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Congo_Jack · Aug 9, 2005, 11:45 PM

I'm considering buying a 379$ ibook G3 500... But I have a few questions:

I don't need a fast machine - An older version of photoshop, ms office, and a decent video player is all I'll be running on it, I just need a computer for checking the 'net and doing basic work on the go. My G4 Tower is 450mhz, so the processor speed is compariable... and the RAM is the same... What I want to do on the ibook works fine on the tower. What I'm wondering is: will I get some sort of change in performance even though the specs are basically the same?

Eug Wanker · Aug 9, 2005, 11:53 PM

G4 450 blows away an iBook 500 in perceived speed in most usage.

Also, that model iBook is at high risk of the video/motherboard going kaput.

Decent video playback should not be expected on a G3 500. QuickTime 7's H.264 sucks donkeys balls on the G3. Standard def (640x480) H.264 is completely unusable on even a G3 900. At least a G3 500 won't be much worse.

pat++ · Aug 10, 2005, 12:36 AM

Yes you will see a huge performance difference for video playback. Don't buy a G3 500mhz if you plan to watch DivX movies. It won't be able to play a lot of them because it's too slow. The G4 450 is much faster because it has altivec.

Nerozwei · Aug 11, 2005, 01:34 AM

Originally Posted by Congo_Jack

I'm considering buying a 379$ ibook G3 500... But I have a few questions:

I don't need a fast machine - An older version of photoshop, ms office, and a decent video player is all I'll be running on it, I just need a computer for checking the 'net and doing basic work on the go. My G4 Tower is 450mhz, so the processor speed is compariable... and the RAM is the same... What I want to do on the ibook works fine on the tower. What I'm wondering is: will I get some sort of change in performance even though the specs are basically the same?

I'd pass... I planned to use my headless iBook G3 500 as a DiVX player, but it choked on them

If you end up buying it, I suppose you could try the 100MHz bus hack to get it to 600. Maybe that'd help. I'd pass, still.

ShotgunEd · Aug 11, 2005, 05:20 AM

I don't know what you people are doing but I've been using my iBook 500 to play DiVX movies from CD with NO problems whatsoever.

These were downloaded seinfeld episodes from various different sources so the encoding varied greatly.

H.264 does not play in any acceptable form however.

Nerozwei · Aug 11, 2005, 05:58 AM

Originally Posted by ShotgunEd

I don't know what you people are doing but I've been using my iBook 500 to play DiVX movies from CD with NO problems whatsoever.

These were downloaded seinfeld episodes from various different sources so the encoding varied greatly.

H.264 does not play in any acceptable form however.

It's been a while... but back then I tried VLC and some codec pack for Quicktime. DVD rips, ~700Mb, don't remember the exact resolution. Some easy parts (say a shot of a face talking with a plain background) played ok, but when there was more action... kabom. I remember U571 choked always when the sea surface was shown.

What's the resolution on those clips and what are you using to watch them?

worldwearyeyes · Aug 11, 2005, 09:35 AM

I just sold my 500mhz ibook, and it didn't have a dvd player, but I did watch downloaded tv shows on VLC. It was OK. Many fast-moving or action scenes simply froze (though the audio didn't). I watched primarily Lost and Arrested Development. AD did fine, Lost was a little rough.

Don't count on the 500mhz machine being a good one to watch any video on.

polendo · Aug 11, 2005, 05:44 PM

Well, I tried to play a 40 minute focus group video with VLC and my 700 mhz iBook just couldn't handle it. Even VLC displayed a question-message error like "Processor to slow?" I tried it also using Media Player for OSX with the same results (would be a miracle if that thing worked). The video was an avi file.