The Computer World's Smurfette: Apple PowerMac G3
Written: Feb 23 '01 (Updated Feb 23 '01)
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Pros: Style, Easy access to inside for upgrades, Reliable, Fast
Cons: Useless mouse and keyboard
The Bottom Line: Elegant and fast, with great design inside and out. The BMW of the computer world: a bit more expensive but well worth it. ;)
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| herjazz's Full Review: Apple Power Macintosh G3 (M7104LL/A) Mac Desktop |
The PowerMac G3 comes in 3 processor speeds: the Motorola 350, 400, and 450MHz PowerPC chip. But if you're a smart computer shopper, you know not to merely compare and look at MHz, because that is not the end-all-be-all indicator of a computer's speed or overall performance and suitability. Macs in general are faster than their PC counterparts because of faster motherboard bus speeds, huge backside cache running at half of clock speed, and a better chip architecture. All you need to know is that a 400MHz PowerPC chip is roughly equivalent of a 800MHz Intel Pentium III chip, but again, you'd be comparing apples and oranges since they are completely different kinds of chips.
First things first: this machine comes in what I call "smurf" color: blue and white. The design is bold, but more importantly, functional. The handles on top make it very easy to move/lift the computer. In order to open the machine, you pull a little ring on the right side of the computer and that entire side hinges down, giving you extremely easy access for upgrades and add-ons. It's such a beauty looking at the uncluttered inside of a PowerMac G3, compared to your standard PC (like Dell, Compaq, Gateway) with wires and cables and metal everywhere, covering each other and blocking access to other areas. Upgrading memory or adding a PCI card is so simple, since nothing is in the way to give you nasty cuts or require you to contort your wrists and fingers into unnatural positions. Adding a second hard drive is pretty simple as well, since the cable and power plug for the second drive is already set up and ready to just simply plug in!
MacOS 8.6
From the factory, these G3s come with MacOS 8.6, which is a very stable OS compared to 8.0 and the dreaded System 7.xx. Needless to say, it's a joy to use because of its superb usability that has been a trademark of Apple ever since the first Macintosh came out in 1984. Being a review of the machine and not the OS, I'll just leave it at that. You can install MacOS 9.x and OS X on this machine with no problem.
Mouse/Keyboard
The "hockey puck" mouse is too small and hard to hold and useless, so toss it and get yourself a good multi-button optical mouse (I personally love the Microsoft Intellimouse Explorer-- it has a robust Mac driver/program for it). Although I like the very soft touch feel of the keyboard, the arrow keys are crammed and the home/end/page up/page down keys are not in their own cluster (like on a 101-key PC keyboard) but on the side of the number pad! Strange! But you can start your computer using the power key on the keyboard, another Mac-only feature. Again, I tossed the keyboard and got myself an old ADB Apple Keyboard which works well. [Later versions of the G3, and all the G4s did away with the ADB port, so you have to get a USB keyboard for those]
Ports
As far as ports go, the G3 comes with 2 FireWire, 2 USB, one ADB (for older Mac keyboards and printers), mini-stereo audio in and out, VGA out, 10/100 Base-T Ethernet (RJ45). Unlike old (beige) Apples, there are no external SCSI ports (you'll need to buy a separate card if you need to connect to your old SCSI scanners, drives, etc.). The "blue and white" G3s are the first ones to come with FireWire and USB for connecting peripherals and this trend still holds true for the latest G4s. For a dual PC and Mac user like me, this means I can use one USB peripheral for both PC and Mac, as long as that peripheral has drivers for both Windows and MacOS: case in point, the Epson Stylus 740 inkjet printer (USB)-- prints happily from both my Windows98 PC and Mac; another example, my Logitech MouseMan Wheel USB mouse works on both my PC and Mac.
Monitor
For years now, apple has included VGA ports to their Macs, which means that you no longer need to buy Apple monitors. You can just pick up any PC monitor (tends to be cheaper and you have a wider selection) and plug it right in with no problem whatsoever. The only advantage of buying an Apple-branded monitor is 1. you can use the Monitor/Sounds control panel to adjust the monitor settings from within the computer (i.e. not on the monitor itself), and 2. you can color-coordinate your monitor color to your blue/white Mac case color (not that important for me). I've hooked my G3 up to a Radius 19" and 17", a Viewsonic 17", and currently I'm using a KDS 19" monitor. The factory video card is an ATI Rage 128 3D/2D card with 16MB VRAM on it. Not the most powerful card for intense 3D gaming, but more than enough for what I do (and the occasional Tomb Raider / Quake / Unreal game).
Drives
Apple got a lot of heat for not putting a 1.25 inch floppy disk drive in their G3s and iMacs, but in reality I have not used a floppy disk in 5 years, I think. I barely even use ZIP disks anymore. I'm saving files to FTP servers, emailing to myself, or buring a CD with them. I think there's a lot of panic here for nothing: 1.44MB is nothing nowadays. That's not even half an MP3 song! You won't miss the floppy disk. (For those of you that really do use it daily, you can buy an external USB floppy disk drive.)
All models (350, 400, 450MHz) came with a 32X CD-ROM drive and you had the option to get a built-in Iomega ZIP drive. For geeks, the CD (and ZIP, if ordered) drive sit on one ATA controller, and the hard drive (and a second hard drive, if you add one) sits on the other ATA controller. So you can technically install an internal CDRW drive if you don't have a ZIP drive. I just got an external CDRW via a SCSI card.
Factory hard drives are either IBM or Maxtors, 5200rpm. The Maxtors are extremely quiet drives, and I actually bought two 7200rpm Maxtors and put them in my computer to replace the factory ones. Yes, any ATA hard drive can be initialized and formatted for use the G3 with no problem, even if the box says it's for a PC only: simply use the MacOS's built-in Drive Setup program to do it and toss the "setup disk" that comes with the drive which is for PCs.
Quirks/Issues
I never had problems with my Apple internal 56K modem and the included FaxSTF fax software. But others have reported crashes when FaxSTF is installed on their machine. If you have installed the fax software and are experiencing unexplainable crashes, uninstall that software and get another fax software if you must send/receive faxes from your Mac.
Some really old versions of G3s (Revision A and before) did not have the ability to add a second hard drive. You will know when you open your machine: if you see an extra power plug and IDE cable connector and your existing hard drive is in a tray that has a space for another drive on top of it, then you have a Revision B motherboard and you can add a second hard drive. If not, you're out of luck and can't add another IDE drive.
If you are having problems with the DVD drive (the higher-end G3s came with them), you will need to install the upgrade the firmware (go to apple's website: http://www.info.apple.com/support/pages.taf?product=desktop). if you still have issues, you might want to consider upgrading your OS to something like MacOS 9.0.4
Recommended:
Yes
Amount Paid (US$): 2500
Operating System: Macintosh
Processor speed: 301-400
RAM: More than 256
Internal Storage: Zip Drive
Hard Drive (GB): 31-40
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Epinions.com ID:
herjazz
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Member: Mike Choi
Location: Long Island, NY
Reviews written: 70
Trusted by: 56 members
About Me:
Web/Graphic Design, Art, Computers (Macintosh), Activism, Cars, Music (drums, bass, guitar, CubaseVST)
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