Hi everyone!
Ah, the Mac of my dreams. The PowerBook G3. Still feel it's one of Apple's best to date. I had the wallstreet version as a kid, only to be thrown out once the hard drive went kaput and we didn't know what it meant. What a shame in hindsight!
The PowerBook G3 line holds immense sentimental value to me. It was my first Mac I could ever call truly my own, and it was where it all began for my Apple enthusiasm.
I found an incredibly lightly used PowerBook G3 Pismo 500 MHz with original power adapter, "working battery," and original DVD player on eBay. I got it for about $215. This PowerBook has a light scuff here and there, but it given it's 23 years old, it's in INCREDIBLE shape. I couldn't believe it when I opened it. The battery is not the original battery -- it was likely replaced in ~2005 or so with a non-OEM. I don't see any manufacturer on it, but certainly not an Apple Original. I don't really care - it looks like it could last 2-3 hours based on initial usage, possibly more. Can't believe it!
The Mac has Mac OS X 10.3.9 and Mac OS 9.2. It's got 512 MB memory and original 10gb HDD. Swapping the HDD for an SSD is the plan to give this a boost. It seems quite slow, even on OS 9.2, and I'm attributing it to the hard drive. Or, the fact that I'm typing this on a M1 MBP and I'm used to things being instantaneous 😂 No airport card, but given the challenge with accessing/viewing the internet on these old guys, I don't see much purpose.
My big question is: how do I take care of this old battery? It's got to be at least 18 years old (going to guess it was bought around 2005/2006 based on "last accessed"/"last opened" files on the current install on the Mac. The previous owner must have put very few cycles on it for it to be alive still. I would love to keep it alive as long as possible. I still can't believe I've stumbled across one working. Any thoughts? Any way for me to figure out how many cycles there are on this in Mac OS X 10.3? Not sure there's a coconut battery equivalent for that era, and there's no cycles listed in System Profiler.
I'm defaulting to Mac OS 9.2 right now as that's where the real sentimentality is. Might have to load it up with some software from the Macintosh Garden or something.
Had to share my excitement with a minority of Mac users, you - the PPC community!
Ah, the Mac of my dreams. The PowerBook G3. Still feel it's one of Apple's best to date. I had the wallstreet version as a kid, only to be thrown out once the hard drive went kaput and we didn't know what it meant. What a shame in hindsight!
The PowerBook G3 line holds immense sentimental value to me. It was my first Mac I could ever call truly my own, and it was where it all began for my Apple enthusiasm.
I found an incredibly lightly used PowerBook G3 Pismo 500 MHz with original power adapter, "working battery," and original DVD player on eBay. I got it for about $215. This PowerBook has a light scuff here and there, but it given it's 23 years old, it's in INCREDIBLE shape. I couldn't believe it when I opened it. The battery is not the original battery -- it was likely replaced in ~2005 or so with a non-OEM. I don't see any manufacturer on it, but certainly not an Apple Original. I don't really care - it looks like it could last 2-3 hours based on initial usage, possibly more. Can't believe it!
The Mac has Mac OS X 10.3.9 and Mac OS 9.2. It's got 512 MB memory and original 10gb HDD. Swapping the HDD for an SSD is the plan to give this a boost. It seems quite slow, even on OS 9.2, and I'm attributing it to the hard drive. Or, the fact that I'm typing this on a M1 MBP and I'm used to things being instantaneous 😂 No airport card, but given the challenge with accessing/viewing the internet on these old guys, I don't see much purpose.
My big question is: how do I take care of this old battery? It's got to be at least 18 years old (going to guess it was bought around 2005/2006 based on "last accessed"/"last opened" files on the current install on the Mac. The previous owner must have put very few cycles on it for it to be alive still. I would love to keep it alive as long as possible. I still can't believe I've stumbled across one working. Any thoughts? Any way for me to figure out how many cycles there are on this in Mac OS X 10.3? Not sure there's a coconut battery equivalent for that era, and there's no cycles listed in System Profiler.
I'm defaulting to Mac OS 9.2 right now as that's where the real sentimentality is. Might have to load it up with some software from the Macintosh Garden or something.
Had to share my excitement with a minority of Mac users, you - the PPC community!
