PowerBook G4- Ubuntu or Mac OS X?

[bunnspecial]

Personally, I never saw exactly what was better about Leopard over Tiger - save for this "eye candy" that everyone recommends turning off. I mean, I'll give Leopard some points for having better software support; but that just comes due to the fact that it's the more recent of the two, and at least for me, Handbrake is the only application I can think of at the moment of which the Leopard version has features that are of benefit.

On Tiger, I have TenFourFox for browsing, TenFourBird for email, iTunes for music and VLC for media, Audacity for editing, Office 2004 for documents; I rarely touch other applications, and these all do the job I need them to. I recognize that not everyone is as simple as I am in computing needs, but I see no need for cover flow in Finder, Stacks or Spaces, or any of the other features Leopard touts over its predecessor.

I guess it's all a matter of perspective. I use the finder features of Leopard pretty heavily, and find myself somewhat cramped when I use Tiger seriously.

Office 2008(or newer) is an absolute necessity for my work as I need to both read and edit XML documents. Of course, the requirements for O2008 are massively overstated, and it will actually run fine(albeit slowly) on a G3 under Tiger.

 

[eyoungren]

Personally, I never saw exactly what was better about Leopard over Tiger - save for this "eye candy" that everyone recommends turning off. I mean, I'll give Leopard some points for having better software support; but that just comes due to the fact that it's the more recent of the two, and at least for me, Handbrake is the only application I can think of at the moment of which the Leopard version has features that are of benefit.

On Tiger, I have TenFourFox for browsing, TenFourBird for email, iTunes for music and VLC for media, Audacity for editing, Office 2004 for documents; I rarely touch other applications, and these all do the job I need them to. I recognize that not everyone is as simple as I am in computing needs, but I see no need for cover flow in Finder, Stacks or Spaces, or any of the other features Leopard touts over its predecessor.

Well, that is probably the difference (what you and I use our OS for). I am a big user of spaces. But I am often in multiple programs all day. It's just easier to switch a space to get to related apps versus wading through windows to get to the right one (in the right app).

Leopard has better print server capability. Leopard has a better Finder in PC/Mac/Server environments. Leopard has better networking capabilities.

Incidentally, I don't really use Stacks and I do not use Cover Flow either. But there are a ton of underhood improvements over Tiger that benefit me. If the Finder crashes with servers connected for instance, Leopard will maintain the link to the server. Tiger just disconnects from it. No big deal if you're not really in the environment I am, but if Tiger drops a connection while I'm working, InDesign is going to terminate in the middle of working on a document. No save, no possibility of quitting gracefully, ID just stops dead - because the connection was dropped.

Sure that may be more of an issue with ID, put at least Leopard will keep the server connected when Finder bombs.

Just little things like that that drive me to Leopard.

 

[Dronecatcher]

Personally, I never saw exactly what was better about Leopard over Tiger - save for this "eye candy" that everyone recommends turning off.

I agree if you want to squeeze every last drop of performance from your machine. However, for me, the deal breaker is Safari5/Webkit/ClickToPlugin - need Leopard for that combo.
If a machine only goes online occasionally, I install Tiger - all my important stuff works in Tiger.

 

[val1984]

Personally, I never saw exactly what was better about Leopard over Tiger - save for this "eye candy" that everyone recommends turning off. I mean, I'll give Leopard some points for having better software support; but that just comes due to the fact that it's the more recent of the two, and at least for me, Handbrake is the only application I can think of at the moment of which the Leopard version has features that are of benefit.

One advantage of Leopard vs Tiger is that it has finer kernel locking which results in less problems when you multitask, particularly when accessing network shares.
If you have quite a bit of time ahead of you, you may read John Siracusa's in depth review.

 

[happyfrappy]

I tried ubuntu on my powerbook a while back and could not get it working. Black screen. I think it had to do with the nvidia graphics vs. ati in the other powerbooks.

You need to use Lubuntu/Xubuntu spin on 12" PowerBook G4s & early nVidia 17" as it included the nVidia detection as part of the boot process.

