Getting FREE Apple Products!

Gamer9430 said:

So, at my school, I'm part of the computer club and we get free stuff almost every week. So far, I've gotten a free 1 GB stick of DDR3 RAM, 2 VGA cables, a DVI cable, an AMD RAEDON graphics card, a 3 TB HDD, a Dell Optiplex 360, a Dell monitor, 2 Dell keyboards, one Dell mouse, and now i'm going to get a free SATA to USB wire and a PowerMac G5 (don't know what peripherals will come with that system yet). So living the dream life of free tech, and to top it off, the moderator added me into his dev account so now i can get any iOS beta!

So I'm wondering, because the PowerMac G5 was A, the last PowerMac, B, one of apple's last PowerPC computers, and C, extremely expensive at the time of release, do you think this computer will become a collectors item down the road, let alone sell for a large sum of money. Ik it won't happen any time soon, but what about 5+ years into the future? If not, it's a nice novelty to have!

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Collector's item?

No. Even the Quad G5's are now starting to show their age as they get passed in performance by mid level Macs and PCs.

I have a G5. It's a lower end spec Mac (1.8ghz) and it's still serving at work doing production (newpaper layout and ad design). My point in bringing that up is that no collector's item is going to be put to everyday use. These are still working Macs. My particular one is worth $60, the price I paid to replace the logicboard and CPU last year when it died.

But enjoy what you get. They are the most powerful PMs of their time and will run anything they are capable of running well.

I threw everything at that G5 for eight years and now my coworker is throwing everything at it as well.

eyoungren said:

Collector's item?

No. Even the Quad G5's are now starting to show their age as they get passed in performance by mid level Macs and PCs.

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Er, I don't think you've understood what a collector's item is...

Collectors items have got a special story behind them, for example: The PowerMac G4 cube, the G5 quad, the bondi blue imac G3. A collectors item also normally comes boxed with every accessory and every bit of documentation and is in very good condition. When you fulfill all this criteria you can expect your mac to go up in price at a fast rate, otherwise it's just another old mac which will gradually go up In price (like 20 years). At the moment the PowerPC Macs are going down in price and will only start going up in price again, when they have gotten very rare.

HereBeMonsters said:

Er, I don't think you've understood what a collector's item is...

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Possibly.

But in regards to the G5 Quads (as a collector's item) it think it's in the eye of the beholder.

Everyone sees…G5 Quad. Two dual processors, massive (for it's time) amount of ram, upgradeable with good video cards, etc, etc. I've always wanted one.

But here's what I see based on what I've read on this forum…
Faulty liquid cooling system and all the damage that can happen with that. Sure, you can upgrade it, replace it…and if you get it wrong, kiss all your work and your Mac goodbye.

A collector's item should be just that. A gem of a system that maybe needs a little work but otherwise performs flawlessly.

You can never go wrong with a free Mac, especially a G5.

As far as it being a "collector" piece-none of us have a crystal ball and can see what's going to be collected in the future. Even relatively ordinary early Macs worth a bundle now.

With that said, certain PPC era Macs are starting to appreciate. TAMs come immediately to mind. G3 Imacs and G4 Cubes are on their way there.

The G5s did set the "design language" used on professional Mac desktops for 10 years(2003-2013) and thus are significant in that sense. I also think that the Quad has built up something of a "cult" status(which it had even when enw), being the last and best of the PowerPC Macs. Prices on all G5s, even the Quad, are still on their way down rather than up from what I see. Some of them-particularly the dual 2.7-are still plagued by leaking LCSs that scare many people-collectors and users alike-away from them.

I'm not convinced that your every day, run of the mill G5 will ever be worth a bundle, but I can see the Quad maybe one of these days bringing a decent premium. But, as I said, none of us have a crystal ball.

eyoungren said:

Possibly.

But in regards to the G5 Quads (as a collector's item) it think it's in the eye of the beholder.

Everyone sees…G5 Quad. Two dual processors, massive (for it's time) amount of ram, upgradeable with good video cards, etc, etc. I've always wanted one.

But here's what I see based on what I've read on this forum…
Faulty liquid cooling system and all the damage that can happen with that. Sure, you can upgrade it, replace it…and if you get it wrong, kiss all your work and your Mac goodbye.

A collector's item should be just that. A gem of a system that maybe needs a little work but otherwise performs flawlessly.

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Being a problem child doesn't automatically exclude a system from being a collectors item. Take the original Lisa with its problematic Twiggy drives. Apple offered a free upgrade to the newer 3.5" drives and therefore there are few Twiggy drive configured Lisa's out there. I recall, years ago, an original Lisa with Twiggy drives sold for $10K on eBay.

eyoungren said:

Possibly.

