Mac OS 8.5 Left Behind Far More Macs than
Leopard
From Ed Hurtley:
You mention that 60 models are being left behind, and how it is
cutting of fairly new machines.
Here is some perspective:
On October 26, 2007, Leopard's release date, the oldest
machine that is officially supported will be the 2001 Quicksilver Power Mac G4 at
867 MHz. It will be 6 years, 3 months, 8 days old at that time.
(Released 7/18/2001.) The newest machine that is not
supported will be the
original 12" iBook G4, which is unsupported at 800 MHz. It was sold
until 4/19/2004, meaning one bought on the last day it was "new" would
be 3 years, 6 months, 7 days old.
So Leopard supports all machines newer than 3 years 6 months and
supports some machines going back to 6 years 3 months old. Wow. That's
it? Only 6 years 3 months at the top-end, and as recent as 3 years 6
months on the low? (Not counting refurb 800 MHz machines sold after the
model was replaced as "new".)
Well, nothing is going to compare to System 7.5.5, whose oldest
supported machine was over 10 years, 8 months old when it was released
(OS released on 9/22/1996, Mac
Plus on 1/16/1986.) But how about a slightly newer OS?
Mac OS 8.5 was released to the wild on 10/17/1998. It shut out
all non-PowerPC machines. 8.1 was supported on all 68040s; 8.5
wasn't. That was almost as many models shut out (if you count
Performas) as are being shut out by Leopard. (Although I am dubious as
to how you count "60 models". When the only difference between two
systems released at the same time are processor speed, memory, and hard
drive size, they shouldn't be counted as different models.)
At that time, the PowerBook
190cs had only been discontinued for a little over 2 years. (I
can't find an exact date, just "September 1996", so it could be
anywhere from 2 years, 17 days, to 2 years, 1 month, 16 days.) I feel
more sorry for those PowerBook 190cs buyers than I do for iBook G4
buyers. At least iBook G4 buyers could run the latest OS for over 3.5
years.
Leopard supports machines that are almost 2 years
older at time of release than 8.5 supported at its time of
release.
The oldest machine that supported 8.5 at its release were the
original Power Mac x100 series, released on March 14, 1994. Those
machines were only 4 years, 7 months, 3 days old. Leopard supports
machines that are almost 2 years older at time of release than 8.5
supported at its time of release. So rather than a span of 3.5 to 6.25
years of questionable machines for Leopard, 8.5 had a span of 2 to 4.6
years.
If on Leopard release day, your Mac is newer than 3.5 years
old, you are guaranteed to work. And if your Mac is as old as 6.25
years, you have a chance of working. When 8.5 came out, you had to be
newer than 2 years to guarantee it would work, and the oldest machine
with any chance of working was only 4.6 years old.
In mobiles, Leopard's oldest supported machine is nearly 5 years old
(867 MHz PowerBook
G4, released 11/6/2002,) whereas at time of 8.5's release, the
oldest supported portable was barely 3 years old (PowerBook 5300, 8/25/1995.) So for a
supported portable machine, you needed one that was newer
time-wise than the newest machine Leopard shuts out.
9 years ago, Mac users were in much worse shape than they are today
with the current OS release.
Ed Hurtley
Owner of over 50 Low End Macintoshes, ranging from a Macintosh Plus
to an eMac; Macintosh Portable to a MacBook Pro.
Ed,
Thanks for all the research you did here. I remember
standardizing on Mac OS 8.1 at work when we outgrew 7.5.5 because it
supported our Quadras, 500 series PowerBooks, and Power Macs. I don't
recall much software that required 8.5, though, which is one of the
issues moving forward.
Thanks for reminding us how Apple left so many Macs
out in the cold - also under the Jobs regime.
Dan
Leopard Pales Compared with Macs Abandoned by Mac
OS 8.5
From Carl Hult:
Hello!
I've been reading the articles about the Macs left behind when the
latest cat joins the family, and I just want to say that even though
it's sad to see so many Macs not supported, I'm still optimistic
because it means that Apple wants an OS as fresh as it could be.
