Whats the absolute newest/latest linux for G3 processors?

[Appleuser201]

It's been a while since I've posted but I've lately really gotten into vintage Apple products again and might go on a used PowerPC splurge once again. I really liked my old 400mhz purple iMac G3 with 256mb of ram running Tiger and OS9, but I had to sell it for space reasons a few years back. I really want an iMac G3 again now (a snow or blueberry) and would like to actually get as much use out of it as possible. Is there any modern Linux distro that'll work on it (or the G3 processor in general) that'll give me a reasonable web browsing experience, media player (including streaming video, audio and radio), and productivity apps (word processing, photo editing). I know it's super impractical to use these ancient machines but they are just so unbelievably cool and super nostalgic. There's no other computing experience like it, the iMac G3 is a legend and I'd love to make one useful for myself with the help of Linux.

 

[Dronecatcher]

There's no other computing experience like it, the iMac G3 is a legend and I'd love to make one useful for myself with the help of Linux.

But if you're running Linux the experience will essentially be the same as running Linux on a X86 PC.

 

[Heindijs]

But if you're running Linux the experience will essentially be the same as running Linux on a X86 PC.

Not entirely, it will just be a lot slower

 

[Appleuser201]

But if you're running Linux the experience will essentially be the same as running Linux on a X86 PC.

But it'll be on an iMac G3, which is what I really care about. I like classic Mac OS X, but it just isn't very usable in 2023 for daily use (with no modern web browsers, besides the defunct TenFourFox).

 

[Dronecatcher]

But it'll be on an iMac G3, which is what I really care about. I like classic Mac OS X, but it just isn't very usable in 2023 for daily use (with no modern web browsers, besides the defunct TenFourFox).

There's TenFourFox, InterWebPPC, ArcticFox and Links2. I still make use of Safari 4 and OneWindowBrowser for things too.

I'll let someone with experience tell you if Linux on a G3 can provide a more modern experience without being so slow as to be unbearable.

 

[Dronecatcher]

https://forums.macrumors.com/threads/linux-on-imac-g3-in-2023-project-review-video.2375804/

 

[Appleuser201]

There's TenFourFox, InterWebPPC, ArcticFox and Links2. I still make use of Safari 4 and OneWindowBrowser for things too.

I'll let someone with experience tell you if Linux on a G3 can provide a more modern experience without being so slow as to be unbearable.

I know there are alternatives to TFF, but they aren't fundamentally different from TFF (I believe they are all already based on many years old versions of Firefox). I guess I could accomplish the stuff I want with Mac OS X, but I really want to try a modern linux experience on one of these with a web browser with more up-to-date standards. I want to do Reddit, Facebook, Twitter, and general web browsing without certificate errors or horribly rendered sites. I don't care if the browser if more stripped down, I just want the web content. I'm not gonna be trying to stream video off of a browser. I haven't been active in the PowerPC community for a while, so maybe I'm wrong but last time I was active here, people were already talking about Linux being the future for PowerPC processors.
Thanks for the link. I actually remember someone live streaming from Twitch on a G3 iMac on Linux.

 

[MysticCow]

But it'll be on an iMac G3, which is what I really care about. I like classic Mac OS X, but it just isn't very usable in 2023 for daily use (with no modern web browsers, besides the defunct TenFourFox).

Neither is Linux on an iMac G3. You’re trading getting a modern browser for turtle slow speeds.

Once you take a visit to the Garden and find what you need for that G3, you’d be surprised at how little you go online.

 

[Appleuser201]

Neither is Linux on an iMac G3. You’re trading getting a modern browser for turtle slow speeds.

Once you take a visit to the Garden and find what you need for that G3, you’d be surprised at how little you go online.

Maybe I am wrong. But I want to make this amazing machine as useable as possible, I want to do casual browsing on this (without certificate errors), word processing, light photo editing, the plan is to make this a semi-daily machine for light tasks. It's my favorite Mac of all time.

 

[mectojic]

Maybe I am wrong. But I want to make this amazing machine as useable as possible, I want to do casual browsing on this (without certificate errors), word processing, light photo editing, the plan is to make this a semi-daily machine for light tasks. It's my favorite Mac of all time.

Not many people posting are seriously trying to use an iMac G3 as a modern machine. But I have tried. Here’s what I think:

You need a slot-load iMac, I.e. 350mhz or higher. Run 10.4 Tiger. Max the ram to 1GB and use ethernet for internet. Upgrade the hard drive to SSD, it’s extremely worth it.

The landscape for web browsing is actually the best it’s been in the last 10 years. Try Arctic Fox and Interweb with Inthebox optimisation. Old.reddit will work, with patience. Google Gmail works great too with HTML version.

For YouTube, your best bet is Iteroni or PPCMC, or that Russian site. Don’t expect more than 240p smooth playback in most cases.

I have a 450mhz Ruby. I absolutely love the colour, but assuming I didn’t, I would definitely have preferred a 500mhz 2001 iMac- the main reason being the improved VRAM from 8mb to 16mb. But the CPU speed does make some difference too. In your case, get a 500-700mhz Snow.


