Just how far can we go?

[robertdsc]

Regarding G5's as a daily driver, I do that every day.

I've mentioned my setup in the past but I'll go over it here:

Dual Processor 2.0, 5 GB RAM, 2TB of space among four (2x250, 1x500, 1x1TB) drives. Radeon 9600XT 128MB ADC/DVI video card/Radeon 9200 128MB PCI video card. My acrylic Cinema HD display goes into the 9600XT, an HP 19 inch monitor goes into the 9200.

I run Tiger 10.4.11. My dock has 34 applications in it. Just about every single app gets use through the day or during the week. Everything I use works without fail.

Over the past several years, I haven't had the funds to buy newer Intel Macs. I picked up Gretzky in May 2013 for $100. Before then, the applications and operating system worked without fail on a G4 466, PowerBook G4 500, PowerBook G4 1.67, a G4 Dual 1.25 MDD, and a G4 Dual 1.0 MDD. But the G5 has become such a treat and rock solid (to date) that I went and set the Dual 1.25 MDD aside for a second Dual 2.0 G5, named Alison. That Mac has an exact duplicate of Gretzky's OS and application setup and does video transcoding. I am very well aware that Intel Macs would be light years faster, but the movies I make on Alison are ones that work without fail on multiple platforms.

In short, I use my G5s to do my daily business and have next to zero problems because everything I use is something I know that works. Period.

The only reason I am considering getting a newer Mac Pro tower is two-fold: I want to record widescreen HD video and be able to manage my iDevices with iOS. Otherwise, I'm perfectly happy with my G5s. If both of them died, I'd go back to the G4 MDDs. And so on and so forth until I was able to get another G5.

Is my setup perfect for today's environment? No. I'll admit that. But what I use works and I *know* it works. I'm fine with that.

 

[wobegong]

Image


Now if you really want the best of both worlds, here is a mini classic I put together.
Image

Image

REAL classics and spotless too, highly impressive they look like they should be in a display case

 

[reco2011]

Now if you really want the best of both worlds, here is a mini classic I put together.
Image

Is that really an ADB keyboard / mouse plugged into the Mini?

 

[BJonson]

Is that really an ADB keyboard / mouse plugged into the Mini?

Yes. Using iMate adapter. Works perfect.

 

[reco2011]

Yes. Using iMate adapter. Works perfect.

Very cool.

 

[noodle654]

Sadly, yesterday I got rid of my last PPC machine. Sold off my DC G5 to someone that had always wanted a G5. It was a great machine, not 1 problem ever. If my software didn't require an Intel processor I would have kept it. But as of now the last thing I need is another computer collecting dust.

 

[2984839]

It appears that Sports Illustrated has read through this thread and decided to savagely beat the PPC with a war hammer made of Javascript. Check out the new abomination that is SI.com: http://www.si.com/nfl

 

[Altemose]

it appears that sports illustrated has read through this thread and decided to savagely beat the ppc with a war hammer made of javascript. Check out the new abomination that is si.com: http://www.si.com/nfl

Evil!

 

[Hrududu]

It appears that Sports Illustrated has read through this thread and decided to savagely beat the PPC with a war hammer made of Javascript. Check out the new abomination that is SI.com: http://www.si.com/nfl

Jeesh! It basically brought the 20" iMac G4 to its knees with Safari. I'll have to see what CPU usage looks like on one of the MDD machines.

 

[Altemose]

Jeesh! It basically brought the 20" iMac G4 to its knees with Safari. I'll have to see what CPU usage looks like on one of the MDD machines.

Crashed Leopard WebKit completely, TFF opened it slowly with issues displaying parts, and my browser worked okay but was slow.

 

[eyoungren]

OK, I guess this is where my optimizations and addons come in to play.

Page loads on TenFourFox with NoScript blocking everything in about 10 seconds.

Once I give si.com permission to load JS through NoScript it takes about 30 seconds.

Giving timeinc.net permission from NoScript drags page load time out to about 1 minute.

Denying taboola.com permission to load reduces page load time to about 40 seconds.