Also, people have been lamenting the fact that Macs were left behind
before, but where are they now? I remember back in 1998 or something
like that, when Mac OS 8.5 was announced. Apple killed off support for
non-PowerPC Macs back then. The response from some of the Mac users
were very like the response of today. But that debate died very
soon.
BTW, the required computers for Leopard can be compared to other
limits back in 1998 for example. We have 3 GHz computers today and the
limit is 867 MHz. That is a healthy margin even if you have a computer
from 2003 or 2004. In 1998 the shift was about leaving a whole chip
family (68K) behind. This time it's about cutting one chip family (G4)
in half, leaving the "weeds" behind.
I know it's kind of far fetched to compare it to 1998 but the jump
in requirements back then was bigger then, at least in my opinion. It's
not a brain transplant this time, as it was in 1998. That transplant
will come either with 10.6 or 10.7.
Sincerely,
Carl Hult
Carl,
Thanks for writing. There are a lot of different ways
of looking at this issue, but what it boils down to for a lot of us it
that there is no reason the underlying operating system should have
such high hardware requirements. The problem is the eye candy.
For all the grief Microsoft has deservedly received
over Vista, they got one thing right: a user interface that makes less
hardware demands on less capable hardware.
Put another way, we've been very happy with the user
experience in Tiger, so we know the hardware supported by Tiger is
capable of producing a more than acceptable user experience - and all
of a sudden we're being told that not only 350 MHz G3 or 700 MHz G4,
but even dual 800 MHz Power Macs are unable to provide an adequate user
experience.
The real problem isn't not being able to run Leopard,
which will probably bog down older Macs to a considerable extent, but
being unable to run new software on Tiger as the years go by and
developers stop providing browsers and whatever else we need to keep up
with standards.
Dan
867 MHz Cutoff for Leopard
Dan,
With all this talk about the 867 MHz cut off for Leopard, I have
been thinking about it. At least for single processor Power Macs, the
867 MHz Quicksilver has 2 MB of L3 cache, where the "lesser" 733
MHz and 800 MHz only have 256 L2 cache, but no L3 cache. This makes the
performance difference much more the actual clock rates of the CPUs
would tell. Of course, this doesn't allow for the 800 MHz Dual
Processor Quicksilver, which does have L3 cache. Of course, the
difference between 800 & 867 MHz PowerBooks. The 867 MHz and 1 GHz
TiBook do have Radeon 9000 graphics, vs. the 800 MHz with Radeon 7500,
but both the 800 MHz and 867 MHz have 32 MB of VRAM.
All that said, I still think the cutoff should have been something
like G4 Processor as a minimum processor and a minimum amount of RAM
(and of course hard disc size), and a DVD-ROM (which could be
external).
Regards,
Jay Snyder
Jay,
Thanks for writing. I also wish Apple had drawn the
line a bit lower - maybe at a single 667 MHz G4 or dual 450 MHz G4 so
all eMacs, all G4 iMacs, all G4 iBooks, all dual processor G4 Power
Macs, and all but the three slowest titanium PowerBooks would be
supported.
We are very much looking forward to reading field
reports next week and learning how well or poorly Leopard performs on
unsupported hardware.
Dan
Cutting Off Support at Five Years
From Gary Kohl:
I'm sorry that Mr. Hodges is so angry about this one, but I do have
to disagree again with his main points. The fact that System 7.5.5
lasted 10 years is wonderful from a hardware point of view, but any
history of Apple will tell you that Apple's inability to progress
beyond 7.5.5 or minor variations of it (as Systems 8 & 9 were)
almost put Apple out of business.
7.5.5 lasted as long as it did only because Apple couldn't get it's
act together and produce a modern operating system. We really don't
need those days again. We also don't need a return to the days when
each new generation of Mac was a minor speed bump over the previous.
Yes, the G3s were a big advance, the G4s somewhat, but the pace of
hardware advancement has increased rapidly since the move to Intel and
promises to continue to advance quickly.
