iBook G3 to G4 upgrade - worth it?

[scott]

Right now I have a 500 MHz G3 iBook with 320Mb of memory. It has a hard time with a lot of current websites, and can't do Youtube at all. (I dunno, maybe that's a good thing...)

 

Anyway, I could get a 1.x GHz G4 iBook with 768Mb of memory for about $300. But is it even worthwhile to get a G4 at this point? Will it be a viable upgrade for a few years, or is it already close to too old? I can't really afford to get a G5 model (lowest used I've seen is about $600).

[disturbman]

Hard question but I think G4 are out of date now. Too old. Typically computers, and even more laptops, start to be old things after 3 to 4 years. So you are just a little above the limit here. It will work better than your actual computer but you might still encounter problems with youtube and myspace. That says, if you got a newer G4 version it can be okay (the one with 1Ghz were discontinued in 2004).

 

My suggestion will be too look out for a G4 a little bit stronger. For me, nowadays 1Gb memory is a minimum. This could be your answer: http://support.apple.com/kb/SP43

 

And, if it's too expensive, you should have a look to those micro laptops. I think they cost between 300 to 500 new. But they are PCs.

[to2leo]

Yikes getting on top of the Apple lifestyle is expensive...hmm maybe I should take a second look of buying their stocks!

[Martijn Meerts]

Meh, in case of Apple, you (usually) get what you pay for. It's easy to say a MacBook Pro is so much more expensive than the average Dell notebook, but you tend to get higher quality hardware, and obviously a much better OS ;)

 

The best is always when people compare a Mac Pro with a cheap Dell desktop machine, completely ignorant to the fact that the Mac Pro has Xeon processors and fitting mainboard and all the other hardware required to run Xeons at full speed. Put together a Dell with dual Xeon quad cores, and you'll quickly get to a price point beyond the Mac Pro...

 

My only complaint with Apple is the expensive videocard upgrades for the Mac Pro, and the lack of a non-xeon based Mac (for those that don't want an iMac for example)

[CaptOblivious]

Can you get a used MacBook? Apple no longer supports the PowerPC Macs (G3, G4, G5), your best bet is to get one with an Intel Core chip. Even the oldest of these designs should work well for you for a few years yet.

[scott]

Thanks for all the thoughts.

 

Right now, I don't think I can cough up for a MacBook, as nice as that would be. I'm still dealing with the pre-payment portion of our trip to Costa Rica this coming January, plus I just spent $200 on a long zoom lens for that trip (must get wildlife pictures....). So $600+ on a computer (which seems to be the going rate) seems a bit steep right now.

 

I'm starting to think that maybe I should just use the iBook for what it's good for (and what I said it would be for--writing and personal projects), and just give up on things like Youtube and Facebook. (Just dropping those two things could be a real time-saver, although it's frustrating not to be able to see all the cool videos that Bill finds on Youtube). Maybe sometime in the next few years I'll be able to afford an Intel mac. After this many years (20+), I can't really face switching over to Windows.

[Guest ___]

Hey Martjin, comparing to Apple to Dell is like apples and oranges.

 

Personally, when I was getting my A+ cert a decade ago, we were suppose to cover Mac in the class. when I asked in a session what do we do if a Mac goes down, the instructor replied toss it, and buy a new one.

 

I will admit, my years in the paper had me using macs all the time, and I will agree when a mac goes down, forget trying to get them working again. Personally, I lost a lot of any positive onion of the macs when they went to using an Intel chipset.

 

As much as everyone gripes about the stability of PC software, I think it's a lot better trade off than dealing with Mac hardware issues as over the course of the past year at least twice a year I hear from all my mac-maniacs griping and whining about when there is a hardware failure of hearing them rant on and on about how long it takes and the cost of having their mac serviced by the apple store.

 

Hearing mac service rants makes my TOMIX rants (and RealZJ) rants sounds pretty tame in comparison.

 

 

______________________________________

LINEX LIVES!!

[Martijn Meerts]

Hmm.. Haven't any any problems with any Mac I've worked with.. We have only Mac at work, and it's quite seldom that one breaks. We still have G3's running here, and those have been running for at least 8 years.

 

I had an issue with my MacBook Pro at some point, which was my own fault really. I took it on the plane, but instead of hand luggage it was in my regular luggage. Shortly after the battery stopped charging, and a few days after that it broke down completely. Sent it in for repair and a week later it was back with a new logic board, new battery and some other stuff (it was almost an entirely new machine), didn't cost me anything at all. I didn't even have AppleCare either.

