Last of the 'Classic' Machines
Here is a list of the 'best' machines that will boot in to the old Classic Mac OS. Kind of a footnote to the current (and aging) machines, but will anyone actually miss the ability to boot up in Mac OS 9?
So here they are:
iMac G4 800 MHz
eMac G4 800 MHz
iBook G3 800 MHz
PowerBook G4 1 GHz (15")
Power Mac G4 Dual 1.25 GHz
iMac G3 700 MHz
That doesn't mean they won't offer processor upgrades for certain machines, but it kind of makes you think about how strange it is that these will be the last of the Macs we grew up with.
On to 'bigger and better' things I guess, but these Macs will probably hold their value for a longer time as people still might want to buy a Mac that boots into Mac OS 9 a year or two down the road.
[ 01-25-2003: Message edited by: Fran441 ]</p>
So here they are:
iMac G4 800 MHz
eMac G4 800 MHz
iBook G3 800 MHz
PowerBook G4 1 GHz (15")
Power Mac G4 Dual 1.25 GHz
iMac G3 700 MHz
That doesn't mean they won't offer processor upgrades for certain machines, but it kind of makes you think about how strange it is that these will be the last of the Macs we grew up with.
On to 'bigger and better' things I guess, but these Macs will probably hold their value for a longer time as people still might want to buy a Mac that boots into Mac OS 9 a year or two down the road.
[ 01-25-2003: Message edited by: Fran441 ]</p>
Comments
when I boot into 9 my mac looks and feeld like its mine, the gui etc has been completely customised with 3rd party bits and resedit to look the way I want it to. I have 3rd party add ons to make my working easier. When I boot into X my mac looks like any other mac on the planet. why? because I am scared stiff to do anything to it. I don't understand how X works well enough to believe confidently that I could sort out any mess. If I put on some 3rd party gizmos I can't be sure they will work under 10.2.4 for example. equally, I've found that removing stuff is NOT as straightforward as just throwing the folder into the trash as so many here have claimed. unlike 9 where you can go into the system folder and throw any lingering files - you cannot do this with X. hell, in X most of the files don't even have any reasonable names or icons. In 9, even if you didn't know what a file did you could tell what it was related to by its name or icon.
Finally, when X first came out I screamed blue murder at the inclusion of a CLI. I was (and still am) totally opposed to the idea of a CLI. Of course practically every pro X poster blasted me for my apparent narrow mindedness and replied with the immortal line
"stop whining you <insert your expletive of choice>. For the last time, if you don't want to use any command line stuff then you WON'T have to. you'll never see it."
of course since getting X the number of times I've had to resort to the command line to fix problems such as undeleteable files, fsck-ing my system, starting in single user mode to sort out problems - often suggested by the same people who told me I'd never have to see it.
I really want to love X. I adore the way it looks. I just wissh it was a true mac and not just a macified Unix box.
9 is gonna be around for a while yet as I think many people haven't moved to X for similar reasons to me and not the usual QuarK et al excuses
Wait, you say there's a way to fix those nagging bugs and undeleteable files? A command line interface? Fixing problems in your GUI with a command line interface... an OS that takes up four times the disk space and 3 times the memory of its predecesser while having half the features... this sounds familiar... Oh yeah... Microsoft.
A year and a half ago I switched for a reason, I was fed up with instability and DOSlike problem solving in my OS. While X does give me the stability, though no more or less than 9, I always feel restricted when I use it, like it's preventing me from efficiently using my computer. Very often I get frustrated with something simple not working, like changing the IP address or connecting to my PowerBook so I simply reboot into 9 and the problem is solved.
I don't feel that X is ready yet. We all have X now, not because it is superior or better developed, but because it is Steve's pet and he loves it. Sorry Steve, but I'm not a super-geek, I cannot speak binary or any programming languages, command lines tick me off. I will miss 9 sorely on the day that non-updated hardware drivers and X only apps drive me from it. Hopefully by then X will have matured into the smooth and simple OS that 9 is. In preparation for the Jobs-enforced X only future I'm trying very hard to use it on a daily basis and get comfortable with it, but it's slow going.
For those of you wondering, I run X.2.3 on a SP Quicksilver 867 with 512 megs of RAM. The PowerBook I mentioned is a WallStreet G3 233 with 192 megs of RAM and runs 9.2 only. I mention this so no one thinks my problems stem from running X on unsupported hardware like a beige G3 or something.
