So er, buying a slightly old iMac...

[MonkeyHugger]

Right, getting a mac, but quite an old one. It's an iMac, not the last gen, or the one before that, or the one before that, or the one before that. Or the one before that.

It's the old CRT one. 128mb ram, 40GB HD, 400MHZ.

Got a few question, as I've never used an old machine before.

It's running OS X 10.2. How bad is this gonna run? And how slow when booted up?

Also, I'm gonna use it as a web server. Someone said that Tiger had it built in. Can I allow FTP access, passworded? On windows, if you make a form in a website, you have to have extensions installed, can you do this too?

-If not, if someone could reccomend some software that allows me that'd be grand

Cheers.

 

[robbieduncan]

You can turn on the FTP server easily. The default is to require users to have an account on the machine iirc so it will be password protected by default.

I'm fairly sure even 10.2 has apache built in for web serving. If this is the case it has CGI capabilities but it's up to you to write the server side code to handle form submits.

 

[CanadaRAM]

Just a couple of things to consider:
Check if this model has a Firewire port. Less desirable without one. because with USB 1.1 only, you can't have a bootable external drive, and data transfers from drives are excruciatingly slow.

Check if it has a DVD ROM drive. Less desirable without one - because you have to scrabble around for OS installer disks on CD.

THe iMac G3 is not an ideal machine to use as a server where it will be on 100% of the time, because the motherboard, power supply/analog board and CRT monitor all share the same case -- this leads to heat problems, and fried analog boards are pretty much guaranteed within 3 - 6 years. Leaving it on 24/7 obviously escalates the probability.

If it's the 400 MHz model, then it uses PC100 DIMMs for memory upgrade and you can install 2 x 512 Mb DIMMs for a total of 1 Gb.

If it has a 40 Gb drive, then it has been upgraded at some point.

 

[MonkeyHugger]

Cheers guys. FTP easyness - yey.

It has firewire, but a CD drive only. Bit worried about it breaking down know you told me that How easy is it to replace logic boards etc if it did go bang?

 

[ZombieChef]

Hey,
I used that exact computer with jaguar for a long time. (Got it new when it came out and replaced it lst year).
Jaguar runs well and it boots quickly enough all things considering.
As for it braking, I wouldn't worry. Mine is still going strong being used by my cousin. It was a well made computer.
I'm sure you will be happy with it.

 

[regre7]

Hey, I don't know if this would work well, but a guy that I'm buying from in the Marketplace forum has a Power Mac G4 Sawtooth for $100. It's got a busted video card, but it can be replaced for about $30 (with a Radeon 7000 AGP from NewEgg, I think). I guess you could install more cooling for it since it's Power Mac.

Edit: Here's the link.

 

[CanadaRAM]

Cheers guys. FTP easyness - yey.

It has firewire, but a CD drive only. Bit worried about it breaking down know you told me that How easy is it to replace logic boards etc if it did go bang?

New parts cost more than the machine is worth -- $200, $300 something like that.

 

[RumoredTone]

If not, if someone could reccomend some software that allows me that'd be grand

Hey there,

Just a note regarding FTP. If you find OS X's built in services too awkward to work with, you could also try a nice piece of shareware called CrushFTP:

http://www.versiontracker.com/dyn/moreinfo/macosx/1083

It's only $25 and has been well-regarded for many years.

Good luck,
-Tone

 

[MonkeyHugger]

Thanks for tips guys

On the powermac front, I'm in the uk so buying it wouldn't be pratical

That software looks pretty intresting too...will certinally have to give it a try.

A slightly different question...would you buy this imac now and use it for a year or so, or wait till december and buy a brand new mac then? I'm thinking of waiting...or maybe buying now and later, but then, the imac would of had just 4 months use and won't be used again.