I still think
there is a lot of life in Power Macs. My two main desktop
machines and my main laptop are all PowerPC (G5, iMac G4 and late iBook G4).
I plan to get at least 10 years out of my quad, and I have a spare unit
identically configured, just in case.
Depending on your requirements, that sounds reasonable. I managed to
get nearly 7 years out of my Rev.0 Dual 2Ghz G5 PowerMac, and I'm a
heavy Photoshop user. Granted I was ready to replace it at about 5
years, but limped on for a couple more. My primary problem was I
needed more RAM (I had 7 of the 8Gb possible). The hardware finally
gave out on me (the onboard ethernet died about 3 years before the
rest of the system).
Really, for my purposes all I need is a current web browser (heheheh). I'm
pretty insulated against hardware failure and I keep cloned spares ready to
go just in case.
With 8GB of RAM, the quad runs Photoshop (7, because I hate product
activation), Final Cut Express HD, TenFourFox, Office v.X (I have 2008, but
v.X works just fine for my purposes), GarageBand and a smattering of Classic
apps including QuarkXPress 4 quite nicely. I stuck some Caviar Black drives
in it which yielded a minor but appreciated throughput increase, and I
usually run the system in Reduced mode to save power and wear and tear (a
convenient MenuExtra I found lets you flip to Automatic/Highest on the
fly without a trip to System Preferences, so I can turn on turbo only when
I need it).
My next "computer" will probably be an ARM netbook of some kind anyway; I
really don't need another desktop system since I have my own server room.
As long as I can get an xterm and a basic browser, I can run everything else
off the POWER6. But I'm doing fine on what I've got.
The only thing I don't like is because of Mozilla rapid release, I spend
way more time on TenFourFox than I'd like to. Classilla is getting neglected.
I/O. Actually the main performance problem is these
**** HD's that
go to sleep on their own when not being used, and there doesn't seem
to be a way to turn off that behavior!
That is super annoying. Another win for old "stupid" hardware.
--
------------------------------------ personal:
http://www.cameronkaiser.com/ --
Cameron Kaiser * Floodgap Systems *
www.floodgap.com * ckaiser at
floodgap.com
-- Architecture is the art of how to waste space. -- Philip Johnson -----------