It helps that NoScript is blocking three or four different analytic sites (scorecardresearch I HATE YOU!) as well. It's usually the analytics sites that hit hard with JS.

Finally, I have Local Load which is an addon that forces javascript to use local JS libraries (i.e, from your hard drive) instead of loading JS from the internet server.

I was able to scroll smoothly and additional content loaded up as I scrolled down within an acceptable time frame. I did however note that the ENTIRE time I was on the site my CPU was spiked to 100%. But despite that, navigation and menus weren't an issue.

Guys, this is where Mozilla has it over Webkit. Sorry!

 

[2984839]

Opening the home page is actually worse (save your work before clicking this link): http://www.si.com

With Firefox 26, CPU usage was at 99% on the PowerBook, the CPU temp jumped by 5 C, and it hadn't even begun to load images when I mercifully closed it. Dillo refused to render it properly and gave me a massive scrollable list of links, most of which wouldn't open. Netsurf had tears in its eyes when it gave up. I couldn't even scroll down.

On the MBP, CPU temps jumped by 6 C, Firefox was eating 45% of the CPU, and the page was noticeably laggy. And that's on a Sandy Bridge i7.

Programming like that is going to kill the PPC for general purpose web browsing pretty soon. I have so far resisted the urge to report SI.com as an attack site.

----------

OK, I guess this is where my optimizations and addons come in to play.

Page loads on TenFourFox with NoScript blocking everything in about 10 seconds.

Once I give si.com permission to load JS through NoScript it takes about 30 seconds.

Giving timeinc.net permission from NoScript drags page load time out to about 1 minute.

Denying taboola.com permission to load reduces page load time to about 40 seconds.

It helps that NoScript is blocking three or four different analytic sites (scorecardresearch I HATE YOU!) as well. It's usually the analytics sites that hit hard with JS.

Finally, I have Local Load which is an addon that forces javascript to use local JS libraries (i.e, from your hard drive) instead of loading JS from the internet server.

I was able to scroll smoothly and additional content loaded up as I scrolled down within an acceptable time frame. I did however note that the ENTIRE time I was on the site my CPU was spiked to 100%. But despite that, navigation and menus weren't an issue.

Guys, this is where Mozilla has it over Webkit. Sorry!

NoScript is cheating.

It is, however, the only way to reasonably use a PPC on the modern internet.

 

[Altemose]

OK, I guess this is where my optimizations and addons come in to play.

Page loads on TenFourFox with NoScript blocking everything in about 10 seconds.

Once I give si.com permission to load JS through NoScript it takes about 30 seconds.

Giving timeinc.net permission from NoScript drags page load time out to about 1 minute.

Denying taboola.com permission to load reduces page load time to about 40 seconds.

It helps that NoScript is blocking three or four different analytic sites (scorecardresearch I HATE YOU!) as well. It's usually the analytics sites that hit hard with JS.

Finally, I have Local Load which is an addon that forces javascript to use local JS libraries (i.e, from your hard drive) instead of loading JS from the internet server.

I was able to scroll smoothly and additional content loaded up as I scrolled down within an acceptable time frame. I did however note that the ENTIRE time I was on the site my CPU was spiked to 100%. But despite that, navigation and menus weren't an issue.

Guys, this is where Mozilla has it over Webkit. Sorry!

My browser never hit more than 75% usage on my G5 with none of those extensions

 

[eyoungren]

NoScript is cheating.

It is, however, the only way to reasonably use a PPC on the modern internet.

Yeah, LOL! But cheating is the only way in regards to this.

Seriously, half the crap cluttering sites out there is either social or analytics.

Page load time 1 minute 20 seconds.

Got that down to 55 seconds by denying the social sites and most of the stuff I didn't recognize.

Still 100% CPU but also still scrollable and responsive. I'm on T4FX 24.6 by the way.

Oh, note too something I found that's interesting.

