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What to Buy Oo?!

A

Academician

6502
First off I am a Mac nub, I've dealt with PCs forever. Not to say that I'm "seeing the light" and changing to Macs, but after buying an Apple II I've become a little more open to fooling around on the fruit computers :p

I am currently eying a Beige G3 on eBay that so far seems to be relatively decent in price, aka within the range that should not instigate my own mugging.

The listing says it's a 466Mhz G3, 128Mb RAM, running OS8 currently.

My main question is more around what things I would have to do to this machine to get it running OSX, if any, and what upgrades in general would be available to me.

I have heard however that the latest OSX will only run on G4s and above, so that also opens the question of longevity in this system.

Do you guys believe a G4 or above would be a better investment at this time? And if so, what model should I be looking out for. I hear people throw around Digital Audio and Quicksilver, and obviously, I have no clue what these mean [:D] ]'>

Thanks in advance for your continued help 8-)

-Academician

 
A Beige G3 is not a very good choice for a first MacOS X machine. It will need extensive upgrades to perform well, and even installing the software will be difficult. Newer versions of MacOS X will require XPostFacto software for installation.

For a stock Beige G3, I'd recommend maxing the RAM, overclocking the bus, getting a flashed PC video card, upgrading the CPU, and getting a new hard drive, just to reach a minimum standard of productivity. Not really a project for the faint of heart.

If you just want the cheapest, easiest box to try MacOS X on for kicks, I'd look for a Blue and White G3. In stock form it'll at least run even the newest versions of MacOS X. Without any upgrades, the performance will certainly leave something to be desired, but it'll be really cheap.

For something more useful but still mostly inexpensive, you're right on about the G4s. Any old G4 with an AGP video card (avoid the "yikes!" G4 which is just a B/W G3 with a G4 card and different colored plastic) will be a much better MacOS X machine in stock form.

For just fooling around, get whatever's cheapest; if you want to get serious about running MacOS X on a G4, I'd recommend reading more about the specs at everymac.com, lowendmac.com, apple.com, or another site, and choosing your favorite. Whichever G4 you choose, there will be good articles in the archive at xlr8yourmac.com.

 
I hear people throw around Digital Audio and Quicksilver, and obviously, I have no clue what these mean
Click to expand...
You should get the program Mactracker, which gives details on all the models in order of their introduction, along with the codenames that they are usually referred to by.

I have heard however that the latest OSX will only run on G4s and above, so that also opens the question of longevity in this system.
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The current latest version of OS X, 10.4 Tiger, is great and runs on any G3 or above Mac (you need to use XPostFacto to make it install on a Beige G3, while it will install more easily on a Blue & White or other colourful G3, but don't be put off as once you've got the installation itself done it's no different to running OS X on a "supported" Mac). The next version, 10.5 Leopard, will only run on G4 and above. Don't let anyone put you off the Beigeys, they are great machines and I love mine! (my first and only OS X machine!) :) Better still, you should be able to pick one up for free without too much trouble (B&W G3s can also be found for free but are rarer, whereas G4s are expensive still).

You'll want at least 256 MB Ram, and preferably 512 MB or more, whichever Mac you get, if you're running OS X. You'll also want a reasonable video card - a requirement on the Beige G3 as it's very difficult to get OS X set up using only the integrated video, and a good upgrade on the B&W G3 and later as the stock video card is not good for OS X performance. A Radeon/Radeon 7000 Mac Edition shouldn't be too costly (note that PC cards are not compatible unless you want to get into flashing them, but even then I think the real Mac Edition cards tend to work better). For hard drive, it depends what you want to install on the machine - a few GB is enough for an installation of Tiger, but you should be able to find a nice 20 or 40 GB drive at little or no cost though.

 
Thanks for all the advice so far guys =]

Gonna do me some re-Mac-search this weekend ;P

By latest OSX I guess I meant the new up and coming version, reading through that comment again I probably should have worded that far better, hehe :] Glad you answered both sides of the question though, sure helps me decide on what to buy.

There are a few older iMacs in town for sale but nothing in any reasonable price. I live in Bismarck, ND, and as you may be able to imagine, I don't see too many free computers around here, let alone free Macs [:D] ]'> I'll of course be keeping my eyes open, as I'd really enjoy having a nice Mac that can perform comparably to my AMD rig in everyday tasks.

In the end I'll probably be more limited to eBay than anything, which could prove to be an interesting adventure given you can barely get a Apple II for a decent price on there :p

Again thanks, and if anyone has more advice I'd love to hear it.

