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| Click here to select a new forum. | | OS X on a PowerBook 1400c 400 Mhz G3 | Posted by: Sawtoothdude on 2008-01-06 19:33:36
I was hoping to put a version of Mac OS X, Preferably 10.2 or 10.0, on my PowerBook. Is this possible?
It has a 400Mhz G3 processor,64MB of RAM and a 10GB Drive.
Thanks, and if it's impossible, let me know.
| Posted by: alk on 2008-01-06 19:38:30
No.
Not possible.
OS X cannot run on NuBus systems or systems with a PowerPC 601. This precludes its use on 6100, 7100, 8100, 7200, 7500, PowerBook 5300 series, PowerBook 1400 series, 6200, 6300 (except 6360), 5200, and 5300 Macs and all associated clones.
Peace,
Drew
| Posted by: Sawtoothdude on 2008-01-06 20:57:54
I'm guessing it's because of the NameregistryLib?
Anyways thanks. The machine is screaming fast in 9 though.
| Posted by: equill on 2008-01-06 21:09:47
Perhaps beddereven in OS 8.6? For me, the overheads of OS 9.1 are not worth the space or the RAM in a similarly tricked-out 1400: (Sonnet) G3/400MHz, 64MB (single 48MB RAM card), IBM 4GB HDD, VIEWpowr video-out card and Farallon EtherMac PC card. Keep in mind that Target Disk mode, if it concerns you, is 'off, dear', for HDDs of greater than 4GB. It's a ROM feature, and therefore irremediable.
de
| Posted by: Metalchic on 2008-01-07 07:47:46
on the subject of the PB1400c/cs computers, idk if this is standard but mine was build with a 166MHz 603e CPU, with a Cresendo G3 upgrade and a little bit of spiceing a Laptop DVD drive into a dead PB1400 CDROM module i dont see any reason that OSX.1 (mabye a little later??) should not work.
| Posted by: iMac600 on 2008-01-07 08:06:30
Because the motherboard itself is based on an architecture called NuBus. OS X is just not capable of booting on a NuBus system and will only boot on a PCI architecture board.
Therefore OS X will never boot on a 1400, regardless of how upgraded it is.
It would be like trying to run Windows NT PPC on a Mac, the CPUs are the same, but the way the system pretty much handles everything else isn't the same and in turn isn't compatible. It just doesn't work.
| Posted by: alk on 2008-01-07 20:50:18
And there's also the problem of OS X needing 96 MB of RAM and the 1400 maxing out at 64 MB.
Peace,
Drew
| Posted by: Temetka on 2008-01-07 23:08:27
Will it run on a 3400c?
| Posted by: Metalchic on 2008-01-07 23:11:33
Supported MacOS: 7.6-8.6, 9.0 i would say you would have to test that out.
| Posted by: alk on 2008-01-08 00:18:55
Yes, it will run on a 3400c. There is no sleep support or battery monitoring, and PC card support is limited to CardBus (no 16-bit cards, it would seem). I think I read that the backlight control is non-functional and that the backlight is on full, as well.
144 MB RAM is probably helpful.
I just installed it on my 2400c/240 via XPostFacto on a 9500 is SCSI Disk Mode, but I can't boot it. I'm not done playing around, yet, though.
Peace,
Drew
| Posted by: Quadraman on 2008-01-08 09:33:33
No.
Not possible.
OS X cannot run on NuBus systems or systems with a PowerPC 601. This precludes its use on 6100, 7100, 8100, 7200, 7500, PowerBook 5300 series, PowerBook 1400 series, 6200, 6300 (except 6360), 5200, and 5300 Macs and all associated clones.
Peace,
Drew OS X can run on a 7200 or 7500 with a CPU upgrade.
| Posted by: tomlee59 on 2008-01-08 10:05:02
Yes, a PCI-bus mac is a candidate for OSX, so a 7200 with a CPU upgrade could work. But a stock 7200 won't.
Edit: See rest of thread below. A 7200 isn't a good candidate, after all.
| Posted by: SiliconValleyPirate on 2008-01-08 14:54:06
OS X cannot run on NuBus systems or systems with a PowerPC 601. This precludes its use on 6100, 7100, 8100, 7200, 7500, PowerBook 5300 series, PowerBook 1400 series, 6200, 6300 (except 6360), 5200, and 5300 Macs First non-NewWorld machine I ran OS X on was a 7500 with a 604e/200 in. It ran OS X 10.1 for about 8 months as a server, and was oddly usable as long as you didn't try and do too much at the same time.
| Posted by: Anonymous Freak on 2008-01-08 18:12:06
It is my understanding that OS X cannot be made to run on a 7200, no matter what; because the 7200's 601 is soldered to the motherboard, and 7200 CPU upgrades are really just 'computers on a PCI card' that don't actually kick in until their driver is active. Wow, was that ever a run-on sentence. (Sorry equill.)
Since XPostFacto can't use the PCI-card-based CPU upgrade, it can't boot OS X.
The lowest-end machine OS X can be forced to run on is the 7500 with a CPU upgrade to at least a 604. (I have run 10.1. on a G3-upgraded 7500, and on a non-upgraded 8500.)
| Posted by: Temetka on 2008-01-08 20:17:43
When I first got into OS X my box was a 200MHz 8500.
I still have that box, and although it has been way heavily upgraded, it will always be my first mac, and thus my first love. I will own that box until I can longer find parts for it.
First X I ran on it was 10.1.5. The OS ran kinda alright as long as I didn't run more than 2 or 3 programs at once. Once I slapped a G3 in, the machine was faster. Toss in 512MB of RAM, ATA/133 Controller, Rage Nexus 32MB and my new G4 ZIF and man that sucker flies. Currently running 10.2 Jaguar, soon to try Tiger.
| Posted by: alk on 2008-01-08 21:25:41
OS X can run on a 7200 or 7500 with a CPU upgrade. OS X cannot run on a 7200.
OS X can run on a 7500 with a CPU upgrade, yes, but the 7500-as-shipped has a PowerPC 601 which cannot run OS X.
Peace,
Drew
| Posted by: bmacsys on 2008-01-19 09:00:56
And there's also the problem of OS X needing 96 MB of RAM and the 1400 maxing out at 64 MB.
Peace,
Drew One time I got four 168 pin dimms from somewhere. I put them in my smurf G3. Took a long, long time to boot. When it finally dropped into the Finder I found out why. They were only 16 meg dimms. OSX and 64 megs of ram don't mix! From personal experience anything under 512 megs is insufficient. Bumping up even to 768 megs is much better than 512. Less disk thrashing.
| Posted by: alk on 2008-01-19 15:47:29
Did they even make 16 MB capacity PC100 DIMMs? I'm surprised!
Peace,
Drew
| Posted by: Anonymous Freak on 2008-01-19 15:49:20
I know there were 8 MB PC-66 DIMMs. I don't recall the smallest capacity PC-100 I have ever seen, though. I know I've seen a 32 MB, but not sure about smaller than that.
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