WallStreet Zip Thank You
From Christopher Beaver
Hey, Charles,
I'm a devoted fan. Start every day with a read of Low End Mac. Love your roundups of information,
news, thoughts, opinion. Kind of eases me into my fairly solitary
work as a documentary filmmaker.
As soon as I read your column that mentioned the 250 Zip for a
WallStreet, I ordered one. I
already had a 100 Zip but at thirty-five bucks and the greater
flexibility who could argue.
I love the WallStreet PowerBook. I have a ton of legacy devices
and floppies, and the WallStreet sits at the perfect juncture
before Apple closed out so many existing options.
I would definitely upgrade if I could afford it. A new PowerBook
would be fantastic, let alone a dual processor G5. However, most of
my gear (scanner, CD burner, and so on) was purchased with a
one-time equipment purchase grant before the switch to no floppy
drives, the end of SCSI, etc.
So until the next equipment grant arrives (about the time we
land on Mars I'm expecting) hooray for the WallStreet and my
upgraded Power Mac 8500 (with all
those PCI slots) and, of course, Low End Mac!
Very best always,
Christopher Beaver
- Hi Christopher,
Thanks for reading!
The old WallStreet is indeed a formidable beast. Mine is back in
daily use now that I replaced the failed processor.
You do have a bit of upgrade path leeway leeway with your old
peripherals. The Lombard supports SCSI, and if you can find a VST
SuperDisk expansion bay module, it will happily read and write
floppies. I have one for my Pismo and it works great in both
OS 9 and OS X.
Those old PCI Mac towers are great machines too. I still have my
Umax S900, and my son just
upgraded his S900 to 500 MHz G3 power.
Charles
PowerBook Battery Replacement
From Robert Gruber
I just came across your article
from 10/6/03 regarding a Pismo battery replacement. I was
wondering if you are happy with the Wegner Media battery you
purchased. They are down to $99 now, and, on the other end, OWC
offers an even higher capacity Pismo replacement for $160.
I'm leaning toward the Wegener Media one to keep my Pismo going
for another year or two and wanted to know your experience.
Thanks for the helpful column.
Rob
- Hi Rob,
It's still working. I was getting about 2-1/2 hours running time
(OS 9) when it first arrived last fall, but after I installed
OS X 10.3 I noticed that charge life took a steep dive (even
when booted in OS 9).
I'm not sure whether this is coincidental or not. It's pretty hard
to generalize about the batteries from Wegener because they are
pulls and their condition is not likely uniform.
If you were planning to keep the Pismo for a long time, the OWC
unit would probably be your best bet. If it's just a stopgap, the
cheaper alternative might be worth a roll of the dice.
Charles
iBook Repair and General Mac Musings
From Run
Hiya Charles,
I've since heard from my friend that her seemingly rugged Vaio
laptop is kaput. Thus, your quotes of woe befalling other owners of
the same was indeed the closing argument against the brand. What
about those cool looking Alienware laptops? On the coolness scale,
they rival the Apples, but guts [are] still Wintel. I also am
curious about these Lindows units
Walmart has experimented with
selling.
Nevertheless, nothing beats this Pismo. Like you, I am opting for a G4
upgrade. I am also thus far very pleased with the TiBook I
acquired. Not as sturdy a case, no upgradeable CPU, as far as I
know, but slick. So very, very slick.
I wonder what Apple has up it's sleeve regarding G5
laptops...
Well, aside from writing and day-to-day business, what tasks do
you task your 'Books with? Might make for an interesting article. I
would be happy to contribute a portion: I use a laptop in nearly
every room for dedicated purposes. One is an iTunes server, another
is dedicated to my exercise room, another acts an entertainment
center, etc. A 1400c, a 3400c, a TiBook, my Pismo, and the iBook, too
(if I can repair the video cable). All [were] acquired used, except
the 1400c. All [are] trouble free, except the iBook and the Pismo
processor failure. All [are] working very, very hard.
Dare I say, Macs are more popular in Canada than in the US? I've
been visiting Vancouver, BC, quite a bit lately, and Macs are even
in municipal use. Amazing.
Run
- Hi Run,
Interesting about that Vaio....
As for uses my Macs get put to, I'm afraid it's a pretty boring
story. I work at journalism probably about 10-12 hours a day, and
that's about all the computing I need. The only game I have on my
hard drive is the Chess program that installs with OS X (I've
never opened it), and any music listening I do is background for
work.
Aside from my work on the Mac Web here and at Applelinks and
MacOpinion, I write
four weekly newspaper columns, another every second week, and I
also contribute regularly to about half a dozen magazines, and
maybe a dozen more on a sporadic basis. It keeps me busy.
I like your idea though. It reminds me a bit of Apple's old
"What's
on Your PowerBook" magazine ad campaign, which I think were
my favorite Apple ads ever.