But in regards to the G5 Quads (as a collector's item) it think it's in the eye of the beholder.

Everyone sees…G5 Quad. Two dual processors, massive (for it's time) amount of ram, upgradeable with good video cards, etc, etc. I've always wanted one.

But here's what I see based on what I've read on this forum…
Faulty liquid cooling system and all the damage that can happen with that. Sure, you can upgrade it, replace it…and if you get it wrong, kiss all your work and your Mac goodbye.

A collector's item should be just that. A gem of a system that maybe needs a little work but otherwise performs flawlessly.

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As long as it does what it was designed to do - I have no problem with older kit not being able to run newer apps.

There seems to be an obsession with getting older Macs onto the web, for instance. They were never designed to do so - I'd be happy to keep it for what it was good at when it was new.

reco2011 said:

Being a problem child doesn't automatically exclude a system from being a collectors item. Take the original Lisa with its problematic Twiggy drives. Apple offered a free upgrade to the newer 3.5" drives and therefore there are few Twiggy drive configured Lisa's out there. I recall, years ago, an original Lisa with Twiggy drives sold for $10K on eBay.

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That is true. Certain Macs that are collector items have or had issues. The difference here is that an issue with a Quad can be quite destructive.

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HereBeMonsters said:

As long as it does what it was designed to do - I have no problem with older kit not being able to run newer apps.

There seems to be an obsession with getting older Macs onto the web, for instance. They were never designed to do so - I'd be happy to keep it for what it was good at when it was new.

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I can agree with all of this.

My daily driver will soon to be an Intel Mac. Web browsing mainly is what I use my daily driver for. But all the rest of my Macs (once I get them functioning again) have specific purposes beyond web browsing so will continue to fulfill those roles because they do it now. Nothing along those lines will change.

Rarity helps with value. In Apple terms, G5s sold by the truckload and, unlike today's offerings, they were built to last.

weckart said:

Rarity helps with value. In Apple terms, G5s sold by the truckload and, unlike today's offerings, they were built to last.

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I think there's something to be said for this...

I know of a LOT of people who bought Quads even after the Intel transition was announced. Initially at least, many folks had concerns about how well their programs they had already paid big money for(like CS2) would run under Rosetta, and the last I heard the answer was "not very well." My impression is that Mac Pros and the like didn't really take off until the Universal and/or Intel native versions of software(CS3 I think was the first from Adobe).

Contrast with the TAM, with a production of(I think) 12,000 units, as well as some known "bugginess" with things like the speaker buzz, as well as the really high initial price of them.

Gamer9430 said:

Ik it won't happen any time soon, but what about 5+ years into the future? If not, it's a nice novelty to have!

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Hopefully by 5+ years you mean 20-30 years. Very often collectors' items must be in their original packaging and untouched to retain a good value.

I've not seen any 10-20 year old used system have a market value above it's original retail price. TAMs included.

Current examples of market value rising over book value of electronics/computers of utility include extremely small production run. eg. the HP 15C calculator:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/HP-10C_series

Gamer9430 said:

So, at my school, I'm part of the computer club and we get free stuff almost every week. So far, I've gotten a free 1 GB stick of DDR3 RAM, 2 VGA cables, a DVI cable, an AMD RAEDON graphics card, a 3 TB HDD, a Dell Optiplex 360, a Dell monitor, 2 Dell keyboards, one Dell mouse, and now i'm going to get a free SATA to USB wire and a PowerMac G5 (don't know what peripherals will come with that system yet). So living the dream life of free tech, and to top it off, the moderator added me into his dev account so now i can get any iOS beta!

So I'm wondering, because the PowerMac G5 was A, the last PowerMac, B, one of apple's last PowerPC computers, and C, extremely expensive at the time of release, do you think this computer will become a collectors item down the road, let alone sell for a large sum of money. Ik it won't happen any time soon, but what about 5+ years into the future? If not, it's a nice novelty to have!

Click to expand...

It isn't going to be a valuable collector's item by any means. That being said, we have a great community here who will be more than happy to get you up and running with that PowerMac. Surprisingly, a few of the members here are very active in our schools' IT departments like gavinstubbs09 and I.

Of all PowerPC machines, the only one right now that seems to have the most value/rarity factor would be the Cube. Every other model (besides the short three months of DLHR 15" PowerBooks and the iSight G5s) are much easier to find.

If I have to make a prediction of what the next model may be the cube in years out would be the TiBooks. Many are hammered and it's hard to find one that's in good shape granted they were sold for two years.

gavinstubbs09 said:

Of all PowerPC machines, the only one right now that seems to have the most value/rarity factor would be the Cube. Every other model (besides the short three months of DLHR 15" PowerBooks and the iSight G5s) are much easier to find.

