Ready for OS X with style...
Written: Jan 31 '01 (Updated Jan 31 '01)
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Pros: It is a great machine for OS X.
Cons: It's still a mac.
The Bottom Line: Buy this machine if you want to use OS X!!! Avoid it if you don't....
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| markhaml's Full Review: Apple Power Macintosh G4 Base |
Dual Heads! Mac OS X will offer support (finally) for SMP (Symmetric Multi-processing...) These are the rigs that can take advantage of it.... I am a BIG fan of OS X, and personally saw a 350 MHZ Powerbook with 64 MB and OS X Beta WAX a PIII 700 with 256MB and Win 2000... The Powerbook had over 12 applications open at the time... one was DVD... The Matrix. To qualify this, read my review of OS X... I hated mac until then... OS X is Unix!
Practical Mac Uses I know... who the heck can call a box that looks like an art exhibit a "Practical" anything? Let's look at what Macs are used for... ok.. Graphics. Big ones. Stuff that takes a while... Now lets consider who uses them.. ok.. Artists. Now have you ever had a sudden burst of inspiration? maybe... to paint something? Try to imagine spending alot of time painting a masterpiece over about five hours... there you are, exhausted but proud, and a visitor pops in... Bill Gates looks at your work and says "Wow! What a beautiful picture!" thne he throws paint thinner on it.... You ever gonna let him in your house again? Creative professionals need stability in their OS, but they are also the folk that push the limits dancing in virtual memory (Disk space acting like RAM) and complex calculations where accuracy is vital... (As a web developer, I had some major issues trying to get "TRANE Orange" for the TRANE Air conditioner folk...) OS X combines the most stable OS in the world (BSD Unix) with the best multimedia features for a Graphics foundation that allows you total flexibility...
What's the verdict? The G4 Base, and all new Macs, are designed for OS X. Using them with other OS's just isn't worth the difference... Even the Power PC chip has never been fully utilized... It contains instructions for predicting calculations designed to work ahead of the curve. (I know this because I am an IBM RS6000 admin, and the Power PC chips all have this enhancement.) The hardware is great! The software has been (Untill OS X) only decent. Only upgrade if you intend to use OS X! With Apple's trouble, you may want to check availability of OS X...
Additional Buying Advice Make sure the G4 you get has the ATI Radeon chipset... My understanding is that some were shipped with the older ATI Rage chipset... It is still a good card, but the Radeon is cutting edge! Knowing Apple, you are paying for cutting edge anyway, why not make sure that's what you get! Also, make sure the G4 you pick up has an additional pocessor slot... It doesn't have to be filled, but make sure it's there... down the road, that's one heck of a good upgrade...
Peace,
Lee
Recommended:
Yes
Amount Paid (US$): 2100
Operating System: Macintosh
Processor: PowerPC G4
Processor speed: 401-500
RAM: 128
Internal Storage: CD-RW and DVD
Hard Drive (GB): 21-30
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Epinions.com ID:
markhaml
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Member: Lee Markham
Reviews written: 30
Trusted by: 14 members
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