Edit: for word processors, try Office 2004 or Bean OSX. Both are great. Or even iWork 05.

 

[MysticCow]

Maybe I am wrong. But I want to make this amazing machine as useable as possible, I want to do casual browsing on this (without certificate errors), word processing, light photo editing, the plan is to make this a semi-daily machine for light tasks. It's my favorite Mac of all time.

You can do web browsing without much issue in 10.4, as outlined above. Now for the rest:

Word Processing/Office Productivity: Office 2004 (best version ever and can read docx with a plugin), AppleWorks, WordPerfect 3.5e in the Classic Environment. Pages is in its infancy but is good at page layouts. All of them are good choices.

Photo Editing: iPhoto is weirdly robust for some editing. I used it just to brighten up a bunch of old newspaper scans I did for example. You can also use GIMP if you have the X11 environment installed, just like in Linux.

The rest just depends on what else you want and you just grab from the Garden.

 

[Appleuser201]

You can do web browsing without much issue in 10.4, as outlined above. Now for the rest:

Word Processing/Office Productivity: Office 2004 (best version ever and can read docx with a plugin), AppleWorks, WordPerfect 3.5e in the Classic Environment. Pages is in its infancy but is good at page layouts. All of them are good choices.

Photo Editing: iPhoto is weirdly robust for some editing. I used it just to brighten up a bunch of old newspaper scans I did for example. You can also use GIMP if you have the X11 environment installed, just like in Linux.

The rest just depends on what else you want and you just grab from the Garden.

Honestly I thought Tiger was dead in the water. The community has done some great work to keep it usable. Even YouTube applications are still around for it. I am wondering though, could I stream Tidal or Spotify in the browser on 10.4? The G3 would make a great music streaming machine since the speakers aren't half bad (if they aren't foam rotted)

 

[wicknix]

Honestly, you are asking wayyyyy too much from an old under powered G3. For modern web browsing with Linux you'd really need a minimum 1ghz G4 with at least 1gb of ram. Browsing on anything less would be slower than trying to melt an ice cube at 35 degrees (F).

If you are a paying subscriber of Spotify there are some console and QT based apps you can install on Linux. It wont work in any PPC browser because googles widevine (DRM) codec was never available for PPC.

G3's also have the worst non-supported graphics card (rage128) when it comes to Linux. You more than likely will never get x11 working and be stuck in console mode only.

As for what "modern" sites and services still work with tenfourfox/interwebppc/arcticfox etc on Tiger / Leopard check here.

If you really like that machine, get it. Then use it with the OS and software it was designed for. Then get a newer faster G4 or G5 to use with current Linux and software for the other more "modern" things you want to tinker with. Even then you won't be able to do all of what you want. For that get an intel or arm machine that isn't 20+ years old.

Just my 2 cents.

 

[theMarble]

In my opinion, the only PPC Macs worth running modern Linux on are the G5's. They are 64-bit, meaning the much newer apps and tools can be run, and because you can run over 2GB of RAM on a G5, the experience feels much smoother.

10 or so years ago, I ran Lubuntu 12.04 on my old A1046 (the original 1GHz AlBook), which had 1.25GB of RAM at the time. It was fine enough, but even back then when the modern web was much slimmer, it was still way slower than any more modern machine I had, and even TFF on Leopard was slightly faster on some sites.

For a G3, I'd stick with Mac OS X (or maybe OS 9 for a bit of fun). OpenBSD could be another option, I've been wanting to try it on my Blue and White, but haven't gotten around to it yet.

 

[mectojic]

In my opinion, the only PPC Macs worth running modern Linux on are the G5's. They are 64-bit, meaning the much newer apps and tools can be run, and because you can run over 2GB of RAM on a G5, the experience feels much smoother.

10 or so years ago, I ran Lubuntu 12.04 on my old A1046 (the original 1GHz AlBook), which had 1.25GB of RAM at the time. It was fine enough, but even back then when the modern web was much slimmer, it was still way slower than any more modern I had, and even TFF on Leopard was slightly faster on some sites.

For a G3, I'd stick with Mac OS X (or maybe OS 9 for a bit of fun). OpenBSD could be another option, I've been wanting to try it on my Blue and White, but haven't gotten around to it yet.

Yeah I think so. Too much effort to get a 32-bit Linux with not enough benefit.

 

[Appleuser201]

Honestly, you are asking wayyyyy too much from an old under powered G3. For modern web browsing with Linux you'd really need a minimum 1ghz G4 with at least 1gb of ram. Browsing on anything less would be slower than trying to melt an ice cube at 35 degrees (F).

If you are a paying subscriber of Spotify there are some console and QT based apps you can install on Linux. It wont work in any PPC browser because googles widevine (DRM) codec was never available for PPC.

G3's also have the worst non-supported graphics card (rage128) when it comes to Linux. You more than likely will never get x11 working and be stuck in console mode only.

