Become a MacRumors Supporter for $50/year with no ads, ability to filter front page stories, and private forums.

Slix

macrumors 68000
Mar 24, 2010
1,593
2,376
Giving this a go on my newly acquired iBook G4. Currently installing over FireWire from my MDD! I'll let you know how it goes after I have some time to play with it (and it finishes the copy!).
 
  • Like
Reactions: lepidotós

lepidotós

macrumors 6502a
Aug 29, 2021
677
750
Marinette, Arizona
Giving this a go on my newly acquired iBook G4. Currently installing over FireWire from my MDD! I'll let you know how it goes after I have some time to play with it (and it finishes the copy!).
I think you'll be happy with it. It runs great on my iBook G4 even when it had 512MB RAM, though having a web browser open does drag it down a little. Blame the Internet being a bloated mess; it feels nearly as fast and responsive as the Classic Mac OS does otherwise.​
 

Slix

macrumors 68000
Mar 24, 2010
1,593
2,376
I plan to make my own user account on this once it's done doing the initial tuneup command. Is there anything else I'd have to do after creating my own account to reap the benefits of this enhanced OS?

I noticed iDisk was removed nearly everywhere except in the Finder sidebar. ;D

Have you tried to allow this to NetBoot or anything yet? I might see if that works with the setup at some point to allow for multi-Mac boots.
 
Last edited:
  • Like
Reactions: lepidotós

ww2_1943

macrumors 6502
Nov 25, 2021
422
285
North NJ
@z970

I noticed that that Apple included trim support in later versions of Snow Leopard and there were several third party trim enablers that were made for SL as well. Is there a way to make a trim enabler work with Leopard? I’m just curious considering many of us have upgraded to SSDs in our old machines.
 

ChrisNonyminus

macrumors newbie
Jan 6, 2022
1
0
Hi, just joined to ask:
Any progress on getting Classic Environment working under 10.5.x yet? I've seen the thread for that but it's kinda died down.
 

Macbookprodude

Suspended
Jan 1, 2018
3,306
898
I think you'll be happy with it. It runs great on my iBook G4 even when it had 512MB RAM, though having a web browser open does drag it down a little. Blame the Internet being a bloated mess; it feels nearly as fast and responsive as the Classic Mac OS does otherwise.​
Yes, the internet is RESPONSIBLE for why even a Quad G5 can't browse right.. Pathetic !
 
  • Like
Reactions: lepidotós

Macbookprodude

Suspended
Jan 1, 2018
3,306
898
@z970

I noticed that that Apple included trim support in later versions of Snow Leopard and there were several third party trim enablers that were made for SL as well. Is there a way to make a trim enabler work with Leopard? I’m just curious considering many of us have upgraded to SSDs in our old machines.
It would be nice, as I have an M2 SATA in my Titanium. Sadly, Trim won't work under Leopard.
 

z970

macrumors 68040
Original poster
Jun 2, 2017
3,589
4,541
@Slix Everything has been taken care of straight out-of-the-box, save for the post-install tuneup script (which should still be run periodically, anyway). Once you've got the system personalized to your liking, you're more or less good to go.

@ww2_1943 Not to my knowledge. If I remember correctly, OS X only gained TRIM support with 10.6.3, and I think those TRIM enabler apps might have relied on that foundation in order to function. In any case, the binaries they used were most likely Intel-only.

With today's flash technology however, it shouldn't be necessary. As I understand it, pretty much all modern SSDs should ship with their own TRIM functionality built-in, and as long as they're given enough free space to work with, their integrated controllers should all do the job just fine; OS-supported or not.

@ChrisNonyminus In that thread, it was established that getting Classic functionality under Leopard was virtually impossible, or at the very least impractical for the effort required.

-

... With that being said, I have a few ideas. ;)
 
Last edited:

PowerfulEra

macrumors member
Jul 20, 2017
97
49
I know you said no but would it be possible to rethink launchpad on future iritations of sorbet?
 

Macbookprodude

Suspended
Jan 1, 2018
3,306
898
@Slix Everything has been taken care of straight out-of-the-box, save for the post-install tuneup script (which should still be run periodically, anyway). Once you've got the system personalized to your liking, you're more or less good to go.

@ww2_1943 Not to my knowledge. If I remember correctly, OS X only gained TRIM support with 10.6.3, and I think those TRIM enabler apps might have relied on that foundation in order to function. In any case, the binaries they used were most likely Intel-only.

