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[Need Windows related help!] Need a desktop. EDIT: Bought a powermac g5! Need help!

Orange Furball

Orange Furball

macrumors 65816
Original poster
May 18, 2012
1,325
6
Scranton, PA, USA
Well I got my PowerMac and everything is wonderful. Nothing can slow this thing down after installing an ssd. My only problem: the hard drive. Loudest thing in there, and extremely annoying.

I have a 500gb i can switch out from a windows machine. Problem is that i cant figure out a way to clone the 500gb to the 160gb (powermac hard drive) and make it bootable on the windows machine. If i can get that to work I can put the nearly silent 500gb in my PowerMac and keep the loud 160gb in my parents computer.

Anyone know how to do that?


for reference I have included.....
___________________OLD POST______________________
****got one!****need help****see below****

Hello.

I have a MacBook (aluminum unibody) and while its good, I really feel limited with it (screen size and storage). What I currently use it for is browsing the web and Photoshop. That's it. I feel like I can keep mobile computing and Photoshop to the MacBook and use a desktop for day to day browsing.

I have hackintoshed in the past (its what made me a fan of os x, IMO the only good thing left of apple :D) but I don't see the need here and would prefer a real Mac. I was going to go Intel Mac, but I have a thing for ppc and feel like they are still good.

I have a VERY limited budget. I would like to spend less than $200 for a computer... which is why I need your help.

Power PC Macs are wonderful to me. I had 4 powermac g4's and an emac and loved them. Now I think I'm going to go for a powermac g5.

Is there any reason I shouldn't? Also what should I look out for? I need to be able to play YouTube and store TONS of videos(NOT P0RN before someone says something!)/music/files/android stuff so I figured the Mac mini was not going to work and the iMac is a no no too.

I currently have a 22" HDMI/VGA monitor I would like to use, a Microsoft Sidewinder keyboard I love, and a Sidewinder mouse, so I think all I need is the tower.

Video card: what is the BEST one for flash?

Hard drives: can I run SATA drives in a g5? I have a 64gb boot drive and I can switch a low capacity drive out in my parents PC for a 500gb to start, but all my hard drives are SATA. In one of my g4s I used an ide-sata adaptor I picked up for $3 on ebay so if worst comes to worst I'll use that.

CPU: DP or single?

RAM: I wanna Max her out! How much can this puppy use? If its more than 6-8gb I think I'll stop there. I use 4gb in my mb now..

So... help me figure this out please... I can probably go up to $250 if I have to but that's with upgrades and all. (I'm on a student budget!)

Oh! One more thing... can it be possible for me to use my storage as a server? So that I can access my word documents from my MacBook from school, or play music from my phone on the road? Thank you
 
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alexreich

alexreich

macrumors 6502a
Jan 26, 2011
638
26
Orange furball said:
...can it be possible for me to use my storage as a server? So that I can access my word documents from my MacBook from school, or play music from my phone on the road? Thank you
Click to expand...

Reference to eyoungren's post below about that. I didn't know it was possible, but apparently so. Learn something new every day!
----------

Orange furball said:
Hard drives: can I run SATA drives in a g5?
Click to expand...

Yes. The PowerMac G5 can use SATA drives.

----------
Orange furball said:
RAM: I wanna Max her out! How much can this puppy use? If its more than 6-8gb I think I'll stop there. I use 4gb in my mb now..
Click to expand...


Maximum RAM capacity varies by model.

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Orange furball said:
So... help me figure this out please... I can probably go up to $250 if I have to but that's with upgrades and all. (I'm on a student budget!)
Click to expand...

You can get a pretty good G5 for $250 on eBay, or on your local craigslist.

----------
Orange furball said:
Video card: what is the BEST one for flash?
Click to expand...

As far as I know, flash support for PPC computers is dead. I don't think it's been updated in quite some time. But when it comes to graphics cards, I've been told that the Radeon X1900 XT is a good one. Average tasks and even gaming would be pretty nice with that one.


Here's a good machine on eBay right now for $199.

http://www.ebay.com/itm/Apple-Power...le_Desktops&hash=item19d1bd6bbd#ht_535wt_1400
 
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T

tayloralmond

macrumors 6502
Mar 26, 2009
446
9
Michigan, USA
alexreich said:
As far as I know, flash support for PPC computers is dead. I don't think it's been updated in quite some time. But when it comes to graphics cards, I've been told that the Radeon X1900 XT is a good one. Average tasks and even gaming would be pretty nice with that one.
Click to expand...

