Ye Olde iBook

[Super Cameraman]

I got a couple iBooks today from my mom's friend. They're the first ever iBooks. Like, the first ever EVER iBooks. My mom's friend went to Macworld, saw it there, came home and got it.

Anyway, I didn't test both of them, but one of them turns on, but it's REALLY slow and takes a very long time to boot up. Is this normal? I think it's from 1999... Anywho, is there any way I can get start over with it? Like delete everything off the harddrive but the OS? It has OS X. Maybe the laptop isn't powerful enough for it? What should I do?

(This is the 3rd and 4th free laptop I've ever gotten, and the 2nd that's ever turned on. Just, FYI)

[bicostp]

How much RAM, how big are the hard drives, etc?

Really REALLY early iBooks, you say? You're probably better off running OS 9.2 on them than OS X. They can run OS X, but 9 would be faster. (They have the new world ROMs so they can't run anything under 8.6.) You'll shut yourself out from some programs, but you can run iCab as a browser (my 7600 running 7.6.1 does ), MacWorks or Office for Mac, and all that stuff.

As for the extreme slowness, my first guess would be lack of sufficient RAM. Next up for questioning would be the hard drive, maybe it's going.

*still <3's classic Mac OS*

[vb_master]

If you come on AIM I can help you optimize OS X for the G3 that is in the iBook.

[Super Cameraman]

Bicostp, yeah the really REALLY early one. I checked Apple.com to see what kind of specs are needed to run OS X, this thing doesn't have enough power.

I'm booting it up right now, (yes it takes that long) so I'll see what we have for memory, and RAM and stuff.

Where can I get OS 9.2? Would I have to buy it?

As for programs, my old middle school has Macromedia Studio MX for the older Mac OS (not sure which one, but it was the one on the clear iMacs.) Maybe they'd let me install it!

I'm not really sure why I want this laptop, but it's my first time owning a Mac, so I'm pretty excited. (I guess.)

EDIT: 288 MB SDRAM, 300 MHz PowerPC G3, and I don't know how to check the harddrive.

EDIT2: Turns out, the other one (I got two) work's almost perfectly. Took a while to boot up, but it seemed to work fine. And it's got Microsoft Office on it! However, GarageBand isn't on there? Doesn't OS X come with it? Or would it not fit on it's 3 GB harddrive? (I am not even kidding.)

[bicostp]

Where can I get OS 9.2? Would I have to buy it?

Unfortunately the newest version of the OS Apple gives away for free is 7.5.3. After that they only offer minor updates. (7.5.5, 7.6.1, 8.1, 8.5.1, etc.)

As for programs, my old middle school has Macromedia Studio MX for the older Mac OS (not sure which one, but it was the one on the clear iMacs.) Maybe they'd let me install it!

OS 9 will probably run it. (I've only seen OS X running on a couple clear iMacs, and they were the 400 mhz DV ones.)

I'm not really sure why I want this laptop, but it's my first time owning a Mac, so I'm pretty excited. (I guess.)

Well you should be. As for software, look around Tucows and VersionTracker. Both have been around forever, and I've even found System 7 stuff around there.

Also check out the Info-Mac archive and this site on the University of Michigan's server. (The very servers we got software from back in the early nineties.)
http://www.umich.edu/~archive/mac/
http://hyperarchive.lcs.mit.edu/

For browsers, you have Netscape, an older version of Mozilla, and iCab. Get a copy of "Fetch" for FTP transfers. (FTP is the easiest way to transfer files between an older Mac and a PC. Just run FileZilla on your desktop.) Disinfectant is a great free anti-virus program.

EDIT: 288 MB SDRAM, 300 MHz PowerPC G3, and I don't know how to check the harddrive.

Oh yeah, 9 will fly on that. It's really too underpowered for OS X.

[Black Six]

EDIT2: Turns out, the other one (I got two) work's almost perfectly. Took a while to boot up, but it seemed to work fine. And it's got Microsoft Office on it! However, GarageBand isn't on there? Doesn't OS X come with it? Or would it not fit on it's 3 GB harddrive? (I am not even kidding.)

What version of OS X is on there? Garageband only started becoming available with 10.4 I believe. At any rate you only get Garageband if you buy a new Mac, otherwise you have to pay for it.

[Super Cameraman]

For now, I'm going to stick with OS X, it's working surprisingly well.

The only problem is that when I close it, and then open it, it won't wake up unless I plug it in. Battery isn't the problem, I don't think because I can unplug it and it works on battery power.

EDIT: I can see the wires in the AC adapter sparking inside the rubber. (It's clear.) I'm going to hold off charging it for a while....

[rockem sockem forever!]

YES!, someone else is interested in late 90's macs, I'm so happy right now
.

[Triton]

i kinda like the fruity ibooks let me know if you wanna get rid of one

[sgtpepper]

Yeah same here! I love the clamshell iBooks! I'll gladly take one if you're getting rid of them (hell, I'd even pay you! )

[Super Cameraman]

Bit of an update, one of them works pretty well, even with OS X. I used ShadowKiller to get rid of the shadows and clear up some RAM, and I think it's working pretty well. I even got Wifi working, and it's got IE and Safari on it, so that's nice. The only problem is that I don't think the battery charges, and it won't wake up from sleep mode unless it's plugged in. The green LED pulses when it's a sleep so I think it's working, but it just won't wake up. I'm thinking there's a button or some mechanism in the hinge that lets the iBook know when the lid is open, and it's broken. The hinge is sort of messed up. I'll see if the other one (which doesn't have a hinge problem, but is ridiculously slow) has the same problem.

EDIT: Well the other one wakes up and goes to sleep fine, but it's so slow that it doesn't realize the lid is closed until I open it to see if it's asleep, and then it goes to sleep. But it works, it's just slow.

Also, the one that isn't slow, the battery lasts about 10 minutes. That's bad, right?

[bicostp]

I think maybe the hard drive in the slow one is failing (or at least heavily fragmented).

You could scratch together a good laptop from those two semi-good ones. Stick the hard drive from the good one into the slow one and try booting again. (You said it's in better shape.) Boot it up and see if it works fine. If you can, combine the RAM from both into the now-good one.

And yes, the battery being that run down is a bad thing. (The batteries for my Duo were at about the same state when they were 9 years old.) Since you really have two batteries at your disposal, take the completely dead one apart and replace its cells.

Afterwards, put the slow hard drive in the iBook with the hinge problem and track down a copy of OS 9. Install it and see if it's any faster. At least then you'll get the best of both worlds as far as OSes go.

[Super Cameraman]

That's a really good idea! Thanks! Also, I forgot to mention, the screen from the slow one, which is in better condition, has a line in it. It's not distracting, but I bet I could take the screen out right?

EDIT: Doh, I need a torx screwdriver. Don't have one.

EDIT again: Can't combine RAM, only one slot.

[thehackerinside]

Any chance of some pictures of these sexy beasts , I <3 the clamshells.

Joe

[Super Cameraman]

Yeah I took some pictures, but Imageshack isn't working for me for some reason. What are some other image hosting sites?