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The Placid Casual · Jun 30, 2002, 06:58 PM

Just saw this on ebay...

<a href="http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=2034447497" target="_blank">Job lot of Macs going cheap...</a>

to paraphrase:

ALL-IN-ONE
==========
4qty MAC SE (classic collectables) working
1qty MAC PLUS (again collectable) not tested

BASE UNITS - 36qty
==========
LCII 10Mb RAM 80Mb HDD Network card
LCII 8Mb RAM 50Mb HDD
LCII 10Mb RAM 50Mb HDD Network card
LCII 8Mb RAM 40Mb HDD
LC475 8Mb RAM no HDD
LC475 16Mb RAM 160Mb HDD Network card
LCIII 8Mb RAM 120Mb HDD
LCIII 4Mb RAM 42Mb HDD
LC 10Mb RAM 170Mb HDD
LC 4Mb RAM no HDD
LC 4Mb RAM no HDD
LC 4Mb RAM 42Mb HDD
IIci 16Mb RAM 500Mb HDD Network card
IIci 8Mb RAM 120Mb HDD Network card
IIci 8Mb RAM 160Mb HDD Network card
IIci 8Mb RAM 80Mb HDD Network card
Quadra650 16Mb RAM 160Mb HDD Network card CDROM
Performa630 4Mb RAM 260Mb HDD space for CDROM
PowerMac6100/60 16Mb RAM 160Mb HDD *14qty*
PowerMac6100/60 16Mb RAM 660Mb HDD
PowerMac6100/60 empty
PowerMac6100/66 32Mb RAM 500Mb HDD DOS CARD
PowerMac6100/60 16Mb RAM 350Mb HDD

FAULTY/BASE UNITS MISSING BITS - 13qty
==============================
LCII 1qty
LC 3qty
LCIII 2qty
IIci 2qty
Centris650 2qty
PowerMac7100/66 1qty
Performa 2qty

MONITORS - 24qty
========
Apple Performa Plus Display 7qty
Macintosh Color display 11qty
Apple color High Resolution RGB 6qty

LASERS - 6qty
======
Laserwriter II NTX
Personal Laserwriter 3qty
Laserwriter Plus
Laserwriter II

I guess about 50+ boxes all in...all for less than �160 when I last looked..

I know next to nothing about old Macs, and what I was wondering was, how much crunching power would it possible give you?

Are the Macs so old that they would only be the equivalent of a Dual 1ghz ?! or, if you had the space would they be effective at all...

Just wondering,

Marc

Shaktai · Jun 30, 2002, 10:26 PM

The fastest macs there are only 66 mhz. Many are as slow as 16 mhz. None of them have enough RAM to run anything. If you scavangered RAM out of the whole bunch, you might get the 6 Powermacs and maybe a performa or two up and going, but the only projects you could run on them would be either SETI (maybe) or Evolution@Home. Nothing else that I know of would run on them. All total, you would have less than 400 mhz of crunch power and it really wouldn't be worth the power you used. The LC's and IIc's are pretty much worthless for today's DC projects, even though they were good machines in their days.

It would be like asking a bunch of 90 or 100 year olds to run an Olympic marathon. Champions in their day, but that day is long gone.

Scotttheking · Jun 30, 2002, 11:49 PM

useless
Although I once saw a bulk deal of faster powermacs.

But there's not going to be any bulk deals that would be worth it, I don't think.
Not unless they are bulk athlon systems

The Placid Casual · Jul 1, 2002, 04:23 AM

Cheers for the info, I was just wondering how they would do! When you see a big bunch of Macs like that I always wonder...

Once my flight of fancy subsided (!) I worked out they would actually fill my house, for the most part floor to ceiling across the whole ground floor...

I guess they would have been a talking point anyway!

Now the Dualie has gone (replaced by 2 G4 450's), and I'm down on power I'm looking for ways to pep-up my crunching stats...however I guess once Macworld comes around, and my credit card starts burning in my pocket, the situation will sort itslef out naturally...

Peace,

Marc

P.S. I just signed my big sis's new P4 2.2 box up to dFold, under the name NICXJR...no dramatic crunch rates, but it seems to be making good progress down at the bottom of the lists considering it has only been running for a few days...

The Placid Casual · Jul 1, 2002, 04:25 AM

<blockquote>quote:<hr />Originally posted by Shaktai:
 It would be like asking a bunch of 90 or 100 year olds to run an Olympic marathon. Champions in their day, but that day is long gone.<hr /></blockquote>This quote has really made me feel quite sorry for them now!

jarling · Jul 1, 2002, 08:46 PM

I tried putting my sister's old Powerbook 520 on the most simple of evo@home simulations and it crashed it every time. I like the idea of utilizing obsolite hardware, but some times they really are obsolite.

Shaktai · Jul 1, 2002, 10:01 PM

<blockquote>quote:<hr />Originally posted by Marc2211:
 <blockquote>quote:<hr />Originally posted by Shaktai:
 It would be like asking a bunch of 90 or 100 year olds to run an Olympic marathon. Champions in their day, but that day is long gone.<hr /></blockquote>This quote has really made me feel quite sorry for them now!<hr /></blockquote>Don't feel sorry for them, just recognize them for what they are. They can still do a lot of things, heavy duty distributed computing is just not one of them.

cdhostage · Jul 3, 2002, 12:01 AM

We donate ttehese sort of things to the local elementary school and let the kids learn how to \type. They';re aboslutely worthless for anything else. Maybe Kid Pix will work. That wasa cool program.