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svtcontour · Nov 21, 2005, 11:05 PM

I just got a free ancient mac and am doing something stupid I think or waste of time anyway but its the only mac I have at the moment. It will be my second computer to compliment my dual xeon PC box.

Got a free 9600 / 350Mhz with 384mb RAM, Rage 128 PCI video, 4.5gig and 9gig SCSI drives (7200RPM). I'm just attempting an install of 10.2 on there. Its about 1/2 way done.

Its just going to be for fooling around with and learning OSX and unix. I wont be running big apps on there.

lothar56 · Nov 22, 2005, 12:22 AM

I've run a G3/266 with more ram with 10.2 and it's livable but not the fastest thing you've ever seen. If you want to play around with Linux, I'd suggest Ubuntu, that was the easiest for me to install, and it runs okay on my Beige G3. More RAM would definitely be the best thing you could possibly do, and it's in the neighborhood of $10-$15 for 2 64 meg chips on eBay, just look for 168-pin DIMMs. The 9600's have like 12 RAM slots, so I'm guessing you have a few open.

ajprice · Nov 22, 2005, 04:27 AM

I would think it would run and be very usable. G3 iMacs shipped with OS X. OS X does like RAM though, so install as much as you can, as lothar56 says. Even if you don't run 'big apps', OS X itself is a big app and will take a lot of resources.

WizOSX · Nov 22, 2005, 06:39 AM

I assume that you are installing 10.2 using Xpostfacto? If so, it should run OK. Get it up to 10.2.9 which really helps. I'm running it now on a 7600 in which I put a 333mhz G3 (448 mb RAM I think) and it is just usable with a little patience. RAM helps although not much past 400 mb will make much of a difference--I tried adding RAM in increments and found somewhere around the 384mb additional RAM doesn't help that much in 10.2 because you can't run really ambitious software anyway--too slow. Recently my main machine had to go into the shop for a new hard drive so I used the 7600 for a couple of days and I was able to get some work/internet done. OK in a pinch.

svtcontour · Nov 22, 2005, 12:40 PM

Originally Posted by WizOSX

I assume that you are installing 10.2 using Xpostfacto? If so, it should run OK. Get it up to 10.2.9 which really helps. I'm running it now on a 7600 in which I put a 333mhz G3 (448 mb RAM I think) and it is just usable with a little patience. RAM helps although not much past 400 mb will make much of a difference--I tried adding RAM in increments and found somewhere around the 384mb additional RAM doesn't help that much in 10.2 because you can't run really ambitious software anyway--too slow. Recently my main machine had to go into the shop for a new hard drive so I used the 7600 for a couple of days and I was able to get some work/internet done. OK in a pinch.

Hmm my install of 10.2 failed using Xpostfacto. It did the whole install, but upon reboot I was greeted with the do not enter sign

I cant find any good readme's on the proper open firmware settings to configure a 9600 for OSX using xpostfacto....

WizOSX · Nov 22, 2005, 04:02 PM

Did you remove PCI cards before you installed and rebooted? I know that, for me, Xpostfacto/OSX required that the first boot be on the internal video of the machine. Then I installed my 7000 card, rebooted and all was fine.

svtcontour · Nov 22, 2005, 08:51 PM

Originally Posted by WizOSX

Did you remove PCI cards before you installed and rebooted? I know that, for me, Xpostfacto/OSX required that the first boot be on the internal video of the machine. Then I installed my 7000 card, rebooted and all was fine.

Well actually I dont have onboard video. I had two video cards in there, one rage 128 PCI and the other was some long LONG apple card that took up the whole width of the computer. Should I try doing the first boot with that instead? Hmm maybe I will try that anyway.