PowerPC Macs Are Useless...

[mmphosis]

I tried NoScript and then uMatrix. Thanks eyoungren.

I like the "scalpel" that uMatrix provides. I spent a lot of time making boxes red or green in the matrix for a single page on a website. Wow, just wow, there was so much unncessary stuff! The main page of the site actually works with my brutal "shotgun" approach, but I'll try uMatrix.

 

[eyoungren]

I tried NoScript and then uMatrix. Thanks eyoungren.

I like the "scalpel" that uMatrix provides. I spent a lot of time making boxes red or green in the matrix for a single page on a website. Wow, just wow, there was so much unncessary stuff! The main page of the site actually works with my brutal "shotgun" approach, but I'll try uMatrix.

Yeah, uMatrix gives some fine granular control and really lets you know where all the web requests are coming from.

Some people (@Dronecatcher) prefer NoScript though, which is why I mentioned it. Either way, filtering this garbage out without having to shut the entire thing off is preferable.

I use uMatrix to filter out a lot of the analytic sites. Don't need them tracking me and that's the single biggest thing that slows sites down. uMatrix also allows you to filter out ads so that's another good thing.

Hope it works for you.

 

[Macbookprodude]

Question is how will PPC life be in 2019 ?

 

[1042686]

I anticipate not very different tomorrow as it was today.

 

[captainfamicom]

I recently got a PB G4 12" at 1.5 gigahertz. I must say, its performance was underestimated, as I didn't expect it to be as fast as it is. It makes a great netbook (better than any Atom made in 2008 or 2018) and gets the job done. I may even port over some emulators for those who want to use their Mac Mini instead of a Raspberry Pi. People calling older computers useless really comes down to the use case they are put under. Some say a Win 95 computer is useless simply due to the fact it can't browse the web. People say that an older GPU is useless because it cant play the newest games 4K Ultra 144 hertz. I love my older computers and they work for my needs. Heck, I know a guy who uses a first gen Pentium 4 for MAME. I feel as if I jumped onto the PPC bandwagon late, but hey, at least I enjoy using them.

On a side note are there any new web standards that may hurt PPC usage?

 

[nglevin]

I can see 32 bit PPC getting a bit tougher as the open source world has less reason to consider 32 bit architectures.

Recent experience building QEMU 3.1 is picking up some obvious issues like the use of "long" (32 or 64 bit integer type depending on target arch) instead of "long long" (always a 64 bit integer type) for storing what has to be a 64 bit integer, and the expected runtime crashes that happen when those bad assumptions are made.

I'm curious if the recent if niche Talos II and Blackbird hype (*cough*) might mean a little more 64 bit PPC support. Maybe there will be some reason for the G5s to start being worth more in the second hand market than the cost of shipping? Who knows.

 

[psychicist]

I can see 32 bit PPC getting a bit tougher as the open source world has less reason to consider 32 bit architectures.

Recent experience building QEMU 3.1 is picking up some obvious issues like the use of "long" (32 or 64 bit integer type depending on target arch) instead of "long long" (always a 64 bit integer type) for storing what has to be a 64 bit integer, and the expected runtime crashes that happen when those bad assumptions are made.

I'm curious if the recent if niche Talos II and Blackbird hype (*cough*) might mean a little more 64 bit PPC support. Maybe there will be some reason for the G5s to start being worth more in the second hand market than the cost of shipping? Who knows.

Support for 32-bit PPC is already deteriorating in upstream projects but some people are working on fixing bugs and issues so those should be ironed out. The availability of Talos II and Blackbird POWER9 desktops and workstations means that for the first time in a decade there are high-end systems that allow developers to fix and optimise open source software. These are also not more expensive than Powermac G5 machines 15 years ago. People with G4 and G5 machines will benefit from that work, as more software gets VMX (Altivec) and VSX support and overall optimisations for the architecture.