Guess I've gotten enough off my chest for today... what was the topic again? Oh yeah... yes, I will miss 9.
[ 01-26-2003: Message edited by: Guartho ]</p>
I felt just as you did when I started to use X at version 10.0. Of course, back then, it was very frustrating and it was easy to forget about it and go back to 9.
As X matured, it got better, faster, more "mac-like" and some applications started coming out that made it easier to stay in X for longer periods of time. At 10.1 I was in X 100% of my time. (I obviously am not a power user but I do use my mac in the business world with the PC crowd.)
The hardest thing about using X is when you first start out. OS 9 was a good friend and we were all quite comfortable with it. Force yourself to use it. Keep your mind open and yes, you could still go back to 9. I think you will find though that if you can be in X for a few straight weeks, you will see what the rest of X users see. It is more mac like than you now believe. In fact, I looked at 9 on a machine in a camera shop the other day and it looked very foreign.
Don't worry about CLI. You'll never know it is there. The beauty of the Unix background is the community it has added to our mac family. Problems or bugs that are found quite often are solved by these new members. If you want to fix the problem instantaneously, you could use CLI. But usually, if you wait for a few days, an update is offered that is easily installed in a mac interface.
There is a tremendous amount of developer activity for X and it is hard for me to remember when this much was ever going on in the pure macworld.
There are a lot of enhancment applications that you can use to modify your mac in OS X. I haven't used many if any of them because I like X enough as it is.
You will also find that it is easy to throw away software or files if you use the improved finder. Just use the name of the app and add the found items to the trash. Easy. You never need to go into the System folder with X. You don't have to fiddle with extensions, etc. You won't find the conflicts in X that you find in 9.
Since I have been on X for over 2 years, I have spent more time having fun (okay some of it is work) and way less time worrying about conflicts, crashes, etc. X just keeps on working.
With all of the fun apps such as the iLife package and the countless third party items working in 10.2 and higher, soon you and the rest of our mac brothers will be swayed to X. It is a good thing.
I had to learn perl for work. I was able to run everything from the terminal and it looked exactly the same as it did when I Telnet into our corporate Unix servers.
Also, the same CLI is why one of my co-workers purchased a Mac for his home, something I don't think he would have done with OS 9.
I'm trying to learn everything I can about the computer world (I'm a recent grad and in IT so I need to try to get ahead). OS X is offering even more chances to do that at home. At the same time, I have no concerns about putting it on my mom's computer other than I would like to be around the first day she starts using it just because she will have a couple of questions, just like she does every time she gets a new program.
[code]
[Whitey:~] pinko% uptime
10:49PM up 17 days, 6:22, 6 users, load averages: 0.07, 0.11, 0.32
</pre><hr></blockquote>
Thanks Steve.
<strong>Goodbye 9, you total piece of sh*t, I'll only miss 8. The last 'classic' OS update that made my mac faster, more enjoyable, and fuller featured. And as for X...
[code]
[Whitey:~] pinko% uptime
10:49PM up 17 days, 6:22, 6 users, load averages: 0.07, 0.11, 0.32
</pre><hr></blockquote>
Thanks Steve.
OMG... My PM G4 400 AGP with 512 Mb ram, lies around .80 to .95 in the middle..
Jumping to 10.2 was hard for a week or two, nothing was were it should be simple stuff like dragging a file to the deskop meant it would copy to the HD.
Months later i have never ever started classic and using 9 for some games only. In fact 9 feels as primitive as Os 6 felt compared to 9.
I love the mutitasking and the modern file browsing in X and I am willing to pay some performance penalty and even to lose some things from 9. Not that I can recall a single feature that I really miss <img src="graemlins/cancer.gif" border="0" alt="[cancer]" />
My advice is to buy something like the "the missing manual" for X and use a couple of evenings to systematically learn X, you will love the cool cat
The only conceivable nicety of being able to boot into classic is VGS, but I don't play video games too much anymore, and when I do, it's usually on one neighbor's PS2 or another neighbor's Xbox.
As it stands right now, I'm not using a single Classic application on even a monthly basis (had to do some messing in ResEdit a couple of weeks ago, but that's about it), and I'm very, very close to deleting my OS 9 folder and just plugging the drive containing my pre-OSX system into a Firewire case whenever I need to visit the Stone Age...