Ubuntu never worked properly on nVidia based Macs after Unity, some have managed to force compatibility mode via boot flags but you run the risk of Ubuntu+Unity getting stuck at 800x600 resolution and manually needing to edit the system file after installing--2nd monitor support glitches pre-miniDVI 12" PBs too. Haven't touched Ubuntu since the Unity nightmare, its been downhill for PPC optimization since.

 

[SkyBell]

Yeah, I've always heard Leopard had much better networking capabilities than Tiger; I do remember one time trying to connect my eMac and an old Windows XP machine I had, and it certainly wasn't quick and painless. But, I was doing that just for the "fun" of it; as long as I have no troubles connecting to a WiFi network, that's as far as I need "networking" to go.

Above all else I suppose, I really enjoy Tiger's visual design, and Leopard just doesn't do it for me. Call it vain if you want, but an ugly OS just puts me off.

 

[eyoungren]

Call it vain if you want, but an ugly OS just puts me off.

LOL!!!

That's one of the reasons I like Leopard more than Tiger.

Hehehe…if Tiger appeals to you visually, might I suggest Panther? It's got a lot more of that brushed metal Tiger uses!

 

[bunnspecial]

LOL!!!

That's one of the reasons I like Leopard more than Tiger.

Hehehe…if Tiger appeals to you visually, might I suggest Panther? It's got a lot more of that brushed metal Tiger uses!

Or get a new Intel Mac and run Yosemite or El Capitan

 

[MysticCow]

Or get a new Intel Mac and run Yosemite or El Capitan

My gut still turns over Yosemite. It's to the point where I like Windows 10 better and that's saying something.

 

[flyrod]

Is mintPPC still around? I read that was pretty quick on a powerbook.

 

[SkyBell]

LOL!!!

That's one of the reasons I like Leopard more than Tiger.

Hehehe…if Tiger appeals to you visually, might I suggest Panther? It's got a lot more of that brushed metal Tiger uses!

I actually had Panther on an old clamshell iBook of mine, and aside from the lack of Spotlight and nil application support, I quite enjoyed it.

 

[bunnspecial]

I actually had Panther on an old clamshell iBook of mine, and aside from the lack of Spotlight and nil application support, I quite enjoyed it.

I have said before on here that Tiger is the oldest version of OS X that I will consider using for any serious use(although I do have older versions installed on some computers, including one with everything from PB to 10.5). The main reason is application support(specifically TFF). I also love Spotlight, although I realize this is somewhat controversial.

 

[eyoungren]

I actually had Panther on an old clamshell iBook of mine, and aside from the lack of Spotlight and nil application support, I quite enjoyed it.

Panther is actually one of my favorite OS X versions.

Oh, it's BORING as hell in the interface department but other than Leopard it was one of the most solid versions of OS X I've used yet in a mixed network environment. Finder was absolutely solid and I had very few issues.

Jaguar however was just a trainwreck to try and connect to a mixed network - let alone use on that network.

 

[eyoungren]

I have said before on here that Tiger is the oldest version of OS X that I will consider using for any serious use(although I do have older versions installed on some computers, including one with everything from PB to 10.5). The main reason is application support(specifically TFF). I also love Spotlight, although I realize this is somewhat controversial.

You can drive QuarkXPress 6.5.1, Acrobat 6.04 Pro (with Enfocus Pitstop Pro 6 and Quite A Box of Tricks), Photoshop 7.0.1 and Illustrator 10 on Panther. InDesign 2.0 also works on it as well.

I had that load out for YEARS for our newspaper. Daily production.

 

[weckart]

Haven't touched Ubuntu since the Unity nightmare, its been downhill for PPC optimization since.

And if Unity didn't suck enough, the overhead due to the forced inclusion of Amazon results in any search killed Ubuntu for me, which I quite liked up until then. I know Canonical was looking for ways to monetise Ubuntu and is far from the fluffy, tree-hugging open-source outfit it likes to portray itself as but that was one hell of a disappearance up its own fundament.