I don't have a Talos II or a Blackbird motherboard and just use QEMU for emulating PPC systems on my x86 laptop. This mostly works fine even if there are still some bugs in QEMU that cause Firefox and Epiphany to crash, but I expect these to be solved over time. I filed a bug report and some QEMU developers are looking at the problem. What is however most ironic is that Apple stopped developing PowerPC versions of Mac OS X more than a decade ago, especially now that POWER9 is a viable alternative to Intel and AMD processors. This even gives continuity to older PPC processors as they can run the same software as the latest and greatest hardware, if you retain backward compatibility in the binaries.

So it is not really an issue of the hardware not being capable. Intel, AMD, POWER9 and ARM processors are all highly capable and fast for running the latest operating systems. And if Apple didn't have an incentive to push their own hardware, they could support all of these with up-to-date Mac OS just like NeXT did before they got bought out by Apple.
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IMO no computer is truly "useless". Every computer ever made, will likely still be able to do most of the same things now, that it could do back when it was new. A PowerBook G4 now, can still watch video/DVD, edit photos, play music, mix audio, write documents, create presentations, and browse Wikipedia, just as well now as it could back then.
What has changed, is that newer computers are better at doing that stuff now, it's not that older computers have gotten any worse at doing those jobs, it's just that newer computers have gotten better/faster.

Sadly, there are some things that have/will get worse on the old computers, thanks to the internet. Since newer computers are getting faster, websites get more bloated to "take advantage of" these faster computers, this of course, makes the browsing experience on older computers, much worse(since they can't handle these huge Javascript-based websites).

Lastly, there is also a software component. For example, with 16GB of RAM, a 1TB SSD, and a 2TB 7200RPM HDD, and a Quadro FX 4500, a Quad G5 should still be able to handle almost everything a modern PC or modern Mac can. But, it can't because no one writes new software that will work on it(OS X 10.5 was the last PowerPC supported MacOS version, and no one writes apps that support 10.5 anymore let-alone PowerPC-optimized 10.5 apps. Linux is just as bad, because although some distros still support PowerPC, and have new apps, almost none of them are optimized for PowerPC so they run slower than they really should.)

I don't think Linux is just as bad. The problem is that PPC was never the primary hardware architecture for Linux when Powermacs were being sold and few developers owned one. For the first few years most users would also be using Mac OS 10.4 and 10.5 as those were still fully supported. Now that it is a decade later and Linux is the primary operating system on newer POWER hardware you can expect more people to buy these systems and develop and optimise software for the architecture. Few people know PPC assembly for example so it will take quite a bit of time for people to learn and apply patches to open source software. And after that it may take quite a bit longer before this optimised software will be included in newer distributions. But you can be assured that Linux and FreeBSD will get better.

People just like being able to buy new and fast hardware, which is something that wasn't possible in the PPC world for a long time until now. So just wait and sit back for faster software to arrive. Or if you are a developer you can help out with lots of projects out there. What will probably not change is new development for Mac OS 10.4 and 10.5 unless people from the Mac world write new software for these older operating systems. I am still interested in the possibilities of Darling to run older Mac software for PPC on newer POWER-based Linux desktops.

 

[powermi]

What we need is encourage developers to keep Linux 32bits PowerPc version still alive and updated, the thing is that most of the users don't really realize that powerPc G4 is the more reliable computer architecture ever created.
So maybe we need a movement for pushing Linux world to stay alive for us.

 

[mmphosis]

What we need is encourage developers to keep Linux 32bits PowerPc version still alive and updated, the thing is that most of the users don't really realize that powerPc G4 is the more reliable computer architecture ever created.
So maybe we need a movement for pushing Linux world to stay alive for us.

Even though CPUs are deemed X-bit that does not mean software and operating systems are limited by those number of bits. The PowerPC G4 has 64-bit operations and a 128-bit vector processing unit! Software can be written and is written to handle bit patterns of varying sizes. Software is also written that imposes ridiculous false limits: ie. Y2K.

