Powerbook G3, Trying to Updated to Mac X!

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vegas4ever

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Ok here is hx; I got a Powerbook G3/233- 20hd and 256memory, running 9.2.2, from ebay it came with microsoft office 2001 which is nice. It dint come with any cds just the laptop and charger, now I want to upgrade to the Mac X and my friend gave me the Mac X 10.0.4 Cd (never register) I try to install the OS but it gets to a part where it ask "CHOOSE A SECTION WHERE YOU WANT X INSTALL" I can see the HD and CD icon but they are backout (not clickable) what can I do????
 
Hm. Don't bother. OS X will never run acceptably fast on that machine. 10.0.4 is very old, and in order to run current software, you'd need at least Jaguar (10.2.8), better Panther (10.3.9) - and with such an old machine and 256 MB of RAM, it wouldn't be much fun. I'd stay with OS 9 for that.
 
Wow, well first thanks for the response! and lets just say that I did want to install the OS, just for the beuty and the icons, its there any way possible to install x or I cant do it at all?
 
Theoretically, OS X 10.0 (and at least 10.1) should be able to install. On that type of machine, though, you maybe need to partition and let OS X live in a partition that only occupies the first 8 GB of the drive. Which means you'd have to erase the drive. I'm not sure if you want to do that...
 
can I partition the part of the drive that I will be using for X, (by the way How to you do a partition???) and Can I do a dual boot, like 9 in one and 10.x in the other??/
 
Even if you elect to go ahead and install OS X 10, do not install 10.0. According to no less an authority than Steve Jobs, OS X 10.0 was for early adopters only. There are too few compatible device (printer, etc.) drivers, most current applications will not run with 10.0, and to be charitable -- 10.0 performance sucks. OS X 10.1 has a respectable number of device drivers and better performance, but it is still an early release and would not be my choice. By the time you get to Jaguar (10.2) and Panther (10.3), OS X is becoming a mature OS and performance improves with each release. Given the speed of your processor, you would need all the performance improvements you can get.

Since you would be purchasing used copies of OS X there are some things to watch out for:
  • You only want to purchase a retail version.
  • Do not purchase a copy of OS X that came with another Mac. It probably will not install.
  • NEVER purchase upgrade CDs. They require the previous version of OS X to be installed before they will work and you loose the Archive & Install as well as the Erase Install options that became available with Jaguar.
Yes you can partition using Disk Utility in OS X or I forget what it is called in OS 9 but from my experience, no matter how you partition, the disk space you need will always be on the wrong partition. But if you elect to got that route partition such that you allow 1 GB for OS 9 and the rest of the drive for OS X. OS X likes lots of headroom!
 
Wow, So I just got school on how much 10.0.3 sucks, which its cool by me because I fund a site that sells 10.2 for $20 brand new, (google rocks) here is my question let say I want to install the x.2 on my laptop look for specs above according to Apple my laptop can handle the OS, Do I need to partition my drive? can I do it, and of course buying a new laptop is not a option!!!
 
if the powerbook g3 has no firewire or usb than the max os x that can be installed on it is 10.2.8. To install os x I recemmend that you have a 8gb or larger hd. And if your powerbook has no firewire or usb than it is a wallstreet and you will need to install os x on the first 8gb for it to boot. To partion your hard drive you will need to boot from a cd I beleve (thats how I did it) and go to disk utility and create some partions if you dont want os 9 I beleve you can just install os 10.0.4 over it. I have a powerbook g3 wallstreet 266mhz 192 mb ram and a 20gb hard drive with 10.1.5 on it and it works fine.
 
vegas4ever said:
Do I need to partition my drive? can I do it, and of course buying a new laptop is not a option!!!
Click to expand...
In my not so humble opinion the only reason to partition your drive is if you will be spending a substantial portion of your time on the computer actually booted into OS 9. Otherwise you are robbing OS X of precious disk space.

Your hard drive has an advertised nominal capacity of 20 GB. Those are decimal GigaBytes where 1 GB - 1,000,000,000, but OS X (like all computer operating systems) allocates and uses drive space in binary GigaBytes where 1 GB = 1,073,741,824. So as far as OS X is concerned your drive has a functional capacity of 18.62 GB. You should never allow the free space on a hard drive to fall below 15% or you rise irreparable damage to the file system. That means the usable capacity of your hard drive is actuall 15.83 GB. (Don't worry, it all works out to the same number of Bytes so you aren't really losing anything.)

A 10 GB drive is adequate for Jaguar or Panther but just adequate and it is definitely marginal for Tiger. OS X is happiest and fastest when there is a lot of headroom (free space) on the boot drive. So you end up being better off not partitioning. That does not mean you cannot boot into OS 9 if you must but you have to do it through System Preferences > Startup Disk or the Startup Disk control panel in OS 9.1 or later. The control panel in OS 9.0 or earlier will not recognize OS X as bootable.

If you just have to partition, OS 9 will install and run in as little as 512 MB if you don't have a lot of classic applications. 1 GB is comfortable for OS 9.
 
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