Remember, again, it was Apple's inability to produce significantly
faster machines that depressed the Mac market and led to the Intel
switch. Things ran well on G3s and G4s for a long time because Motorola
and IBM moved development at a glacial pace. There is nothing wrong
with my Yikes machine or
MDD G4, and I
continue to enjoy and use them on a daily basis. But I certainly am
glad that Apple is now in a period where it finds itself moving rapidly
from generation to generation. I believe that's what it takes for Apple
to compete, and if the price of that is that a 5 or more year old
computer gets "left behind", I think it worth the price.
It's certainly better than having no Apple around at all, and that's
where we were headed on a few occasions, precisely because of the
situations Mr. Hodges cites as "the good old days". Support for 10.3.9
was continued by Apple for quite some time, and I expect Apple will not
abandon 10.4 users with necessary updates for some time either. Apple
isn't forcing Mr. Hodges to do anything.
Gary,
It's not System 7.5.5 that lasted ten years - System
7.0 came out in May 1991, 7.5.5 on October 1996, and 7.6 in January
1997. What Ted Hodges was commenting on what how the Mac Plus, introduced in January
1986, was still supported by the current version of the Mac OS right
through the end of 1996.
With Leopard we're seeing that cut in half.
Apple was long at the mercy of Motorola and IBM as far
as faster CPUs goes, and today it's completely at the mercy of Intel.
Motorola got stuck at 500 MHz for a while, then shot past it so Apple
could sell 733 MHz Power Macs (46% faster on one jump!). With the
switch to IBM's G5, Apple moved from a 1.4 GHz dual G4 Power Mac to a
2.0 GHz dual G4 Power Mac , increasing raw processing power about 40% -
and eventually reached 2.7 GHz for another 35% gain in processing
power.
In the same time period, Intel moved the Pentium 4 from 3.0 GHz to
3.6 GHz, a very unsatisfactory 20% increase in processing power.
Today's fastest Mac runs a 3.0 GHz, and after fifteen months at that
point, Apple may finally be able to move to 3.33 GHz or possibly 3.66
GHz by the end of the year.
IBM, Intel, AMD, and the rest of the industry keep
running into obstacles, and the only reason the Intel-based Macs are
such screaming powerhouses is that Intel backed away from the
marketing-friendly Pentium 4 architecture to one designed to provide
more processing power - and the switch to dual- and quad-core CPUs.
We'll continue to see progress in processing power,
but it's not very often that we'll see the kind of leaps going from
PowerPC 604 to G3 - or going from Pentium 4 to the Core architecture.
Most of the progress will be slow, but thanks to the switch to Intel
we'll at the very least have GHz parity with the Windows world.
Dan
It's All About Eye Candy
From Rich Brauer:
Hi Ted,
I think you hit the nail on the head in your latest article
[If a Mac Plus Can Run System 7.5.5,
Why Can't an 800 MHz G4 Run Leopard?]- I suspect the Leopard system
requirements are all about the eye candy. My cursory look indicates
that the supported models almost all shipped with 64 MB video cards or
better. I'm going to guess that Leopard will need that as a minimum to
give the user all of the fancy visual effects without a significant
system slowdown (those Macs that are supported but lack 64 MB cards
will probably suffer, either by not supporting those effects or slowing
down significantly). [And I'd be more certain, but my 3G modem seems to
suffer from the rain we're experiencing down here, but while it's not
specified on the Leopard page, this is my guess]
My own iceBook has 32 MB VRAM, and is unsupported, as an example.
Presumably, the idea is that the 1 GHz version can power through
acceptably with the same amount of VRAM.
Your point is unarguable - this is probably largely a result of the
"eye candy" effect. On the other hand, every software developer seems
to be embracing that (even the latest release of Ubuntu is noted for
it); whether that can be combated it debatable.
As I mentioned in my earlier missive, I'll be curious to see how
XPostFacto does with Leopard, and how those newer "vintage" machines
perform. I suspect that if it's merely a question of clock cycles,
XPostFacto, or something similar, will enable them to run Leopard,
albeit with the speed issues machines unsupported my Tiger &
Panther have experienced. We got OS 8 on 68030s, after all.
