Thread
50 G4 Minis (not mine)
The issue with the eMac is that its big, heavy, and prone to capacitor failure.
Well, graphics program rendering is not "as native" as OS 9. Some games do not work in Classic Mode hypervisor/virtualiser, but do run well in OS 9.
Mac Mini G4 is a iBook less battery and panel. I would rather have Titanium PowerBook base (any model after first launch model), than g4mini.
I don't know if the 1.42s suffered that issue, there's a specific "2005" revision of the 1.42, it seems.
Access to hardware is a separate issue than "native." There is a differentiation between Classic Mode (which is ultimately a hypervisor doing virtualization) and booting directly on the hardware, but the code is still natively executing on the processor, and is not being emulated.
Also, a TiBook isn't really going to be any better at anything than a mini except maybe booting Mac OS 9, at which in my experience, it was also pretty bad, and most software never ran much faster on my TIBook than it did on my 450MHz Power Macintosh G3 (Blue and White) or my 500MHz "Pismo" PowerBook G4. It will have gigabit Ethernet and that will be literally the only advantage a TiBook will have over a G4 mini, from a hardware perspective.
The bus speeds on a TiBook would be sloooowww(not that any G4 had great bus speeds). And at least the G4 Mini uses DDR RAM and later revision silicon.
Cory5412, TheWhiteFalcon:
I am not calling a TiBook faster, but better for my usage. TiBook base plus AC adapter (compatible with today's Apple AC cables), versus Mini plus peripherals plus larger power brick. Ability to tinker with ease: tool-free access to memory, and obvious access to drives. Mini is much more involved, not easy to open, not easy to visualise components. TiBook has CardBus socket, for more yesteryear fun. PC Card is a tactile piece, joy to use. Mac Mini with just disc slot is no fun, in my opinion.
I am making a mess with words. I just dislike Mini. Yes, B&W and Sawtooth are lovely, but huge and impractical for a bedroom hobbyist with space constraint.
edit add: my intention was to say "more native", jokingly, to resemble Animal Farm "all are equal, but some are more equal than others".
I am not calling a TiBook faster, but better for my usage. TiBook base plus AC adapter (compatible with today's Apple AC cables), versus Mini plus peripherals plus larger power brick. Ability to tinker with ease: tool-free access to memory, and obvious access to drives. Mini is much more involved, not easy to open, not easy to visualise components. TiBook has CardBus socket, for more yesteryear fun. PC Card is a tactile piece, joy to use. Mac Mini with just disc slot is no fun, in my opinion.
I am making a mess with words. I just dislike Mini. Yes, B&W and Sawtooth are lovely, but huge and impractical for a bedroom hobbyist with space constraint.
edit add: my intention was to say "more native", jokingly, to resemble Animal Farm "all are equal, but some are more equal than others".
Hm, even then, the physical footprint of a TiBook is pretty big. It would be neat if you command-stripped it to the side or back of a monitor, perhaps, I have done that with an Asus netbook, but the TiBook is also very big.
Back in 2005/2006 or so when my own TiBook's (QT2451CEN4M -- I was on the phone with Apple a lot) screen finally failed for the last time and I was running it in perma-desktop mode, I just dropped it on top of a 17-inch CRT I had. If at the time you'd given me the opportunity to trade it for a G4 mini I would probably have said yes so quickly you'd have retroactively felt it in the past. It is insanely inconvenient to use a TiBook as a desktop.
Below is a picture of that desk setup, it was a Viewsonic/OptiQuest CRT with a flat top deck, which was basically the only reason the setup worked at all.
Now, if Apple had introduced a miniature system in 2001/2002/2003 based on TiBook guts like the mini but different, then that would be a different situation, but as it stands, the TiBook itself is pretty bad for that task. I think in 2003, however, Apple was still a little bit off-put from that idea based on what happened with the Cube.
PCMCIA and Cardbus are neat, but what really is there for it these days other than (admittedly helpful) USB controllers or maybe if yours was ordered without Airport, a WaveLAN or a Linksys WPC54G (for OS X)?
I've spent a long part of my Windows-using life buying ThinkPads with as many expansion options as physically possible only to find out that a Sony Ericsson GC86 wasn't even very good or practical when it was new, and that as soon as you buy a cardbus/pcmcia media reader for your camera, you'll buy a new camera that requires a different card reader. Of course, some entire concepts like having a mobile data plan for your laptop have simply changed or moved on since, and now that we're standardized on both phone tethering for mobile data and SD and variants for cameras, those two situations are a little bit more stable.
Back in 2005/2006 or so when my own TiBook's (QT2451CEN4M -- I was on the phone with Apple a lot) screen finally failed for the last time and I was running it in perma-desktop mode, I just dropped it on top of a 17-inch CRT I had. If at the time you'd given me the opportunity to trade it for a G4 mini I would probably have said yes so quickly you'd have retroactively felt it in the past. It is insanely inconvenient to use a TiBook as a desktop.
Below is a picture of that desk setup, it was a Viewsonic/OptiQuest CRT with a flat top deck, which was basically the only reason the setup worked at all.
Now, if Apple had introduced a miniature system in 2001/2002/2003 based on TiBook guts like the mini but different, then that would be a different situation, but as it stands, the TiBook itself is pretty bad for that task. I think in 2003, however, Apple was still a little bit off-put from that idea based on what happened with the Cube.
PCMCIA and Cardbus are neat, but what really is there for it these days other than (admittedly helpful) USB controllers or maybe if yours was ordered without Airport, a WaveLAN or a Linksys WPC54G (for OS X)?
I've spent a long part of my Windows-using life buying ThinkPads with as many expansion options as physically possible only to find out that a Sony Ericsson GC86 wasn't even very good or practical when it was new, and that as soon as you buy a cardbus/pcmcia media reader for your camera, you'll buy a new camera that requires a different card reader. Of course, some entire concepts like having a mobile data plan for your laptop have simply changed or moved on since, and now that we're standardized on both phone tethering for mobile data and SD and variants for cameras, those two situations are a little bit more stable.
They make a nice little box for a basic browsing workstation, a network terminal, a NAS fileserver with USB disk(s) attached, a media server, a device controller, a NAT router - it's only with heavy graphic applications that you notice the slowness. We tend to overlook that not everything is about the screen performance.
Rick
Rick
If I had 50 G4 minis, I could rule the... 1. WORLD! [ ] 2. House [X]
Hmmm... An overclocked 1.66 GHz PowerPC Mac mini (the PowerMac10,2 model) with a 500 gig SATA hard drive in place of the DVD drive never uses more than 32 watts even with the CPU at 100%. At that amount of power usage, you'd be able to use all 50 Mac minis on a single 15 amp, 120 volt circuit, assuming you don't try to turn them all on simultaneously.
I run two PowerPC Mac minis as servers. One of the reasons I chose them, aside from size, is because of how little power they consume. I also just finished working on a film shoot where the main Final Cut project was prepared and footage from an ARRI Alexa was reviewed using a PowerPC Mac mini. They're very handy little machines.
