The G3 iMac War!!!

Motherboard

customisbetter said:

my friend and i have started a mac war. he bought a blue imac g3 500mhz slot, 100 gig hdd with 128 (2x64) ram and 10.3.9 w/o classic 9. $100. then i bought a
white g3 imac slot 500mhz with 1x128 meg ram and a 20gig hdd including airport card, 10.3.9 and classic 9. $30. the problem is that his seems to run faster and smoother than mine and i don't know why. can anyone explain this anomaly?
is it the drive speed thats faster on his or the use of both slots?
please help for i need the upperhand in this battle for the ages.

Click to expand...

Check the Specs on Apple > Support -- I think your iMac uses a slower motherboard (in terms of bus speed) and has less cache. If the G3 has a faster bus, then the 2 RAM slots will be further magnified by faster read/write access over TWO slots.

Not sure, but bet this is it.

customisbetter said:

no... we both have the same bus speed but i dont know how fast his hdd is. did the 100 gig ones come with faster drives? my twenty is going to be replaced soon by a 7200. will it be noticeably faster?

Click to expand...

imacs never came with 100 gb hds, his is an upgrade. 7200 is great, I have one in my imac, but more than anything 1 Gig of ram will make a world of a difference on the imac. Ps. Your hd is currently 4200 rpm

customisbetter said:

will it be as fast as my hp? thats kind of my standard in computation. i have it pretty much streamlined and it is really quick, about as fast as my friends recent 17in intel imac. will it be that fast running 10.3? what would be the effects of 10.4?
thanks btw.

Click to expand...

Hi. There is no way that the iMac will beat your dual core HP, not a chance.

However, it will run panther very nicely, most people with suped up imac g3s like mine run tiger, but i keep jaguar/0S 9, it just seems more authentic.

Also, any intel mac will smoke the imac g3, but it really depends what you're doing. Mine is great for word, excel, and couple games of chopper (Look it up its really good), monopoly, lux, etc. I've only ever has issues with it dropping frames on video playback and ilife (Video editing).

get more ram! My old g3 400 imac definitely performed better after I upgraded it to 640 ram

You'd still need the RAM, so do that first. My G3/500 does just fine with its 768MB RAM. I've got to put Tiger on it, but even with 10.2.8, it gets plenty of use with kids games and surfing.

Flash videos shouldn't be troubled by a lack of memory. The CPU and/or the hard drive may be causing the problems.

customisbetter said:

what if i drop $200 and get a g4 board replacement? is that even close to worth it?

Click to expand...

NO. You can max out your model with less than 150 dollars, if you're spending money on upgrading anything more than the HD and RAM, i would reccomend going for the Emac.

customisbetter said:

where would i go about getting a new drive, preferably 7200. size doesnt matter but price does.

Click to expand...

Absolutely anywhere.

Now, putting it in might be tricky in a G3 iMac.

Changing the HDD in the slot loading iMac G3's is fairly easy. However, its not going to make flash video's (youtube) run better. Thats 100% CPU limited, and those slow G3's just aren't fast enough.

The hard drive is your weakest link at this point. Your original 20gb was only a 4200rpm drive with a 2mb cache.

MAKE SURE you get a new hard drive with at least an 8mb cache or if you can find one, a 16mb cache PLUS the 7200 rpm speed. Price out the 160gb to 250 gb drives as you can probably find a really fast drive for less money. The iMac G3 will only recognize 128gbs of hard drive space, however.

And, you have to get a gig of ram. I think YOU TUBE will be fine with the faster, larger hd with at least an 8mb cache and the ram.

I am the wrong person to ask about PC's having never owned one and having been on Macs since 1989. Dells give me the creeps. Of course, SELL IT while you can get some bucks for it! The iMac G3s are indestructible.

Yeah upgrading the machine won't help for flash. I would know. However, it does speed up the computer. (The new HDDs are much faster and quiter too).

If you'd rather play with the G3, sell the Dell.. you might be able to get something for it on ebay or some-such.

edit.. wait, is the HP a laptop?

If so, then the question is: Are you going to miss having a desktop computer aside from your G3?

I don't know what sort of ram your PCs take, but if they're somewhat older it's possible that they have the same as the G3. You might be able to salvage parts for the G3 out of the PCs, and save some money. The hard disk is a definate possibility. Of course, it would mean your PC can't be used anymore

You can play AVI files under OS X with VLC. I do not know if there is a "classic" version available. If you're going to put money into something, put it in a Sawtooth.

I think that this imac is limited to 120 GB size (even smaller) read before buying a 250GB drive...
2cents.