Take care,
Rich Brauer
Why Can't an 800 MHz G4 Run Leopard?
From Bill Brown:
Yo Dan and Ted,
Ted Hodges asks: "If a Mac Plus Can Run System 7.5.5, Why Can't an
800 MHz G4 Run Leopard?"
Fellas, 7.5.5 doesn't run on a Plus; it barely crawls. 7.1 and even
7.01• crawl on a Plus. System 6 runs on a Plus. In 1986, most of
us were still unaccustomed to throwing away the purchase price of a
computer with a .x jump in an operating system came along. Initially,
from System 1 of 1984 into System 7 through 7.01•, system
upgrading was free. We may have tried the upgrade on a Plus to System 7
because we could do it for nothing. Many have gone back to System 6.
Certainly most of the surviving Plus' have gone back to System 6. Most
with a Plus never considered moving to to 7.1 for several reasons:
System 7.1 cost money, the first Mac OS (a Mac OS was called a System
in those days) Apple sold to Mac users rather than giving it away. The
sluggish experience of many with the free upgrades through System
7.01• was not inspiring on the Plus, SE, nor later Classic. You
needed to spend money on installing extra memory, which wasn't cheap
back then. And the simple fact that most Macs go from cradle to grave
never having any upgrade of anything. Over its long production life,
many Plus' were built. Including until today, I doubt that one percent
of them have had System 7.5.5 installed even briefly. Yes, I have a
Jasmine external SCSI hard drive with 7.5.5 on it that I can boot my
Plus to. "Who cares" is about all that can be said for the fact that a
Plus will run on 7.5.5.
All of this is poor performance with newer operating systems than
System 6 were okay because a Plus sings on System 6. System 6 is a
robust (robust sounds so 80s) system able to offer a user a huge Mac
experience keeping many productive to this day. I possess a copy of the
very first full color coffee table book "Whale's Song" produced
entirely on two Macs and largely on a Plus with System 6. No
typesetting, no camera ready copy, no photo engraving, no lithography
plates, the Plus even ran the press. The Plus on System 6 goes online,
does your email, can even still crudely surf the Web. 7.5.5 offers no
increased capability for its sloth performance. System 7.x was for Macs
of the nineties. Much like Mac OS X Leopard is for Macs of 2005
and beyond - for a while anyway.
Apple put their Leopard support cutoff where they pleased. So be it.
Get used to it. Some of us look to have Leopard up and running on any
G4 we see. A few will hack away until we have Leopard running on a
hacked G3 or maybe even a Plus just for Ted. Uhhh, Ted, you do have one
of those accelerator kits for a Plus that uses a Kelty Clip to clip a 1
GHz G4 processor card onto the Plus' 68K processor, don't you?
;^)
So Ted's article had 4,000+, hits did it. In another year, all of
this whining over the last year about where Apple will place their
cutoff for Leopard will be ancient history. Nobody will care any more
where Apple put their cutoff. We will have any G4 that wants to run
Leopard running on Leopard. The Plus will still be running System 6
very happily even though, yes, you can get 7.5.5 on to it and whiners
will be pointing to this fact as some justification to whine. G3s and
many early G4s right on up through many Core 2 Duos will be happily
running Tiger. The whining, and interest, about Leopard's cutoff will
happily be over. It made great news while interest lasted. It's
over.
Of course, in a year we will be whining about where Apple will place
their cutoff for 10.6. Let us start the whining now!
Bill Brown
Bill,
Yes, there's a difference between being able to run
System 7 (or Leopard) and being able to run it well. As a Mac Plus user
from the System 6 days, I can tell you that although I got to play with
System 7 on my Mac Plus (had to sign a nondisclosure agreement), I went
back to System 6 as soon as 7.0 was released. An unaccelerated Mac
Plus, SE, or Classic does not run it well.
Memory was costly back then - about $70 per megabyte
if I recall correctly. So I took my Plus to 2.5 MB when funds allowed,
and later to 4 MB. It only became a System 7 computer after I had
a Brainstorm 16 MHz accelerator installed, and System 7 is very usable
with a 16 MHz Mac. But at least Apple let the end user decide whether
System 7 ran well enough to use - the only Macs it didn't support had
less than 1 MB of RAM, and System 7 required 2 MB.
