[sanitarium]

i've just been given an imac powerpc g3(crt) with mac os 9.2.1 installed this is my first mac & am wondering how i can upgrade it & what os can i go upto am thinking about putting tiger on it would that work?
any help would be Appreciated
sani

[Ozzpot]

Tiger will run great on that. I have an iMacDV (G3) 400mhz that started out on OS9. I upgraded it to 10.2, then 10.3, then 10.4, and it just got zippier each time. It would be awful with Leopard however, as it is not a Quartz Extreme capable machine, and Leopard relies on that to run nicely.

So yeah, slap Tiger on it, and max out the RAM too.

[sanitarium]

kool thanx it has 64 meg in it at the moment could you please tell me how much it can handle?
the machine speed is 350 MHz if that makes any diffrence

[seanc]

1GB RAM is the max. Make sure you apply the updater for OS X BEFORE installing OS X, don't even put the disc in. If you don't do this, you'll probably break the iMac almost irreversibly.

[Koralatov]

Originally Posted by Ozzpot 

It would be awful with Leopard however, as it is not a Quartz Extreme capable machine, and Leopard relies on that to run nicely.

Correction: it won't run Leopard at all. Even with the open firmware trick that's floating about the interwebs, you won't even get it to install because it's not a G4 or better.

Originally Posted by seanc 

1GB RAM is the max. Make sure you apply the updater for OS X BEFORE installing OS X, don't even put the disc in. If you don't do this, you'll probably break the iMac almost irreversibly.

I couldn't agree more; running the firmware updater is an absolute must, otherwise you'll end up with a (very large) brick.

Overall, the performance on Tiger is good on an upgraded iMac G3--I run it on a 500MHz 'Blue Dalmatian' iMac, and it runs really well. The only thing that can be a bit juddery is Expose's "All Windows" function; it's not slow, just not totally smooth.

[iOta]

You can also swap out the probably small capacity, 5400 rpm HD for a larger, 7200 rpm HD. The max that can be recognized by the hardware is 128 GB, I think. There are about 20 screws to deal with. I have a G3 iMac DV slot loading 400 Mhz machine that runs nicely with a 120 GB drive and OS 10.3.9. Definitely max out the RAM with two 512MB sticks.

[Eriamjh]

Don't waste your time or money unless you want to play old games.
You will not be happy with it even maxed out with any OS. I know. I've been there.

[gooser]

eriamj, i know where you're coming from however a g3 imac can be very useful for light duty tascs. i use my g3 600 almost daily. completely quiet computer.

[Koralatov]

Originally Posted by Eriamjh 

Don't waste your time or money unless you want to play old games.
You will not be happy with it even maxed out with any OS. I know. I've been there.

Well, I think it depends on what you're hoping for. If you want to do iDVD encoding, heavy Photoshop work, or music-making, then you're going to hate even trying to use a G3 iMac for it. Even a G4 iMac isn't really suitable for the task (I've tried converting DivX to DVD using iDVD, and it takes forever). However, if you only want to use it for playing music, surfing the net, email and IM, then it's a fantastic machine; I used the 'Blue Dalmatian' I got as a present for a friend to do just that, and it worked really well. I use a 466 Clamshell iBook to do all of the above on an almost daily basis, and I have no complaints, other than an inability to play Flash video at a reasonable framerate (maybe a blessing in disguise though).

I think, ultimately, it comes down to whether you're a heavy-lifter or a light user. If you're in the latter camp, it's almost perfect for the task. Plus, as gooser says, it's pretty much silent (beyond the HD spinning up every so often), and silent computing is a real pleasure.

[ixus_123]

Jaguar (10.2.8) ran well enough on my G3 366Mhz / 320mb RAM iBook.

However, Ubuntu linux ran better on it :-)
That's worth giving a try - it's free so you only have time too loose

[JKT]

APPLE MANUALS

There will be a manual there for the type of iMac that you have, showing you how to take it apart to upgrade the hard drive. If you are going to install OS X on it then, if it has the default hard drive that it shipped with (which will probably be 20GB or much less), it'll be the first thing you'll need to do after performing the firmware upgrade as recommended by others above. Then upgrade the RAM.

The version of OS X you can install on it will depend on the speed of the iMac. If it is 400Mhz or higher (all slot-loading G3 iMacs, i think), then you will be able to install up to OS X 10.4.11 (Tiger) on it. If it is 350MHz or lower (tray-loading iMacs) then it will only take up to OS X 10.3.9 (Panther) on it.

Visit here for more info:

apple-history.com

For Tiger, my experience is that 750MB RAM is the minimum you should install for reasonable performance. For Panther, 512MB. However, both will run a lot better with the maximum 1GB (2 x 512MB chips) you can install in the slot-loading iMacs.

Both Panther and Tiger are fine versions of OS X. You can get both second hand for a few tens of pounds/dollars.

[moonmonkey]

It will never be able to play portal, even on minimum settings.

[Eriamjh]

I have a 233 iMac maxes out running Panther and it is a drudgery to do simple things. I also have a 400 Pismo and it is actually pretty good. So the 350 iMac might be acceptible. I'm just giving you a warning that it won't be as snappy as some might describe it to be.

[P]

To run Tiger, you need at least 512 megs of RAM. The type is SDRAM PC100 or PC133. That is a workable setup, but the tiny screen makes it quite hard to work - OS X likes a lot of space. That model also has a tiny HD - 7 gigs or so I think - so a bigger HD is probably required. 128 GB = 137 billion bytes is indeed the max that model supports.

I would seriously consider getting a refurb Mac mini, especially if you have a display available. A 17" CRT + a base Mac mini and your old keyboard and mouse would make a much more powerful combination, at only slightly higher cost.