[Wyatt]

I'm considering buying a used iBook (just because I flat out can't afford to shell out a grand for a new one), and I want to install OS X on it. I've used it at work a few times, and I absolutely love it. I found Jaguar online for a pretty good price, so I'm considering buying the Jaguar upgrade and a used iBook. I just wanted to know how well Jaguar would run on this system:

G3 500
192 MB RAM (I may upgrade this in the future)
10 GB Hard Drive

So, what do you guys think? Is it worth it? Or should I try to find a slightly newer one?

[wuf]

I just installed 10.3.8 on my friends G3 500mhz iBook, and it runs just fine. Some apps were a *cough* BIT slow because she only had the installed 128mb chip in it, but we just popped in another 512mb chip and it works even better.
What size is the screen? What are you going to be using it for?

[FFL]

I'd look for something a bit newer.

It's got an underpowered CPU, not enough RAM, and 10 GB is too small for a hard drive.

[Wraven]

I agree - 10GB is just too small for a hard drive.

[wuf]

Overlooked that part.....
You might check out macofalltrades.com, they have a 15" G4/667 PB with 512mb and 30GB HD for $999.

[Luca]

He said he couldn't afford to spend a grand... besides, that PowerBook is a really bad deal. $999 for a G4/667? Yeah it has the nice screen but be reasonable, you can get a brand new iBook G4/1.2 GHz for the same price, and the iBook comes with a one year warranty.

[wuf]

That's true...But there are other differences between i/P books.........I was just throwing options out.....
Maybe the question should be, how much CAN you spend fcgriz?

[Random Hero]

Can we ask what your budget is fcgriz?

[frizz]

Up the ram and it should run fine. If all else fails their is elways ebay.

[curiousuburb]

The iBook G3 500 only has 8MB of VRAM on an ATI Rage Pro.

The 600, 700, and beyond all had at least 16MB ATI Radeon GPUs.

With a Radeon, you could run the Spanning Hack from http://macparts.de/ibook to get true multiple-monitor support and clamshell use (which will cripple a 500 if you try the same hack). Not a huge benefit, unless you would like to use two monitors (not mirrored), which the iBook 500 cannot do. This might justify searching for an iBook with a 16MB Radeon.

Only potential downside from a 600 - 800 were that some had bad logic boards, and if you were going to buy an old 600 or 700, you'd want to know if it had already had its logic board replaced, or was in the serial number range where it might be suspect and therefore a poorer risk to purchase because of the likelihood it might require this repair in future.

A G3 500 will run Jaguar, and will run Panther fine, too... but you'll definitely need more RAM, and it had better be the combo drive version, because you'll need to be burning discs to keep your wee 10GB drive relatively free.

Depends what you're paying...
it's as low as I would recommend for an 'OS X starter laptop'.
Budget for extra RAM (at least a 256, if not a 512), possibly an external FW HDD.
It might also need an Airport card, and if it's battery has seen heavy use might want a new one to get back over 3hrs charge, depending on settings.

[Luca]

Well, there's an iBook G3/500 on eBay for under $400 right now. It's not powerful but it'll certainly get the job done. If you can spend a bit more, though, I'd really recommend jumping to a model with a higher bus speed. The 500 MHz ones came with a slow 66 MHz bus, and performance really suffered from it. Go for a 600 MHz and you'll see a major improvement. And you should have at least 512 MB of RAM.

Also, as a clarification, only SOME 600 MHz iBooks have 16 MB Radeon GPUs. The G3/600 iBook with a Combo drive had an 8 MB Rage GPU, while the G3/600 with a plain CD-ROM drive came with the 16 MB Radeon. I'd take the latter myself, unless you REALLY need to watch DVDs on it.

[curiousuburb]

Luca is correct on the 600s being in at least two configurations as far as GPU.
(The number of permutations for sale has dropped with BTO catching the rest)

IIRC, the original 500 (Dual USB) was 8MB Rage
The following rev, the 600 (Late 2001) was still an 8MB Rage
The (mid 2002) rev got a 16MB Radeon in 600 or 700 form.
The next revs (late 2002) was 700 and 800, and (early 2003) 800/900 all had 16 or 32MB Radeon 7500,
and the rev from 800 to 933 to 1GHz as iBook G4 marked the first 32MB VRAM Radeon 9200 GPU

I'm sure apple-history.com or others have this stuff laid out clearer and/or more accurately.

