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iBook G4: Uses?

P

PurpleMarmalade

macrumors regular
Original poster
Aug 29, 2010
118
1
I've been handed an iBook G4 by a friend who upgraded to an MBP 13" (they were simply going to throw it away, so I asked if I could have it instead!). It's the 1.33Ghz model, with 768mb RAM, and it really is in fantastic condition. No cracks, marks, etc - it's been kept in a case or used on a desk its entire life.

I've never had a PPC Mac before (I bought my unibody MB in Feb 2008, and now have a 2011 MBA 13".) So, my question: what can I use it for? It seems a bit underpowered to use a a music hub, and my MBA takes care of all my computing needs. Would it be worth trying to sell it (i.e. does anyone still buy iBooks, or should I simply give it to charity)?

Thanks all.
 
If you don't want to keep it, then why have you asked for it? I guess donating it to some poor kid would be a good gesture this christmas.
 
Nameci said:
If you don't want to keep it, then why have you asked for it?
Click to expand...

Because (at the risk of repeating myself) otherwise it would have been thrown away. It felt a bit like saving an old dog from being put down; remember, they're for life, not just for Christmas.

And, to clarify, if I was to sell it, I would obviously give the profits to the original owner.
 
I have lots of notebooks myself, I have an MB, Powerbook and the 1.33 iBook as well as a couple of windows notebook. I don't use my two windows notebook anymore. But the 3 macs they are alternately used when I am travelling.
 
If you were to keep it I'd max out the ram to 1.5gb, stick a nice hard drive in there, put leopard on it and use it as a netbook/websufing and a DVD player as the MBA don't have built in optical drives ;)

If you were to sell it you'd easily get £90-£120 for it :)
 
Goftrey said:
If you were to keep it I'd max out the ram to 1.5gb, stick a nice hard drive in there, put leopard on it and use it as a netbook/websufing and a DVD player as the MBA don't have built in optical drives ;)

If you were to sell it you'd easily get £90-£120 for it :)
Click to expand...

Thanks for the ideas, but I don't need a netbook - the MBA satisfies that need. As for DVDs, I just use the blue-ray player! Watching a film on the iBook screen would be fairly irritating, I'd imagine, after watching things in high-def glory.

Yep, I'll sell it, and hand the dosh to the original owner as an Xmas pressie.
 
PurpleMarmalade said:
I've been handed an iBook G4 by a friend who upgraded to an MBP 13" (they were simply going to throw it away, so I asked if I could have it instead!). It's the 1.33Ghz model, with 768mb RAM, and it really is in fantastic condition. No cracks, marks, etc - it's been kept in a case or used on a desk its entire life.

I've never had a PPC Mac before (I bought my unibody MB in Feb 2008, and now have a 2011 MBA 13".) So, my question: what can I use it for? It seems a bit underpowered to use a a music hub, and my MBA takes care of all my computing needs. Would it be worth trying to sell it (i.e. does anyone still buy iBooks, or should I simply give it to charity)?

Thanks all.
Click to expand...

If you don't want it, I'll take it :D
 
If you want to sell it on Ebay, there are plenty of people who will pay good prices for a working G4 iBook. This one is typical:

http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/290644989931?ssPageName=STRK:MEWAX:IT&_trksid=p3984.m1423.l2649

Even broken ones are snapped up by people. If you cannot find a use for it, then someone else will. Mine is fine for e-mailing, office work, simple video playback, and so on. I've also used it as a wireless home music server. It uses little power, is almost totally silent, and looks good as a part of the sound system. You can also use them as a firewall.

For the record, mine is a 1.2GHz G4 with 768MB RAM and runs OS X 10.5.8. I've trimmed the system, with Monolingual, and also removed some of the nonessential software, such as print drivers and so on, to give me just over 20GB of space on the 30GB drive. That's more than is available on many netbooks. It is in near-new condition. and was rescued from being thrown away.

I use a 32GB thumb drive for extra storage, when on the road. The battery lasts 4 hours or so, after about 250 charge cycles.
 
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