Mac OS X.I on an iMac (rev a)
- Thread starter anerki
- Start date
RodriC02000
Registered
I am using OS X.1 on both my iBook (Dual USB) and my old iMac 333.
The iMac 233 and 333 are very similar, and I have to say OS X.1 runs decently well on my iMac, although I have no 3D accelerator support, everything else is workable, IE actualy launches in one bouince
But your machine being 100Mhz Slower, and I believe you also have a lower end vid card (Rage II) instead of RagePro You might not even get 2D accelleration, Still though OS X will be usable on the iMac just make sure you have plenty of RAM and try it out for yourself, it really isnt that bad.
The iMac 233 and 333 are very similar, and I have to say OS X.1 runs decently well on my iMac, although I have no 3D accelerator support, everything else is workable, IE actualy launches in one bouince
But your machine being 100Mhz Slower, and I believe you also have a lower end vid card (Rage II) instead of RagePro You might not even get 2D accelleration, Still though OS X will be usable on the iMac just make sure you have plenty of RAM and try it out for yourself, it really isnt that bad. I'll try installing it again, I installed X before but it just wasn't fast enough ... I hope 10.1 works more smoothly
About the graphics card, the card that's in my iMac is a Rage II like you told with standard 2MB RAM ... Since I upgraded the VRAM to 6Mb my card functions like a Rage PRO card, giving RAVE support ... Hope the 3D support works, but 2D is most important, I don't play games on this machine (iMac) anywayz, it's more like an internet machine (Carracho, Hotline, IE, ICQ, MSN, Outlook, Interarchy, News, ...). You know, I was just hoping to install X because MSN and Carracho are REALLY unstable :-(
Anywayz,
tx
About the graphics card, the card that's in my iMac is a Rage II like you told with standard 2MB RAM ... Since I upgraded the VRAM to 6Mb my card functions like a Rage PRO card, giving RAVE support ... Hope the 3D support works, but 2D is most important, I don't play games on this machine (iMac) anywayz, it's more like an internet machine (Carracho, Hotline, IE, ICQ, MSN, Outlook, Interarchy, News, ...). You know, I was just hoping to install X because MSN and Carracho are REALLY unstable :-(
Anywayz,
tx
RodriC02000
Registered
Cool, I actually didnt know that about the Rage cards....
Playing games on the iMac is not too bad, as long as they are not too much 3D intensive. OpenGL Acceleration does not hapen on a pre Rage128 card, the drivers just arent there....
Cro Mag Rally is unplayable in X, so is Sims, etc. on OS 9 they run fine, hell even the Aqua Icons screensaver (Open GL) Loosk bad in an iMac.
For everything else the iMac should be great!!!!!!
Playing games on the iMac is not too bad, as long as they are not too much 3D intensive. OpenGL Acceleration does not hapen on a pre Rage128 card, the drivers just arent there....
Cro Mag Rally is unplayable in X, so is Sims, etc. on OS 9 they run fine, hell even the Aqua Icons screensaver (Open GL) Loosk bad in an iMac.
For everything else the iMac should be great!!!!!!
Hehe, I know about the screensaver, don't try that outerspace-thingie-screensaver, on my iMac on the old OS X it went at an amazing speed, maybe even 1 frame / 2 minutes when I was lucky!!
Hehe, other than that, it should work I'm gonna install it tonite (tomorrow morning?) I'll let you know how it goes
Tx
.anerki
Hehe, other than that, it should work
I'm gonna install it tonite (tomorrow morning?) I'll let you know how it goes Tx
.anerki
I have a rev B imac/233 and I put 10.1 on it starting from 5G59 until recently with the final update that shipped.
Even with the added 128 MBs (total: 160) and 10 GB drive which has a slightly higher seek time, This machine is rather slow. It slows down a bit more with CDs loaded. I believe the first gen iMacs only had one IDE channel which is why you notice a slowdown when I CD is placed in the drive.
I have used Norton Systemworks to optimize the drive but in the process, I can't run 'Terminal.app"
Is it usable? Much more than it was with 10.0.4. I would say it is like running MacOS 9 on an old 7100.
The iMac is not quite the workhorse it was with 9 on it. This is only a theory but I believe the main bottleneck may be the Graphics chip on that. The rage + used a 64 bit 2D chip. From what I gather, Aqua relies not only on the Quartz engine but the OpenGL engine as well. I have not researched this enough so don't quote me but it seems some of the GUI widgets may be 3D rendered. Which ones I do not know but if I were to guess it would be the buttons.
I have only come to this conclusion because of how slow the screen redraw is on this thing.
If you are using this only for the internet, then you might not have issues. That is all that my iMac is for as well. It is mainly used for Carracho, Hotline, Web surfing, email, chat, iTunes and Audiogalaxy. It is not as speedy as it used to be.
I am considering purchasing one of those new HARMONi cards from Sonnet. It is a 500 Mhz G3 that you can use to upgrade Rev A-D imacs. It also has one Firewire port to turn it into a Firewire capable mac. Street price is usually affordable. If anyone has used these cards i'd be interested in hearing about 10.1 performance.
There are also affordable upgrades from Powerlogix. They don't have firewire with them but do have one that is a G4 upgrade for those machines. I would also be interested hearing about MacOS 10.1 performance on these as well.
Finally, I am will be upping my RAM to 320 to see if that maybe helps with speed.
