Zippy and Nice Looking, Too!
Written: Jun 08 '00
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Product Rating:
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Pros: fast, reliable, stylish, runs MacOS
Cons: no free drive bays, puck mouse, small keyboard
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| suebee277's Full Review: Apple Power Macintosh G4 Multimedia |
I am a graphic designer. I am a Mac freak. Therefore, I had to have a G4.
Before I begin, I need to add a note about my system. My Mac falls neither into the Multimedia or the Professional category; it is somewhere in between. I purchased it as a floor display from CompUSA. It is 450 MHZ, but it has 256 MB RAM, the DVD-RAM drive and 27 GB hard drive... all features of the 500 MHZ. This is because it is a G4 from after the processor downgrade from last year (350,400,450), but before the re-upgrade (400,450,500). They could not continue to display it as a floor model because the model no longer existed. In order to get rid of it, they sold it to me at the normal 450 price of $2,500. Essentially, I got 128 MB of RAM, DVD-RAM drive and extra HD space for free. Not a bad deal...
Having said that, this is a sweet machine. It's fast, very reliable, and pretty nice looking. Graphite is a much better color choice than the Bondi blue of the G3 line. It is much more professional and "hi-tech" looking, which can be an asset in the graphic design market. In subconsciously tells your clients that you have a good design sense. Odd, but true.
Of course, the main asset of the MacOS is its ease of use. I'm not one to fiddle with my configurations too much, but all of my other Macs were at my job, so I never really had the opportunity. This one is all mine, and I can do what I want with it. My husband easily installed a SCSI card for our existing scanner (I am still nervous about touching the innards), and I had the drive partitioned and the OS installed in under a half hour.
The only think I had to remedy immediately was the puck mouse. I hate that thing! I replaced it with a MacAlly iSweet one-button mouse. They keyboard is also annoying, with its size and lack of a forward-delete key, but I am getting used to the size, and I downloaded KeySwapper to make option-delete perform forward-delete duties.
If you're already a Mac freak, like myself, then I am surely preaching to the choir when I recommend this system. Even without the little extras I lucked out in obtaining, it is a top-notch system. See if your local store has any floor models lying about... maybe you can luck out like I did.
Recommended:
Yes
Amount Paid (US$): 2500
Operating System: Macintosh
Processor: PowerPC G4
Processor speed: 401-500
RAM: 256
Internal Storage: Zip Drive
Hard Drive (GB): 21-30
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Epinions.com ID:
suebee277
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Member: Sue Meredith
Location: Rochester, New York
Reviews written: 24
Trusted by: 3 members
About Me:
I'm a graphic designer who loves crafting, pet rats, Macintoshes and Barenaked Ladies (the band).
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