Can't connect to...

[iCmdQ]

Hello,

This is my first post on this forum. I have been getting by with my G5 tower (OS 10.5.8) just fine until a week or two ago. I use my G5 mostly for graphic design (older version of the Adobe Creative Suite), along with some music and video production. And of course I use it to browse online. For the most part, it has been doing everything I needed it to, except that being unable to upgrade my browsers and plug-ins becomes a bigger problem all the time. I plan to get a new machine within the coming months.

As for my problem... Recently (probably about two weeks ago) I started having problems connecting to Google, most websites and the iTunes store. I do have an internet connection, as a few sites still load fine. My first inclination was that it was officially time to go Intel, but it all happened so suddenly that I feel like there is something specific to my hardware/software/internet provider that is preventing me from being able to get online, something I can fix for the time being.

I have done a decent amount of research and haven't seen instances of other people suddenly having the same problem as me. I thought that if Google, iTunes, etc., changed technology and cut a bunch of people off, that there would be a lot of search results for people having the same problem.

My gut feeling is that it's either software-related (something on my machine), or that maybe something changed on my ISP's end (I have AT&T internet).

Any ideas? Thanks in advance.

Scott

 

[Possumgal]

What browser are you using? As they age, some websites get "improved" to the point that older browsers can't handle them. Try TenFourFox, if you haven't already. It's kept many of our Power PCs cranking away on the internet.

Don't know if that would help the iTunes situation; somebody more experienced in this will probably help soon.

 

[iCmdQ]

Thanks for the reply Possumgal. I use Safari and Firefox, and both experience the same problems.

I found about about TenFourFox in the process of researching my problems, and will probably try it soon. Since I'm having problems connecting to the iTunes store as well, I thought maybe there was a bigger underlying problem that goes beyond the browsers.

 

[eyoungren]

T4Fx is up to version 38 now. The last version of Firefox for PowerPC is 3.x something. So, you are plugging along with a version of FireFox that is about 35 versions out of date. T4Fx versions are equivalent to the same Firefox version because Cameron Kaiser (the developer) starts with the Mozilla code. T4Fx is a fork of Firefox specifically for PowerPC Macs.

Any addons, or configurations you use in Firefox will be compatible with T4Fx. In my signature you can see a link to optimize T4Fx if you want to do that. It will speed things up and offer suggestions on addons to install to make browsing better. Note that as of version 24 plugins (ie., stuff like Flash, etc) are automatically disabled in T4Fx for security reasons.

Safari is a dead horse. You can't expect much from it. There is, however, Leopard Webkit which is an update of the underlying webkit frameworks that Safari uses.

I am not experiencing your issue with iTunes. However, I do not often login to iTunes. All of my music is in iTunes and I tend to sync my phone with an Intel Mac or a PC only when I need to (it's jailbroken so I don't need to a lot).

However, the Google issue I understand. I have a Fluid app specifically for Google Music. However, it has not been able to access my Google Music library for some time because the last PowerPC version of Flash (based on my research) is just not compatible with what Google has done to the site. So, I have to use a different device to access that.

But other than that site I have zero issues with Google. I expect updating 35 versions will probably help you as the underlying Javascript code engine in Firefox 3.x is probably very outdated.

 

[iCmdQ]

Thanks eyoungren! Very good info there. Maybe the iTunes and browser issues are separate. If I install TenFourFox and it it solves my web problems, I can just worry about iTunes separately.

I'll try it when I get home.

 

[Possumgal]

I'm like you, iCmdQ. I do a little design work with an older Creative Suite.

Just a tip: Since Flash is disabled in TenFourFox, you may run into problems with a site or two. I run a Quicksilver with OSX 10.4, so my Safari is practically useless, but I do need it for a couple of sites that don't work without Flash. For the most part, however, TenFourFox keeps my good old QS from being a doorstop.

 

[eyoungren]

I'm like you, iCmdQ. I do a little design work with an older Creative Suite.

Just a tip: Since Flash is disabled in TenFourFox, you may run into problems with a site or two. I run a Quicksilver with OSX 10.4, so my Safari is practically useless, but I do need it for a couple of sites that don't work without Flash. For the most part, however, TenFourFox keeps my good old QS from being a doorstop.

I'm using mine (Quicksilver) for design work too. I think we use different versions though. I'm using CS4.

 

[iCmdQ]

Kind of ridiculous that we can still do great work on these machines, but "simple" internet browsing will probably be the thing that forces me to upgrade.

 

[eyoungren]

Kind of ridiculous that we can still do great work on these machines, but "simple" internet browsing will probably be the thing that forces me to upgrade.

Yeah, that's been discussed a few times.

What it comes down to is the fact that later models are able to power through all the bad and excessive code. It's not that our Macs got less capable, but that people who code these sites are doing it in a much less efficient manner. They don't have to be efficient any more because the majority of people are on fast connections nowadays.

But the end result is a wall of crap thrown against our poor Macs.

One of the reasons I use NoScript and Request Policy.

 

[Hrududu]

I think it's worth installing Leopard WebKit. Tenfourfox is great and all, but like Firefox, extremely bloated and slow. I keep both on all my PPC systems. Nice to have options.

 

[Altemose]

@iCmdQ If you are using stock Firefox, which ended around version 3.6 if I recall correctly for PowerPC then page display errors are to be expected. I believe that the iTunes Store uses underlying frameworks from WebKit (Safari) so if there is corruption going on you are not going to fix it by installing TenFourFox. However, since simple browsing is giving you fits, a couple of members here have created special guides on improving the web browsing experience on PowerPC Macs.

@eyoungren created a special guide of tweaks and tricks you can use with TenFourFox to speed it up and improve its performance here.

If configuring all of his tweaks is daunting, you can try my easy installer for it. Note that I do not include all of his tweaks in this file, but rather the ones most critical to speed and other improvements. Tweaks that modify the behavior of the browser or offer little performance gains are not included in the installer as I find them to be up to personal preference. You can check the thread out here.

Finally, if you prefer Leopard WebKit, a fork of Safari 5, check out my guide on streaming video. While MacTubes and YouView used to work well, those programs were deprecated so this was the next best solution!

 

[2984839]

What kind of sites are not working? A site that has multimedia content could stop playing it if they no longer support the plugins you have. But if you get no connection at all, it's very unlikely to have anything to do with being on an older version of OS X or a PowerPC.

Some stuff to try from a terminal next time:

ping www.site.com

traceroute www.site.com

dig www.site.com

Ping will test for connectivity to a site. Traceroute will show you each hop along the way, which allows you to see where the failure point is (i.e., within your network at your router, or somewhere beyond it and out of your control). Dig will test DNS requests for that particular site. I'd run them all against functioning websites to get a good baseline, then try it on the ones that are problematic.

edit: Definitely get a modern browser though such as TenFourFox.

 

[iCmdQ]

Update: I installed TenFourFox last night. I didn't get to do much testing, but it definitely looks like a success so far. I haven't had a chance to see its limitations yet, but I checked a couple of the sites I frequent (including Google) and so far so good.

I'll have to look further into the iTunes issues, but this is definitely a step in the right directions. Thanks again for all the comments/suggestions.

 

[Altemose]

@iCmdQ Report back with the results of the rest of your findings!

 

[bunnspecial]

FWIW, I have no trouble connecting to the iTunes store from my Quicksilver using the most current version of iTunes that will run in Leopard.