Check the bottom of Apple's main page for the old link on "ibook logic board replacement program" to find models and serial number ranges that might be covered by replacement of logic board or at risk for that failure.

[Luca]

Hehe... slight correction to that too. The 600/700 lineup had 16 MB Radeons across the board, and the 700/800 lineup had Radeon 7500s, but the 700 MHz model had 16 MB and the 800 MHz one had 32 MB. After that the iBooks were 32 MB for all configurations.

[curiousuburb]

Damn... dueling corrections, and I'm it... your shoelaces are undone.

[bostongeek]

Go to Vegas with the money you have, and hope you come away with enough for a G4 ibook/pbook.

[autodata]

I don't recommend buying a used ibook or powerbook. I have a 900 mhz g3 and it can be frustratingly slow. The difference between that thing and just about any comparable G4 is pretty big. It seems to me that used machines are overpriced for the performance compared to current models. Refurbished machines can be fantastic, so you might want to check @ apple or smalldog for one. I know you said you can't spend $1K right now, but the fact is that the current machines are probably at the point where you won't need to upgrade for speed. I have a 1 ghz powerbook that's over two years old and the only thing that will make me upgrade that is physical deterioration. The point being that in the long run you might end up paying more than if you just buy a newer or refurbished one now.

[Wyatt]

Wow... I've never seen a response this large this quickly on a board I was new to before. Thanks a lot to everyone.

My budget maxes out around $600-700, and that's a bit of a stretch for me. My job doesn't pay the best, and I have plenty of other little expenses that pile up rather quickly. I could possibly save the money for a new iBook, but it would take several months. And by several I mean it could be August or September before I could even think about ordering it.

However, by some of the responses here and some further thinking on my own part, I think I might go ahead and see what I can do about saving. I don't have much of a chance of help from my parents, as my Mom's unemployed at the moment, but I do have a birthday coming up, so maybe that will help me out a bit.

College sucks sometimes... I hate being broke (this would have taken no time at all to save up for at my old job... damn work-study)

[curiousuburb]

educational discounts on new apple gear can be up to $200... check with your campus to see if they're listed at the apple store for education (a little pull down menu of "other apple stores" at the bottom of the main apple store page.)

[BarracksSi]

RAM, RAM, and more RAM.

My 800 MHz G3 ran fine while it had 640 MB. When it had just the original 128, it would drag ass with more than two apps open. There was just too much disk swapping going on for it to do anything else.

The interesting thing is that my old skool 300 MHz blueberry iBook wasn't any slower since it's got 160 MB (that is, 128 MB in G3 800 =about as slow as 160 MB in G3 300). That will be changing next week when I drop the 512 RAM stick in the old one.

The processor speed has some bearing on "daily driven" performance, of course, but having low amounts of RAM will cause more performance/livability problems.

And, remember, every computer ever built (well, almost all of them) was the Latest And Greatest Thing at the time.

[Brad]

Yeah, currently the Apple Store for Education is offering iBooks as low as $899. Sometimes actual campus bookstores will offer a slightly better discount or will bundle some other goodies with it.

Also, don't forget to check out the red tag "Special Deals" section of Apple's online store on a regular basis. In particular, check out the Apple Certified refurb page. These items literally change from day to day as individual items become available and are sold, but sometimes there are some really good deals that even beat the educational pricing.

[torifile]

I'd recommend going with nothing lower than an 800 mhz iBook, for future proofing. My wife has one with 640 megs of RAM and it's perfectly acceptable for what she throws at it. She's running Panther and I'm certain it'll run Tiger just fine. If you could scrape together enough dough for one, it would be a good investment. Of course, if you can't, Macs hold their resale value very very well and you could likely recoup the costs of your entry-level mac on eBay so you're not going to be stuck with it forever.

BTW, you didn't mention (or I missed) how much the iBook you're looking at is.

[torifile]

Shoot. There was JUST an iBook G4 in the special deals section on Apple's site for $650! It's gone now but that would have been the machine for you. Keep an eye on that page. Looks like you might get lucky!

[Wyatt]

The one I was looking at was $400, but it doesn't have a combo drive (just straight CD-ROM). Not having the combo drive is a big problem for me. I think I'll just wait it out and see what I can do about getting some extra funding.