-Academician

 
There are a few older iMacs in town for sale but nothing in any reasonable price. I live in Bismarck, ND, and as you may be able to imagine, I don't see too many free computers around here, let alone free Macs [:D] ]'>
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Price-wise, if they are iMac G4s (LCD displays) then they will be expensive, whereas iMac G3s (CRT displays) are cheap these days (and the earlier models are sometimes free). I would probably avoid iMac G3s though, as discussion here gives the impression that they tend to die young. A tower is of course much easier to repair and upgrade, while a tower of the same age is often both cheaper and more powerful than an iMac.

I'll of course be keeping my eyes open, as I'd really enjoy having a nice Mac that can perform comparably to my AMD rig in everyday tasks.
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Even the G3s offer great performance, despite being old - my G3 feels so fast even with Tiger, that's one reason why I love it :)

 
For a first OS X machine for a small investment, I'd get a B&W Powermac G3. You'll have a lot fewer problems than with anything in a beige case and it will be better supported by aftermarket upgrades.

Of course, if you can find a Powermac G4 for cheap, I'd grab that instead.

 
I bought a B&W G3 a week and a half ago. It's one of these:

http://www.everymac.com/systems/apple/powermac_g3/stats/powermac_g3_350_bl.html

The sticker on the back says it had 64MB originally (it had 256MB when I bought and I've since boosted it to 512) leading me to believe it's the M7556LL/A model. I didn't originally want a G3, I have a 512MB SDRAM DIMM that won't work at full capacity in anything less than a Sawtooth G4 and I was fed the same line about OSX not running terribly well on them. However, I saw this advertised in the Sunday newspaper for AUD$50 and thought it was too good an oppurtunity to pass up.

It was quite a surprise, on all sorts of levels. Firstly, it was more than I was expecting. It was advertised just as a "G3 Tower" and for the price I thought I'd wind up with either a beige or the earlier 300Mhz B&W (more on that later). It was quite a suprise to find out it was not only a 350Mhz model, but also had a Revison 2 motherboard. Secondly OSX performance wasn't that bad, even with the 256MB it had originally. Adding an extra 256 improved things a hell of a lot and I would certainly recommend it but it was still usable enough with 256.

A few tips I can give you if you're looking for a B&W (a G4 would be a better bet but if all you're looking for is a cheap way into OSX then one of these B&Ws is a good place to start) are for starters, avoid the 300Mhz model. Not only are they always on the revision 1 logic board, they only have half (512K) the L2 cache of their faster brethren leading to them apparently being able to be outperformed byt the earlier beige models. Secondly, look for one with a revision 2 logic board which, among other things, has an improved IDE controller that corrects a couple of nasty issues with the older one. 450Mhz systems will always have the newer board while 350Mhz and 400Mhz machines can have either so it helps to be able to verify the board in person (easiest way to tell is the newer boards have "402" on the CMD IDE chips whichj is at the rear of the board, near the PCI slots). Thankfully the case design on the B&Ws makes this ridiculously easy: all you have to do is pull a lever on the side up and the whole side of the case will come down.

hth.

 
First off I am a Mac nub, I've dealt with PCs forever. Not to say that I'm "seeing the light" and changing to Macs...
...I am currently eying a Beige G3 on eBay that so far seems to be relatively decent in price, aka within the range that should not instigate my own mugging.

The listing says it's a 466Mhz G3, 128Mb RAM, running OS8 currently.

My main question is more around what things I would have to do to this machine to get it running OSX, if any, and what upgrades in general would be available to me...

-Academician
Click to expand...
Seeing that you've just entered the light and decided to try out Mac OS X, I'd suggest getting an Intel Mac Mini. You'll be able to use the latest Mac OS X for the next few releases, and run Windows and windows applications at full speed.

To dual boot the machine with XP or Vista you would use Apple's built-in boot camp. You could also run Windows (and any Intel Platform OS) in a window within Mac OS X by using Parallels (at http://www.parallels.com).

Windows applications can also run directly on Mac OS X using WINE. There is a version for Intel Mac OS X here.

http://sourceforge.net/projects/darwine/

You could probably find an Intel Mac Mini Core Solo for around $300. This is a best buy if you know how to upgrade a CPU. The core solo CPU can be switched with a Core2Duo Merom chip. Plenty of stories here:

http://www.google.com/search?q=mac+mini+merom+upgrade

Of course, you can also upgrade a core duo, but what for? It costs a bit more in the second hand market (~$400) and will probably be fast enough already.

It may cost more than buying an older G3, but when you factor in the upgrades you'll want to install and the cost of Mac OS X 10.4, you might find that option cheaper. Also, with an Intel Mac you're buying both a Mac and a PC, so that's a real bargain.

Apologies to the group, I'm aware this is a PPC section, but I think it's better to suggest an Intel Mac to a new switcher from Windows since it allows them the option of using the computer with both Mac OS X and Windows at full speed.

 
back back back you foul zombie !

back to the grave !

bit late a response and a G4 or G5 is right now a better choice anyway

 
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