Low End Mac
Search LEM 
Donate · Amazon.com · iResQ · Advertise
Other Cobweb sites: Low End Living · Reformed.net
Quicklinks: · Power Macs · 'Books · Early Macs · Week's Best Deals · OS Downloads
Aquatic Mac

Obsolete Two Year Old Computers

Andrew W. Hill
2002.05.06

Why are computers continually replaced by large companies and institutions? Most people would have you believe that the computer is outdated and slow, cannot fulfill the necessary tasks, and slows the employee down, thereby costing the company money. It seems to me that this is only partially correct.

I am currently typing this article on a slot loading iMac with 64 MB RAM, Mac OS 9.0.4, and Netscape 4.0.8. It's in the back of the room, while the brand new Dells are at the front.

Nobody uses the iMacs. Why? Websites don't load properly with them. What good is a Web station that can't load all the relevant websites.

As everyone around Low End Mac knows, an iMac is not a slow computer, especially when it has no applications beyond a Web browser on it. This is probably a 350 MHz machine, which was the bottom of the slot-loading iMac range - not too shabby at all. My main machine is a G3/450. Sure, my G3 has a bunch of added extras, but I do some fairly hefty stuff on that computer - certainly more than this iMac does.

As you, my gentle reader, have probably figured out by now, the problem here does not lie in the speed of the machine or even the comparatively small amount of RAM, but in the browser. Although I refuse to use it, Microsoft Internet Explorer 5.1 is a fantastic browser and will load any page the Dell's at the other end of this room will. Netscape 4.0 was not a fantastic browser by anyone's standards (at least on PowerPCs). At the least, they should be using Netscape 4.7, which at least works most of the time. Mac OS 9.0.4 was not exactly the best operating system, but upgrading to 9.1 or higher probably won't yield any better performance.

Why does this machine have nothing but the stock software on it? Unfortunately, people cost more than machines. The time to upgrade the software and keep them up to date costs more than anyone is willing to invest. Suppose we were to hire a student at $10-15 an hour and it took him two hours to upgrade the browser and OS of five machines. There are about twenty machines here, so we're looking at about $100 to update machines that would cost around $16,000 to replace. Sounds like a good idea, yes? Keeping in mind this would be done every three to six months to keep them current, that sounds like $350 a year. Surely that isn't too much?

The problem lies in bureaucracy. Sure, it only costs $350/year to get the kid to keep the lab up to date, but the costs go beyond that. Naturally, you can't hire someone for a one time task, but there are enough labs on campus to give someone a five hour a week job. Now you have a single employee. Who is his superior? Probably someone in the tech department. Oh, there's no tech department? Let's put him in the maintenance shop in the computer science department then.

OS 9.1 is a free upgrade from Apple? Well, now you have to pay him to download and burn a copy of this free upgrade. Oh, he doesn't have a CD burner? Why can't he just download it on each machine? Oh, we don't do that. That's a security risk. We'd probably get a virus. We'd need to give him administrator privileges.

Now we'll go to personnel and payroll. We've subsidized a small closet in the basement of the computer science building for him to work in, which seems to be larger than most faculty offices. We've subsidized a computer for him to work on (probably a Dell). We've pushed paperwork for hours. Now we have to pay the administrators their salary - and don't forget to pay them for the hours they spent organizing the staff stress relief party.

In the end, there is too much paperwork that costs too much money. It's not the work that's expensive, it's the people that catalogue the work for various government agencies that's expensive. And for what? The computer gets a two-year tax write-off, and then they can just buy another computer (sending the old one to China) and get another tax write-off.

Wouldn't it be nice if it took one person to do one person's work? Heinlein seemed to think so.

<This article is available in a printer friendly format.>

Join us on Facebook, follow us on Twitter or Google+, or subscribe to our RSS news feed

Andrew W. Hill (a.k.a. Aqua) has been using Macintosh computers since 1987 and maintains that the Mac SE is the perfect Macintosh, superior to all - including the Color Classic. He is on the verge of being evicted from the family home due to its infestation of Macs (last count: about 50). Andrew is attempting to pay his way through college at UC Santa Cruz with freelance Web design and Mac tech support.

Today's Links

Recent Content


<back to Aquatic Mac index>


\r\n\r\n"; if ((isset($pool) AND isset($type)) AND (isset($ip) OR isset($ok))) { if (!isset($siteid)) $siteid="270"; if (!isset($pageid)) $pageid="0"; if (!isset($force)) $force=""; if (!isset($keywords)) $keywords=""; if (!isset($pos)) $pos=""; if (!isset($optcode)) $optcode=""; getad($siteid, $pageid, $pool, $type, $ip, $force, $keywords, $pos, $optcode); # $adr = "http://adserver1.backbeatmedia.com:6789/servlet/ajrotator/$siteid/$pageid/viewHTML?pool=$pool&type=$type&ajip=$ip"; # $success = @readfile("$adr"); } ?>

  • Mac of the Day: Kanga PowerBook G3, introduced 1997.11.10. The first G3 PowerBook ran at 250 MHz, was limited to 160 MB RAM.
  • List of the Day: G-List is for Power Mac G3, G4, and G5 users.
  • Channels
     Power Macs
     iMac Channel
     iBook/PowerBook
     MacInSchool
    Computer Profiles
     iMac
     Power Mac
     PowerBook/iBook
     Performas
     Mac Clones
     Older Macs
     LisaNeXT
    Editorial Archive
    Mac Daniel's Advice
    Email Lists
    LEMchat (uses AIM)
    Online Tech Journal
    Consumer
     advice, reviews
     guides, deals
    Software
    Apple History
    Best of the Web
     Best of the Mac Web surveys
    Miscellaneous Links
     Used Mac Dealers
     Video Cards
     Mac OS X
     Mac Linux
     Macspeak
     RAM Upgrades
    About Low End Mac
    Site Contacts

    Open Link

    Support LEM

    Affiliates

    The Apple Store
    The iTunes Store
    MacMall
    iResQ
    ExperCom
    eBay
    Amazon.com
    PayPal
    PCMall
    PC Zone
    Crucial Memory

    Our advertising is handled by BackBeat Media. For detailed price quotes and advertising information, please contactat BackBeat Media (646-546-5194). This number is for advertising only.

    Aquatic Mac begun December 28, 2001. All Tech Reflections articles ©2001-2003 by Andrew W. Hill. Low End Mac is an independent publication and has not been authorized, sponsored, or otherwise approved by Apple Inc. Opinions expressed are those of their authors and may not reflect the opinion of Cobweb Publishing. Advice is presented in good faith, but what works for one may not work for all.
      Entire Low End Mac website copyright ©1997-2016 by Cobweb Publishing, Inc. unless otherwise noted. All rights reserved. Low End Mac, LowEndMac, and lowendmac.com are trademarks of Cobweb Publishing Inc. Apple, the Apple logo, Macintosh, iPad, iPhone, iMac, iPod, MacBook, Mac Pro, and AirPort are registered trademarks of Apple Inc. Additional company and product names may be trademarks or registered trademarks and are hereby acknowledged.
      Please report errors to .
      LINKS: We allow and encourage links to any public page as long as the linked page does not appear within a frame that prevents bookmarking it.
      Email may be published at our discretion unless marked "not for publication"; email addresses will not be published without permission, and we will encrypt them in hopes of avoiding spammers. Letters may be edited for length, context, and to match house style.
      PRIVACY: We don't collect personal information unless you explicitly provide it, and we don't share the information we have with others. For more details, see our Terms of Use.