imac g4 800 vs. emac 1ghz

[tabrown4]

I am looking for some advice. I am a teacher and I currently have some imac g3 computers that I let my students use for light web browsing and creating simple documents with neo office. A couple of students asked about purchasing some of my imacs so now I am thinking about upgrading and letting them buy my imacs (these are mine and not the property of the school system i work for).

Ebay is where I am looking (which is actually where the imac g3's came from) and I am looking at either the imac g4 800 (http://cgi.ebay.com/Apple-iMac-M649...le_Desktops&hash=item588b0fc2e7#ht_1600wt_932) or an emac 1.0 ghz (http://cgi.ebay.com/Apple-eMac-Powe...le_Desktops&hash=item20b5599298#ht_3981wt_698).

I looked at everymac.com and couldn't find any major differences between the two systems. The biggest pro for the imac is the smaller form factor but the emac is slightly faster and the glass screen is a little more appealing. I still have sticks of pc133 512 ram so I am planning on upgrading the ram.

Any advice between the two machines would be great. (Please stick with these two machines as I know that the g5 is faster and intel is the future but I am working with the budget I have..not the school systems). Also feel free to tell me if the difference between the imacs I have now (g3 400) and the two machines I am considering is substantial.

 

[Brother854]

Go for the cheaper emac.

Let's be honest, these computers are out of date. They will both run web browsers. You might as well go for the CRT (it will last longer) with more memory and the slightly faster processor.

The emac is going to be a more durable machine for your purposes.

 

[MacHamster68]

shop around especially for eMac 1.0 , because there had been 2 of them which look like twins gut some significant differences inside



1) 1ghz from 2003-2004 ,with the old 133mhz system bus and
a ati 7500 graphics 32mb and 256mb level 2 cache and usb1.1 only and only pc133 ram up to 1 GB

2) 1ghz from 2004-2005 with the new 167mhz system bus ,32 mb ati radeoon 9200 , 512mb level2 cache and usb2.0 and pc2700 ram up to 2 gb

the later is a bit more future prove and despite the same 1ghz , but with usb 2.0 , and faster system bus the later feels double the speed and can be upgraded to 2 gb ram if needs arise ,

the later was a education model that actually was only a downclocked 1.25 ghz model and funny enough quiet rare because some schools still refuse to part with them, because they are nearly indistructable and have by now outlived all the later iMac g5 edu models and even the iMac intel edu models, so schools have more interest in systems that outlast others and still capable of most things with ease


but be careful both have a tendency to blow capacitors ,but thats a easy fix " if " it happens and you know someone who can solder the capacitors cost next to no money at all

but depending on your budget and how many you need i would strongly advice to go for the eMac 1.42 ghz model , no blowing capacitors to worry about(apple had sorted the problem by then ) , still a very fast system even by todays standards , a 167mhz system bus , 512mb level2 cache , takes 2 gb pc 2700 ram but more significantly offers the ati radeon 9600 with 64mb vram and was only build between may and october in 2005 so unlike all the others its only just 5 years old , some like my 3 shipped in 2006 and came last year (2009) out of apple care

i have 3 of them and i would not even part with 1 of my eMac 1.42's even if you offer me 3 iMac 27" i7 in exchange for , despite the good performance eMac's are a bit louder due to the fact the huge single fan at the back has to get rid of all the heat of the crt and the processor and gpu , and does that very effective and extracts the heat with constant rpm's so its not as annoying as other newer Macs where the fan speed goes up and down all the time
and it could cope with leopard more easy then the earlier eMac's and iMac's G4

 

[tabrown4]

Thanks for the advice so far. I was leaning towards the emac to begin with and you have made some great points. I was initially interested in the 1ghz because i could take some of the ram I already have (pc 133) and max out the machines but your recommendation about the 1.42 definitely got me thinking about that particular machine.

 

[tabrown4]

Emac 1.25

Okay.. so i ended up with 4 emac 1.25's because they were priced pretty well (45.00 each). Does anyone know if this RAM will work with this machine?

http://cgi.ebay.com/1GB-DDR2-PC3200...ultDomain_0&hash=item19bf8e237d#ht_6761wt_822

I went to RAMseeker and it keeps trying to get me to buy pc2700 ram but the machines have pc3200 in them. Is it the same?

 

[MacHamster68]

yes normally you will get pointed to pc2700 ram as thats what the iMac usb2.0 models want , but pc3200 might work as well if its backwards compatible(most are backwards compatible and cheaper too )