Even with educational discounts for my college (a very small school), the base iBook with a combo drive is still $950.

I guess I can just hold on to the money for a while. It won't really hurt anything to wait it out. If I buy a new one, I want to wait until they come with Tiger on them anyway. So I'll wait it out for a few months and see what I can get.

[FallenFromTheTree]

Originally Posted by fcgriz The one I was looking at was $400, but it doesn't have a combo drive (just straight CD-ROM). Not having the combo drive is a big problem for me. I think I'll just wait it out and see what I can do about getting some extra funding. Even with educational discounts for my college (a very small school), the base iBook with a combo drive is still $950. I guess I can just hold on to the money for a while. It won't really hurt anything to wait it out. If I buy a new one, I want to wait until they come with Tiger on them anyway. So I'll wait it out for a few months and see what I can get.

The newer iBooks and PowerBooks are so much better than what you were looking at.

You really will be much happier if you save a bit more to get a machine
with at least an 867 GHz processor.

If you REALLY need a new computer to get you through school,
why not take what you have already and consider the Apple loan program.

12" PB Superdrive is still the best bang for the buck for $1499 (edu)

[julesstoop]

My 2 cents:
- Run the newest OS X version you can get: it's almost allways faster than the previous version;
- Do not install 'classic' unless you really need it;
- Get at least 512 MB of RAM and make sure that's not the logical maximum so you could expand further;
- HD minimum 30 GB (i.m.o, but greatly depends on your usage: I have a lot of music and want to keep it with me);
- Get at least a G4, about 800 MHz is a minimum for modern software. For really really simple tasks only 500 MHz G3 should do, but don't expect to be able to run - for instance - iWork or any of the Apple content creation apps.;
- Hope for at least 32 MB of VRAM, 16 is an absolute minimum.
- Make sure you at least a combo-drive - if you don't own a desktop as well - for back-up purposes.

If you can't find something like described above for lets say 700, save up for a new machine.

[Wyatt]

I've actually ended up in a better situation now than I was previously. I realized a few days ago that I have a ton of stuff lying around that I don't use any more, so I decided to sell a bunch of my old video games... I raised over $200 to go toward my iBook last night, and I get paid tomorrow, so I should be able to put back $200 out of my paycheck. That gives me $400 toward an iBook pretty quickly. I would be a little closer, but since I bought an iPod on Friday, I'm 200 back from where I would have been. In any case, I should be able to buy a brand new iBook in June, a couple months earlier than I previously estimated, provided things continue to go well for me and I can get a decent summer job.

I'm very much looking forward to having my iBook now. The more I learn about Apple products and the more I talk to people who own Macs (and play with the Macs myself), the more excited I get about having one of my own.

[Franz Josef]

Originally Posted by fcgriz I'm very much looking forward to having my iBook now. The more I learn about Apple products and the more I talk to people who own Macs (and play with the Macs myself), the more excited I get about having one of my own.

I hope it's the start of a long and loving relationship

[baaron]

Definitely don't be afraid to save up for a new iBook that comes with Tiger. I imagine you'd be able to get one pre-installed with Tiger for $899 from the Apple Education Store by June.

By then, we might even see some upgrades in the iBook line, and I doubt the prices would go up. (At least for the base model iBooks, which is what you are looking at.)

And I'll admit it. In Nov/Dec 03, I went with a 14" G3 iBook, 900Mhz, 640MB RAM, 32MB VRAM, and I really wish I didn't. Even though I got it for $799, (with only 256MB RAM, mind you), it is really starting to show its age right about now. Especially with apps like Azureus and Konfabulator, and not being able to use any advanced editing features in iPhoto '05. Don't even get me started on importing (never mind editing) video in iMovie or editing pictures in Photoshop Elements.

I'm seriously considering selling it on eBay and buying a top-of-the-line 12" iBook as soon as the iBook line is updated again, AND when Tiger comes pre-installed on them. This thing is really getting to be a drag.

I guess my point here is buy the most recent technology. You'll have instant gratification, you won't have to worry about updating, and it will be cheaper in the long run.

I guarantee it.

***COUGH***(SOME RESTRICTIONS MAY APPLY)***COUGH***