old iMac and OSX

[stoneage]

Is it possible to install OSX on this system? It currently has 8.5 installed.
Machine ID: 406
Model: IMAC
Processor Info: Power PC G3
Speed: 333MHZ
RAM: J3/Bottom 32MB DIMM
J1/Top 128MB DIMM

[johnnyjibbs]

Yes, you'll be able to install it on any iMac. It won't run the best on a 333MHz G3 obviously but Panther, in particular, has greatly improved performance on older machines such as this, apparently. It probably has an ATI Rage graphics card so it should be fine. It'll be a bit slow for video rendering, etc., though.

[BornAgainMac]

CPU is fine, memory is too low for Mac OS X. 256 mb is the min with just Sherlock and Safari and Mail running at the same time since there is only a few megs free and close to swapping to disk.

I would suggest installing Linux instead for that class of machine if you want something new. Or just run the older Mac OS. I think OS 9 was pretty fast and there are enough shareware programs to keep it useful for years to come. Or just use it for Internet and email. I never had 8.5 but OS 9.1 wasn't too bad.

[Macmaniac]

My advice if you want at least some decent performance ditch the 32meg chip and try to buy a larger chip, the RAM for old iMac's is very cheap, and if you are handy with tools you can install it yourself. Also if you do go to X, make sure u upg to 9.2 first, going from 8.5 to X is not recommended. It probably won't even work.

[Duff-Man]

My advice if you want at least some decent performance ditch the 32meg chip and try to buy a larger chip, the RAM for old iMac's is very cheap, and if you are handy with tools you can install it yourself. Also if you do go to X, make sure u upg to 9.2 first, going from 8.5 to X is not recommended. It probably won't even work.Duff-Man says...yes, for sure upgrade the RAM as it is inexpensive to do so....and to clarify...I think that OS X will run just fine, but if you want to run "Classic" you will need 9.2....oh yeah!

[javabear90]

I just got thourgh installing OS X on a bondi Blue iMac. it was a peice of Junk. it had 8.1 installed on it, 32 megs of ram, and a 4 gig hardrive. then, In 2 days it had OS X 10.4, 160 megs of ram, and a 40 gig 7200 rpm hardrive. It accually works great! My mom uses it for e-mail, internet, etc.. And I use it for backup, Bit-torrent and a small server. it's accually not that slow. I fought through hell to get it working, the CD-ROM drive would not close, it wouldn't boot, I had to update the firmware, spend several hours with Apple care, and take it apart about 8 times... a day.... Sounds fun dosn't it? Acually it was... ;) ( Ahhh, yes I'm a geek :cool: )

[Mord]

10.4? and apple beta test i see?


(insert sarcasm here)