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Upgrading a G4 cube on OS X 10.3.9 to 10.4 (Tiger)

W

weyus

macrumors member
Original poster
I am helping out a friend who has recently inherited a G4 cube, which, believe it or not, is a significant hardware upgrade for her.

It is the 450 MHz model, almost 30GB hard drive, 256 MB of RAM (I think).

I'd like to find out about upgrading it to OS X 10.4 (Tiger).

First of all, would a hardware accelerator be required?
Would I need to expand the storage?
How much more memory should I get? The memory for these things is pretty cheap, so not that concerned about it.

Thanks,
Wes
 
There isn't any such thing that's specifically called a hardware accelerator, so I don't think you'll need something that doesn't really exist 😛.

Tiger will need around 10-12 GB (you can uncheck the extra languages and other crap to reduce this by a lot). So depending on how much space your friend will need, you may or may not need to get a new hard drive.

You should definitely bring the memory up to 512 MB, if not more. RAM for older computers isn't necessarily cheap, by the way. In fact, 256 MB of PC-100 RAM for the G4 Cube will cost you at least $23, while 1 GB of PC-5300 (for newer computers) will cost the same amount.
 
It's a 20GB hard drive and there's about 10 GB free right now with Panther installed. I read somewhere that Tiger would only need 3-4GB.

I think < $150 for 1.5 GB (3 512 MB sticks @ $48 each) is a great deal, but I also haven't purchase memory in a while 🙂.

The G4 is a very cool machine.

Thanks!

Wes
 
No problem. More RAM (if you really only have 256MB) would help but otherwise you should be okay. Remember, Tiger replaces Panther. My only other concern would be over the age of the hard drive.
 
weyus said:
It's a 20GB hard drive and there's about 10 GB free right now with Panther installed. I read somewhere that Tiger would only need 3-4GB.

I think < $150 for 1.5 GB (3 512 MB sticks @ $48 each) is a great deal, but I also haven't purchase memory in a while 🙂.

The G4 is a very cool machine.

Thanks!

Wes
Click to expand...

Yes, that was a great deal a little over a year ago. RAM prices quartered because companies thought people would buy RAM after upgrading to Vista, but no one upgraded to Vista. Tiger only needs 3-4 GB if you install just the bare minimum. You'd be surprised how much space extra languages waste. You might have to upgrade to Tiger, clean install, or delete panther after an archive and install.
 
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