The whole X-bit cpu / operating system debacle makes me cringe. The limit on the number of bits comes from poor design decisions, for example from the ancient x86 world -- an 8-bit / 16-bit CPU with segment registers (glorified bank switches in registers), or way back in the '90's on the Mac, I've dealt with the 24-bit to 32-bit "clean" transition. It's 2019, and on an x86 laptop running Xubuntu:

ls -d /lib*

/lib /lib64​

64-bit libraries and x-bit libraries? Breakage. Confusion. Many of the problems are from assumptions we make as programmers and making things way more complicated than they need to be. How could anyone need more than 640K RAM or even 2Gb / 4Gb of RAM? Or, 4-digit years? Well, of course we do.

There is some good work being done to build Linux for our old PowerPC Macs: Void, and other Linux distros.

 

[LordeOurMother]

When I was in high school I used a powermac G5 and powerbook g4 without any issues. I still have my powerbook around today as a back up laptop in case my macbook air goes awry (although so far it's been a quite remarkable machine.)

I have in total 2 or maybe 2 G5s laying around back home in the USA, but when I moved to the UK I purchased a Mac Pro 1,1 so I could have something that's more current for university. I'm hesitant to let them go as I enjoy having them around, but I may sell my 1.6 ghz model eventually. In all honesty right now I get more web incompatibility from Lion than I used to with leopard, so I've purchased a new graphics card for the 1,1 and intend to install El Capitan in the next week or two. When I graduate and move on to my masters I suspect I will buy a newer mac pro.

Not much has changed with these machines compatibility wise since I was using them as my main drivers 4-5 years ago, and if I was told today that I had to go back to a powermac G5, if that means I could retain all my old programs from that time I would not complain. Not many computers that you can buy for $50 that come with 8 GB of ram and dual 2 or more ghz processors. At the time I was making a lot of music, editing 720p video, typing reports for university, etc.

Also the powerbook g4 aluminum-era keyboard is still the best keyboard on a mac laptop ever.

There's also much to be said for purchasing 'pro' level hardware even if it's 10-15 years old, it feels much more premium than a comparable black windows device would, and if you use software from its era it absolutely demolishes it.

 

[z970]

Furthermore, the benchmarks are running under Linux, which again, we all know isn't optimised to run on PowerPC.

Apologies if this reply is rather late, but I disagree. Speaking for myself, all applications I run under PPC Linux are usually faster than under OS X, when all potential tweaks and optimizations are applied under both operating systems (preload, swappiness, vfs cache pressure, etc; QuartzGL, 2DExtreme, AudioIPCDriver, etc.). Arctic Fox is always a joy to use. A non-tweaked TenFourFox, while I applaud Dr. Kaiser for formulating such a brilliantly engineered web browser as it, makes me want to shoot myself.

I believe people here have that notion because whenever Linux comes into the question, Ubuntu is almost always the distribution of choice. And speaking from personal experience, Debian installs are typically slimmer and less bloated than Ubuntu installs are. A Debian LXDE desktop will generally perform better than a Lubuntu desktop from the same timeframe.

Of course, we still haven't gotten a good idea of what Fienix performs like either, given that it isn't released yet. Though it's getting there. Updated images were produced on February 1st.

(Linux/BSD don't count because people don't buy Mac's to run Linux, people buy Mac's to run OS X)

Unless some people aren't trying to buy Macs, but comfortably powerful desktop RISC machines that do not break the bank.

I find that I closely share Dr. Kaiser and zen's views (http://tenfourfox.blogspot.com/2018/01/why-my-next-laptop-isnt-gonna-be-mac.html), (http://powerpcliberation.blogspot.com/2012/09/claim-your-computing-freedom.html) on PowerPC Macs, and for that matter, Apple in general.

They've got the greatest architecture inside, and can run great things besides OS X. The problem is, for the longest time, they were the only usable option of having a non-Intel desktop machine. That's finally changed with the Talos II, but not everyone has the funds to drop on their model of choice, so that leaves me remaining here, because this subforum happens to be one of the best places for keeping this hardware alive in the world of today.