With today's flash technology however, it shouldn't be necessary. As I understand it, pretty much all modern SSDs should ship with their own TRIM functionality built-in, and as long as they're given enough free space to work with, their integrated controllers should all do the job just fine; OS-supported or not.

@ChrisNonyminus In that thread, it was established that getting Classic functionality under Leopard was virtually impossible, or at the very least impractical for the effort required.

-

... With that being said, I have a few ideas. ;)
So does this mean if I have a modern M2 SATA in my titanium, it already has trim with it ?
 
  • Like
Reactions: Hellfirechrome

lepidotós

macrumors 6502a
Aug 29, 2021
677
750
Marinette, Arizona
So does this mean if I have a modern M2 SATA in my titanium, it already has trim with it ?
Yes, as long as it isn't from 10 years ago, and some unpartitioned space at the end of the disk (e.g. formatting up to 240GiB out of 256GiB) is left for the drive's firmware to have room to do it. If you see an SSD with non-power of 2 capacities (e.g. 180GB, 240GB, 500GB), that's usually the manufacturer locking off that extra space (from 192, 256, and 512gb resp.) for that purpose.​
 

Macbookprodude

Suspended
Jan 1, 2018
3,306
898
Yes, as long as it isn't from 10 years ago, and some unpartitioned space at the end of the disk (e.g. formatting up to 240GiB out of 256GiB) is left for the drive's firmware to have room to do it. If you see an SSD with non-power of 2 capacities (e.g. 180GB, 240GB, 500GB), that's usually the manufacturer locking off that extra space (from 192, 256, and 512gb resp.) for that purpose.​
Its an ADATA 256GB M2 SATA.. I think it was made a year or 2 ago, so it has garbage collection I believe ?
 

bunnspecial

macrumors G3
May 3, 2014
8,352
6,495
Kentucky
Just as an FYI on TRIM-to my understanding it is not possible over ATA(PATA) regardless of the OS/other software operating it. The first generation Macbook Airs, for example, don't support it even in 10.6.8 with a factory installed SSD.

Of course if you're on a G5 with SATA, I'd guess it would in theory be possible but I'll defer to others on adding the functionality to 10.5.8.
 

en_voyage

macrumors newbie
Jan 17, 2022
5
5
I tried searching this thread, but perhaps I'm overlooking the answer to my question: I'm in doubt between choosing Tiger or Sorbet Leopard for my Mac Mini G4 1.5. I still like it after all these years and I wish to turn it into a distraction-free machine for writing purposes, but I occasionally need to look things up on the internet (registry system of the research university I work for). Further, I sometimes need to watch a tutorial video on Youtube.

I know this is possible with Sorbet Leopard with Interweb PPC and TenFiveTube, but my experiences with vanilla Leopard on the Mac Mini are not that good: the system becomes sluggish. Is system performance under Sorbet Leopard comparable to Tiger? The size of the hard drive and the current data on it do not yet allow me to create multiple partitions and intall both Tiger and Sorbet Leopard. If only I had a bigger hd in this little soldier... :)

Besides, thumbs up for Sorbet Leopard! Good to see that people still develop ways of keep these machines up and running. The condition of my machine is too good to just throw it away and replace it by a new Mac Mini.
 

Hellfirechrome

macrumors newbie
Aug 23, 2021
11
20
Twin Peaks
I tried searching this thread, but perhaps I'm overlooking the answer to my question: I'm in doubt between choosing Tiger or Sorbet Leopard for my Mac Mini G4 1.5. I still like it after all these years and I wish to turn it into a distraction-free machine for writing purposes, but I occasionally need to look things up on the internet (registry system of the research university I work for). Further, I sometimes need to watch a tutorial video on Youtube.

