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And my Rev A iMac is still running, capturing internet radio on a co-worker's desk. It's running Mac OS X 10.3, a far cry from the 8.5(?) it started with.

May 07, 08 - 11:54 am Comment from: Macintosh

I got the iMac right when it came out. No floppy disk, and this "new" technology called USB. An external Zip drive connected via USB was a dream come true.

May 07, 08 - 11:59 am Comment from: Predrag

In 1998, the fastest PC was Pentium II at about 266MHz. Even with 512MB of RAM (probably maximum you could put on it), it wouldn't be able to run anything but Windows 2000; XP might install, but it would be practically useless.

Original iMac, with extra 512MB or RAM can comfortably run Tiger (until last september, latest version of Mac OS X).

I stil have an old blue&white;G3 tower (300MHz), with 1GB RAM. Most recent tiger runs quite well on it. It runs Adobe CS, all Apple pro applications (that are supported on G3, i.e. early versions) and is looking to celebrate its own 10th birthday in six months.

If there are still people who can't figure out that Apple's hardware outlasts ordinary PCs by a factor of at least 1.5, they should stick to their overpriced Windows machines.

I got a Bondi 233 in trade for an eMachines POS some years ago, and sold it after a year (got $300 for it, if you can believe that). Now I'm looking for one as a keepsake. I doubt that they'll ever be worth as much as a 128k, but I still think it'd be a cool museum piece.

No floppy? This product will fail

May 07, 08 - 12:06 pm Comment from: Ampar

Big barbecue and beer bash blowout at Bondi Beach?

May 07, 08 - 12:08 pm Comment from: Thorin

@ Asmodeus

$99 http://www.shrevesystems.com/systems.html

I so wanted one. Still do... but with two drive bays. My eyes light up when I see one nowadays and I am tempted to hug it and kiss its plastic top. What curves! I remember walking into some office and being surprised at seeing the lovely secretaries each with a candy iMac on their desk. What a boner that gave me!

May 07, 08 - 12:09 pm Comment from: Ampar

"No floppy?"

I'm pretty sure the stiffy replaced the floppy some time ago.
It even has its own NASCAR sponsor. Yeah.

May 07, 08 - 12:18 pm Comment from: Buster

Rob...please meet LiM to rectumfy your situation.

The iMac is the best computer ever!

May 07, 08 - 12:22 pm Comment from: MacRaven

At the end of that new iMac presentation the first thing I said was: "We're back!"

Steve was in charge again and on his game. The minute I saw the iMac, I bought a bunch of Apple stock.

May 07, 08 - 12:25 pm Comment from: ElderNorm

Input and request for info.

I just sold my old Bundi Blue iMac ref B. It had the tray so no upgrade to OS 10, or so I was told. Since I was limited to OS 9 I ran into the problem of internet surfing where browsers would not support the old OS. So old browsers that would not run flash, etc, etc. It was still running quite well when I sold it for $250, software included (games, etc.)

Side track item. -----

I am missing something here or was a big problem the lack of software upgrades that would keep the system up to date.?????

I am looking at getting a g4 tower (mostly for old times sake but also) for running internet access and other etc stuff. Also I always loved the look of that rounded tower.

What is the min power g4 tower I should accept. I know Apple says below 800mhz, no Leopard, but is that real??

Any other input is welcome. .

Thanks in advance..... and now back to your regular programming.

I got my son a Strawberry iMac last year from a school for $25. I'm guessing a little on the specs, but I believe it was a 333 G3 and it has 384 mb of ram.

My five year old loves the hell out of his very own Mac — and it keeps him away from mine.

I installed Panther on it, and it runs beautifully. The only downside to the whole thing is that its hard drive is a paltry 10 gigs, and by the time you have the operating system on there and a few apps, it's pretty well clogged.

I'd have to say it was the best $25 I've ever spent. I actually bought three of them with similar specs all at once for a grand total of $75 — one for my kid, one for a niece and one for my father-in-law (who has never owned a computer but had no problem figuring out how to use a Mac).

I should have bought more of them and sold them on ebay!

May 07, 08 - 12:54 pm Comment from: It's About Time

My new Intel iMac wishes its ancient ancestor a happy birthday and a case of Geritol.

Curious if MDN uses a bondi iMac for its server.

MidWest, you can save a lot of space with Youpi Optimizer. It strips out other-language resources and gets you back a gig or so from your OS+standard apps installation. There's something to strip "fat" binaries, too, can't remember the name right now.

May 07, 08 - 12:59 pm Comment from: Spudly

MDN - Boldly serving today's news at yesterday's speed (☎).

May 07, 08 - 01:00 pm Comment from: jonahan

ElderNorm: You can put Leopard on a 800MHz G4 it's just you have to install it from a faster mac via FW Target disk mode or Cloning. It's probably just easier to grab a 1GHz G4. They probably are cheap these days.