Even with the added 128 MBs (total: 160) and 10 GB drive which has a slightly higher seek time, This machine is rather slow. It slows down a bit more with CDs loaded. I believe the first gen iMacs only had one IDE channel which is why you notice a slowdown when I CD is placed in the drive.
I have used Norton Systemworks to optimize the drive but in the process, I can't run 'Terminal.app"
Is it usable? Much more than it was with 10.0.4. I would say it is like running MacOS 9 on an old 7100.
The iMac is not quite the workhorse it was with 9 on it. This is only a theory but I believe the main bottleneck may be the Graphics chip on that. The rage + used a 64 bit 2D chip. From what I gather, Aqua relies not only on the Quartz engine but the OpenGL engine as well. I have not researched this enough so don't quote me but it seems some of the GUI widgets may be 3D rendered. Which ones I do not know but if I were to guess it would be the buttons.
I have only come to this conclusion because of how slow the screen redraw is on this thing.
If you are using this only for the internet, then you might not have issues. That is all that my iMac is for as well. It is mainly used for Carracho, Hotline, Web surfing, email, chat, iTunes and Audiogalaxy. It is not as speedy as it used to be.
I am considering purchasing one of those new HARMONi cards from Sonnet. It is a 500 Mhz G3 that you can use to upgrade Rev A-D imacs. It also has one Firewire port to turn it into a Firewire capable mac. Street price is usually affordable. If anyone has used these cards i'd be interested in hearing about 10.1 performance.
There are also affordable upgrades from Powerlogix. They don't have firewire with them but do have one that is a G4 upgrade for those machines. I would also be interested hearing about MacOS 10.1 performance on these as well.
Finally, I am will be upping my RAM to 320 to see if that maybe helps with speed.
Tx for the loads of information It was exactly what I sought ...
Anywayz, adding more RAM will probably give you faster starting times, faster screen redraws, ... All the stuff you have to do a lot
I was thinking about buying a HARMONi card too, especially because it has firewire, I read an article about it in MacWorld (the French edition) and it got a pretty good review! But do you know where the FireWire port is? I scouted all the internet in search for a picture of the firewire port ... Is it where the mezzanine slot is in rev a->d or is somewhere else, like at the back of the iMac?
I'm not sure about the single IDE, I always thought it was a cache problem ...
BTW, if anyone has any news about the iBooks and what will change in the next half year, I'd be happy to take any info availible
Tx
.anerki
It was exactly what I sought ... Anywayz, adding more RAM will probably give you faster starting times, faster screen redraws, ... All the stuff you have to do a lot
I was thinking about buying a HARMONi card too, especially because it has firewire, I read an article about it in MacWorld (the French edition) and it got a pretty good review! But do you know where the FireWire port is? I scouted all the internet in search for a picture of the firewire port ... Is it where the mezzanine slot is in rev a->d or is somewhere else, like at the back of the iMac?
I'm not sure about the single IDE, I always thought it was a cache problem ...
BTW, if anyone has any news about the iBooks and what will change in the next half year, I'd be happy to take any info availible
Tx
.anerki
(BTW Tried to post this earlier but no success...)
Well what can I say?
I have an iMac Rev. A, 192MB ram, 2 MB video ram and a borrowed IBM HD (for now 6 months... 7200 rpm?) in it with OS-X and 9.1 and now 10.1 and 9.2 on it.
10.0.4 was COMPLETELY unusable, regarding to speed and bugs. 10.1 is not perfect yet, but it makes a hell of a difference and I haven't booted in 9.2 so far.
sleep: works perfect
ppp/modem: works perfect and does not try to answer incoming calls anymore!
modem-sound: it... works!
login: about 5 seconds, superb!
logout/turn off: heee... it asks for to quit running apps!!!
window dragging: so so
window resizing: still poor, but better than 10.0.4.
app launching: very nice, 4...5 times faster? dunno, but acceptable for me
app re-lauching: bouncing.. what bouncing? Okay, a few of them.
general speed increase: feels almost like dual-G3 cpu
Classic: thumbs up
iTunes: finally useful, even from cd with 150 mp3's on it!
Stability: control panel once crashed in my face, till now uptime max. 2 1/2
days out of 2 1/2 days...
crashes or reboots: none
So, am I happy? I'm happy!
To be continued...
Well what can I say?
I have an iMac Rev. A, 192MB ram, 2 MB video ram and a borrowed IBM HD (for now 6 months... 7200 rpm?) in it with OS-X and 9.1 and now 10.1 and 9.2 on it.
10.0.4 was COMPLETELY unusable, regarding to speed and bugs. 10.1 is not perfect yet, but it makes a hell of a difference and I haven't booted in 9.2 so far.
sleep: works perfect
ppp/modem: works perfect and does not try to answer incoming calls anymore!
modem-sound: it... works!
login: about 5 seconds, superb!
logout/turn off: heee... it asks for to quit running apps!!!
window dragging: so so
window resizing: still poor, but better than 10.0.4.
app launching: very nice, 4...5 times faster? dunno, but acceptable for me
app re-lauching: bouncing.. what bouncing? Okay, a few of them.
general speed increase: feels almost like dual-G3 cpu
Classic: thumbs up
iTunes: finally useful, even from cd with 150 mp3's on it!
Stability: control panel once crashed in my face, till now uptime max. 2 1/2
days out of 2 1/2 days...
crashes or reboots: none
So, am I happy? I'm happy!
To be continued...