older mac upgrade advice

External Since: Jul 02, 2007 Posts: 4

I just finished refurbishing 2 older Macs. They were free and dirt cheap so I
couldn't resist.

(side note: I have always drooled about getting a Mac ages ago but could never
afford one. Most of my current systems were built from parts or dumpster dives and
so run Slackware Linux except for the "newer" AMD64 3000+ which dual boots WinXp and
Slamd64.)

They both run great and both are pretty much stock (except as noted below). The
older one,

Power Macintosh 9500/132 PowerPC 604e, 1GB HD, OS 9.2.2

works well except for the SCSI CDROM is having problems (doesn't always read a CD on
insert). Also, OS 9 software looks hard to find these days. The newer one,

Blue & white G3 350MHz, 640MB DRAM, 40 GB and 10 GB HD, CDRW/DVD combo, OS 10.4.10

Both run well on my polyglot WindowsXP/Linux network and can access the DSL
modem/router for WWW and Internet.

The 9500 is probably a lost cause these days, but is it worth upgrading the B&W G3
with more RAM, a G4 and a faster (if I can find one) PCI video card?

Thanks for the help.

Ed

External Since: Dec 16, 2003 Posts: 230

On 7/2/07 2:16 PM, in article 46894f00$1@nntp.zianet.com, "King Beowulf"
wrote:

> I just finished refurbishing 2 older Macs. They were free and dirt cheap so I
> couldn't resist.
>
> (side note: I have always drooled about getting a Mac ages ago but could
> never
> afford one. Most of my current systems were built from parts or dumpster
> dives and
> so run Slackware Linux except for the "newer" AMD64 3000+ which dual boots
> WinXp and
> Slamd64.)
>
> They both run great and both are pretty much stock (except as noted below).
> The
> older one,
>
> Power Macintosh 9500/132 PowerPC 604e, 1GB HD, OS 9.2.2
>
> works well except for the SCSI CDROM is having problems (doesn't always read a
> CD on
> insert). Also, OS 9 software looks hard to find these days. The newer one,
>
> Blue & white G3 350MHz, 640MB DRAM, 40 GB and 10 GB HD, CDRW/DVD combo, OS
> 10.4.10
>
> Both run well on my polyglot WindowsXP/Linux network and can access the DSL
> modem/router for WWW and Internet.
>
> The 9500 is probably a lost cause these days, but is it worth upgrading the
> B&W G3
> with more RAM, a G4 and a faster (if I can find one) PCI video card?
>
> Thanks for the help.
>
> Ed

The B&W will old 1gb RAM if you're lucky. I've had some that would only take
768.

Look at Sonnet Technology's site; they sell processor upgrades (among
others). IMHO, it's not worth the cost of the processor, ram and video card
you contemplate. You can get a G4 on Ebay for the money.
--
Brian Ehni