May 07, 08 - 01:00 pm Comment from: Ampar

Skinny Mac: "There's something to strip "fat" binaries, too, can't remember the name right now."

One is Xslimmer:

http://www.xslimmer.com/

I was on a business trip in 1999 when I got an email from a woman friend looking to buy a first computer for her parents. After I mentioned the "usual suspects" (Dell, HP, IBM) I wrote, "You really need to check out this new Apple iMac. I think it's exactly what your folks need." She wouldn't even consider it! She bought them a Windows box. It's what she knew. You still see that kind of stubbornness today, but it's not as widespread.

As I think I mentioned in an earlier post this week, a former colleague who used to poo poo my subtle nudges toward the Mac finally had it after his HP notebook suffered a Windows melt-down. He's now the happy owner of a 24" iMac.What a remarkable 10 years it's been!

May 07, 08 - 01:04 pm Comment from: Ampar

P.S. Skinny Mac: "There's something to strip "fat" binaries, too, can't remember the name right now."

There's also Trimmit.
(http://www.versiontracker.com/dyn/moreinfo/macosx/33361&vid=469137)

As always, back up first and use at your own risk.

My parents still have the Summer 2000 iMac they bought later that year. I maxed out its RAM a few years ago so that it could run OS X comfortably. Regrettably this machine has only a CD-ROM drive and no Firewire, so it can't go beyond OS 10.3.9 (now I wish I'd urged them to at least go with the iMac DV, since it was only about $200 more at the time, and could run a fully current OS. Considering the only thing they use it for is to read email and go to a very few websites, what they have is fine though.

But I wish it could run 10.4 for my Dad, because he goes online to check some stocks, the names of which he must *type* into the nasdaq web page. Considering what a god-awful typist he is, this is a grueling process. How I wish I could set him up with 10.4 so all he'd have to do is hit F12 to bring up the stock widget in dashboard!!

The old girl has a mere 7Gb hard drive, so the last time I was home and ran software update, it complained about lack of space to run installs. I went through and deleted all the old OS 9 programs on there which freed up nearly a Gb of space. The updates were occasioned by a complaint from Mom that Safari no longer worked with mapquest or Google Maps. Took me a while to discover that because of their old system, the latest Safari that they can run is 1.3.2, and these sites did something that somehow breaks this older browser. Even the Apple support page suggested trying Firefox, which I did and that at least has stopped Mom's tech support calls to me when she can't print map directions!

Man, it hurts to see those iMac specs...

"When I was kid, I had to process my apps in 12 feet of snow. Uphill, both ways!!!!"

May 07, 08 - 01:17 pm Comment from: DLMeyer

My wife never owned one of these first-generation iMacs. She was sold (switched) by the ease of adjustment of the second generation and has since upgraded to an Aluminum model. It's been ten years? Amazing! Not surprising, her desk-lamp model is still working (needed a USB Ethernet as a replacement), but amazing. I wonder if any of the "fruit-colored" copy-cats are still operational.

I bought the original iMac (Rev A), it was my very first computer and it's still in use today... I gave it to my mom and she uses it mostly for email and card games.

Can't believe it's been ten years already.

I'd love to see a comparison of what your $1,299 bought in 1998 vs. today's iMac for a few hundred dollars more. It would have to be an incredible leap forward in terms of speed, capacity, etc.

Someone with some time want to do that?

BTW... That old iMac of mine is still running OS 9

Cool beans.

May 07, 08 - 01:30 pm Comment from: qka

@ Skinny Mac & Ampar

Monolingual is another foreign language resource removing program, and one I have used with no bad results.

http://www.macupdate.com/info.php/id/7758/monolingual

@ Rheinhard

Bummer on the iMac G3 w/o FireWire.

If you want to install Tiger on an iMac G3 w/ FireWire but w/o DVD drive, do the following:

1) Get a newer Mac w/ DVD drive.
2) Connect to G3 w/ FireWire cable
3) insert Tiger Install DVD in new Mac and boot into Target Disk Mode (Command-T at powerup)
4) on G3, select Tiger DVD as startup volume
5) Restart G3, perform install

When I first did this, I didn't believe that it would work! However, Apple never ceases to amaze me with things that "just work"!

I cannot say whether this will work for Leopard.

May 07, 08 - 01:33 pm Comment from: Malthus

I was driving through Albuquerque last week and passed a school-district truck that had about 50 of the old Bondi Beauties in the back. Guess they've only just been taken out of service? For those that want one maybe you should contact http://www.aps.edu...

@JeffA

everymac.com has done all the work already...

$1299 iMac 1998
http://www.everymac.com/systems/apple/imac/stats/imac_ab.html

$1199 iMac 2008
http://www.everymac.com/systems/apple/imac/stats/imac-core-2-duo-2.4-20-inch-aluminum-early-2008-penryn-specs.html

May 07, 08 - 01:51 pm Comment from: Ampar

And lowendmac.com has a plethora of links to resources to upgrading every Mac ever made.