And that is all.
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Macrumors is particularly bad about this since they redesigned it a couple years ago. I used to be able to browse MR with Netsurf or Dillo from my PowerBook and it was perfectly usable. Now it's a disaster if you don't have Javascript, which really grinds my gears because it isn't necessary.

[this post frustratingly posted from Dillo]

I find that using the plain text editor over the main one for writing comments and such works much faster. There's no bells and whistles, but I'd rather write something than stylize it.

 

[Dronecatcher]

I believe people here have that notion because whenever Linux comes into the question, Ubuntu is almost always the distribution of choice.

My experience with PPC Linux has been Debian mostly and some Lubuntu but only on Powerbooks - I can't personally vouch for G5 performance but suspect more is made of 64bit optimisations? Even with a skeletal Debian install, I could never get Debian to match OSX for speed and seeing as the majority of apps I use have no Linux analogues it's not really of any consequence as OSX will remain my main environment.
My suspicion over the failings of PPC Linux is I've yet to see any comparative benchmarks or real world examples online?

 

[z970]

My experience with PPC Linux has been Debian mostly and some Lubuntu but only on Powerbooks - I can't personally vouch for G5 performance but suspect more is made of 64bit optimisations? Even with a skeletal Debian install, I could never get Debian to match OSX for speed and seeing as the majority of apps I use have no Linux analogues it's not really of any consequence as OSX will remain my main environment.
My suspicion over the failings of PPC Linux is I've yet to see any comparative benchmarks or real world examples online?

Though I have based most of my experiences on a G5, I think my new motto is: Everyone's Mileage Will Vary. There's a reason why I included the prefix "speaking for myself".

I think the lesson is to use what makes you happiest. That is after all, the entire reason a PowerPC community even exists.

But I believe we must try Fienix and Sid to have a fully conclusive comparison before we reach any definitive conclusions. Those, in my eyes, are the most promising Linux options today, at least as far as software support goes.

I also need to give Adelie Linux a try, when it matures a little more. One of these days.

 

[wicknix]

To be fair on the linux vs osx comparisons, one should really use yellowdog or ubuntu 10 or something that was released closer to tiger/leopards release dates. Those distros were a fair bit lighter, as was the software available at that time. Comparing a 2016 or 2018/19 linux to a decade old osx with decade old software really isn't a fair test. The linux kernel and some distros use of systemd has become somewhat bloated over the years, and the software has generally gotten heavier as well (same with newer intel OSX releases). With that said, i doubt anything will beat tigers boot time (except MorphOS), but web browsing on tiger is downright horrible. Lubuntu and Leopard share a similar boot time, and web browsing is generally comparable (depending on browser used), but slightly better under linux. Application launch speed on any of the 3 OS's are so similar i don't really notice much difference. That is why i triple boot my G5 however. Each OS has it's own advantages/disadvantages over the other. I boot linux for newer software and better web browsing. I boot tiger/leopard for music/dvd creation. Win, win.

Cheers

 

[z970]

To be fair on the linux vs osx comparisons, one should really use yellowdog or ubuntu 10 or something that was released closer to tiger/leopards release dates. Those distros were a fair bit lighter, as was the software available at that time. Comparing a 2016 or 2018/19 linux to a decade old osx with decade old software really isn't a fair test. The linux kernel and some distros use of systemd has become somewhat bloated over the years, and the software has generally gotten heavier as well (same with newer intel OSX releases). With that said, i doubt anything will beat tigers boot time (except MorphOS), but web browsing on tiger is downright horrible. Lubuntu and Leopard share a similar boot time, and web browsing is generally comparable (depending on browser used), but slightly better under linux. Application launch speed on any of the 3 OS's are so similar i don't really notice much difference.

I couldn't have said it any better myself.

That is why i triple boot my G5 however. Each OS has it's own advantages/disadvantages over the other. I boot linux for newer software and better web browsing. I boot tiger/leopard for music/dvd creation. Win, win.

Brilliant technological harmony greatly leveraging community solutions.

In other words, making wonderful use of each OSes natural strengths and abilities.

I adore that concept, and make use of it every day.

