Will a G3 suffice for this . . .

[swindmill]

My 14 year old brother uses a P4 windows computer for AIM, Firefox, and iTunes, and has constant problems with it. Whenever I am at my parents house I end spending an hour removing viruses, adware, and spyware, and just generally making it work after he destroys it. We've had to reload the OS several times. For his purposes, OS X would make much more sense, but at 14 it's not worth spending much. I was thinking of getting a G3 with added RAM and installing OS X. He would typically have iTunes, Firefox, and iChat running at the same time. Could I make either an iMac G3 or a later powermac G3 run at a similar speed as his eMachines P4 for these purposes? (Or would he be dissapointed)

- he's connected via ethernet

 

[Gerg]

I have an older Blue & White G3 that runs just fine for anything I need, including MS Office, Adobe Illustrator, Quark Express, etc. I do have a lot of memory installed (about 800MB or so, as I recall) and that certainly helps.

The G3 doesn't like iPhoto and iMovie as much as my Mac mini, but that's to be expected.

 

[Fender2112]

If he is going to have it for a while, I'd go with a G4 with 512 MB ram. I think the G3 will be a noticable speed drop.

As an alternative, you can let him clean up his own mess for a while. This would teach him to be more responsible about what does.

Just a thought.

 

[Jigglelicious]

A G3 would feel very slow coming from a P4. If you wanted to get an iMac, then to get it up to acceptable levels i'd say you want at least a 500mhz slot loading version, install a new hard drive, and upgrade the RAM to 512mb. However, all those together would end up costing over $300 , and he would be stuck without a CD burner (or DVD drive depending on the model), no Quartz Extreme support, etc. You might as well just save up for a Mini.

 

[Lord Blackadder]

I think the G3 would be a little too slow after using the P4. I recommend one of 3 things:

Buy a used G4 tower, the cheapest you can find, and give it 512 MB of RAM. This machine will run all the apps you list just fine and has a huge upgrade potential. You should be able to get one for $200 or less if you look around.

Get a 1.25GHz Mac Mini. It will cost a bit more than the G4 tower but is faster and smaller. Make sure you get it with 512MB RAM or bump it yourself.

Clean up the P4, make yourself an admin acount and then give your bro a restricted account that won't let him do anything (access control panels, install things) other than run his applications.

Good luck.

 

[840quadra]

I think the G3 would be a little too slow after using the P4. I recommend one of 3 things:

Buy a used G4 tower, the cheapest you can find, and give it 512 MB of RAM. This machine will run all the apps you list just fine and has a huge upgrade potential. You should be able to get one for $200 or less if you look around.

Get a 1.25GHz Mac Mini. It will cost a bit more than the G4 tower but is faster and smaller. Make sure you get it with 512MB RAM or bump it yourself.

Clean up the P4, make yourself an admin acount and then give your bro a restricted account that won't let him do anything (access control panels, install things) other than run his applications.

Good luck.

I concur, The G4 is easy to find and to upgrade.

 

[nagromme]

My G3/333 running OS X is adequate for those things. My friend uses a G3/350 running OS X as his only machine, for everything from music to watching streaming video. It really has kept its value.

But if you're used to faster, it will bother you! My G3 bothers me vs. my G4 eMac--not to mention my G4 PowerBook.

A person has to decide if it's worth freeing themselves from virus hassle. It definitely WOULD be worth it to me. But you will feel the price in terms of speed.

So a used G4 sounds better. Maybe wait for a Mac Mini revision and then pick up a used first-gen cheap.