I've been using a G3/400 iMac as my desktop media server for about a year now. It's worked out well, but the Achilles' heel turned out to be its lack of USB 2.0 ports. Since FireWire got Betamaxed by high-speed USB, it was time to find a newer machine in order to be able to synch my iPod in anything less than geological time scales, as well as use newer portable hard drives for backup or music storage.
Fortunately, even late model eMacs are available for a song on FleaBay these days, so I picked up a 1.25GHz DVD eMac for under a c-note.
Doing the software update dance now...
Score! My emac is still running fine, I think it's ten years old.
ReplyDelete(He typed, on his $25.00 G5. Don't be hating.)
I was merely thinking that some readers might understand why I needed a newer Mac...
ReplyDeleteNow that they've put serious processors in the Imac, I'm only awaiting for decent engineering software to be ported to it, and switch over. I'm a Unix geek at heart, and the OS-x is a damned fine OS. No overhead, no forests of DLLs to wade through to get stuff done. If all I was doing was word processing and storing pics and music etc, I'd already be there. I hate steve jobs, but I now hate Bill Gates just a teeny bit more.
ReplyDeleteAfter what I paid for my current laptop, all I can say is ... dammit. Ima go with a netbook next time.
ReplyDeleteand, like betamax, 1394 is so much better than usb 2 (for its intended purpose) that I'm left scratching my head by the outcome.
ReplyDelete@ Anon: The backwards compatability of USB stuff pretty much guarenteed it's success with the general public.
ReplyDeleteBeta found a niche in broadcast quality camcorders and survived long after the public had given up on it, I'd expect Firewire will do the same with those who truly benefit from it's advantages.
og: Well, y'know it'll boot Windows completely natively, and run it alongside OSX in a virtual machine at something like 90% of native speed...
ReplyDeleteSig, the point is not to run windows, but to not run windows.
ReplyDelete