If I have to make a prediction of what the next model may be the cube in years out would be the TiBooks. Many are hammered and it's hard to find one that's in good shape granted they were sold for two years.

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Don't forget the 20th Anniversry Mac has a PowerPC inside of it. What those are selling for now you could have bought a new Cube with when they were released.

yangchewren said:

I've not seen any 10-20 year old used system have a market value above it's original retail price. TAMs included.

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When the TAMs were new to the market, they were $7995, although that eventually dropped to $1995.

From what I've seen, $1500-2000 is typical for a complete, working, no problems and untampered with system. Boxed and/or unopened examples push that a lot higher.

So, if you compare the "blowout" retail price to the current value and take inflation into account, I doubt you're ahead, but I do think these systems(in particular) have a decent chance of appreciating.

If you had bought an Apple I new, on the other hand($666.66), you'd be well ahead of inflation($2788) relative to its current value. I'm pretty sure these are in 6 digits these days.

Without the butler in the limo delivering and setting up your TAM for you, they are worthless to me. If I am laying down serious money, it better arrive in some style.

With a TiBook they have style and with the problems they are getting rare to be in perfect shape. The TAM wouldn't do much for me, they don't look pretty either (maybe it was because Ive had hair )

bunnspecial said:

You can never go wrong with a free Mac, especially a G5.

As far as it being a "collector" piece-none of us have a crystal ball and can see what's going to be collected in the future. Even relatively ordinary early Macs worth a bundle now.

With that said, certain PPC era Macs are starting to appreciate. TAMs come immediately to mind. G3 Imacs and G4 Cubes are on their way there.

The G5s did set the "design language" used on professional Mac desktops for 10 years(2003-2013) and thus are significant in that sense. I also think that the Quad has built up something of a "cult" status(which it had even when enw), being the last and best of the PowerPC Macs. Prices on all G5s, even the Quad, are still on their way down rather than up from what I see. Some of them-particularly the dual 2.7-are still plagued by leaking LCSs that scare many people-collectors and users alike-away from them.

I'm not convinced that your every day, run of the mill G5 will ever be worth a bundle, but I can see the Quad maybe one of these days bringing a decent premium. But, as I said, none of us have a crystal ball.

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This is similar issue I have with my Quad G5. I got it as a present about two years ago, I saw it at a school surplus and my wife decided to get it for me as early birthday present. Now, the machine is fully functional but as much as I like to nerd out with it I'm finding it harder and harder to work with it. Here are several of my issues with it:

1. As a server, even if one wants to use it as a server. You first have to get pass the idea of the fact that it draws large amount of electricity. Also, that machine is not quite at all, so if you have a small study like me and you want to leave it in there as a server, you can kiss the quietness good bye. Plus, it generates so much heat that you can already feel the temperature difference after just having it on for half an hour. You also have to deal with the issues of not having a wireless card.

2. As a work machine. So as a work machine it is perfectly fine (computation power wise), let's skip over the noise and all the implied issues. But even as a work machine it is becoming increasing difficult to find software that will work with it, or even tweaks that you can implement easily. For example I use Matlab, Python, and even trying out a Matlab alternative Octave. You can't hardly find support on any of those softwares anymore. I feel that in general if you don't already have the stable software to work with you will be spending much more time trying to get it to work then actually doing work with it.

3. Like it was mentioned, you never know when its going to break down. Once it does, I personally don't think I have the energy and the money to make the necessary repair (at least not now).

So, my question here is, should I (or we) hold on to a machines like this? and what for? Do you hope that you might be able to sell it for a good money few years down the road? Or do you think it's worth keeping it for history's sake? I'm personally on the verge of selling my G5, I want it to go to somebody that might be able to get more use out of it or maybe have a different perspective from me. I honestly not sure what else I can do practically with the machine.

aajeevlin said:

1. As a server, even if one wants to use it as a server. You first have to get pass the idea of the fact that it draws large amount of electricity. Also, that machine is not quite at all, so if you have a small study like me and you want to leave it in there as a server, you can kiss the quietness good bye. Plus, it generates so much heat that you can already feel the temperature difference after just having it on for half an hour. You also have to deal with the issues of not having a wireless card.

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The heat issue is not insignificant. I don't have a quad, but even my lower spec G5s(single 1.8 and dual core 2.0) can heat up a room pretty quickly if I really get to cranking on either one of them. The dual 2.0 is about to go to work with for this exact reason.

As far as wireless-the late '05 G5s could be ordered from the factory with a combo Wifi/bluetooth card. This was not officially a user installable part, but is not terribly difficult to do. The combo card itself is not difficult to find, although the "runway" card that is required for it to fit the G5 is quite difficult to find and expensive.

