawned on me that I have no idea what to use it for 😅. I’d guess the performance per watt isn’t really spectacular these days haha. But yhea, if you have any fun usage ideas, let me know!
 

Attachments

  • 62152573-0DFC-479B-A62B-25712C0D4A21.jpeg
    62152573-0DFC-479B-A62B-25712C0D4A21.jpeg
    2.3 MB · Views: 11

3lectr1cPPC

Well-known member
Sweet pickup! I snagged a graphite recently and I can’t wait to upgrade it as far as it will go.
I’m not sure how many Macs you currently have, but here are some ideas:

1. It appears to have a built in ZIP Drive, if you have an external SCSI zip you could use it as a bridge machine.
2. Old games! Provided yours has a decent GPU you could have hours of fun running the latest and greatest of 2002.
3. Try to use it for 2002-era productivity tasks, such as video editing, photo editing, etc.
4. It will run OS 9, so all of the above extends to Classic Mac OS software as well!
5. Put Linux on it and see how far you can push it with modern tasks.

Many possibilities, enjoy it!
 

Aeroform

Well-known member
Sweet pickup! I snagged a graphite recently and I can’t wait to upgrade it as far as it will go.
I’m not sure how many Macs you currently have, but here are some ideas:

1. It appears to have a built in ZIP Drive, if you have an external SCSI zip you could use it as a bridge machine.
2. Old games! Provided yours has a decent GPU you could have hours of fun running the latest and greatest of 2002.
3. Try to use it for 2002-era productivity tasks, such as video editing, photo editing, etc.
4. It will run OS 9, so all of the above extends to Classic Mac OS software as well!
5. Put Linux on it and see how far you can push it with modern tasks.

Many possibilities, enjoy it!
Thank’s for the tips :). I have mostly 68k compacts, but also a G4 iBook mostly used by my daughter to play old kids games (she loves it).

Sadly no other zip drives, and I have most others network so not really in a need of a bridge either.

Games could be fun, I wonder if it could pull of running Quake 2, it should I guess.

As for creative tasks, well, I’ve used most models since the first iMac in my profession (graphic design) and well, even a fully decked out dual G5 was slow as molasses brand new haha. It’s incredible how much faster (comparably) a regular Macbook Pro is today.

Linux could be fun, haven’t played around with that too much (outside of tinkering with rpi’s).

I just have this weird feeling that I can’t really justify burning so many kW’s getting the poor performance I would out of this haha. Maybe my climate anxiety is to big 😂
 

olePigeon

Well-known member
QuickSilver is the best PowerPC Mac, in my opinion. It's the second fastest native-OS 9 machine, just behind the FireWire 400 Mirror Door model, but I think it looks a LOT nicer than the Mirror Door. So that's why it's my pick.
 

volvo242gt

Well-known member
Nice score. Had one a few years ago that was a little cheaper. Probably should've kept it instead of selling it, but it came during a time period when I was trying to cull the herd.
 

Unknown_K

Well-known member
I would have snagged it for $10 as well.

Generally I try to have 2 working examples of the all the G4 towers (Sawtooth, QS, MDD).
 

joshc

Well-known member
Yeah these are great, I have a real soft spot for the Sawtooth but the Quicksilver is hard to beat.
 

CC_333

Well-known member
I may have one of these for sale soon, if anyone's interested (I have two and I can't remember why; One's enough!)

c
 

LaPorta

Well-known member
Wow, I TOTALLY would have taken that as well!! I use mine as a network bridge machine (with 10.3 on it), and have a FW800 and USB 2 card in it for expansion. I popped in a used Apple 1TB HD from OWC for its HD. I use it for games as well: Halo, Stronghold, Medal of Honor, Red Faction...that sort of thing.

The photo looks nice, but if it needs any spiffing up, I made this guide here:

 

CC_333

Well-known member
Hmm....what's it got....
i don't remember. I'll have to drag it out of storage and take a look. I know one of them is a DP 1.0 GHz (I hope nobody minds that I'm keeping that one :) ).

I think it's the one I offered you like last year, yes?

c
 

LaPorta

Well-known member
I totally forgot about that! You did indeed. I was very, very fortunate to have made a trade with Torbar for a DP 1.0 GHz that he had acquired from someone. I just like seeing who has what out there.
 

Trash80toHP_Mini

NIGHT STALKER
I just have this weird feeling that I can’t really justify burning so many kW’s getting the poor performance I would out of this haha. Maybe my climate anxiety is to big 😂
Don't even give it a thought. ;) Until the eco-dilettante-elites suck it up enough to outlaw golf and ski lifts there's no good reason not to play with retro-tech as a hobby. :rolleyes:

Quicksilvers rock, use mine for AI9 and GraphicConverter under 9.2.2. My place is a rentware free zone.
 

CC_333

Well-known member
Until it breaks in 5 years and replacing it is in the $100's.
True, but as long as there are places like this forum, I'm sure I can find parts that are reasonably priced if I ever need any.

I'm just trying to downsize, because I need to somehow cram three 10x28 foot storage units full into the space equivalent to one 5x14 foot unit, lest I go broke trying to pay for said 10x28 foot units 😲

Needless to say, I'm totally confounded as to how, in fact, that can be accomplished.

c
 

bdurbrow

Well-known member
burning so many kW’s

Slap some PV panels on your roof and quit worrying about it. ;)

(seriously - the emissions from just changing your driving style a little bit absolutely dwarf what a computer uses. 1 Horsepower = 0.7457 kW)
 
Top