I'm not sure whether Macs are more popular in Canada than the US on
a proportional basis. They certainly aren't in my part of Canada.
Coastal British Columbia is sort of Canada's California - more San
Francisco than LA in flavor, so I'm not surprised to hear that Macs
are popular there.
Charles
What's on My Pismo?
Hiya Charles!
What's on my Pismo? I can't believe it. In addition to FCP4, I
hacked LiveType, CinemaTools, SoundTrack, and Boris to load and
function on this Pismo. Gotta tell you, with a gig of RAM, the
whole suite runs like a charm, even FCP4. But can't seem to
hack the Compressor pkg to install. Long shot: Some hack ideas?
Barring that, any good substitutes for Compressor that will
compress on a G3 in 10.2.8?
In any case, what all this shows me is that Apple has made a
purely sales driven decision to render some of its programs
incompatible with G3 units with code instructions only. The
programs themselves run fine on a G3. Wow. This means that
even the company knows it's machines are keepers and has to
work to make them artificially obsolete. That
is a story.
I'm heading back up to BC this weekend. What other journalism do
you do aside from Mac reporting? I used to cover the arts. I kind
of would like to get back to journalism...
Talk to you from Canada next.
Run
- Hi Run,
Thanks for the WOYPB report.
'Course, Apple was still selling brand new G3s up until three
months ago (iBooks), so they had to keep them compatible. I
anticipate that we will see a falloff in G3 compatibility now,
especially with G5 PowerBooks likely by the end of the year with
that IBM low-power G5 chip announcement last week.
My other journalistic endeavors? I write about current affairs,
politics, culture, religion, health, and environmental topics in my
newspaper columns. I'm a generalist in that capacity, I
guess.
I also write for several specifically Christian magazines and
newspapers. I have a regular marine tech column in Canadian Yachting magazine
and also appear frequently in West
Coast Mariner. I've been a columnist for Atlantic Fisherman
for 17 years, covering the commercial fishing industry here in
Atlantic Canada.
Charles
Pismo Upgrade Info
Fro Joel Mueller
Hi Charles,
I wanted to write about my experiences upgrading my Pismo PowerBook. Originally, it was the 400
MHz G3. I sent it in to get upgraded to a 900 MHz G3, and that
hardware upgrade along with the Panther upgrade made the computer
quite usable, but still slow compared to the iBook 900 MHz
machines.
Then recently I purchased a 60 GB 7200 RPM PowerBook drive from
TransIntl.com, and that
made all of the difference. I was simply amazed at how much of a
difference the 7200 RPM drive made inside of the Pismo. If you're
going to upgrade your Pismo's processor, I'd highly
recommend upgrading the hard drive as well.
Joel Mueller
http://www.macupdate.com
- Hi Joel,
I agree in principle, and perhaps I'll be able to put it into
practice when the budget permits.
I'm very pleased with the performance of my new 550 MHz G4 upgrade,
and a faster HD would be another step up.
Charles
USA Today Top 10 'Books List
From Ruffin Bailey
You wrote, "The 140 and 190 would
not make my seven best list. I agree about the PowerBook G3, which I think is the
best-ever Apple 'Book so far, and the
17-incher is delicious."
I think the issue is that the author just listed the PowerBooks
he'd owned, which is a shame. Sure, I'm partial to the ones I owned
as well, but that hasn't stopped me from looking anew now with a
little hindsight as I try to eBay "The Perfect Word Processor." It's a shame an
article with this much play misses the really great 'Books like the
Duos and the 1400.
Actually for the price today, the 500 series 'Books look like
they might be the best old school PowerBook. Batteries are
expensive, but built-in ethernet and the ability to run PCMCIA
cards (so wireless capable as well, apparently) - as well as the
trackpad and price - make them pretty nice machines.
Ruffin Bailey
- Hi Ruffin,
I included the Duo and the 1400 in my most recent
"Great 'Books" list on MacOpinion. :-)
Also the 500 Series, which, as you observe, in the context of its
time is pretty tough to beat (although IMHO the G3 Series books
were the best-ever PowerBooks - time contextual)
Charles
Power Mac 6500
From Mark Lappe
Mr. Moore,
I recently read your article
in Low End Mac and wanted to ask you several questions. I have been
out of the Mac arena for several years, but I still have an old
6500/250 that just won't die - not
very fast, but dependable. I figured if I watched the price on
G3 upgrade cards I might just catch
one at a good price for the L2 cache upgrade. Here is where my
questions come in.
I am currently running OS 8.6, if I remember right, I either
installed 8.0 and upgraded to 8.5, downloaded the 8.6 and updated
from there or did clean install of 8.5 and upgraded to 8.6.
If I use the G3 card, I am interested in going to OS 9. Is
it a new OS? in other words, it if I install OS 9, am I
upgrading from OS 8.6, or is it like a totally different setup?
Thanks!
