Help me convert a PC user - is a G3 enough?

karavite

karavite

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Hi, I'm helping a friend decide on a new laptop and am doing my best to sway her from getting a PC and buying her first Mac. She can't afford a G4 Powerbook (without a little pain anway) and is thinking about a G3 iBook. I was a little concerned that a G3 might not be a good long term investment. My only recent experience with a G3 is with my wife's 400 MHZ iMac and compared to my G4 450, it does seem sluggish. However, I have never used a G3 running OS X. Am I a "G4 snob"? Will a 500 MHZ G3 iBook running OS X be a worthwhile investment for the next two to three years? I'm expecting a range of opinions on this, and please don't flame me due to my limited experience with G3s. I suppose it would be easy to figure this out if I could establish a benchmark based on my G4 450 performance (what I am familiar with).

Also, is expecting G4 Powerbook prices to drop a pipe dream? Seems like they are over due and when you look at PC laptop prices, it also seems like a few hundred off on PowerBooks would make the decision that much easier.

I've convinced scores of people to buy Macs over the past ten years, and they have all been happy, but it seems harder to do now than at any time - all due to pricing issues. I know Macs were always priced a bit higher, but it just seems different now. I'm not sure why.
 
I think it really depends on what she is planning to do with the computer.

My roommate has a G3 iMac with OS X installed. She uses it to do word processing, import photos from her digital camera, and surf the web. No problems at all.

If your friend is doing heavy graphic work, or multimedia stuff, forget the G3.

It's that same thing that PC users are faced with at the store -- "You need a Multi-Processor GHz machine with 2 GB of RAM to stay up to date -- even though you're only typing your elementary school papers..." Don't try to force the user into something that they don't need.

And a specific example (since I haven't driven this point beyond utter exhaustion yet :) ). A friend recently had me help her with problems she was having with her laptop. I don't know what kind of processor it had -- I'm not the experienced with Macs, but it has something like 64MB RAM and running System 8.something. She uses it to word process only. No email, no web, just wp. She doesn't have problems with its speed at all. (Her Zip drive was messed up, which is why she brought it to me)
 
Thanks Tortise - I forgot to mention no heavy graphics beyond the occasional web design/photoshop stuff - primarily business, word processing, web surfing, PowerPoint, email kind of stuff.

You bring up the point I failed to make - I realize a G3 should be fast enough for almost anything people need to do with a computer, but will Office 2003 (probably released in late 2004) be such a bloated pig that it will make life difficult? Who knows. Glad to hear OS X runs nice on an iMac - maybe it is time to upgrade my wife's machine?
 
Don't take my word for the running of OS X on a G3 -- there are a lot of people who think it runs as fast as a salted slug even on a G4. I'm just a Mac newbie...
 
I had a PB G3 "Pismo" running OS X and Office v. X and I think it was fast enough for that. I used it for e-mail and surfing the web also and still i think i ran decent. I think the trick is to have a fair amount of RAM if you want to use OS X with a G3.
If it's a good long term investment...that depends. Will she use the same e-mail and Office app. she uses now then yes...if not then no. Not even the new iMac is a good investment if you want the latest apps. in three years.
 
The latest iBooks are on par with late model crt imacs... they should be fine for almost anything your friend would want to do. They can handle light to moderate video, lots of photographic type work, and will chew through almost any standard tasks she might throw at it.

In my (admittedly narrow) scope... most people who don't know what they need a G4 for don't really need it. Unless she wants to really dive into some heavy video work... the laptop should keep up fine (and with far less problems than I've been seeing from the titaniums).
-stephen
 
I have a 500MHz dual USB iBook, and I run OS X exclusively on it. I think the performance is good - not great - but good. Make sure you get plenty of RAM, I maxed mine out at 640MB. I used to use 256MB, and it was okay, definitely more RAM helps performance. Overall, the system is fine for most tasks. I do web development work, word processing, email, and web surfing of the laptop, and it performs well. The only think I annoys me running OS X is that the finder seems a bit sluggish (windows resizing, etc.), but it's not unbearable.

Overall, I think the iBook is a great value. I looked at all the PC laptops out there, and you really can't beat the iBook in terms of size, weight, default RAM and HD configuration for the cost. Furthermore, the iBook is REALLY well built. Take her to your local CompUSA and play with all the PC laptops. Within the iBook's price range, you'll instantly see how cheaply made the PCs are. Also if you can, take her to an Apple Store and let her play with the iBooks there - that way she can see how they performs.

-B
 
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