Yep, Flash is on its last leg on PowerPC. There are some tweaks to keep Flash working on Facebook, etc. but that's only going to last for a short time. Also, a faster video card isn't going to do much good for Flash performance because AFAIK Adobe didn't implement proper hardware acceleration until after PowerPC support was dropped.
 
eyoungren

eyoungren

macrumors Penryn
Aug 31, 2011
28,796
26,888
alexreich said:
You could make it a LAN file server, and you could store files on it. Then your MacBook could access the files on the G5 via sharing on your local network. I don't think that you'll be able to stream music from it outside your local network, but you can inside your LAN. If you want to play music, why not put it on your phone before you go out? or use Pandora?
Click to expand...
You can stream it across the internet if you are willing to do a little work and have access to the network equipment. I've done it a few times.

I used to keep my old PowerBook G4 at home. It had my music library. I opened the port in my router for Apple File Sharing and opened the same port in the router at work (I double as the System Admin at work). This allowed me to connect to my laptop at home via AFP. Once I had the home Mac's drive on my work G5's desktop I simply made an alias to the iTunes library on my home Mac and placed that alias in the same spot on the G5. All I had to do then was open iTunes on the G5 and because of the alias to my home Mac's iTunes library it opened that library instead of the library on the work G5.

That was all fine and good, but I got tired of having to connect to my Mac at home. So, I searched hard and found iTunes 4.0.

iTunes 4.0 is the ONLY version of iTunes (on OSX at least) that will allow you to stream your library over the internet. As long as you know the IP address of the home machine (and it has iTunes 4.0 open) you can connect directly from iTunes over the internet. Both Macs have to be using iTunes 4.0. But if all you are doing is trying to access your music across the internet it's not really necessary to have all the latest stuff in the later versions of iTunes.

Apple removed this functionality in iTunes 4.0.1 and has never put it back.
 
alexreich

alexreich

macrumors 6502a
Jan 26, 2011
638
26
tayloralmond said:
Yep, Flash is on its last leg on PowerPC. There are some tweaks to keep Flash working on Facebook, etc. but that's only going to last for a short time.
Click to expand...

Like he mentioned, Flash + PPC = Dead.

If you really need flash, why not get like a early Intel Mac? I'm betting you'll find that Intel Macs that can't run Mac OS Lion are much cheaper now that they can't run the latest OS, which decreases their value. Any Intel machine that doesn't have a Core 2 Duo (or newer) processor is probably pretty cheap now.
 
thekev

thekev

macrumors 604
Aug 5, 2010
7,005
3,343
Ram hits severe diminishing returns on a G5 as you are lacking real 64 bit application builds. Graphics cards might help for a couple things, but not that much. I'd look for a really good deal on a quad G5. That one is pretty good. Beyond that remember that some of them sound the same. The very first dual 2ghz had a lot of problems. The dual 2.5 and 2.7 had many radiator leaks. I wouldn't go crazy with upgrades, as these things are not so repairable these days. If you're lucky, you can find one of the nicer ones good to go under $200.
 
Orange Furball

Orange Furball

macrumors 65816
Original poster
May 18, 2012
1,325
6
Scranton, PA, USA
The reason why I would rather not go Intel is that the Mac pros are extremely expensive and the form factor seems to be my best option for a desktop

Also I found this... seems like a great price. http://pages.ebay.com/link/?nav=item.view&id=190688654058
 
alexreich

alexreich

macrumors 6502a
Jan 26, 2011
638
26
Orange furball said:
The reason why I would rather not go Intel is that the Mac pros are extremely expensive and the form factor seems to be my best option for a desktop

Also I found this... seems like a great price. http://pages.ebay.com/link/?nav=item.view&id=190688654058
Click to expand...

That is a fantastic deal. Snatch that up before I do! :D

Just kidding. But really, that's a great deal so you better buy it before someone else does.

Do take note that it has Tiger (10.4) installed, and only 1GB of RAM. If you're wanting to run Leopard and/or upgrade the RAM you'll have to put more money into the machine.
 
G

gtjeta

macrumors member
Mar 31, 2012
94
51
With your limited budget I would buy a 7200 rpm 512Gb/1Tb disk, copy your current disk to it using Carbon Copy Cloner and swap the disks, and buy a VGA adaptor for the MacBook. So I would use the MacBook as a desktop, attached to the screen. You may even have money enough to improve RAM.

Having only one computer to maintain is a good thing.
 
Orange Furball

Orange Furball

macrumors 65816
Original poster
May 18, 2012
1,325
6
Scranton, PA, USA
alexreich said:
That is a fantastic deal. Snatch that up before I do! :D

Just kidding. But really, that's a great deal so you better buy it before someone else does.

Do take note that it has Tiger (10.4) installed, and only 1GB of RAM. If you're wanting to run Leopard and/or upgrade the RAM you'll have to put more money into the machine.
Click to expand...