I am very much looking forward to reading field
reports about Leopard next week, especially from those running it on
older, slower, and possibly unsupported hardware. Then we'll be able to
determine whether Apple's 867 MHz cutoff makes sense or not. Until
then, I just hate it.
Dan
Mac Plus Ran System 7.5.5 Poorly
From Peter Hillman to Ted Hodges:
The 16 MHz IIcx ran 7.5.5 just fine. The 8 MHz
Classic was not a speed
demon, but it got the job done. As long as you didn't use Adobe Type
Manager or a lot of TrueType fonts, any 8 MHz 68000 Mac (the Plus,
SE, and Classic) could run 7.5.5 very nicely. Why should we let Apple
dictate to us what machines will be too slow? I'm not saying that 4-7
year old Macs will be speed demons under Leopard, any more than I'm
saying a Plus was a speed demon under 7.5.5, but it should be up to the
user to decide what is and isn't fast enough, not Apple.
A Mac Plus barely
ran System 7.5.5. I had a Mac Plus, and System 7 was considerably
slower than System 6, and System 7.5.5 was a memory hog and even
slower. As you stated, you had to disable software that people used on
a daily basis: Adobe Type Manager and minimize TrueType fonts. How does
that make someone productive?
You cannot compare the Mac Classic to the Mac IIcx. The Mac IIcx was twice as fast,
used a different processor, and supported 128 MB of RAM. Of course it
ran 7.5.5 just fine. You couldn't run more than one program on a Mac
Plus with 4 MB of RAM with System 7.5. The only reason System
7.5.5 ran on the Mac Plus is because Apple created the Mac Classic in
1990 to lure buyers into thinking they were getting a good computer for
less than $1,000 - when in reality it was a computer that was
four years old with a new name. If the Classic did not exist,
System 7.5 would have required a 68020 or higher CPU. Sure the Mac
Plus/Classic ran System 7.5.5, but no one actually did it. They stuck
with System 7.1.
If Apple allowed the customer to decide what is appropriate, then
they would get sued again and again. If Apple released Leopard claiming
it would run on a 400 MHz
1st Generation Power Mac G4 (which is 8 years old), the complaints
would be through the roof on how slow it was and how unproductive the
computer would be. If Apple retained an outdated 10 year old GUI just
so it could run on computers that were 10 years old, who would buy it?
You would complain that Apple is not innovative and stuck using an
outdated OS.
When Apple was developing OS X, they claimed the Beige G3 was the minimum
required computer. Instead of updating the system requirements, they
continued to claim the Beige G3 was supported. When OS X was
released, users quickly discovered that the floppy drive didn't work,
all serial ports did not work, and the onboard graphics were not
supported. How could Apple claim a computer was supported by an OS that
disabled half of the computer's primary functions?
For printing, Apple recommended printing to a network printer on
Ethernet. Not many home users had a network printer. Apple was quickly
sued for falsely advertising OS X. A class action settlement
allowed Beige G3 owners to obtain a full refund with the return of
OS X 10.0. Mac OS X 10.1 and 10.2 improved performance, but
the floppy and serial ports were still nonfunctional, and people added
a CPU upgrade and PCI graphics card for better performance. They had to
modify the computer to make it work well.
So Apple needs to draw the line somewhere, and 5 years is pretty
good for OS support. Apple could have easily dropped the G4 altogether,
but they adjusted the requirements to include 867 MHz or faster.
OS X 10.6 is already rumored to be Intel only. I am sure PowerPC
G5 users are going to be pretty upset, especially for Dual Processor
owners. If Apple releases OS X 10.6 in two years (2009), why
should they support a processor that hasn't been used since 2005?