Kaiser mentioned in one of his blog posts for T4Fx 31 that this about:config option set to false would speed things up a bit in 31: set layers.offmainthreadcomposition.enabled

Now, that setting does not exist in 24. So, I added it and set it to false. And I got a bit of a speed boost.

Take that as you will!

 

[Altemose]

Yeah, LOL! But cheating is the only way in regards to this.

Seriously, half the crap cluttering sites out there is either social or analytics.

Page load time 1 minute 20 seconds.

Got that down to 55 seconds by denying the social sites and most of the stuff I didn't recognize.

Still 100% CPU but also still scrollable and responsive. I'm on T4FX 24.6 by the way.

Oh, note too something I found that's interesting.

Kaiser mentioned in one of his blog posts for T4Fx 31 that this about:config option set to false would speed things up a bit in 31: set layers.offmainthreadcomposition.enabled

Now, that setting does not exist in 24. So, I added it and set it to false. And I got a bit of a speed boost.

Take that as you will!

I take it as Kaiser is trying to optimize 31 as best he can because he knows Firefox really did him over on this one. And I think Microsoft just did away with Skype 2.8 today...

 

[Member2010]

browsing and macbook

Actually, plugin support was deprecated. It's not broken, it's just permanently disabled.

The reason was security. There was a Java malware issue a while back that hit Intel Macs pretty hard, but because T4Fx allowed the use of plugins it also technically made PowerPC Macs vulnerable to attack through the browser.

Cameron Kaiser noted that this actually happened, but because the payload being delivered used Intel specific code it actually didn't affect PowerPC users.

However, Kaiser disabled plugins for later versions of the browser because of that.

And in the end it was the smarter decision. By using extensions we can circumvent it with a far more usable and secure measure...

If you ask me, that was just one of the last nails in the coffin for it. Lack of Flash can be a real dealbreaker. Sadly, there is no extension-based "replacement" for flash.

Today is the first day in about a week that I booted my Intel MacBook Pro. Does it handle the web better? Yes! My big thing is that since my needs aren't changing any time soon, I can happily have my one Intel and a couple of PCs along with my PPCs. The Internet is going to be more of a pig every day, and sloppy code is bringing them to the demise, but until it is unusable, let's keep one using them until they die.

...
I also bought the following for $150.00 on Craigs List a few months ago:

http://www.everymac.com/systems/apple/macbook/specs/macbook-core-2-duo-2.0-black-13-specs.html

This one had the RAM upgraded to 2GB but the HD downgraded to 80GB (I suspect at some point the original HD was removed as the HD tray was not with it either). It has the standard chipping along the edges but otherwise it's in great condition.

...

That's pretty neat; I just got one a couple months ago myself. A gift from a friend - the catch? It was pretty beat up and taken apart. My eyes have been opened over the last few months, and I think one of the only things in laptop repairs that is worse than fixing a 2006 Core2Duo MacBook is trying to fix one that someone has already tried to "fix" and left in pieces and put in a box with no organization. Over a dozen different sizes of screws - seriously apple?

I've already got Windows 8.1 on the thing and it plows through anything the G5 could and more. For a 2006 laptop, I am very impressed.

...

My financial situation is such that I have to justify $20-40 or above purchases because that's gas money. Or a good portion of my water bill. But show me the decent Intel Mac that's in that price range right now. Even the broken machines are asking higher prices!

So, while I'd be with you on getting something Intel for my daily driver, it's just not been in my price range to do so. So, PowerPC has still served as my daily driver because of that.

I've seen people buy regular computers and load OSX on them, if that's really your thing and you want to save money while you're at it .

Sadly, yesterday I got rid of my last PPC machine. Sold off my DC G5 to someone that had always wanted a G5. It was a great machine, not 1 problem ever. If my software didn't require an Intel processor I would have kept it. But as of now the last thing I need is another computer collecting dust.

I'm thinking of doing the same thing myself. The G5 is at a point where it has more cash value to me than it does value as a useful computer. It was certainly a cool experience. I learned all sorts of things and made some money on top of that. And that fantastic shiny case...

OK, I guess this is where my optimizations and addons come in to play.

