Cool Mac Gear

With the release of the G4 iBook and the mild upgrade of the eMac last week, the last consumer Macs that could boot into OS 9 are now gone. The new entry-level machines can still support OS X Classic Mode of course, but the only Mac available to the general public that can still dual-boot is the holdover 1.25 gigahertz Power Mac tower (which reportedly is selling extremely well).

So the curtain really is finally dropping on the Classic Mac OS X. It will be around in Classic mode for the foreseeable future, but its significance is fading fast.

Personally, I now very rarely boot into OS 9 on my production machines.

However, for folks who are content to work with older software, OS 9 remains a wonderful operating system. For that matter, even older versions. I use OS 8.6 on my PowerBook 1400 as the best compromise between features and processor/RAM demands on this old, slow machine. However, fewer and fewer classic Mac OS X applications and utilities are being updated. New listings to the Classic software section on VersionTracker get sparser and sparser every day. The only Classic Mac OS browser still being actively developed is the Classic version of iCab.

Lack of interest by software developers is beginning to catch up with Classic OS holdouts who still want to remain reasonably current. A friend of mine has a Power Mac 6500 that he bought new in 1997 just days before the first G3 Macs were introduced. Over the years he has gradually upgraded this machine with a G3 processor upgrade, USB and FireWire PCI cards, maxed out the RAM, added a FireWire CD-burner, a larger hard drive, and so on, and it still does a pretty good job for him, but he's forever blocked at OS 9.1 (or OS 9.2.2 if he bothered to use the available installer hack).

I've been surprised that this guy hasn't upgraded to a newer computer. His wife is using a slot-loading CRT iMac (but in OS 9 only thus far). I thought that OS X might prove a catalyst for a hardware upgrade for him, but so far he's hanging tough with his beloved old 6500, and this month he even ordered an internal Ethernet card to support a switch from dialup to broadband Internet connection.

While he's not averse to trying new things, I infer that there is a real reluctance to move up from the Classic OS he knows so well and climb the learning curve that a switch to OS X would entail. The old Power Mac 6500 provides an excuse for not taking that step. I expect there are a lot of Mac users out there like my friend.

Postscript: As I was putting the finishing touches on this column, my friend phoned me back. He's dediced to check out purchasing one of the 1.26 GHz G4 Power Mac towers, which can still boot into OS 9 to support his exsiting software collection, and will work with his existing monitor and peripherals. He's tired of being limited to 128 MB of RAM, and the old 6500 is exhibiting symptoms of possible motherboard problems. I hope he goes through with it. It's time.

Moore's MailBag

Panther and CopyPaste

From dxtr

Hi Charles,

As you know I am an early adopter so Panther was installed as soon as I got home from the release here in Alaska. Everything went smooth on my LittleAL. Only one problem to report so far. The "c" key, lower case only was acting like the command key was depressed giving a copy command every time it was depressed. The culprit turns out to be CopyPaste. I am sure a lot of people will run into this one as CopyPaste is so useful. Hope they fix it fast at Scripts Software.

As for the rest it's all good....

When you finally get around to upgrading you will love Expose, way cool for the many windowed environment types!!

seeya
dxtr

Thanks for the report, dxtr. Delighted to hear that things are going well.

Charles

Panther Upgrade

From David Johnson

Charles

I tend to be one of those early adopters. I received my copy of Panther Monday from Small Dog. About 4 PM I decided to install the new software. I took the Upgrade route rather than clean or Archive and Install. Other than a couple of broken links in the Dock, I haven't experienced any problems. Safari flies open and Mail is much faster than before. Photoshop even opens much quicker.

The desktop looks better and the finder seems a bit faster. One thing you have to be careful of is other drives. I have two internal drives, one large one with OS X install and a smaller one with OS 9 installed. I ejected the OS 9 volume and wasn't aware of it until it disappeared from the Desktop. Haven't tried my printers yet but they showed up in the printer list like before. BTW, printers are now in the system prefs called Print&Fax. I don't do faxing so that is not an issue either.

Will keep you informed of any changes or problems that might arise. Keep up the good work and don't be too tentative about upgrading to Panther. I think you will like the result.

David

Hi David;

I'm actually looking forward to it. I'll likely try it first on my backup computer (currently my 500 MHz Pismo), and I want to reformat the drive with a bigger OS X partition, which will involve a backup operation.

As for FAX, I don't use it a lot anymore, but I do have occasional need for it, and up to now I've been booting back into OS 9 to use the wonderful old GlobalFax software that supports the modems in my PowerBooks but not the software modem in the iBook, alas. Consequently, Panther's FAX capability is something I'm loking forward to.

Charles

GUI aberration in OS X?

From Kim Peacock

Charles,

As someone who has become familiar with the ins and outs of OS X through your Odyssey, I am turning to you to answer once and for all a mystery in the Apple way of doing things regarding their famous sliding drawers. You know, the ones to access mailboxes in Mail, for example.

I hate these drawers. I stick with Eudora just because of the way Mail handles access to its mailboxes (I much prefer accessing stuff from the Menu). The same thing for iCal. I hate it that I have to use a drawer to access the setting priority and due date. Ditto Apple Help to get the list of Help files available.

But I am not writing just to gripe. I feel that I am doing something wrong and as someone who has lots of Mac experience I cannot figure what. Why does Apple not fix what I feel is a GUI atrocity which is:

When I have a window open full screen in iCal/Mail/Help and I want to add access this drawer, I have to physically use my mouse to resize the main window so that I can see the drawer. Otherwise, it opens off screen. For a long time in iCal I thought it was not opening because it did not appear by itself. As I said, I think I am doing something wrong because I really cannot believe that Apple would want it that way. The proper way to me would be if the main screen resized automatically to the left or right so that the drawer appears by itself when and only when someone wants to access it and then have a button to get rid of it...and the main window resizes to full screen as before---automatically. BTW, using the Green re-size button does not do it.

The same for Mail. I want to access mailboxes only a certain times. Why must I use my mouse to resize my main window just to see the mailbox list? The same for Help.

Strangely enough, I seem to remember trying an app (non-Apple, I believe--Omniweb perhaps) which did resize the screen when needed.

What, if anything, have I missed? And if it is this way, I wonder if Panther will sort it out tomorrow.

Best regards

Kim

Hi Kim;

I'm not a big fan of the Cocoa drawers either, partly I imagine because I work on 1024 x 768 and 800 x 600 monitor screens.

Actually, I keep forgetting that Eudora has the drawer, since the menu works for me.

Perhaps someone can tell us whether Panther addresses the window resize thing (not optimistic).

Charles

The OS X Odyssey archives may be accessed here:
http://www.applelinks.com/news/odyssey/

CM

Charles W. Moore