Peter Hillman
Peter,
I have to agree with you on the 8 MHz Macs. Although
they could run System 7.5.5, they did so v-e-r-y s-l-o-w-l-y even with
ATM disabled and avoiding TrueType fonts. But any 16 MHz Mac -
including the Mac Portable,
PowerBook 100, and an accelerated
Mac Plus - ran it quite comfortably. And it was possible to run 2-3
programs at once with 4 MB of RAM, such as Word 5.1, FileMaker Pro, and Excel (whatever
version was current circa 1991).
Apple really took a beating over Mac OS X 10.0. Not
only were the floppy drive not supported serial ports, there was no
acceleration whatsoever for the onboard graphics, and there was no
support for DVD playback in a lot of G3 Macs with DVD-ROM drives. That
said, Mac OS X was as functional on the beige G3 and WallStreet PowerBook as it was
on newer hardware, at least through version 10.2. None of them had
floppy or serial drive support, video was never accelerated, but
eventually Apple managed to get a DVD player that functioned on
G3s.
As for Leopard, there are at least five issues: The
first is what hardware you can install it on, and it seems that 867 MHz
is rock bottom for Apple. They appear to make no allowance for dual
processors with that number, but time will tell.
The second issue is what hardware can run Leopard. We
know that the developer preview ran on systems slower than that, and
Apple's iChat 10.5 FAQ says a dual 800 MHz G4 is adequate for the app,
so it's evident that Apple has also had it running on Macs below 867
MHz.
The third issue is what hardware can run Leopard
acceptably. It may be possible to hack OS X 10.5 to run on a a
350 MHz Yikes! Power Mac
G4 or a 400 MHz
PowerBook G4, but most people probably won't find its performance
acceptable. After all, they're well below half the recommended minimum
CPU speed. But what about a dual 533 MHz Power Mac or an
800 MHz iMac G4, or
a 12" 800 MHz iBook
G4? They are likely to be close enough to perform decently.
The fourth issue is Apple support. If Apple recommends
867 MHz, they are under no obligation to provide technical support.
Perhaps creating an installer that prevents unsupported installs is
part of a strategy to minimize support costs.
The fifth issue is being up to date. With every new
version of OS X, we see software that requires that version,
leaving owners of earlier versions behind. Right now Tiger is up to
date, and so are its apps. But what happens when Microsoft or Adobe or
Mozilla draws the line at Leopard? All of a sudden those who cannot
upgrade to Leopard are left with outdated versions of Word that may not
support the latest document format, Photoshop without the latest and
greatest features, and a browser that's not as compliant was what
Leopard users get.
Just as with each previous version of OS X, Apple has
drawn a line in the sand. And just as then, there will be people who
cross the line, not expecting any support from Apple and cursing under
their breath because of the amount of work involved in hacking Leopard
to run on their hardware.
Dan
Dan,
I agree with you on all points. Here is another thing that is kind
of irritating. Why doesn't Apple release new versions of Safari that
run on Panther, or maybe even Jaguar? Why is Safari only updated with
an OS? My parents don't go for system upgrades. I had to download
Firefox, since
Safari 1.x is pretty much outdated. So if Firefox drops Panther
support, I will have to upgrade their Macs.
I had a Beige G3
with CD-ROM, rev A. It was a great Mac and very stable. Throughout the
years, I upgraded the CPU to 500 MHz, 384 MB of RAM, larger hard
drives, an ATI Rage Orion video card, and an Apple DVD-ROM drive. It
ran Jaguar rather well. Since the Beige G3 required hardware-DVD
decoding, the Apple DVD Player was not included in the Jaguar install.
I copied the player from my PowerBook G4, and DVDs played flawlessly on
the upgraded CPU and upgraded graphics card. I never tried it with the
onboard video, but I am guessing it only played DVDs because of the
Rage 128 Orion card that was installed.
Anyway, thanks for your replies. I enjoy your site and visit it
often . . . to read the articles and to see which Mac is the
"Mac of the Day".
Peter
Peter,
I think there's just about zero chance of Apple
supporting new versions of Safari on old versions of the Mac OS for one
simple reason: It's tightly integrated to WebKit, which is pretty much
tied to each version of OS X. The Safari 3 preview installed a new
version of WebKit, which caused problems with Safari 2 and some other
apps that depend on WebKit and assumed the version used under OS X
10.4 wouldn't change.