Page loads on TenFourFox with NoScript blocking everything in about 10 seconds.

Once I give si.com permission to load JS through NoScript it takes about 30 seconds.

Giving timeinc.net permission from NoScript drags page load time out to about 1 minute.

Denying taboola.com permission to load reduces page load time to about 40 seconds.

It helps that NoScript is blocking three or four different analytic sites (scorecardresearch I HATE YOU!) as well. It's usually the analytics sites that hit hard with JS.

Finally, I have Local Load which is an addon that forces javascript to use local JS libraries (i.e, from your hard drive) instead of loading JS from the internet server.

I was able to scroll smoothly and additional content loaded up as I scrolled down within an acceptable time frame. I did however note that the ENTIRE time I was on the site my CPU was spiked to 100%. But despite that, navigation and menus weren't an issue.

Guys, this is where Mozilla has it over Webkit. Sorry!

Oh gosh - NoScript! I thought I was the only one who used that. It's got to be the most frustrating thing I deal with on a regular basis; the only thing that stops me from uninstalling it is seeing all those erroneous scripts that it blocks, but sometimes it's just a huge waste of time going through playing another game of "which scripts do I need to unblock to get some degree of functionality out of this website?". For those who don't use NoScript - ignorance is bliss .

 

[Altemose]

If you ask me, that was just one of the last nails in the coffin for it. Lack of Flash can be a real dealbreaker. Sadly, there is no extension-based "replacement" for flash.





That's pretty neat; I just got one a couple months ago myself. A gift from a friend - the catch? It was pretty beat up and taken apart. My eyes have been opened over the last few months, and I think one of the only things in laptop repairs that is worse than fixing a 2006 Core2Duo MacBook is trying to fix one that someone has already tried to "fix" and left in pieces and put in a box with no organization. Over a dozen different sizes of screws - seriously apple?

I've already got Windows 8.1 on the thing and it plows through anything the G5 could and more. For a 2006 laptop, I am very impressed.



I've seen people buy regular computers and load OSX on them, if that's really your thing and you want to save money while you're at it .



I'm thinking of doing the same thing myself. The G5 is at a point where it has more cash value to me than it does value as a useful computer. It was certainly a cool experience. I learned all sorts of things and made some money on top of that. And that fantastic shiny case...



Oh gosh - NoScript! I thought I was the only one who used that. It's got to be the most frustrating thing I deal with on a regular basis; the only thing that stops me from uninstalling it is seeing all those erroneous scripts that it blocks, but sometimes it's just a huge waste of time going through playing another game of "which scripts do I need to unblock to get some degree of functionality out of this website?". For those who don't use NoScript - ignorance is bliss .

Flash is a pig. What do you do with a pig? You kill it before it gets too fat and uses all your resources (RAM and CPU). Hackintoshes are a big tinkering project....

 

[eyoungren]

Oh gosh - NoScript! I thought I was the only one who used that. It's got to be the most frustrating thing I deal with on a regular basis; the only thing that stops me from uninstalling it is seeing all those erroneous scripts that it blocks, but sometimes it's just a huge waste of time going through playing another game of "which scripts do I need to unblock to get some degree of functionality out of this website?". For those who don't use NoScript - ignorance is bliss .

I use NoScript is conjunction with Request Policy. If I've not been to a site before I then allow Request Policy to load images. Generally that's enough. I have NoScript set to block everything on a per site basis by default. It's also my FlashBlocker so I don't have to have an additional plugin (which takes up more ram).

If I need to run JS or I'm staying on the site for a while I will tell NoScript to allow just the site itself. Generally that lets the necessary stuff load while denying the analytics and social sites.

It's only if I plan to return and use a site regularly that I'll resort to fine grain controls on it.

I also use Block Site, so even if I've allowed something with NoScript and it's in Block Site's blacklist it won't load anyway. I especially use this to kill all the YouTube crap that Google News insists on linking to. Works pretty well.