 

[mzs.112000]

For a G5, I don't really see an issue with continuing to use them in 2019, especially if you are doing a triple-boot, since you can choose what OS you want to use at bootup. I can see myself using Mac OS X 10.5 for most of my daily tasks, Linux for anything that really needs up-to-date software, and MorphOS for anything the really needs blazing speed.

The only thing that would(for me) stop me from just having 10.5 on there and not dual-booting or anything would likely be the lack of updated software for it.
If Firefox or Chrome was still updated, along with LibreOffice and VLC, I wouldn't care. Of course, MS Office 08 is still quite usable(and IMO it's got a better UI than LibreOffice).
I would really like it if a modern Chromium-based browser was available(Chromium is open-source, it's basically Google Chrome, but without Flash or Java support.)

My dream G5 is probably a Quad, with the full 16GB RAM, a 2TB SATA SSD, along with an additional 2TB 7200RPM drive, I would install a FX4500 or ATI X1900 GPU.

 

[redheeler]

My dream G5 is probably a Quad, with the full 16GB RAM, a 2TB SATA SSD, along with an additional 2TB 7200RPM drive, I would install a FX4500 or ATI X1900 GPU.

All the issues the Quads have with the liquid cooling might make you think twice about that. I still have a Quad that I built myself a couple years ago (received the CPUs and LCS as one unit, no signs of leakage as far as I could tell), but had to switch back to a dual-core 2.3 GHz because the CPUs began overheating.

From what I understand you can take one of the 2.5 GHz CPUs from the Quad, use it to upgrade a dual-core 2.0 GHz or 2.3 GHz, and have one of the fastest Power Mac G5s with air cooling instead of the problematic liquid cooling. I may try that sometime in the future, but to be honest I don't use the dual-core G5 all that often these days; and the dual-core 2.3 GHz I have set up now also seems to have issues, though not related to overheating.

 

[z970]

From what I understand you can take one of the 2.5 GHz CPUs from the Quad, use it to upgrade a dual-core 2.0 GHz or 2.3 GHz, and have one of the fastest Power Mac G5s with air cooling instead of the problematic liquid cooling. I may try that sometime in the future, but to be honest I don't use the dual-core G5 all that often these days; and the dual-core 2.3 GHz I have set up now also seems to have issues, though not related to overheating.

The dual-cores and the Quads have different rated power supplies. Would it indeed be possible to reliably power a single processor 2.5 GHz with the DC's PSU? And although this is likely a redundant question, would it even fit in the socket?

I always sort of held off from upgrading the CPU, because the 2 GHz 970MP could be considered one of the most energy-efficient G5s ever (given the efficiency improvements from the MP over the FX), and though increasing the clock speed would fasten the system, it would also draw more power, defeating one of the revision's main benefits.

 

[mzs.112000]

All the issues the Quads have with the liquid cooling might make you think twice about that. I still have a Quad that I built myself a couple years ago (received the CPUs and LCS as one unit, no signs of leakage as far as I could tell), but had to switch back to a dual-core 2.3 GHz because the CPUs began overheating.

From what I understand you can take one of the 2.5 GHz CPUs from the Quad, use it to upgrade a dual-core 2.0 GHz or 2.3 GHz, and have one of the fastest Power Mac G5s with air cooling instead of the problematic liquid cooling. I may try that sometime in the future, but to be honest I don't use the dual-core G5 all that often these days; and the dual-core 2.3 GHz I have set up now also seems to have issues, though not related to overheating.

I have heard of the LCS issues.
I also plan on sealing up the LCS just to be safe, and applying new thermal paste to reduce overheating.

P.S. does anyone know if you could put 2 of the 2.7GHz CPU modules in there and basically get a quad 2.7GHz?

 

[redheeler]

The dual-cores and the Quads have different rated power supplies. Would it indeed be possible to reliably power a single processor 2.5 GHz with the DC's PSU? And although this is likely a redundant question, would it even fit in the socket?