Passed down through Mom, nephew and now an aunt. Replaced the internal battery and the optical mouse- everything else is running fine. The best thing about it is it didn't have one of those awful glossy screens. Until the matte screen comes back the iMac is off my list.
P.S. don't even suggest I put film on my display.

May 07, 08 - 02:07 pm Comment from: Mr. Peabody

I still have a Strawberry Mac.

May 07, 08 - 02:09 pm Comment from: Jamie

I had an original bondi iMac but I broke the monitor when I accidentally dropped it. I still have it sitting in my office, because even though it doesn't work it is such an amazing design I can't bring myself to throw it away.

May 07, 08 - 02:10 pm Comment from: Cubert

Ohhhhh, the horrid hockey puck mouse!!!

May 07, 08 - 02:12 pm Comment from: Cubert

@Macintosh,
I totally forgot about that much ridiculed decision - to not include a floppy drive. It turns out the critics were wrong - again.

there is no way a computer without floppy drive will sell!
USB UselessSerialBull there are no peripherals for it!
Jobs is insane! Apple will not survive into the millennium.

Not to mention the millennium bug, will Apple survive y2k?
I think NOT!


what a decade!

May 07, 08 - 02:21 pm Comment from: Cubert

@ ElderNorm,
I've got Leopard running on my 450 MHz G4 Cube and it runs great.

To install Leopard, connect the unsupported G4 to a Leopard-supported Mac by Firewire. Boot the older Mac while holding down the T key until you see a firewire symbol on its screen. You should see the older Mac show up as a volume in the newer Mac's Finder. Now, insert the Leopard install disc into the newer Mac and choose the external volume (your older Mac) as the target disc for installation.

Easy as pie!

May 07, 08 - 03:12 pm Comment from: John

Damn this makes me feel old!

I was in California at the time: I'd driven up from LA to see my uncle, who lived right next to Cupertino, so we went to a local computer store and just stared and stared at it. The form factor seems really cliché and old now, but it was a revelation back then!

It's About Time,

great comment about MDN using it as their server.

But you're doing the bondi iMacs a disservice.

They weren't that slow!

My one big regret in life was not making my first computer an iMac. The term multi-media passed me by for the next 7 years.

My Dad would have loved an iMac, we could have had a lot more fun together than with the fragile PC. And I bet it would still be running.

I think it was me who went down the PC route. The iMac seemed expensive for the spec though alluring and aspirational.

If Apple could bottle that "I've got a Mac" feeling and convey it instead of those stupid commercials they come up with - they would do even better.

How to advertise a Mac? You only live once - don't settle for second best!

May 07, 08 - 04:55 pm Comment from: Ampar

"How to advertise a Mac? You only live once - don't settle for second best!"

Absolutely. Or as others here have said, "You're going to be dead a whole lot longer than you're going to be alive."

"great comment about MDN using it as their server."

C'mon! At least it's not a Performa.

I've got the "special edition" model offered in 1999.
400 G3, 13 GB HD and upgraded to 384 MB's of RAM. Graphite in color that included a DVD drive (playback only) and two Firewire ports (plus built in modem and 10/100 ethernet).
Just today I've moved it from its place on my table top as my new iMac (3.06 GHz, 500 GB HD, gigabyte ethernet, 512 MB video card and 4 GB's of RAM) will arrive.
The old iMac was $1,500 and the new one is $2,499 (extra RAM).
24" display as compared to the 13" model. Still an "all in one" design.
I'll pull it out of the closet to give away to a needy child. It worked 24/7 for nearly nine years and still functions just great. Stopped the OS upgrades at 10.3.9.

I still have two iMac G3s (one Snow and one Indigo) and both still work great to this day.

May 07, 08 - 09:35 pm Comment from: The Other Steve

FYI - Due critical user feedback, the modem was upgraded to 56.6Kbps BEFORE the first iMac was sold.

May 08, 08 - 03:24 am Comment from: PDXS

I got to see a pre-production iMac at the last PMUG (Portland, OR Mac User Group) meeting I ever attended, and won a t-shirt with featuring the upcoming launch date. Only wore it a couple times--I think after 10 years it's finally eBay-worthy.

The Apple rep repeatedly told us that since it was a pre-production model it had some issues, and not to touch it. Of course, some nerd had to do it, and it let out an impressively loud, slightly scary, 60-cycle belch. No one blamed the computer, just the dork who couldn't follow directions. Are you reading this today?

At that meeting I knew Apple was going to revive. A few mis-steps along the way, but no major snafus. The computer for the rest of us became the computer (and MP3 player) for the trendsetters, and now the scoffers are starting to switch. The CEO of the software company I work for switched (he's an old Intel exec--it took dropping the PPC chip and going to Unix under the hood to finally do the trick), and other execs are following. I can't imagine this is unique.