I'm looking for a Christmas gift for my girlfriend. She is not a geek at all, but she is a big fan of odd and different things. Lately she has been complaining about how slow her laptop is. She only uses it for internet, AIM, and writing papers. I was wondering if an old iMac G4 would be reasonably fast for those simple tasks. I'm sure its fine for the latter two, but now days sites become more and more demanding on ram and graphics cards, will the G4 still keep up? The main selling point is the cool design, she thinks it looks really cool... Thanks for any help.
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iMac G4??
- Thread starter wawanarchist
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The G4 should be fine. But don't you want to get her a nice, new, shiny, one?
It's just my opinion, but i'm not a big fan of the G4 model, all the other ones are nice though.
You should get her the latest iMac http://www.apple.com/imac it's really nice, has a huge screen, and will last a lot longer than an already four year old Mac.
It's just my opinion, but i'm not a big fan of the G4 model, all the other ones are nice though.
You should get her the latest iMac http://www.apple.com/imac it's really nice, has a huge screen, and will last a lot longer than an already four year old Mac.
Let me give you a bit more background. I'm 18 and in college... I work a min. wage job that makes me $80 a week... even the G4 is pushing it for me... And she loves the G4 model, especially how the screen moves all over.
- She has a portable computer now. Are you sure that she wants a desktop machine?
- The prices for all used iMacs should be pushed downward by the announcements at MacWorld next month. Can you wait a month?
- Yes, the G4 is fine. Be sure to max out that RAM. If that machine is what she wants...
- For the above reasons, you should probably give her a coupon. Design a nice "redeemable for one computer" coupon, print it on nice paper, wrap it in a nice envelope, and give her that. It's just as good, and allows her to give her input, since you are not actually a mind-reader.
-She would still have a laptop for all portable uses, this would just be a supplement
-Very true, I'll probably take that into account, although I'm just going to hit up craigslist and offer $150 to everyone selling them, someone will take it eventually (no need for anyone to warn me off of craigslist, i know what im doing with it, what to look for, ect.)
-In the end I'm hoping to find a more personal gift, but right now im stuck (no i dont need ideas from people here..
) and everytime we pass one in one of the older computer labs she talks about how cool they are
I wouldn't go below 1ghz processor and 512mb ram. I know what you mean - I'm in college with a part time job at Walmart. The stories about them being horrible arent all true, and they pay fairly decent so I was able to get the last version - the 1.25ghz 17 inch one. It is a great machine and the design is like no other.
I must have a say in every iMac G4 thread as of late, people are going to hate me.
Anyway, it's a damn fine machine, and I'm running Leopard and it runs just fine. I had a bit of a stint trying to get everything I need from Tiger to Leopard via an external hard drive, but once it was all done I could enjoy my machine. I love it so much I almost bought a desk we had kicking around the back of my store to go with it - with a raised section to display it's sexy hotness.
It's great, and I love it. It would make one hell of a unique gift. Just to really be useful for some time to come, get the best processor / ram you can. The 17inch widescreen is also a plus over the 15. The 20 seems a bit heavy and overkill to me as I'm sitting less than 3 feet from it. Get the speakers that go with it - I love them and they add to it's design. I pushed to get all the originals as I didn't feel like going and paying for something else, and I wanted everything that was designed to go together.
I'm very passionate about this computer. Pardon the speech.
I must have a say in every iMac G4 thread as of late, people are going to hate me.
Anyway, it's a damn fine machine, and I'm running Leopard and it runs just fine. I had a bit of a stint trying to get everything I need from Tiger to Leopard via an external hard drive, but once it was all done I could enjoy my machine. I love it so much I almost bought a desk we had kicking around the back of my store to go with it - with a raised section to display it's sexy hotness.
It's great, and I love it. It would make one hell of a unique gift. Just to really be useful for some time to come, get the best processor / ram you can. The 17inch widescreen is also a plus over the 15. The 20 seems a bit heavy and overkill to me as I'm sitting less than 3 feet from it. Get the speakers that go with it - I love them and they add to it's design. I pushed to get all the originals as I didn't feel like going and paying for something else, and I wanted everything that was designed to go together.
I'm very passionate about this computer. Pardon the speech.
I hear you. Apple had a 17" Core Duo iMac in the refurb store yesterday for something like $599. Quite a deal on a machine that would probably last her/you through college and beyond, but that is a lot of money for your situation.
We live near a college town (Ann Arbor, MI) and U of M has a property disposition department where they sell off all the equipment they are replacing. Very often, huge batches of Macs pass though there for very good deals. We grabbed a G4 iMac from there a number of years ago for a very good price. If you live by an major universities, it might be worth looking into. You might find you can get a more recent machine for the same or cheaper dollars.
Good luck!
good luck getting one for <$150. I bought my 15" 800mhz G4 two years ago for $350, i'm typing on it right now actually. Just let me say that I never regretted it. The resale value alone is worth it, too much demand for such an old computer. But I digress, the 800mhz works just fine for surfing, typing, and handles most flash based websites, just max out the RAM to about 512 and you should be good. The 800mhz will be the cheapest to look for and since its a 7 year old mac, it will run better than a 1 year old PC.
Count yourself lucky! I just went surfing around to see if the University of Arkansas had a property disposition department, and I found that Michigan has the absolute best. They really aren't that prevalent which is sad.
The iMac G4 is awsome. I still have mine, along with my newer mini. My G4 can still do photoshop and games just fine. Web surfing, instant messaging, ichat, email. all that. It is still a great machine.
I got my G4 on Craigslist used. I picked it up for 1/2 the price. You can probably pick up a 20" model for around $600 bucks. If you already have a monitor, keyboard and mouse, a used and newer mac mini might be a better choice for around the same price.
If you buy a pre-owned mac, buy a copy of tech tool pro and run it through the diagnostics. You can also pick up a free shareware program from version tracker to test the monitor for dead pixels.
Powermax is a great place for tested and guaranteed, pre-owned macs
http://www.powermax.com/preowned_macs
http://www.powermax.com/parts/code/PM_CU_IM_TF_20
I got my G4 on Craigslist used. I picked it up for 1/2 the price. You can probably pick up a 20" model for around $600 bucks. If you already have a monitor, keyboard and mouse, a used and newer mac mini might be a better choice for around the same price.
If you buy a pre-owned mac, buy a copy of tech tool pro and run it through the diagnostics. You can also pick up a free shareware program from version tracker to test the monitor for dead pixels.
Powermax is a great place for tested and guaranteed, pre-owned macs
http://www.powermax.com/preowned_macs
http://www.powermax.com/parts/code/PM_CU_IM_TF_20