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Non-Titanium Powerbooks G4s????

post #1 of 26
12/10/01 at 3:02pm
Thread Starter 
Were any of the Powerbook G4s NOT titanium???

A friend of mine received a Powerbook G4 as a gift and she isn't a Mac person. I said I would trade her my Intel notebook for her PBG4. Hers is a G4-400, mines a P3-450.. I think I'm getting the long end of the stick.

I asked her if it's a titanium colored computer, but she said no it's black.

It was my understanding that there are no black PBG4's. I looked all over the net and could find no black PBG4's.

Anyway, she's not a Mac gal so I walked her through checking the processor via system profiler. She said it's a G4 @ 400mhz.

What do you all make of it?? I'm a little confused here.
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post #2 of 26
12/10/01 at 3:15pm
[quote]Originally posted by hekal:
<strong>Were any of the Powerbook G4s NOT titanium???

A friend of mine received a Powerbook G4 as a gift and she isn't a Mac person. I said I would trade her my Intel notebook for her PBG4. Hers is a G4-400, mines a P3-450.. I think I'm getting the long end of the stick.

I asked her if it's a titanium colored computer, but she said no it's black.

It was my understanding that there are no black PBG4's. I looked all over the net and could find no black PBG4's.

Anyway, she's not a Mac gal so I walked her through checking the processor via system profiler. She said it's a G4 @ 400mhz.

What do you all make of it?? I'm a little confused here.</strong><hr></blockquote>

she has a Pismo G3 400mhz. not a G4.

or she is color blind or something
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post #3 of 26
12/10/01 at 3:23pm
Thread Starter 
I was thinking it's a G3. But I had her go into Apple System Profiler and check the CPU and she did report it as being a G4, and it was 400mhz because I asked her to look. She isn't overly Mac-saavy, but she's always said it's a G4. I am going to actually go look at it. As long as I know there are no black powebook G4's I am content.

Now this brings the next question, is it still worth the swap.

I have a PIII-450 notebook with 228megs RAM and an 18gig HDD. I told her I want to swap hard disks and she said that's fine.

How is a G3-400 compared to a PIII-450?
Can I swap the hard drive? It's a standard 2.5" IDE drive.

I plan to bump the RAM up to 512. So, my last question is.. How would a PBG3-400 with 512mb RAM handle OS X? Pretty decent?

If so, I'm all over it.


[quote]Originally posted by applenut:
<strong>

she has a Pismo G3 400mhz. not a G4.

or she is color blind or something</strong><hr></blockquote>
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post #4 of 26
12/10/01 at 3:27pm
The G3 will pretty much tear the PIII 450 to pieces. How large is the screen on it, and what are the dimensions?

A PB G3 with half a gig of RAM will run OS X pretty nicely. Not perfect, but fairly nicely.

Ask her to check out the other specs...HD and RAM etc. Don't trade until you know what you're getting! You could be getting one of three different Powerbooks if it has a 400MHz G3.
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post #5 of 26
12/10/01 at 3:33pm
Maybe she just misread it or something?
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post #6 of 26
12/10/01 at 3:49pm
Thread Starter 
Oh I plan to look at the thing before making the swap. Let me get specs on the Intel.

15.1" TFT screen
228megs current RAM, 288max
18gig hard disk, which I want to swap out with the PB G3.

Stuff like video and sound are irrelevant to me.

Do not know if the Intel uses ATA/66 or ATA/33.. I assume 66, which should work fine in the PB.

Any ideas?


[quote]Originally posted by MacAddict:
<strong>The G3 will pretty much tear the PIII 450 to pieces. How large is the screen on it, and what are the dimensions?

A PB G3 with half a gig of RAM will run OS X pretty nicely. Not perfect, but fairly nicely.

Ask her to check out the other specs...HD and RAM etc. Don't trade until you know what you're getting! You could be getting one of three different Powerbooks if it has a 400MHz G3.</strong><hr></blockquote>
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post #7 of 26
12/10/01 at 3:50pm
She proabbly has a PowerBook G3 Pismo. They are cool. Incredibly cool.
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post #8 of 26
12/10/01 at 3:58pm
Thread Starter 
Again I ask..

Will a 2.5" ATA66 hard disk from this PC notebook work in the Pismo?

[quote]Originally posted by cdhostage:
<strong>She proabbly has a PowerBook G3 Pismo. They are cool. Incredibly cool.</strong><hr></blockquote>
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post #9 of 26
12/10/01 at 4:08pm
Yes, the hard drives will swap fine, although you will have to do something to get the operating systems correct. I know you can boot from a Mac OS CD and install from that, but I don't know how windows does that sort of thing.

I was wondering, are there any G4 upgrade cards for Pismos yet? Because it might read as a G4 then... I don't keep up with all of those upgrades though, so I don't know if that's it.