As for what "modern" sites and services still work with tenfourfox/interwebppc/arcticfox etc on Tiger / Leopard check here.

If you really like that machine, get it. Then use it with the OS and software it was designed for. Then get a newer faster G4 or G5 to use with current Linux and software for the other more "modern" things you want to tinker with. Even then you won't be able to do all of what you want. For that get an intel or arm machine that isn't 20+ years old.

Just my 2 cents.

Yeah I get that, but I love pushing these G3s to the limit, and they are still surprisingly capable still for basic tasks. I'm still not ready to give up on Linux yet since I've seen youtubers run modern linux on these G3s already and did crazy things like live stream on Twitch right from the iMac itself. But I do think 10.4 will be good enough for my needs. Maybe I might get an eMac as well since it's basically the cousin to the iMac and is much faster. I like CRT Macs.

 

[mectojic]

Yeah I get that, but I love pushing these G3s to the limit, and they are still surprisingly capable still for basic tasks. I'm still not ready to give up on Linux yet since I've seen youtubers run modern linux on these G3s already and did crazy things like live stream on Twitch right from the iMac itself. But I do think 10.4 will be good enough for my needs. Maybe I might get an eMac as well since it's basically the cousin to the iMac and is much faster. I like CRT Macs.

ActionRetro is cool and all, and loves showing off crazy uses for vintage tech, but I highly doubt he uses them seriously when the cameras are off. Like everyone else, he would use a newer/Intel computer for daily tasks.

Ultimately, as I've learnt, it can be really fun to get modern functionality on a G3, but at the end of the day when there are deadlines and bills to pay, the time it takes isn't worth it. Listen to the people on this forum who daily drive these machines – they're all on high-end G4s/G5s.

 

[wicknix]

Well, the 32bit - 64bit debate is sketchy. Debian has no plans to kill off 32bit, and has 99% the same packages for pcc32 as it does for ppc64. I also run a 64bit kernel on one of my G5's but with a 32bit rootfs and software. Same as how PPC Ubuntu used to do it.

Now for a bit of speed reference... here is my 1.3ghz 12" PowerBook G4 running Void Linux browsing the web with a modern-ish webkit based browser. It's amazingly quite fast for such old hardware.

Also since streaming to Twitch was mentioned, here is a snippet of one of old streams from my dual 2ghz G5. Even though it's a G5 the cpu was pegged at 100% and opening of other apps and browsing slowed way down. Still cool that it could be done though.

Cheers

 

[theMarble]

I've seen youtubers run modern linux on these G3s already and did crazy things like live stream on Twitch right from the iMac itself.

IIRC that was from OpenBSD, which is way lighter than Linux.

 

[Dronecatcher]

IIRC that was from OpenBSD, which is way lighter than Linux.

And at 2.5FPS using 100%CPU to display the desktop - strictly a proof of concept!

 

[theMarble]

And at 2.5FPS using 100%CPU to display the desktop - strictly a proof of concept!

Yep! It's awesome to see a G3 do things such as live streaming and web browsing on a modern OS, but that does not change the fact that it is painfully slow, and just a demo/proof of concept as you said.

As I mentioned above, the only PPC Mac I've ever been able to get a modern OS working at a decent speed on is my Dual 2.7GHz G5, which has been upgraded with 4.5GB of RAM and dual SSDs.

 

[psychicist]

I wouldn't try to install a modern 32-bit Linux distribution on a PPC Mac nowadays, but go straight for OpenBSD. As mentioned before in this topic getting X11 to work is a frustrating exercise, whereas getting OpenBSD to run was straightforward.

Last time I installed it there was also 20 GB of applications ready to install, whereas the stability of packages in Debian Sid is dubious at most.

 

[Dronecatcher]

I wouldn't try to install a modern 32-bit Linux distribution on a PPC Mac nowadays, but go straight for OpenBSD. As mentioned before in this topic getting X11 to work is a frustrating exercise, whereas getting OpenBSD to run was straightforward.

Last time I installed it there was also 20 GB of applications ready to install, whereas the stability of packages in Debian Sid is dubious at most.

What are the browser options on OpenBSD - Dillo and Links?

 

[wicknix]

Pretty much. If i recall it does also have otter-browser which isn't too bad. Similar to leopard-webkit in rendering and age. It's also webkit based, but it doesn't have the ssl / tls issues LWK has.

 

[Appleuser201]

Pretty much. If i recall it does also have otter-browser which isn't too bad. Similar to leopard-webkit in rendering and age. It's also webkit based, but it doesn't have the ssl / tls issues LWK has.

How outdated are they? To be honest I wouldn't even bother running modern linux if I couldn't get an actual modern browser working on it. I wouldn't have patience for certificate errors and mark Zuckerberg telling me my browser isn't good enough to load Facebook. I would want something that's using current web standards, and load every website and render it at least usable. Tenfourfox (the Firefox version it's based on, from 2016) is really showing its age (youtube won't even play videos on it anymore).