I know this is possible with Sorbet Leopard with Interweb PPC and TenFiveTube, but my experiences with vanilla Leopard on the Mac Mini are not that good: the system becomes sluggish. Is system performance under Sorbet Leopard comparable to Tiger? The size of the hard drive and the current data on it do not yet allow me to create multiple partitions and intall both Tiger and Sorbet Leopard. If only I had a bigger hd in this little soldier... :)

Besides, thumbs up for Sorbet Leopard! Good to see that people still develop ways of keep these machines up and running. The condition of my machine is too good to just throw it away and replace it by a new Mac Mini.
Your Mini will LOVE Sorbet Leopard. Here's the thing; development has come to a halt for most of the stuff that made tiger usable on modern Internet. Sorbet leopard, while being something of an amalgamation of hacks to get leopard running better on PPC, also gives you access to software that would simply run on leopard and can help keep you limping along in the modern age with such a vintage machine. You would be pretty pleased with either experience but sorbet leopard has some power under the hood that I think you will appreciate especially because that Mac mini far exceeds the requirements. Just get a FireWire external hard drive, or a FW case and put an SSD in it, and run it separate before you do a full clean install (if you find it suits you). A good SSD is crucial to boosting the speed of any PPC Mac, the difference will feel like night and day. Oh, and (yes, groan) max your RAM!
 
  • Like
Reactions: z970

Dronecatcher

macrumors 603
Jun 17, 2014
5,247
7,885
Lincolnshire, UK
I tried searching this thread, but perhaps I'm overlooking the answer to my question: I'm in doubt between choosing Tiger or Sorbet Leopard for my Mac Mini G4 1.5.

There's no getting around the fact, your Mini doesn't have a Core Image fully compatible GPU so both Sorbet and Leopard will steal a bit of CPU power for graphics.

All three options will do what you require but if you want ease of use and the least post installation fiddling and setting up choose Sorbet.
 
  • Like
Reactions: z970 and Amethyst1

z970

macrumors 68040
Original poster
Jun 2, 2017
3,589
4,541
@Dronecatcher In terms of using CPU for graphics, the consequences of this in Sorbet should be markedly less pronounced than in regular Leopard - at least in theory. There were actually some applications in vanilla 10.5.8 that leveraged QuartzGL by default (which depends on Core Image to function, meaning that will either have the CPU emulate CI on top of running the app, or just keep CI disabled altogether - I'm not sure), and most of that was disabled in 10.5.9 because doing so just reduced RAM and thread use whenever those applications were open (I forget the exact list, though).

And that's still not taking into account the other CPU optimizations throughout the rest of the system, which frees it up to do a better job in pulling certain graphical features anyway.

@en_voyage I ran Sorbet on an 800 MHz DP (roughly equivalent to 1.25 GHz SP) Power Mac G4 equipped with a Radeon 9000 Pro for a short period of time, and the experience was quite pleasant, especially in comparison to regular Leopard. In contrast, your 1.5 GHz mini with a Radeon 9200 should positively fly regardless of its GPU power available.

Moreover, if I may make a suggestion - out of the three, I've personally always gotten the best Web / video playback performance with AquaWeb micro (followed by Sorbet's built-in version of WebKit), which is essentially a highly optimized skeletal version of TenFourFox. Therefore, it may be useful for your requirements in particular.
 
Last edited:

z970

macrumors 68040
Original poster
Jun 2, 2017
3,589
4,541
@Amethyst1 Yes, but a 1.5 GHz G4 is also far more powerful than a DP 800 MHz. And while the DP 800 has 4 MB of combined L3 cache, the 1.5 has a 167 MHz FSB (up from 133), ATA/100 (up from ATA/66), and DDR RAM clocked at 333 MHz (up from non-DDR clocked at 133). Plus, if either GPU isn't used for the CI-powered graphics features anyway, then the difference between the two in practice is within the margin of error. :)
 

en_voyage

macrumors newbie
Jan 17, 2022
5
5
@ all: thanks for the responses! I decided to give Sorbet a go. After moving data to a USB stick (slow, consuming a lot of time), I managed to free up some space. Sorbet Leopard was downloaded, and after some repartitioning the image is restoring on a frehsly created partition. As from now, 55 minutes left...

@z970: thank you for mentioning AquaWeb Micro. I'll give it a go as well!
 

Dronecatcher

macrumors 603
Jun 17, 2014
5,247
7,885
Lincolnshire, UK
@Dronecatcher In terms of using CPU for graphics, the consequences of this in Sorbet should be markedly less pronounced than in regular Leopard.
I'd say the difference will be minuscule - on my G4 iMac, Leopard had a fraction of a percent lead over Sorbet on the XBench graphics test - enough to be meaningless.

As with most things PPC, YMMV - most people won't be comparing and contrasting but enjoying the benefits of a fresh install regardless of what it is.
 
Register on MacRumors! This sidebar will go away, and you'll see fewer ads.