I am considering picking up an apple G4 from ebay to use for scrivener. The computer won't be used for anything else, and I may not even link up to my wifi--to keep me from getting distracted.
Does anyone use one of these, still? Will it be terribly slow, or are they actually pretty reasonable in terms of speed (as long as you aren't video editing). What about scrivener (the full version, not gold) does that work fine?
Posted by Troy (Member # 2640) on :
Just for word-processing? It should be absolutely fine. The G4 was advertised as a supercomputer when it came out. It was used for video editing and ran like a champ. Hopefully the one you're going to buy is in good condition.
If I were in your shoes, I would look at the resources required to run Scrivener. Mainly, which versions of the Mac OS does it run on? What are the minimum requirements, if it lists them, in terms of memory and processing speed? (It might not list them, but honestly, it would absolutely blow my mind if anyone ever made a word processing program that couldn't run on a G4). And then I'd double-check the G4 I was thinking about buying against those requirements, with the OS Version being my main consideration.
Long story short, check the specs. You really should be fine.
Posted by skadder (Member # 6757) on :
It just says Mac OS X 10.4 (Tiger) or above. The G4s I have seen all seem to be Tiger.
Posted by Troy (Member # 2640) on :
I would definitely just make sure the OS of the G4 I was getting was Tiger 10.4+ then. Question the seller if the ebay listing isn't clear.
I also wouldn't hesitate to look on craigslist for cheap Macs in my area.
Posted by annepin (Member # 5952) on :
I was using a G4 powerbook up until it died a week or two ago. My big caveat--it doesn't have the intel processor. This means a lot of the newer software won't work on it. If you just want to use scrivener, that will probably work fine. However, I do believe the latest update of Safari/ OSX killed my computer, so don't let it update itself!
Posted by skadder (Member # 6757) on :
I have a dual-core Dell whizz-bang laptop for whiling away the hours on Hatrack...this mac is going to be my mean-lean-get-my-novel-writen-machine.
So aslong as it can handle the latest current scrivener, I am happy.
...for now.
Posted by Kitti (Member # 7277) on :
I've got a 10-year-old G4 desktop. It won't operate the absolute latest operating system (10.5.x), but other than that I have no problems with it. One caveat: I replaced the original 30GB hard-drive with a new one and discovered that, no matter how big a hard-drive is, my G4 could only access and write to 128 GB of it.
Posted by skadder (Member # 6757) on :
Well, thanks for the advice.
I have ordered a G4 ibook with 1.33mhz processor, 750 mb ram and a 60gb harddrive, wifi etc.. It is running leopard 10.5.7, and comes with microsoft office and ilife and iwork for £200. From ebay.
It should run scrivener and still function as a reasonably portable (for holidays, etc.). My dell has a 17 inch screen and fine to move around the house, but is pretty heavy for flights etc.