I'm very excited about Firefox. At present, Camino 1.5
is my browser of choice, a version of Firefox 2.0 customized for the
Mac. (I also use Safari 2, Firefox 2, and the
"BonEcho" version of Firefox 2 optimized for the G4.) With version
3.0, Firefox is getting away from the "one interface for all"
philosophy and will be designed to work like a Mac app under OS X,
a Windows app under Windows, and a Linux app under Linux. Based on the
screen shots I've seen, it's going to look very much like modern Mac
apps - and a lot like Safari.
Dan
Benefits of Dual Processor Macs
Following up on 60 Macs Left Behind
by Leopard, Peter Hillman says:
Dan,
I do agree with you on the dual processor models being capable of
running Leopard better than a faster single CPU. Maybe it would have
caused confusion trying to specify a min. requirement of a dual 500 MHz
as well as a faster single CPU.
Do you think XPostFacto will be upgraded to allow Leopard to be
installed on unsupported Macs? It would be interesting to see how they
handle Leopard.
With regard to age of computers, my iMac G5 (released in late 2005)
will most likely only run Tiger and Leopard. If 10.6 is Intel only, my
Mac only lasted for two system upgrades.
Peter
Peter,
We've been proponents of dual processor Macs since
OS X became a viable operating system - about the time of version
10.1. Getting my own dual G4 setup confirmed that, and it's especially
nice for someone who uses Classic Mode, as that tends to take over a
single processor - which bogs down a single CPU Mac but leaves the
second CPU in a dual processor Mac free to continue humming along.
Switching from a 1.25 GHz eMac to a dual 1 GHz Power Mac did
wonders for my productivity.
I don't know if XPostFacto will be resurrected for
Leopard. I hope so, as the name is established and it has a great
reputation. Regardless, I'm sure someone will discover a way to install
Leopard on unsupported G4 Macs that doesn't require having a supported
PowerPC model to do the work.
The 800 MHz iBook G4 is already where your iMac G5 may
end up; it was only supported by OS X 10.3 and 10.4.
Dan
Love the Flat Panel iMac G4
From Alan Norberg:
I'll tell you what, my wife and grandchildren absolutely love the
screen, which can be swiveled to any angle, and to boot the machine is
dead quiet. This thing doesn't take up much room on a desktop. It was
also seen on every TV series as eye candy for quite a while after it's
introduction.
Regards,
Al
Al,
Yeah, the G4 iMac does have that going for it. It's a
clever design, and I've seen a lot of them on TV, especially in the CSI
labs.
Apple does have a thing for visually distinct
computers. And back in the days of The
Pretender (1996-2000), it was quite obvious to Mac users that
the notebook Jarod used was a WallStreet PowerBook with the Apple logo
covered over.
Dan
iBook G4 800 MHz
From Örjan Larsson:
Nice article.
Perhaps we get better models here in Sweden, but my iBook G4 12" 800
MHz, still used by my girlfriend, does have Airport Extreme. Its
802.11g In fact, it cant even have the old Airport 802.11b card, but
requires the newer Airport Extreme card.
Am also hoping I can move Leopard one way or another into it,
despite Apple cruel "867 MHz", there sure are features in Leopard that
my girlfriend wants. (And she prefer the 12" in iBook, thinks like me
that the MacBook 13" is a tad bit too clumsy overall as laptop)
sincerely
Örjan Larsson
Sweden
Örjan,
Right you are. Our iBook profile stated in one
section that it used AirPort Extreme, another that is used the older,
slower 802.11b. We've since verified that was an error and have
corrected the page.
A lot of people agree with you about the 12" iBook and
PowerBook vs. the 13" MacBook. Here's hoping Apple will someday
introduce a smaller notebook.
Dan
Dan Knight has been publishing Low
End Mac since April 1997. Mailbag columns come from email responses to his Mac Musings, Mac Daniel, Online Tech Journal, and other columns on the site.
