i have a performa 6200 with system 7.5.1. i am considering upgrading the os to 9.0 (from my ibook system cd). my question is: will it work and will its performance improve?
10q

[drewman]

Besides being unethical and fattening, using your iBook CD will be problematic since it is a system restore CD and not a full-fledged MacOS 9 disk.

I believe you could get around this by running the individual installer, but it may be hard coded to run only on the iBook.

drewman

[drewman]

Also, upgrade your memory to at least 64MB before even considering upgrading an older machine to MacOS 9.

drewman

P.S. I'm running MacOS 9 on a Twentieth Anniversary Macintosh with 64MB of RAM and the original 250Mhz 603e processor perfectly.
YMMV.

I have a PowerMac G3 (B/W) OS 8.5 CD that came with my machine, and it won't allow me to install the system software on my other Mac's, so it's probably a matter of trying to install it and seeing what happens. If it gives you a message like "This disk is not useable by your system, please check documentation for details", then you probably can't, otherwise it will install just fine. I've had good and bad luck with this issue.

Nobody is going to lynch you because you use the system software that came with a computer you bought, don't worry.

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Eliott Wolfe
Winnetka, Calif

[Chris_G]

Just an FYI:

The iBook system disks only allow you to install them on an iBook... I tried to use my iBook disks on my PowerCenter Pro and no dice. Also, in my estimation, the 6200 is too slow of a machine to run 9.0 (believe me, I have a 6214 and a 6320... neither of which I would even consider running 9.0 on). You're better off with either 7.6.1 or 8.5.1... from my experience these were two of the more stable and speedy iterations (although many people also liked 8.1) of the Mac OS. Hope this helps.

Cheers!
Chris

[Herr Newton]

I wouldn't go any higher than MacOS 8.6 on a Performa 6200 as they are soooo slow. I've got a 6200 (48MB of ram; the system heap is only 15MB) running around here as a spare, and tried putting OS 9.0 on it. Sloooow. Runs okay with MacOS 8.6, though.

thanks for the input. so if os 8.6 is the highest i should go, is there any way i can get an older os - legally?

[IceCaves]

I have a performa 6115 w/ 72 MB Ram and I am running OS 9.04 just fine. However, it runs OS 9.04 discernably slower than either 8.6 or 8.1. I have read some where that they did some benchmarking between the Mac OS's and found that 8,1 ran the fastest....

I have a P 5200 at home (which is the same as your 6200, except for the monitor) and I found everything beyond System 7.6.1 too slow.

Maybe it's better with more memory (I had 16 Megs).

/sascha

[MacOS761]

The problem with the 5200's is that the system bus is not wide enough - they basically use a board from the 68040 days with a PPC soldered on instead. I can't say if the 6200 is indeed using the same board or not, but I agree that even System 8.0 is too slow - I scaled back to 7.6.1.

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We're supposed to sing about piraty things!

it's a bit more than the bus speed that makes the 5200/6200 series machines slow. They have a very bad memory system, and they incorporate a number of performance robbing '040-PPC emulation "bridges" (memory, graphics, communications) which makes them as a whole very slow.

I would say that 8.1 is the most stable release you'll get on a 5200. I use 8.6 (slowly) on my 5215CD because I wish to use it as a crunching station for Seti@home with the Seti Unit Manager, which requires 8.6. 7.6 and 7.6.1 had some serious stability issues on some machines, as well as many missing and useful features that OS 8+ has.


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Eliott Wolfe
Winnetka, Calif

I agree, If you think you definitely need something newer than 7.6.1 (which I highly recommend for your machine), try 8.1.

/sascha

so an upgrade to at least os 7.6.1 would be beneficial. are thereany sites where i could downoad such an os, is it legal and can i get it over to my 6200 via floppy? 10q

[Chris_G]

Do a search on Ebay for Mac 7.6 and you should come up with several people selling the 7.6 or 7.6 + 7.6.1 OS... some even on floppy! In my opinion this may be your best option. Hope this helps!

Cheers!
Chris

Do NOT buy the floppy version of OS 7.6. I made this mistake three years ago - it was a moment of weakness.

7.6.1 is a free update if you already have 7.6, and is avilable from Apple's software updates site (under support).

To be frank, reading your origional post again brings me to realize that no, upgrading from 7.5 on your 5200 will not improve speed, and will in fact slow things down. You will gain added features in the newer system software, but it will definitely be slower.

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Eliott Wolfe
Winnetka, Calif

I did it!

While I was re-configuring my Performa anyway, I decided to give it a try. Subjectively, the "user experience" is even better than 8.1, but of course, I'll go back to 7.6.1 today, because I still think this is the right system for this machine.

I have a P5200/75 with 32 MB RAM. The system is running on an external SCSI HD, which is probably a bit faster than the internal (IDE) HD - but not much.

If you want to give it a serious try, I'd recommend that you install at least 64 MB RAM before you start, and disable virtual memory (or set it to 65 MB).

But: all of those using 8.5 on their 5200/6200 should consider upgrading to OS 9. It will definitely be an improvement.

Have fun! :-)

/sascha

[Goran K]

Oh

a lot of suggestions on this topic!


I am about to help my father upgrade his Performa 6200.
(I sold it used to him a bit too expensive )

It's now running on 8.0
(I'm not sure about the RAM installed 16M or 24M i think)

It's essential that I can install java on it,
and that is not possible to do on 8.0 as I understand it.

(I've been running 8.6 on my G3/266 for a long time and I think
that's been a very stable config.)

Any views out there on what OS I should put on the old P6200,
to get java-support and decent prestanda?

[MacMonster]

I think Mac OS 8.1 is the best OS on a 6200. I also have a 6200 with 48MB RAM at home, and tried OS 9.0 on it, but the speed is not acceptable.

[finboy]

the 5200 and 6200 motherboard architectures are almost identical, so what recommendations work with the 5200 also go for the 6200.

Suggestions:
Max out your RAM to 64M, buy a bigger, faster HD (most of the newer EIDE drives will work fine), stick with OS 8.1 or 8.6 at the most -- OS 9 is a pig on these older machines.

Get an Apple Remote and a TV card and an AV card and watch TV on your Performa. Or run Video CDs, or capture video from an external source to the hard drive. Both the 5200 and the 6200 machines will also work with the Apple MPEG card, which crunches VCDs much, much faster than a G3 running software-only Quicktime. To have TV, though, you must have the AV card installed. The remote control is a pretty cool feature, too.

How is the 6200 better than an iMac? No analog board troubles, first. Then, it has a floppy drive, a SCSI port, two serial ports, and optional video in AND video out. Plus a remote and a TV tuner option. For cheap, used technology, the 5200/6200 series rocks. Why is it better than some of the other earlier PowerMacs? Try to buy a narrow SCSI (50-pin) 20MB drive for $100.

[redeew]

Originally posted by Chris_G:
<STRONG>Just an FYI:

The iBook system disks only allow you to install them on an iBook... I tried to use my iBook disks on my PowerCenter Pro and no dice. Also, in my estimation, the 6200 is too slow of a machine to run 9.0 (believe me, I have a 6214 and a 6320... neither of which I would even consider running 9.0 on). You're better off with either 7.6.1 or 8.5.1... from my experience these were two of the more stable and speedy iterations (although many people also liked 8.1) of the Mac OS. Hope this helps.

Cheers!
Chris</STRONG>

WOW. And here I thought that me and a guy in Norway were the only ones with a 6320.
And I asked this question about three months ago and it was decided that OS 9 needs too much memory for these older systems.