On Feb 11, 2013, at 10:59 AM, Kris Tilford <ktilfo...@cox.net> wrote:
> On Feb 11, 2013, at 3:23 AM, Wayne Stewart wrote: > >> How about a Sonnet SATA card? It'll boot OS 9. If you really want an >> external you can add an eSATA adapter. You can easily get an external case >> with eSATA and USB or FW so you could easily move data to another machine. >> New SATA drives ate cheap enough, they're almost giving away small used ones. >> I've used one to boot OS 9 on a 9600 via an external 1tb Lacie HD >> (partitioned of course). > > > A Sonnet SATA card would be a pricey addition to an old Mac that's severely > limited already. For the price of the Sonnet card you could likely retire the > Beige in favor a G4, an old Mini, or a handful of Mac laptops that have more > capability than a stock G3. > > I ran a G3 many years while booted externally from Firewire HDs because > Firewire was cheap, fast, and easy to transfer from one Mac to another. I > think the best use of money for upgrading a Beige G3 is CPU first, video card > second, and in my experience I believe internal ATA & SATA cards are not > price effective in comparison to cheap Firewire. > > A fully upgraded Beige G3 MUST have a G4 CPU, a Radeon video card that > supports Quartz Extreme, and both USB 2.0 & Firewire ports. With only 3 PCI > slots available, it's really tough to justify in internal ATA or SATA card > when likely you've filled all three slots with Radeon, USB 2.0, and Firewire. > There are combo USB & Firewire cards, which I have tried in conjunction with > an ATA card, but the problem is that these combo cards never have OS 9 > support are are effectively dead in OS 9. Better to use the internal ATA for > OS 9, and Firewire for OS X in my opinion. > > Upgrading old Beige G3s is NOT cost effective in today's world. The sweet > spot for price vs. power is certainly migrated to used Intel PC hackintosh > hardware capable of running current Mt. Lion software. If you must have pure > Apple hardware, the sweet spot is likely either G5 Macs, or early Intel Macs > - look for upgradeable Intel Macs that support newer CPUs & video, such as > early Intel iMacs. The days of PPC Macs are severely limited now, the > migration to Intel may soon become the migration to ARM, after all, Apple > owns ARM chipset designers, not Intel or PPC. Move along or be left behind, > that's the choice. What Kris said, with these caveats: The OP requires native boot in OS 9. That means one off of this list that shows Boot Only or Boot/Classic: <http://www.everymac.com/systems/by_capability/macs-that-support-macos-9-classic.html> No G5 ever booted in anything but OS X. Also, IIRC there WAS a line of MDD 1.25 systems that were released after the G5 came out that did boot in OS 9, released in response to the demands of a lot of BIG customers using (IIRC) mostly Quark Express. -- Bruce Johnson University of Arizona College of Pharmacy Information Technology Group Institutions do not have opinions, merely customs -- -- You received this message because you are a member of G-Group, a group for those using G3, G4, and G5 desktop Macs - with a particular focus on Power Macs. The list FAQ is at http://lowendmac.com/lists/g-list.shtml and our netiquette guide is at http://www.lowendmac.com/lists/netiquette.shtml To post to this group, send email to g3-5-list@googlegroups.com For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/g3-5-list --- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "G-Group" group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to g3-5-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/groups/opt_out.