-Ender
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post #10 of 26
12/10/01 at 4:13pm
Thread Starter 
The Win 2000 installer will blow away the Mac partition with no trouble.

As long as they are the same TYPE of drive I should be okay.

btw, I missed you guys.

Also, I do not think it was upgraded. She received it as a gift some months back. I need to just go have a look at it. I will report back once I find out more.


[quote]Originally posted by Ender:
<strong>Yes, the hard drives will swap fine, although you will have to do something to get the operating systems correct. I know you can boot from a Mac OS CD and install from that, but I don't know how windows does that sort of thing.

I was wondering, are there any G4 upgrade cards for Pismos yet? Because it might read as a G4 then... I don't keep up with all of those upgrades though, so I don't know if that's it.

-Ender</strong><hr></blockquote>
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post #11 of 26
12/10/01 at 4:42pm
Thread Starter 
Interesting, looks like the G3/400 Pismo uses a daughtercard for upgradability. Here's some info on everymac.com.

<a href="http://www.everymac.com/systems/apple/powerbook_g3/stats/powerbook_g3_400_fw.html" target="_blank">http://www.everymac.com/systems/apple/powerbook_g3/stats/powerbook_g3_400_fw.html</a>

The plot thickens.

[quote]Originally posted by hekal:
<strong>The Win 2000 installer will blow away the Mac partition with no trouble.

As long as they are the same TYPE of drive I should be okay.

btw, I missed you guys.

Also, I do not think it was upgraded. She received it as a gift some months back. I need to just go have a look at it. I will report back once I find out more.


</strong><hr></blockquote>
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post #12 of 26
12/10/01 at 4:55pm
[quote]Originally posted by Ender:
<strong>Yes, the hard drives will swap fine, although you will have to do something to get the operating systems correct. I know you can boot from a Mac OS CD and install from that, but I don't know how windows does that sort of thing.

I was wondering, are there any G4 upgrade cards for Pismos yet? Because it might read as a G4 then... I don't keep up with all of those upgrades though, so I don't know if that's it.

-Ender</strong><hr></blockquote>
Currently there is no upgrade for the Pismo. There is a 500mhz G4 upgrade for the Lombard though, weird.
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post #13 of 26
12/10/01 at 5:00pm
Thread Starter 
Okay.. hmm intereting.

She says it's a black case, and Apple System Profiler reads the CPU as a G4-400.

Hard disk is a 6gig, I had her do a get info on the drive.

RAM is 64mb.

It would have to be either a PB G3 upgraded to a G4 or she has one of these two models.

<a href="http://www.everymac.com/systems/apple/powerbook_g3/stats/powerbook_g3_400.html" target="_blank">Powerbook G3/400</a>

<a href="http://www.everymac.com/systems/apple/powerbook_g3/stats/powerbook_g3_400_fw.html" target="_blank">Powerbook G3/400 FW</a>

[quote]Originally posted by G4Dude:
<strong>
Currently there is no upgrade for the Pismo. There is a 500mhz G4 upgrade for the Lombard though, weird.</strong><hr></blockquote>

[ 12-10-2001: Message edited by: hekal ]</p>
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post #14 of 26
12/10/01 at 5:15pm
[quote]Originally posted by hekal:
<strong>Okay.. hmm intereting.

She says it's a black case, and Apple System Profiler reads the CPU as a G4-400.

Hard disk is a 6gig, I had her do a get info on the drive.

RAM is 64mb.

It would have to be either a PB G3 upgraded to a G4 or she has one of these two models.

<a href="http://www.everymac.com/systems/apple/powerbook_g3/stats/powerbook_g3_400.html" target="_blank">Powerbook G3/400</a>

<a href="http://www.everymac.com/systems/apple/powerbook_g3/stats/powerbook_g3_400_fw.html" target="_blank">Powerbook G3/400 FW</a>



[ 12-10-2001: Message edited by: hekal ]</strong><hr></blockquote>

My guess is it's the top one you linked to with the G4 upgrade card. Also ask her if the keyboard is brown.

[ 12-10-2001: Message edited by: G4Dude ]</p>
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post #15 of 26
12/10/01 at 5:18pm
Thread Starter 
Couple of bad points here. RAM limited to 384.. Not REALLY bad because the PC notebook is limited to 288.

No firewire means no iPod sync.. Again, not really bad because I can use my desktop for that.

Other than that, it seems decent. 384 should be enough for OS X.

What does the brown keyboard indicate?

[quote]Originally posted by G4Dude:
<strong>

My guess is it's the top one you linked to with the G4 upgrade card. Also ask her if the keyboard is brown.

