Out of curiosity only, does anyone here (besides me) use a PowerPC Mac as a daily driver? I know there are a few out there. Thanks for your input.
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Does Anyone Use a PPC as a Daily Driver?
- Thread starter AmazingHenry
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Almost everyone here uses PowerPC Mac as their main machines.
I used a G5 at work from February 2005 to June 2013. It's still being used. There are two 1999 era PowerMac G4s being used as servers back here in my area and the newest Mac I own is ONE 2006 MBP. My main Mac is the one in my signature.
So, yeah, I use PowerPC every day.
I used a G5 at work from February 2005 to June 2013. It's still being used. There are two 1999 era PowerMac G4s being used as servers back here in my area and the newest Mac I own is ONE 2006 MBP. My main Mac is the one in my signature.
So, yeah, I use PowerPC every day.
Wow, you mean the Quicksilver is actually your main Mac? That's impressive, using a G4. Anyway, what I mean is people who only use PPC Macs. Someone may use them for some things, and an Intel for others. That's not what I mean. I mean using it as your daily driver, the Mac that you use for just about everything - web browsing, email, music - that sort of thing. So I guess I'm mostly asking if there's anyone who doesn't own an Intel, although there are exceptions (my Intel Mac is used as my file server, nothing more).
At work, my 12" Powerbook is my driver for recipes, music, and other work-related stuff. At home, I'll grab any one of my PPC machines for web surfing and other stuff when I fancy it, but most of the time I'm on my Intel iMac or one of the Macbooks.
Well, let me be clear.
I didn't get my MBP until 2015.
I've been using PowerPC since 2003 when I converted from PC. I did 8.5 years on a 400ghz Titanium PowerBook until November 2009. Got my first Aluminum PowerBook in December 2009.
I got the MBP because my son got in to the STEAM program and I figured he'd need access to a more powerful Mac. This was before I knew they were getting PC laptops through the program. Otherwise, as nice as it is, I never would have bought that MBP.
My 17" PowerBook G4 (1.0Ghz) is the Mac that goes with me whenever we go out to the coffee shop.
The only reason I use a Mac Pro at work is because after eight years of 24/7 usage the G5 died. I replaced the logicboard and CPU and now my coworker uses it. But I took the opportunity of it going down to get a MP here at work.
This is why I'm so persistent about tweaking TenFourFox. I use it every day.
Sadly, I don't use my G5 Quad or my DLSD anymore as my main. I got a Mac Pro over the Summer, and after maxing out my MBP, the PPCs have practically lost their purpose for me... I do pull out the TiBook to mess around with it, and my Cube sits on my desk. I should be getting a triple monitor setup quite soon, and the displays have VGA, so it should be easier to use my Cube then!
The G5 is my (aka: personal) computer during the cold months, helps keep my office warm 
. During the warm months the G5 remains powered down and I use a iPad or work machine.
. During the warm months the G5 remains powered down and I use a iPad or work machine.I don't anymore simply down to my boss insisting we use Pagemaker 7 on PC for publishing. Bizarrely I could use InDesign 4 on our G5 but would then have problems on music typesetting as we have to use Sibelius 8 to stay up to date. However for running the business such as admin, email, publishing in general, my own composing etc, listening to music I easily could. The 1.6ghz G5 currently serves as backup in the office, solid and dependable, My father in laws 2008 Mac Pro however has just been pronounced dead!
I use PPC computers almost every day.
With that said, when I'm at work my Mac Pro and MacBook Pro are many times more practical just for actually getting work done. I need software that won't work on PPC computers, and have to access website content that won't work.
At the same time, I do have some older expensive software that is PPC only, and the Quad in my office gets a decent work-out using that.
With that said, when I'm at work my Mac Pro and MacBook Pro are many times more practical just for actually getting work done. I need software that won't work on PPC computers, and have to access website content that won't work.
At the same time, I do have some older expensive software that is PPC only, and the Quad in my office gets a decent work-out using that.
I used to,but sadly even my PB 17" 1.67GHz maxed out... has a hard time keeping up with plenty of today's web sites...