I always sort of held off from upgrading the CPU, because the 2 GHz 970MP could be considered one of the most energy-efficient G5s ever (given the efficiency improvements from the MP over the FX), and though increasing the clock speed would fasten the system, it would also draw more power, defeating one of the revision's main benefits.

I don't see why the power supply wouldn't be able to handle a single 2.5 GHz G5 in place of a single 2.3 GHz G5; Apple typically left some overhead for power-hungry expansion cards, etc. when choosing a power supply. And yes, the socket is the same for all the Late 2005 G5 CPUs.

For the Quad, you not only have a second 2.5 GHz CPU drawing power, but also the liquid cooling. Hence the need for a bigger power supply.

I have heard of the LCS issues.
I also plan on sealing up the LCS just to be safe, and applying new thermal paste to reduce overheating.

P.S. does anyone know if you could put 2 of the 2.7GHz CPU modules in there and basically get a quad 2.7GHz?

The 2.7 GHz CPUs were only found in the Early 2005 models, and they are not dual-core each, only single-core each.

 

[mzs.112000]

I don't see why the power supply wouldn't be able to handle a single 2.5 GHz G5 in place of a single 2.3 GHz G5; Apple typically left some overhead for power-hungry expansion cards, etc. when choosing a power supply. And yes, the socket is the same for all the Late 2005 G5 CPUs.

For the Quad, you not only have a second 2.5 GHz CPU drawing power, but also the liquid cooling. Hence the need for a bigger power supply.

The 2.7 GHz CPUs were only found in the Early 2005 models, and they are not dual-core each, only single-core each.

Oh okay, I thought the Dual-core 2.7Ghz was like the Dual-core 2.0Ghz ones, where its a single CPU module that contains 2-cores...

 

[z970]

For the Quad, you not only have a second 2.5 GHz CPU drawing power, but also the liquid cooling. Hence the need for a bigger power supply.

Ah, that makes sense.
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Oh okay, I thought the Dual-core 2.7Ghz was like the Dual-core 2.0Ghz ones, where its a single CPU module that contains 2-cores...

An all too common misconception...

 

[amagichnich]

For a G5, I don't really see an issue with continuing to use them in 2019, especially if you are doing a triple-boot, since you can choose what OS you want to use at bootup. I can see myself using Mac OS X 10.5 for most of my daily tasks, Linux for anything that really needs up-to-date software, and MorphOS for anything the really needs blazing speed.

The only thing that would(for me) stop me from just having 10.5 on there and not dual-booting or anything would likely be the lack of updated software for it.
If Firefox or Chrome was still updated, along with LibreOffice and VLC, I wouldn't care. Of course, MS Office 08 is still quite usable(and IMO it's got a better UI than LibreOffice).
I would really like it if a modern Chromium-based browser was available(Chromium is open-source, it's basically Google Chrome, but without Flash or Java support.)

My dream G5 is probably a Quad, with the full 16GB RAM, a 2TB SATA SSD, along with an additional 2TB 7200RPM drive, I would install a FX4500 or ATI X1900 GPU.

There are dev and Alpha Builds of LibreOffice 5 and I think even 6 for PPC Macs, I just cannot find a link right now. Maybe later

 

[mzs.112000]

There are dev and Alpha Builds of LibreOffice 5 and I think even 6 for PPC Macs, I just cannot find a link right now. Maybe later

I checked the dev build and nightly build server from LibreOffice, the only ones are for MacOS x86_64(64bit Intel).
I think there used to be some unofficial PowerPC builds somewhere, not sure where though. It doesn't matter really, since MS Office 08 works, it's not supported anymore, but it still writes documents, still makes presentations and it still prints, and that's all it needs to do for me.

 

[kasuja00]

There are dev and Alpha Builds of LibreOffice 5 and I think even 6 for PPC Macs, I just cannot find a link right now. Maybe later

I found on the internet release 4.3.0 beta 2 and 5 alpha. Do you think that 5 is based upon a 4.3.0 definitive (but never released) or upon the beta2 of 4.3.0?
Did you tried them? Thanks