[ 12-10-2001: Message edited by: G4Dude ]</strong><hr></blockquote>
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post #16 of 26
12/10/01 at 5:32pm
Sounds like a Lombard (non-FW) to me. My Lombard shipped w/ the same specs. 400MHz/64MB/6GB.
If I'm not mistaken Pismo upped the HD ante to 10GB in it's base config (besides adding FW).
Here's my take on the trade. If it is a Lombard powerbook I'm not sure that I can hands down recommend it. Don't get me wrong, it's a great machine, I just traded up to a 667 Ti from one. It will certainly hold its own against your 450 (I would probably say it's roughly equilivant to a 600-700MHz pentium). What I won't to well currently is run OS X. The problem isn't the machine per-se, it's OS X in it's current form.
OS X doesn't currently have the ATI drivers to do hardware acceleration (which is a huge deal in X) OS X's DVD player also can't be used on the Lomby since it is a software player and that book had a hardware decoder.

Of course, there is one more item to consider...In a year from now the resale on that Powerbook will probably blow that PIII out of the water. Check e-bay if you don't believe me.
[quote]Originally posted by hekal:
<strong>Okay.. hmm intereting.

She says it's a black case, and Apple System Profiler reads the CPU as a G4-400.

Hard disk is a 6gig, I had her do a get info on the drive.

RAM is 64mb.

It would have to be either a PB G3 upgraded to a G4 or she has one of these two models.

<a href="http://www.everymac.com/systems/apple/powerbook_g3/stats/powerbook_g3_400.html" target="_blank">Powerbook G3/400</a>

<a href="http://www.everymac.com/systems/apple/powerbook_g3/stats/powerbook_g3_400_fw.html" target="_blank">Powerbook G3/400 FW</a>



[ 12-10-2001: Message edited by: hekal ]</strong><hr></blockquote>
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post #17 of 26
12/10/01 at 5:50pm
[quote]Originally posted by hekal:
<strong>Couple of bad points here. RAM limited to 384.. Not REALLY bad because the PC notebook is limited to 288.

No firewire means no iPod sync.. Again, not really bad because I can use my desktop for that.

Other than that, it seems decent. 384 should be enough for OS X.

What does the brown keyboard indicate?

</strong><hr></blockquote>

The old black PowerBooks have brown keyboards. The titanium has a black keyboard.
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post #18 of 26
12/10/01 at 5:53pm
The 400 MHz Pismo had a 6 GB hard drive.
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post #19 of 26
12/10/01 at 6:11pm
I have it on good info that a G4 upgrade for the Pismo will be announced at MWSF.
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post #20 of 26
12/10/01 at 6:24pm
[quote]Originally posted by MacAgent:
<strong>The 400 MHz Pismo had a 6 GB hard drive.</strong><hr></blockquote>

The original one did. After they updated the Psimos it went up to 10GB.
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post #21 of 26
12/10/01 at 6:38pm
If it is a Lombard remember the 66mhz bus affects the final speed of the g4 upgrade if there is one.. Also I would consider keeping your p3 if it is a lombard and not a pismo.
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post #22 of 26
12/10/01 at 7:21pm
Assuming this info is right on the upgrade cards for Lombard, then it has to be a Lombard.

I would think about a G4 upgrade forn my pismo.
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post #23 of 26
12/11/01 at 1:30pm
Thread Starter 
The Lombard is lacking FireWire where the Pismo includes FireWire?

Is there any easy way to determine this? Will ASP show you?

[quote]Originally posted by corvette:
<strong>If it is a Lombard remember the 66mhz bus affects the final speed of the g4 upgrade if there is one.. Also I would consider keeping your p3 if it is a lombard and not a pismo.</strong><hr></blockquote>
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post #24 of 26
12/11/01 at 2:44pm
[quote]Originally posted by hekal:
<strong>The Lombard is lacking FireWire where the Pismo includes FireWire?

Is there any easy way to determine this? Will ASP show you?

</strong><hr></blockquote>

Well if it's got a SCSI port it's a Lombard. If it's got 2 Firewire ports it's a Pismo. Not hard.

[ 12-11-2001: Message edited by: EmAn ]</p>
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post #25 of 26
12/11/01 at 5:58pm
[quote]Originally posted by EmAn:
<strong>

Well if it's got a SCSI port it's a Lombard. If it's got 2 Firewire ports it's a Pismo. Not hard.

[ 12-11-2001: Message edited by: EmAn ]</strong><hr></blockquote>

I agree! That Sounds good! ummm....
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post #26 of 26
12/11/01 at 6:32pm
[quote]Originally posted by SDW2001:
<strong>

I agree! That Sounds good! ummm....</strong><hr></blockquote>

Gee.... I wonder who you sound like...

[ 12-11-2001: Message edited by: EmAn ]</p>
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