Darn! I can't spend my money from PayPal for another 3 days! I hope its still there...
 
alexreich

alexreich

macrumors 6502a
Jan 26, 2011
638
26
Orange furball said:
That one is an extra $75 and I already have leopard (from my old g4 days) so I just need to upgrade the ram
Click to expand...

Oh. My bad. I kinda assumed you didn't have a copy of Leopard. Then the machine you posted about is definitely the better deal for you. You could probably put $100 worth of RAM into it (however much that'll give you) and you'll be set with a pretty nice G5.
 
Orange Furball

Orange Furball

macrumors 65816
Original poster
May 18, 2012
1,325
6
Scranton, PA, USA
Anyone know how to tell what kind of g5 it is? There's a billion different 2.0ghz dual models on crucial memory advisor...

alexreich said:
Oh. My bad. I kinda assumed you didn't have a copy of Leopard. Then the machine you posted about is definitely the better deal for you. You could probably put $100 worth of RAM into it (however much that'll give you) and you'll be set with a pretty nice G5.
Click to expand...

Yeah I think that's what I'll go for if its still available
 
D

davidg4781

macrumors 68030
Oct 28, 2006
2,799
400
Alice, TX
I think I'm going to go with that other poster and say upgrade your hard drive and just use an external monitor. You'll keep up to date with software and features and you won't have to worry about streaming your music or keeping everything synced. That's honestly what I'm planning on doing as I'm starting to miss having a larger screen.

If you're looking to just get a PPC for the coolness factor of it, that's a different thing. But if you just want to be able to sit down and enjoy full size KVM, get a BookArc and enjoy!
 
Orange Furball

Orange Furball

macrumors 65816
Original poster
May 18, 2012
1,325
6
Scranton, PA, USA
davidg4781 said:
I think I'm going to go with that other poster and say upgrade your hard drive and just use an external monitor. You'll keep up to date with software and features and you won't have to worry about streaming your music or keeping everything synced. That's honestly what I'm planning on doing as I'm starting to miss having a larger screen.

If you're looking to just get a PPC for the coolness factor of it, that's a different thing. But if you just want to be able to sit down and enjoy full size KVM, get a BookArc and enjoy!
Click to expand...

I kind of just want to keep them separate for some reason. I like having the desktop for syncing all of my stuff to (especially my backups of phones and tablets) and having my laptop for just mobile stuff.
 
D

drorpheus

macrumors regular
Nov 20, 2010
160
1
i think the one you linked for $75 is a Dual 2.0 (JUNE 2004), the 2003 version has 2 seperate G5 panels over the cpus instead of the single plate like in the picture in your link. There is a early 2005 as well but i think it only has 4 ram slots instead of 8 and accepts PCI cards not PCI-X like all the other ones, the LATE 2005 dualcore models use PCIE cards.
 
Hastings101

Hastings101

macrumors 68020
Jun 22, 2010
2,339
1,460
K
Orange furball said:
I need to be able to play YouTube and store TONS of videos(NOT P0RN before someone says something!)
Click to expand...

Whatever, we all know it's P0RN!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!11one

You can't really use Youtube on PPC computers anymore (no flash player and to the best of my knowledge html5 video isn't supported on PPC). You're probably better off saving up a little more money and getting an Intel Mac Mini or buying a larger hard drive for your Macbook.
 
W

wobegong

Guest
May 29, 2012
418
1
As a combination Intel/PPC user (Intel for an old Macbook I use as a media server hooked up to my TV and my Macbook Pro for work - I use a Powermac G5 as my main home machine) I can add a few things to consider....

1. Older apps on the PPC machine - All my photo's are on Aperture 3 on my Macbook Pro - I can't move the library easily to the home machine as it only supports Aperture 2 (incompatible library that is not backwards compatible).

Skype on PPC is v2.8 - No multi window video conferencing.

etc etc.

Other than that I love my PPC but just keep this in mind. You are very app limited and whilst this may not matter so much to a PPC only household if you mix Intel and PPC machines you may have some issues working on files between the two.
 
647156

647156

Cancelled
Dec 4, 2011
276
375
Hastings101 said:
You can't really use Youtube on PPC computers anymore (no flash player and to the best of my knowledge html5 video isn't supported on PPC). You're probably better off saving up a little more money and getting an Intel Mac Mini or buying a larger hard drive for your Macbook.
Click to expand...
The old Flash 10.1 still works fine for YouTube - HTML5 seemed to work when I tried it in Safari on Leopard but the performance seemed no better than Flash - MacTubes is the best option as it uses QuickTime which is faster than Flash, although on a G5 you'll probably be ok, it's more for G4s where Flash performance is a problem.
 
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