Pismo!

[IIfx]

This is my first conquest in a long time. Due to circumstances outside my control, half of my collection and most of my spare parts are stuck at a relatives home and I do not have access. As a result I have done little with old computers in general. Lately I have been thinking of setting up a G3 or G4 PowerBook with OS9. Out of boredom came the decision to act.

By luck, I acquired a Pismo cheaply ($33 total) via *that auction site*. It is a bone stock unit, 400mhz, 128mb RAM, 6gb HDD, DVD. From the sellers photos it appears to be in decent shape. A bit of silver sharpie on the case and some dirt for good measure. One odd thing about it (to me) is how its running OS X 10.0.0. I never thought I would encounter the first OS X on a machine from the wild, knowing how it was only the current release for a year.

I actually had possession of a Pismo years ago - unfortunately it was borrowed off of an acquaintance that wanted to see if it still worked. It was a mint 500mhz unit too! I miss that computer.

As usual, I have a basic question to confirm my train of thought:

Will the AC adapter from my 17 inch AL PBG4 work with it? If that wont work I have a 1400 power adapter that I do remember working with the last Pismo I had short care over.

When I receive the unit I will be sure to post a follow-up with pics. I wonder where I put my OS 9.1 disk...

 

[commodorejohn]

There's a variety of different Powerbook AC adapters that all use that modified RCA plug, so don't make the assumption that it'll work just because it fits - check the voltage/amperage! The Pismo (or at least mine) runs on 24v, 1.875a.

Anyway, congratulations! The Pismo is a very nice machine, though I think of it as more an OS9 system than an OSX one (then again, I've never used any OSX other than 10.4, so I'm not sure that 10.0 won't perform better on a G3.)

 

[TheMacGuy]

Nice score!

 

[markyb86]

I can vouch that 10.2 runs smoothly on those exact specs, but 10.4, not so much. Our pismo runs 9 and loves it. If the G3 inside is anything like the imac g3's then 10.3 would run O.K. on there as well. tiger is a hog, but if you can get 512-1gb ram in there then it will be much better. tiger on a g4 350 is very nice with 1gb so I imagine the same for the pismo.

 

[CC_333]

Hi,

I'd say the only thing holding 10.4 back on the Pismo is the mediocre video chip.

Aside from that, with a fast hard drive and lots of RAM, it runs rather well.

I have a Pismo myself (currently loaned to a friend), and it ran 10.4 OK at 400 MHz, but it ran it better still when I upgraded to 500 MHz.

If someone could someday figure out how to upgrade the video, then it would probably be able to compete with some of the early G4s (although it is admittedly somewhat limited by its basic architecture).

c

 

[Hugh]

Congratulations !!

I now have 2.5 working Pismos running Tiger, but the 2 fully functioning machines have 1GB RAM which makes a huge difference.

Upgrading to G4 makes another difference; the G4 550 boots in just over 40 seconds, while the G3 500 one takes well over a minute.

I'm also now using a 7200 rpm 100GB Travelstar which has boosted the speed up to very nearly 40mb/sec - I found the 32GB SSD I bought to be slower and less efficient and so plonked it into the G3 Pismo.

It would be interesting to find out if you can transplant a higher memory video chip in from another card.

Cheers

Hugh

 

[IIfx]

I find it odd how the Pismo has an AGP GPU, but it is not supported for OS X acceleration. Granted, it is an old Rage 128 type chip.

Unfortunately the GPU is in a BGA package - it would be difficult to replace even if the Radeon 7000 was pin compatible.

The R128 is a fine chip for OS9 though.

 

[IIfx]

Well, I bought more things to go along with the Pismo:

2x256mb PC133 SODIMMs - they will either be a Samsung or Micron set ($9 total)

Replacement Clutch Cover - get rid of the part with sharpie on it ($4 total)

Below are some images from the auction. I really cant wait to get started!

OS X 10.0 o_o

Stupid Sharpie:

Looking at the photos I noticed the bottom of the Mac has a label saying WIRELESS CARD. That leaves me hopeful that someone down the line has installed an Airport card in it.

The Pismo will probably be in my hands by early next week if the seller ships today.

 

[TheMacGuy]

Ah, 10.0.3. The beginning of a new era at Apple.

What I find most interesting is most of the items we know in the menu bar (namely battery and AirPort) are in the dock instead. 10.1 changed that though, I believe.

 

[Juror22]

I really liked the early versions of OSX - the battery icon was AWESOME! And it had my favorite screen saver the one that harvested all your application icons and flew them around the screen (I installed apps, just to have more of them floating around).

The Pismo looks great - congrats!

 

[IIfx]

Well, I picked up the Pismo from the post office today. Its in pretty good shape! Infact, I am typing this now from the local coffee shop using Airport on a clean install of OS 9. Its really amazing how quickly OS 9 installed and bam...I was online. The RAM also came in, so its flying allong with 512mb of it.

So far I only have Classzila installed - but its performing well.

I think the general consensus that the PBG3 Pismo is the peak of the Powerbook line is correct - it feels much newer than something from its era. The design just feels right.

Below is a screenshot of my desktop on this machine. Photos comming later - although I am still waiting on the replacement clutch cover.

 

[TheMacGuy]

Classilla is the only browser I use in 10.3.8 or earlier.

 

[CC_333]

The RAM also came in, so its flying allong with 512mb of it.

You know, they can take 1 GB of RAM, so there's no reason not to max it out, especially if you intend to run Mac OS X at any point (although 512 MB is adequate, for sure).
I ran mine with 1 GB, and it became quite evident that the main bottleneck was the video.

*thinks to self about getting the Pismo back...*

It really is a nice machine.

By the way, if you need any spare parts, let me know as I have a bunch of extra Pismo components I'd like to get rid of.

c