Filed under: PowerBook, Retro Mac
Apple: Welcome to the obsolete list, PowerBook G4
Ars Technica reports that Apple will announce the latest additions to its list of vintage and obsolete machines on March 17. The list, initially reported through MacMerc, includes the following:The "vintage" machines are ones where service parts are available to repair machines purchased in California due to existing statutes. This classification does not apply in the other 49 states.
- Xserve RAID
- Xserve (Slot Load)
- Xserve (Cluster Node)
The rest of the additions, to grace the "obsolete" list, include:
- PowerBook G4
- Power Mac G4 (Digital Audio)
- Power Mac G4 (Quicksilver)
- Macintosh Server G4 (Digital Audio)
- Macintosh Server G4 (Quicksilver)
Have fond memories of these machines? Share them in the comments!
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Reader Comments (Page 1 of 4)
Galley said 7:32AM on 2-04-2009
Be careful what you wish for when you request an upgrade from your IT dept. My 1997 17" monitor had a 1" scratch on the screen. They replaced it with a 1998 monitor with a 1/4" scratch and a blue tint.
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jraine said 7:55AM on 2-04-2009
I'm still rocking my PowerBook G4 1.33GHz, on it's 2nd hard drive, I up graded the combo drive to a super drive and maxed out the RAM. Still using the original battery that still holds a 1.5-2hr charge. My PB G4 has been such a work horse. Sad to hear it's considered obsolete. Guess it's just another reason to get an iMac.
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Saucey said 8:15AM on 2-04-2009
Almost exactly the same story with me, except I'm on my second battery that doesn't hold a charge. This is my kids' machine now in the den. It still looks awesome and people come over and reply that my kids have a better machine than the grown ups in their house.
Daniel said 12:25PM on 2-04-2009
My wife got my hand me down PB G4, and it was still working awesome until it got stolen last week. It was the most reliable mac I've ever owned (including my MBP)
sid said 12:10PM on 2-04-2009
Same here, only I'm on my second hard drive, screen and keyboard, yet I still manage to get 3 hours out of my original battery. Good luck finding any 12inch laptop today that gets 3 hours of battery life without a huge expanded pack.
Obsolete my ass Apple!
Moose said 3:46PM on 2-04-2009
Me too... Second hard drive as well, screen is a little dimmer than it used to be, but still holds a nice 2.5-3hr charge. Not too shabby! One of the best Macs I've owned, 8600 aside...
Now the poor thing plays the glorious role of DVD playback/Hulu streaming on my desk while I work and occasional duty as a presentation machine. Can't bring myself to sell it...
Chocolim said 8:09AM on 2-04-2009
I have a Powerbook G4 867Mhz, on Leopard it just work, with tiger it work fine, try to install a Fedora to have more control but cant make the wpa2 work with the wifi...
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Nathanial said 8:13AM on 2-04-2009
I still use the G4 Quicksilver as my primary machine. Man I need to get a new mac!!
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Tom Waterhouse said 9:45AM on 2-04-2009
I was going to say those PowerMac G4's are still great machines.
I remember being amazed at how much more powerful an 800Mhz PowerMac was compared to a 800Mhz iMac, so I'm not too surprised you're still using it.
However compare it to a new Mac Pro...
SirCom said 1:41AM on 2-05-2009
I am still using it to do iphone development!
Maple said 2:41AM on 2-06-2009
Ditto.
Picked up a very inexpensive Apple ADC monitor a few years back to go with it, and it is just too nice to give up.
gjlamb said 4:33PM on 2-12-2009
Ditto here. Still have the old faithful Quicksilver running in my study. It's doing a great job for my web surfing, email and iTunes master for my AppleTV. I guess as the saying goes, one mans junk is another mans treasure.
Scott said 8:11AM on 2-04-2009
Hear, hear, jraine! I use my 867 MHz PB G4 daily. It now has 1.12 GB RAM and the stock drive, and I'm running Leopard, Office 2008, TurboCAD, OmniPlan, iWork and use it for scientific data analysis. While in my office, I plug it into a 20" widescreen monitor, and it works (almost) as well as any desktop. A few beachballs here and there when it needs to swap stuff, but it always bounces back!
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L said 8:19AM on 2-04-2009
Ahhh yes... fond are those memories of my 12" PowerBook's logic board failure in the middle of finals period and the TWO subsequent LB replacements... and a hard drive replacement in between. All just shy of its third birthday.
Strangely, I still love that silly little machine... especially now that I am not constantly reminded of its slowness. On the one hand, I'm sad it didn't live as long as jraine's (which is actually an even older model, geeze)... but on the other hand... dang, do I like that my MacBook Pro actually works crazy good.
Having said that, I'd sell this MBP in a heartbeat if Apple ever comes out with another 12" pro machine. Now excuse me while I go age a photo of my PowerBook in Photoshop...
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Nick Soper said 8:21AM on 2-04-2009
I had the first 17" powerbook. 1ghz of trailblazing fun, and it got me hooked on Apple.
It didn't get me hooked on the price (£2200!) and the wait (8 weeks shipping time), but overall it was a goodie.
It even managed to play Castle Wolfenstein!!!
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pat said 8:30AM on 2-04-2009
I still have a pair of quicksilvers running server 10.4 (a file server and an internal web server) that haven't hiccuped since the day they went online.
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Citizen of Earth said 8:26AM on 2-04-2009
"This classification does not apply in the other 49 states" or THE REST OF THE WORLD.
Not all your readers are American. Unless I missed the "of America" after "The Unofficial Apple Weblog".
Gahhhhhh!!!!
:)
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kinto said 12:29PM on 2-04-2009
hahahahaha!
i AM american but that was well put =)
falcon5768 said 8:35AM on 2-04-2009
G4 Quicksilver is still our ONLY Mac server in the district running Leopard server.
And it doesnt look like thats going to end anytime soon.
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cdhowe52 said 8:37AM on 2-04-2009
I'm still running a dual 800 MHz Quicksilver connected to a 22-inch ADC Cinema display as my home machine. I remote installed Leopard onto it from my 1 GHz Powerbook G4 (since upgraded to a Macbook Pro), and it runs like a champ. The 1.25 GBytes of main memory in it is a bit of a limitation, and it can't really get above 1.5 Gbytes anyway. But a PCI SATA controller got me over the 128 GByte limit many years ago -- it now runs dual 300 GByte SATA drives (one main drive, one Time Machine), which will shortly go to 1 TByte.
Why don't I replace it? Mostly because it works just fine modulo a few more beachballs than on my MacBook Pro, and I don't currently have the $3,000 for its Mac Pro replacement.
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