I agree, PPC Macs are not very good for web browsing. We have one last chance at speed - mobile websites - but when you look at the speed of phones nowadays those will probably become slow at some point also. We'd better enjoy it while we can. I use User Agent Switcher for TenFourFox when I need to quickly check something.
Maybe it's just me then because it doesn't bother me to wait the two or three seconds that are standard page load times for me. Then again, I'm not usually browsing heavy JS sites so that may be part of it.
The MP at work is of course faster. So is my MBP at home. But 2-3 seconds doesn't bother me on my PowerPC Macs. I kow, too, that depending on strength of LTE my iPhone and my iPad can be slower than my PowerPC Macs to load pages.
I agree with you on that, it's actually not that bad once you're used to it. I only use PowerPC Macs, so the loading times are perfectly fine for me. But I'm sure they will seem very slow to people with newer Intels.
It doesn't bother me either as I'm on them every day however when I do jump on my intel MB and then come back to my PPCs I notice the difference - especially on stupid heavy fatboy websites like newegg for example. Even on my dual G5, NE and equivalent sites are a PITA. Still, for most everything I do, the PPCs perform just fine and they're cool, and they're cheap, and there's a robust community of cool people surrounding and supporting them. It's way cooler talking to folks who are not absorbed with the newest & greatest - rather finding value in old systems and pushing great systems to their extremes. That to me is a million times more engaging and fulfilling than swiping your CC so you can post "hey look at me I just dropped 10K on a new PM".
OK, I guess that was a little judgemental. Sorry, I had a rough couple weeks at work recently lol.
Oh.OK, I guess that was a little judgemental. Sorry, I had a rough couple weeks at work recently lol.
I thought you'd just come from the Intel Mac section of the forum!
I tried to.. The photoshopped iMac in my profile was my first main PPC mac. It served me well doing iMovie stuff and garageband from about 2008-2012. I had a Macbook 3,1 then that i would do final cut pro on, and while rending the video id make other portions of it on the iMac. I had to retire it sadly. I tried again in 2013/2014 ish when i picked up a 1.42Ghz eMac.
Now the eMac even currently can manage to play a Youtube Video at 240-360p in webkit(I'm quite surprised actually) and for summer 2013? i want to say it was? it was my main daily driver aside from when and if I gamed. However, i too had to get off it, as my universities Learn page requires specific web browsers and plug ins to run and the PowerPC G4 wasn't able to perform that. Tried to and the university staff contacted me when i tried to do an online quiz and it kept kicking me out haha.
Now the eMac even currently can manage to play a Youtube Video at 240-360p in webkit(I'm quite surprised actually) and for summer 2013? i want to say it was? it was my main daily driver aside from when and if I gamed. However, i too had to get off it, as my universities Learn page requires specific web browsers and plug ins to run and the PowerPC G4 wasn't able to perform that. Tried to and the university staff contacted me when i tried to do an online quiz and it kept kicking me out haha.
The iMac G4 is my second computer..... hardly a daily driver but clost to it, the audio that comes out of those speaker is AMAZING!
I've never used a PPC Mac as my daily driver. The closest thing to a daily driver was was my PowerBook G4 DLSD HR a few months back. That was my go-to laptop around the house before I got my 2010 MacBook.
Have you tried Leopard-WebKit? I've found that it's faster than TFF. Just curious, why do you use TFF instead of WebKit? Is there some advantage TFF has? Thanks.
Customization.
Webkit is and will always be faster. But I spend 18+ hours online every day and the addons I use to customize that experience in T4Fx are not options available in Webkit based browsers.
So, I split the difference. I don't run stock T4Fx because it's too damn slow. But I can't customize Webkit the way I want, so my solution is to tweak T4Fx. It's not as fast as Webkit, but not as slow as stock and it's customized the way I prefer.
That's why I prefer T4Fx.
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I was at work earlier today so I couldn't show you what I meant by my customizations.
Now, I am typing this on my A1013 so here is what I mean.
You can easily see that what I have done is not possible to do in Webkit/Safari…