 

As for my Mac Pro.. "It just works" ;) It's running both OS X and Vista using bootcamp, and interestingly enough, Vista runs better on it than on most other machines. I've never had Vista crash on me for example ;)

 

 

But, like anything, there are always cases where a Mac is DOA or just stops working after a short period. It's just that all in all I've had a MUCH better experience with my Macs than with any other PC's, and I used to build my own using components designed to work with each other ;)

[scott]

Uh-oh--what hath my thread wrought?

[stickboy]

My 2 cents...

 

Just had a similar dilemma, as my trusty old G3 iMac gave up the ghost (after 8 years of fairly trouble free use), but it was struggling to cope with the websites mentioned above.

 

I thought about buying a used G4/G5, but instead I bit the bullet and forked out 700 GBP for a new Macbook (yes, they are more expensive here! ...and that was with the educators discount).

 

All I can say is it was worth every penny. So much faster than the PC I use for work.

 

My advice, save your money, and buy the best Mac you can... That probably wasn't what you wanted to hear, sorry!

 

Cheers

 

Phil

[scott]

My advice, save your money, and buy the best Mac you can... That probably wasn't what you wanted to hear, sorry!

 

Actually, that's good--helps me avoid the temptation to dive into a purchase that might be pointless. Thanks!

[cteno4]

ok ill throw in my 2 cents.

 

the g4 ibook should give you decent power to do the normal stuff. while it wont be super zippy as a dual core intel mac book would, it will get the job done. only problem is if you get a $300 ibook it may have already gotten a lot of the life beaten out of it. thats always the rub on the used laptops as you dont know how much wear and tear or drops they have gotten. also expect the battery to be an poor performer as they drop off after a couple of years (at least the older ones). i have always been leery of used laptops as i watched the kids in my lab and how they would treat them! that being said i have had many friends buy refurbished and used mac laptops and they have done fine.

 

ill disagree with aaron on the repair issue on macs. I ran a mac lab in a high school with about 80 laptops and desktop macs. these ran the gambit of about 8 years of technology. for the most part the macs never broke. only hard drives would go. when i did loose a few laptop mother boards (usually to external plugs getting levered hard and breaking the connection at the mother board, not the mother board frying) i could replace them for $100-200 easily. compare that to the last dell desktop (pretty simple mid level model) that at 2 yrs old blew the power controller on the mother board and they wanted almost $400 for the replacement mother board... This lab ran full tilt, every period just about and 2 hrs after school. laptops checked out most of the time as well for a week at a time. i had maybe 1 or 2 down out of 80 at one time and those were usually just waiting for parts or i had let a kid install something i shouldnt have (have to let the creative ones have some fun now and then).  the business lab next door that had 28 Dells (top of the line) consistently had 4-5 machines down for hardware and software and that lab had a certified up the wazu tech and he did not teach (i never was taught, all on the job learning and was teaching 6-7 classes a day).

 

I have owned like 15 macs over my life now and none has ever bit the bullet (yes i have had them since 1987). Most got 2-4 years of hard wear by me then were handed off to friends where they lived second and sometimes third lives. usually they got so old that it was os an features that finally retired them. I even had a cup of coffee spilled under my running mac IIfx which was sucked up through the holes in the bottom of the case and shorted the mother board contacts on the underside (imagine walking into the room and seeing two people mopping up around your computer while white smoke is rising from it and the room smells like burned circuitry and coffee). after pulling it apart, flushing it all with distilled water and isopropanol and drying all i had to do was replace the two mother board batteries (pram battery required soldering) and it still worked!

 

every pc i have had has died. every pc i have bought for my wife but one has died w/in 2-4 yrs. every time one of the pcs croaked i attempted to repair but either the price was that of a new one (and 2 yrs better technology) to replace the broken part of it was SOL getting the replacement part (many times i would hear that the part had a lot of blow outs so thats why the part was scarce and that because the half life of a pc was so short secondary companies did not want to get into replacing them. i had to deal with a butt load of pcs in my day and the amount of time to fix things is on at least an order of magnitude or more on the pc... I probably spent a couple of weeks time combined trying to get a sound card to work in one of my wife's pcs when the onboard sound blew. three different cards and untold rebuilds and driver combos would never revive the sound on the system... my google employee ms in software engineering nephew spent a good part of a day on it and almost threw it out the window with no luck!

 

so i think the concept here is that the macs usually dont require the kicking that the pcs to or break as often, but are just as repairable as a pc is. I have had to live and work in both worlds for the last 20 years doing my profession and this is just from brute experience. while the mac is always a bit more expensive the ROI on this far far far beats the savings in the long run! i have lived this over and over again...

 

in your case the g3 is just lacking the horsepower being like 7-8 yrs old!

 

cheers

 

jeff