 

[Altemose]

I use NoScript is conjunction with Request Policy. If I've not been to a site before I then allow Request Policy to load images. Generally that's enough. I have NoScript set to block everything on a per site basis by default. It's also my FlashBlocker so I don't have to have an additional plugin (which takes up more ram).

If I need to run JS or I'm staying on the site for a while I will tell NoScript to allows just the site itself. Generally that lets the necessary stuff load while denying the analytics and social sites.

It's only if I plan to return and use a site regularly that I'll resort to fine grain controls on it.

I also use Block Site, so even if I've allowed something with NoScript and it's in Block Site's blacklist it won't load anyway. I especially use this to kill all the YouTube crap that Google News insists on linking to. Works pretty well.

It is astonishing that you need all that to get a half-decent web browsing experience...

 

[eyoungren]

It is astonishing that you need all that to get a half-decent web browsing experience...

Well…yeah. But this is where I've sacraficed speed for customization.

I could have pure speed just using webkit browsers. But I don't get the customized experience I want. I can get the customized experience I want in T4Fx using the addons I like and not even having the others. But then I get a dog slow, ram hungry, cpu-intensive experience.

All these additional addons and tweaks bring me to a point of compromise between the two. I'm never as fast as I'd love to have in webkit. But I'm never as slow as I would be if I didn't make any of these adjustments. It's a tradeoff I'm comfortable with.

 

[Altemose]

Well…yeah. But this is where I've sacraficed speed for customization.

I could have pure speed just using webkit browsers. But I don't get the customized experience I want. I can get the customized experience I want in T4Fx using the addons I like and not even having the others. But then I get a dog slow, ram hungry, cpu-intensive experience.

All these additional addons and tweaks bring me to a point of compromise between the two. I'm never as fast as I'd love to have in webkit. But I'm never as slow as I would be if I didn't make any of these adjustments. It's a tradeoff I'm comfortable with.

It is a shame though that you need that to make it usable. There is no reason you should need that many extensions on top of your customizations when a Pentium 4 piece of junk handles it fine, and your QS has more power.

 

[rjcalifornia]

I was thinking the same thing. I remember back in 2009 I could browse facebook, ebay, twitter, etc with my ibook G3. Nowadays, can't do the same thing, due to the fact that those sites are loaded with things we don't need.

It is a shame but we will have to update by 2016. It has been a good ride, I've been using both my ibook and powerbook nonstop for months.

 

[MysticCow]

I was thinking the same thing. I remember back in 2009 I could browse facebook, ebay, twitter, etc with my ibook G3. Nowadays, can't do the same thing, due to the fact that those sites are loaded with things we don't need.

It is a shame but we will have to update by 2016. It has been a good ride, I've been using both my ibook and powerbook nonstop for months.

Regular Twitter is horrible on my PowerPCs. Mobile Twitter is just plain awesome and I actually like the mobile Twitter better. Haven't tried mobile Facebook on PowerPC.

 

[TacticalDesire]

I think that's where my main problem now lies. I enjoy working on these Macs and I enjoy the challenge of making them useful, but at a certain point when I'm investing more time in trying to make it work than I am in using and enjoying it…well the novelty and the fun wear off.

I'm getting tired too, like Cameron Kaiser. I just want a machine that works, not one I have to repaste thermal compound on, fix broken parts, replace things or try and figure out what the best about:config options in the browser are. When you keep trying and trying and you keep getting less and less…well I've pretty much had enough.

I saw your comment about Skype in the news section. This is a problem for me. One of my hobbies is role playing games (the old pencil/paper/dice type). I have a friend I've been trying to get to play rpgs with and now he's moved out of state. When he settles we're going to try it via Skype. I've done that before, but if MS cuts us off I either have to find another way or an Intel Mac. This limit on me is not the fault of PowerPC of course, but it's out of my control. Finding a work around if I have to will take more time and effort and I'm just not sure if I'm up to that any more. My interest in making all of this work is waning.

Could you just use the skype app on your phone?

 

[Altemose]

Could you just use the skype app on your phone?

I think Microsoft just killed our version of Skype for PowerPC...