Mark
- Hi Mark,
The OS 9s are not a radical departure from OS 8.6. Just slicker
with more features, and in my experience somewhat more stable. You
should have no trouble at all adjusting, and you can run an OS 9.x
install over an existing OS 8.x installation, thus retaining your
settings and so forth.
Charles
Navigation Software on the Mac
From Peter Howson
Hi, I read an article that you
wrote about Navimaq, and since they have stopped development, I
was wondering if you were planning on an article on OS X
navigation software.
- Hi Peter,
I haven't researched that topic for a while, so I'm not sure what's
available in Mac navigation software (other than a gaggle of GPS
applications) these days. I'll keep it in mind as an article
topic.
Charles
OS 9 Booting
From Scott Selby
Mr. Moore,
I have a reason to be somewhat thankful for OS 9 at the
moment. I am finishing my BS degree at the University of Maryland
University College. I have been taking the classes mostly with our
OS X Macs (a grape iMac, a 450 MHz
B&W, and an 800 MHz iBook). Last semester, all of these
systems worked. This semester, none of them do. It seems that the
only way for me to do the current class is to boot into OS 9,
start Win2k under Virtual PC 6.1, and then bring up IE. I have been
working with tech support for almost two weeks without any success.
I can only wonder how many other Macs are having these
problems?
Scott Selby
Griesheim Germany
- Hi Scott,
Beats me. It sounds like the university must have changed something
on their system.
Hope you get to the bottom of it.
Charles
FireWire 800/USB 2.0 PCI Combo Card
From Derek Morton
Charles,
Regarding your Ramblings of 2
Feb 04:
I have also desired a combo card for my Quicksilver that would give me both
FireWire 800 and USB 2.0 capability in a single PCI card. After an
exhaustive search, I did manage to find a single card. I am not
certain if it is actually being manufactured yet, but it is
available for order... Here is a link :
http://www.firewiredirect.com/firewire/products/adapters_pci800.shtml
There are two adapters shown on the page, the seven port model
is the winner! My only question (and I plan on writing them next)
is whether the adapter is a 32-bit or 64-bit PCI card.
Derek
- Hi Derek,
Looks like a great solution. I have no idea as to the 32-bit vs.
64-bit question. I trust they will be able to tell you.
Charles
Re: FireWire 800/USB 2.0 PCI Combo Card
From Derek Morton
Charles,
I ended up purchasing one of these cards (after asking the
64-bit question, and yes it is). The card is nice, but I was
thoroughly unimpressed with the packaging (or lack thereof). The
card arrived in a loose static bag (no ESD sticker) stuffed in a
brown cardboard box for shipping. No manual or proper product
packaging. All that aside, the card does work well and is truly
plug and play with no drivers required (OS X 10.3). Other than
not being able to start my computer (QS 1.33 GHz) from a keyboard
attached to the card, I am quite happy.
I don't know if the price is good or not ($99), since it seems
to be the only one of it's kind available (so far). It does give my
system all the latest external I/O goodies though.
Derek
- Thanks for the report, Derek.
Charles
Re: iTunes Libraries - From iPod to Hard
Drive?
From Guenter Plum
Hi Charles
I found a way, with help, which is a piece of software for
OS X called
iPod Access that allows you to read what's on the iPod and
copy it to your HD, after which you can update the library on the
iPod. However, since this works only under OS X, I don't have
access to the new music on my iPod under OS 9 - very odd, but
never mind.
But a piece exploring some of the pitfalls or oddities of
iPod/iTunes wouldn't go astray I'm sure.
Guenter
7500 Audio Sound Card Problem
From Dana Walcott
Dear Charles:
I have a Power Mac 7500/100 with
the a/v option. I have upgraded it to G4 status with a PowerLogix
CPU card. It now runs at 450 MHz. I have four 128 MB RAM modules
installed.
The computer locks up about every ten minutes, so I am moving
the RAM modules around to try to fix this.
I am running OS 9.2.2,
Here is the real problem:
I have an Ego Systems Waveterminal 2496 pro audio sound card
installed in a PCI slot. The Apple sound manager does not "see" the
inputs on the sound card. It sees the outputs, but not the
inputs.
I have pro audio recording software installed. Namely, Nuendo
by Steinberg.
The software runs properly. It has these special ASIO drivers
for driving the sound card. However, the ASIO driver is tied to the
Apple sound manager, so the inputs of the card are still not seen
by Nuendo.
The outputs are seen and work fine.
Do you know if I can disable the onboard a/v? How can I get the
OS to recognize the PCI sound card fully?
I would be eternally grateful for any insights or help you could
provide.
Sincerely,
Dana Walcott
- Hi Dana,
I wish I could help, but I'm completely out of my depth on this
question, I'm not a tech, and my experience with computer audio
amounts to playing MP3s with iTunes.
Hopefully some of our readers may be able to help.
Charles
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