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Installing OSX on an old 8600?

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macrumors 6502
Original poster
Aug 15, 2003
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I received an old PowerMac 8600 because it wasnt being used anymore.
It works, I've fired it up in OS9 but it's too unstable for my taste. I made the OS lock up over 4 times in a matter of hours.
I've thought about installing OSX on it, but I dont know if it's even possible or which version would be best to install on it.

The system has a Radeon 7000 Video Card and 512MB RAM.

Any ideas? :D
 
I know it is not officially supported by Apple for Panther, which requires built-in USB. I'm not sure about previous OS X. What version of OS 9 is on it? The most current version is 9.2.2, and if you don't have that you probably need to upgrade it.

Even if you could get OS X to run on it, it would be slower than my 90 year old grandma.
 
there's a hack for this, something you do to the installer script or something, to get X onto unsupported Macs. i can't think of the name, and i'm not nice enough to go look it up. Google it. Don't know if it supports panther tho, last i knew it was jag-- then again, this was a while ago.

paul
 
dukemeiser said:
I know it is not officially supported by Apple for Panther, which requires built-in USB. I'm not sure about previous OS X. What version of OS 9 is on it? The most current version is 9.2.2, and if you don't have that you probably need to upgrade it.

Even if you could get OS X to run on it, it would be slower than my 90 year old grandma.
Click to expand...
The most recent version of MacOS 9 that the PowerMac 8600 supports is MacOS 9.1. You can install MacOS X on this machine if you use XpostFacto.
 
I had 10.2 installed on my 7600 using XPostFacto. Worked fine but was quite slow. The 7600 had a 400mhz g3 upgrade, usb & firewire cards that all worked. I think the only problems was i couldnt use my printer through the serial port and the CD drive wouldnt work in osX, I had to install it an external CD burner. It was more stable than 9.1 !!!!! I seem to recall it taking 4 or 5 hours to install! I got a feeling you might have to have a g3/g4 card or better installed.
 
If it's locking up that frequently with a clean OS 9 install, it's more likely hardware problems than the OS, assuming it's not some specific applications that are locking up. Malfunctioning RAM is the most likely cause.
 
Huezo said:
I received an old PowerMac 8600 because it wasnt being used anymore.
It works, I've fired it up in OS9 but it's too unstable for my taste. I made the OS lock up over 4 times in a matter of hours.
I've thought about installing OSX on it, but I dont know if it's even possible or which version would be best to install on it.

The system has a Radeon 7000 Video Card and 512MB RAM.

Any ideas? :D
Click to expand...


you need a G3 or G4 upgrade first before xpostfacto will work. xpostfacto does allow osx installs on unsupported machines but osx still needs a min. of a G3 cpu to run. it will not run on a 604 or 603 or any other cpu. you need a G3/G4/G5 to run osx period, no matter what mac it is.
 
And if you're considering getting a CPU upgrade, you might rethink that. You could put that money toward a newer Mac. I know it's fun to upgrade an old Mac, but trust me. It isn't worth it when you're done.
 
dukemeiser said:
And if you're considering getting a CPU upgrade, you might rethink that. You could put that money toward a newer Mac. I know it's fun to upgrade an old Mac, but trust me. It isn't worth it when you're done.
Click to expand...

Yeah, that's what I was thinking, I didnt know I needed a CPU upgrade card. Maybe I should just load up Linux on it :cool:
 
I believe the requirements for 9.2.2 were the same for that of OS X, so 9.1 would be the highest you could go. Even if you did get OS X workin somehow, it would be very slow and hardly suitable for use. I would second the recommendation for installing Linux.
 
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