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KINGBEEZ36

macrumors newbie
Original poster
Jul 11, 2009
16
0
I have an old Mac IBook G3 that was gave to me. I'm new to Mac and was wondering if theres anything I could do to it? Its got 10.4 Tiger on it now. I've used windows forever and I like it already. Low on HD space and RAM. Any thoughts?
 
Bump the RAM up to the maximum 640MB (If it's a whitebook, not sure what the clamshell maxes out at) and the HD as big as you can get in PATA 2.5" form factor.
 
Its a white one. I know it can be paint but I wish I could clear it. Make it see-thru.
 
Its a white one. I know it can be paint but I wish I could clear it. Make it see-thru.

You can make it clear, but it's not really that cool. Remove the top case and bottom case and use 91% rubbing alcohol to remove the paint. A tooth brush and large tub helps so you can let it soak and scrub. I do suggest painting it. Krylon worked well when I helped my friend paint his G3 iBook black.

As for hardware upgrades, you need more RAM and a huge, fast hard drive. The hard drive will make it run a teeny bit hotter, but chances are it'll be quieter than the stock hard drive. It'll be a 2.5" IDE (PATA) hard drive, in the 5400 RPM sector. Perpendicular recording is a teeny bit faster. There's also the option of replacing the optical drive so you can burn DVDs. Another modification is to change the Sleep LED to your favorite color. Here's a slightly cliche one, but put a transparency of a picture, pattern or color under the backlit apple.

I'm glad to see someone putting older tech to new use and welcome to Mac.
 
Just something to keep in mind, I wouldn't spend too too much money on this machine. Speaking from experience, you'll likely be moving to a G4 or Intel machine in the coming months. I started out on a G3 too, and it works great to get used to OS X.. not so much for watching YouTube videos or anything remotely intensive.

Keep it real.
 
I thought the white and clear were to different pieces. lol But between the Aspire One and the IBook whats better. I also have a Acer netbook Windows PC. I love Window till it started a war with me. I call that time World War Windows! lol Nothing but viruses, pop ups and errors everywhere. I also know nothing about Tiger can anyone inlighten me?
 
Mac OS X 10.4 (codenamed and marketed as "Tiger") is the fifth release of the popular Macintosh operating system known as Mac OS X (OS Ten in roman numerals). Mac OS X is the tenth release of Apple's operating system, following on from OS 9, OS 8, and so on.

OS X 10.4 follows on from what started as 10.0 in March 2001 (codenamed but not marketed as "Cheetah"), and since has been updated with 10.1 in September 2001 (codenamed but not marketed as "Puma"), then 10.2 in August 2002 (codenamed and marketed as "Jaguar"), which was followed by 10.3 in October 2003 (codenamed and marketed as "Panther") which preceded the operating system which you use, "Tiger". "Tiger" was released in April 2005, and wasn't followed up with OS X 10.5 (codenamed and marketed as "Leopard") until October 2007, making it the longest running version of OS X.

Each update brought with it a range of new features each time, with many refinements being made to the Operating System which decreased bugs and made the Finder (and all the other programs OS X came with) work better with each other and on their own. Each released version of OS X has numerous updates made available free of charge using Software Update, which fixes flaws and bugs that are present within the original release of that version.

The pattern works consecutively, with numbers. For "Tiger", the first update was called 10.4.1. This was followed by 10.4.2, which was succeeded by 10.4.3 and so on and so forth. This applies to the other operating system releases too, for example, 10.3.8 and 10.5.7.

The next release of the operating system is OS X 10.6 (codenamed and marketed as "Snow Leopard") coming in September 2009. As the codename will suggest, "Snow Leopard" is much more of a refinement to the current operating system, Leopard, and includes many new features relating to hardware support such as multiple cored processors, and higher numbers of RAM being made possible, etc. Since it's so much more of an update rather than a lot of new features being made, it will only be £20 or $29 for current Leopard users to upgrade.

Brand new Apple Macs are shipped with the latest operating systems as standard, and they also come with Apple's productive suite known as iLife which comprises of iDVD, Garageband, iMovie, iPhoto, and iWeb. These are updated every year, so users can either pay for upgrades, pay for versions not as upgrades or get it free with a new Mac (find more info here).

If you need any more information about the operating systems or iLife, then check out both the Apple website or Wikipedia. If you need more help after that, don't hesitate to either Google your question or ask it to us here at Macrumors. Welcome to the Mac World :)
 
On top of the very thorough set of information above, I can attest that Tiger seems to be the best version of OS X to run on both G3 and G4 macs. There is even software out there that will allow you to disable some more memory-intensive features in Tiger to make it better suited to older hardware.
 
On top of the very thorough set of information above, I can attest that Tiger seems to be the best version of OS X to run on both G3 and G4 macs. There is even software out there that will allow you to disable some more memory-intensive features in Tiger to make it better suited to older hardware.

Very true, Tiger runs well on older G4s and G3s when things like Dashboard are turned off. Just keeping a good maintenance level on your system (such as checking login items and Activity Monitor) can keep an old machine running perfectly.

However, that website which you hyperlinked to, I noticed it says this
System Requirements

* Mac OS X 10.5 or later

So it won't work with Tiger unfortunately.
 
Mac OS X 10.4 (codenamed and marketed as "Tiger") is the fifth release of the popular Macintosh operating system known as Mac OS X (OS Ten in roman numerals). Mac OS X is the tenth release of Apple's operating system, following on from OS 9, OS 8, and so on.