There are alternatives, however. I recently installed WiFi in my dual core G5(same generation as the quad) and wrote up my experience and the parts I used here

https://forums.macrumors.com/threads/1779572/

As an alternative to an internal card you can always get something like this:



there are tons of alternative makes fitting all budgets but the best part is that these are OS independent so no faffing about with drivers. It is also about the only way you can get 802.11n speeds with OS9 booted natively.

Gamer9430 said:

...do you think this computer will become a collectors item down the road, let alone sell for a large sum of money. Ik it won't happen any time soon, but what about 5+ years into the future? If not, it's a nice novelty to have!

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Just to bring some perspective: compared to original MSRP, PowerMacs are not going to be worth much for a very long time.

The Apple I, for example, is quite valuable, but that's because it's the first ever Apple computer, only 61 are known to exist and only a handful of those still work. It's very rare. By contrast, the ubiquitous Apple II series machines are worth very little.

The original 128k Macintosh has appreciated in value over the last ten years; a nice working example is now worth about $1000- but that's still less than 1/5 the original MSRP adjusting for inflation. So, even 30 years after going on sale the original 128k Macintosh is still worth far less than what it cost new.

Power Mac G5s are never going to be as iconic as the first Mac. They are probably a ways down the list in terms of collector value. Also, G5 prices haven't bottomed out yet.

If you're looking for a Mac that's "investment grade" (i.e. is or will be worth $$ equal to or greater than it's original MSRP), it will have to be one of the following, in roughly descending order of value.

1. Sealed in its original box from the factory
2. Documented as being owned by someone very famous
3. A prototype
4. A popular or more notable model (128k, Cube, TAM, Rev. A iMac G3) used but in near-perfect condition with ALL original packaging, cables, manuals etc etc.

Anyway, I'm blathering. Not trying to dampen anyone's enthusiasm for Apple collecting - as a matter of fact, this should be encouragement, because most collectible Macs are still very affordable!!

I just think it's worth pointing out that most collectible Macs do net represent the kind of investment that will pay big monetary dividends - unless you're planning to buy them now and sit on them for 50 years (in which case you'd better think about replacing all those electrolytic capacitors on the logic boards)...

eyoungren said:

That is true. Certain Macs that are collector items have or had issues. The difference here is that an issue with a Quad can be quite destructive.

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I can agree with all of this.

My daily driver will soon to be an Intel Mac. Web browsing mainly is what I use my daily driver for. But all the rest of my Macs (once I get them functioning again) have specific purposes beyond web browsing so will continue to fulfill those roles because they do it now. Nothing along those lines will change.

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I'm already there. My Mac Pro 1,1 does the bulk of my Mac work every day. It far outstrips any G5 I've owned in terms of movie compression and that is something I value very much. Still, my remaining PPC Macs still have their uses and I'm fine with that. The G5 does movie encoding with subtitles, something the Mac Pro can't do as of yet, the MDD is my backup server, and the G4 466 is a testbed for certain concepts and ideas.

Altemose said:

It isn't going to be a valuable collector's item by any means. That being said, we have a great community here who will be more than happy to get you up and running with that PowerMac. Surprisingly, a few of the members here are very active in our schools' IT departments like gavinstubbs09 and I.

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I sort of wish I could be as well. My school is large and I have no idea who the IT people are. They usually deal with cr@ppy Windows PCs, but the yearbook lab, or whatever, has older Mac Minis, I think some PowerMac G5s, and definitely 23" LCD Studio Displays that I hope are not gone by now. I went onto a 2007-2008 iMac at my school and located all the older Macs I could find on the school's network. I am guessing the two PowerMac G5s I saw are from that photo lab. There is actually another PowerMac G5 in one of my classrooms, but I doubt it will leave for a long time, considering it's a back-up server... and we all know you can definitely still use an "ancient" computer as a backup server. It's locked, so I don't know the specs. The DVD-ROM drive was removed from it.

PowerMac G4 MDD said:

I sort of wish I could be as well. My school is large and I have no idea who the IT people are. They usually deal with cr@ppy Windows PCs, but the yearbook lab, or whatever, has older Mac Minis, I think some PowerMac G5s, and definitely 23" LCD Studio Displays that I hope are not gone by now. I went onto a 2007-2008 iMac at my school and located all the older Macs I could find on the school's network. I am guessing the two PowerMac G5s I saw are from that photo lab. There is actually another PowerMac G5 in one of my classrooms, but I doubt it will leave for a long time, considering it's a back-up server... and we all know you can definitely still use an "ancient" computer as a backup server. It's locked, so I don't know the specs. The DVD-ROM drive was removed from it.

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Gavin actually runs a lab at his school. I do more of the network end of it when problems arise as my Eagle Scout project was installing wireless. They only use PCs there but they are running Windows 7 which is pretty good if you ask me.