OS X 10.4 follows on from what started as 10.0 in March 2001 (codenamed but not marketed as "Cheetah"), and since has been updated with 10.1 in September 2001 (codenamed but not marketed as "Puma"), then 10.2 in August 2002 (codenamed and marketed as "Jaguar"), which was followed by 10.3 in October 2003 (codenamed and marketed as "Panther") which preceded the operating system which you use, "Tiger". "Tiger" was released in April 2005, and wasn't followed up with OS X 10.5 (codenamed and marketed as "Leopard") until October 2007, making it the longest running version of OS X.

Each update brought with it a range of new features each time, with many refinements being made to the Operating System which decreased bugs and made the Finder (and all the other programs OS X came with) work better with each other and on their own. Each released version of OS X has numerous updates made available free of charge using Software Update, which fixes flaws and bugs that are present within the original release of that version.

The pattern works consecutively, with numbers. For "Tiger", the first update was called 10.4.1. This was followed by 10.4.2, which was succeeded by 10.4.3 and so on and so forth. This applies to the other operating system releases too, for example, 10.3.8 and 10.5.7.

The next release of the operating system is OS X 10.6 (codenamed and marketed as "Snow Leopard") coming in September 2009. As the codename will suggest, "Snow Leopard" is much more of a refinement to the current operating system, Leopard, and includes many new features relating to hardware support such as multiple cored processors, and higher numbers of RAM being made possible, etc. Since it's so much more of an update rather than a lot of new features being made, it will only be £20 or $29 for current Leopard users to upgrade.

Brand new Apple Macs are shipped with the latest operating systems as standard, and they also come with Apple's productive suite known as iLife which comprises of iDVD, Garageband, iMovie, iPhoto, and iWeb. These are updated every year, so users can either pay for upgrades, pay for versions not as upgrades or get it free with a new Mac (find more info here).

If you need any more information about the operating systems or iLife, then check out both the Apple website or Wikipedia. If you need more help after that, don't hesitate to either Google your question or ask it to us here at Macrumors. Welcome to the Mac World :)

haha that sounds like a bing commercial
 
Yah I would not spend any money on a G3 book at this point either, time has passed it by except for use as a spare. You could maybe read your mail off it in a pinch, some light browsing, it will be slooooooooow on the internet.

Just use it for text processing, and maybe to play music that you rip from CDs, you could take the output to decent speakers. It won't handle high density video or streaming video off the net. You could import your photos and make simple slideshows of them okay.

Some games probably work ok on it like Bejeweled or the like but nothing video-action-intensive.

I had a G3-700 that I used in the kitchen, had recipes on it and some music but that's about it. It was like a portable radio with a recipe box inside... now I use a G4 ibook there, the same way.
 
Can I put a 1GB ram card from an Acer Aspire One in it? I have a spare Acer laying around. I think the max is 648mb???? Why would the ibook be so slow??? I had a Windows ME desktop with less ram and hd space and it could run games and video. Where can I get a serial decoder?
 
Can I put a 1GB ram card from an Acer Aspire One in it? I have a spare Acer laying around. I think the max is 648mb???? Why would the ibook be so slow??? I had a Windows ME desktop with less ram and hd space and it could run games and video. Where can I get a serial decoder?

Probably not. The G3 iBook uses PC-100 SO-DIMM RAM. If the Acer is new'ish, it's probably DDR based, you'll have to check though.
 
Found this out.

Model: Mxxxx iBook G3 500MHz
Group1: iBook
Group2: G3
CPU speed: 500MHz
Bus speed: 66MHz
Screen size: 12 inch
Memory - number of slots: 1
Factory: UV (Taiwan)code_to_number: 1PQ - W88230VF0P5

Production year: 2001
Production week: 32 (August)
Production number: 1962 (within this week)
 
Found this out.

Model: Mxxxx iBook G3 500MHz
Group1: iBook
Group2: G3
CPU speed: 500MHz
Bus speed: 66MHz
Screen size: 12 inch
Memory - number of slots: 1
Factory: UV (Taiwan)code_to_number: 1PQ - W88230VF0P5

Production year: 2001
Production week: 32 (August)
Production number: 1962 (within this week)

You got the lowest-end one :(.

I don't think that is really worth investing any. Your max memory will only be 576mb since only 64mb is soldered to the motherboard. You also have the slower bus. I believe the VRAM is only 4mb also too.
 
:(

I guess I could save up gut it and put all new internals in.:) Does anyone make an updated board for it? Other stuff anyone can think to look for.

ChocolateJesus
Ahh the ol' 12" form factor. These go for a decent amount on eBay, lucky you!
So why am I lucky????
 
:(

I guess I could save up gut it and put all new internals in.:) Does anyone make an updated board for it? Other stuff anyone can think to look for.

ChocolateJesus
So why am I lucky????
It's not really worth investing any money into a G3. The G3s also are plagued with faulty logic boards...

If you do want to invest in it, you can upgrade it with a 900mhz logic board. That with 640mb of memory and a faster hard drive will be OK for basic stuff like web browsing and youtube and your typical old word processing.

I guess you are lucky because of the form factor. It's a great size and typically everyone wants Apple to bring out a 12" Macbook(Pro). It's the closest thing to a netbook Apple has.

Oh check out the link in my sig if you want to get some ideas of stuff to do with iBooks :).
 
Awesome mods. Definitely not doing the clear ibook now that I see the internals. Might be cool to do if you added led lights. Say green or blue.
 
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