please read the responses according to each paragraph: Jason White wrote:
> Hi, I just bought an 8500/120 for my dad. He's never had a Mac before and > I left it at his house saying it was too expensive to ship back home. > With the 17" monitor, that probably wasn't far from the truth. He's never > had a Mac before and gave up on the PC's about two years ago > (coincedentally, about the same time as his second heart attack) after > having 3 identical machines with identically defective mobos. Gee, my husband is going through that now with his peecee (and have gone through so many problems since he got his first computer - a peecee). I wish he had listened to me on 1995 when I told him "get a mac". Back them the "top of the line" was 8500s. If I had known it was such a great machine I would have insisted MORE! :) > Well, I got dad to start using the machine (he always was a sucker for > Frogger) and showed him that Macs can use the internet just like his > Windows machines. I knew I had him when I asked him if it would be > alright to leave it there and after some jibeerish about just unplug it > when I leave, he asked "How do I turn this thing on, just in case?" You didn't mention modem. Get an external 56k and if you can find a 56K PCI modem for 8500 (rare) you're in luck. Browsing the web with graphics ON is a little slow but NOT slower than my husband's 266Mhz PC. > > At any rate, I'm not writing this to pat myself on the back for buying my > dad a used $100ish machine. If this little seedling takes off, he's going > to outgrow it rather quickly. It'll probably be about 6 months before I > get down to see him again, and I want to have a bag of tricks on hand to > make the machine better (faster) for him. Tell him to use IE. It is faster than Netscape. Teach him to use the audio/video capabilities if you know how, if not please read my post titled: "8500 Video & PCI cards was- Re: Hey guys!..." so you can try it as well. > > I've only had the machine open once, and that was to put in a new PRAM > battery and up the RAM from 16 to 80M. I'm guessing my opinion on this > model's case design is widely documented. Let's just say I'm no fan of > it. While putting in the RAM, I darned near went back and got a 7600 to > give to dad. I digress... Sorry about that :( I had a very bad experience with that. I broke something off the MoBo once while opening it, before I got the 8500/150 model I have now. I hope your father's 8500 motherboard is not exposed like mine was (was I missing something or was it like that?). > > The machine now has this stuff: > > 120 MHZ 604e according to system profiler > 80M RAM > 2 Gig HD > 4x CD ROM (600i, this has gotta go!) > floppy, never tested I've got to say that upgrading to 9.1 was good when it comes to RAM, it really knows how to handle 80MB (just what I have) with ot without Virtual Mem. > It had a "chip" in the cache slot, I don't know what size. System > Profiler didn't identify it, and I didn't bring any type of diagnostic > utilities with me. GURU will help you with that. Most likely 256K DIMM like it says here. > It's not going to take > long and he's going to want to run something on it and the machine isn't > going to be up to snuff for it. Just try it, you'll be surprised of the 8500 capabilities. > The hard drive was well less than half > full when I left and don't foresee capacity being a problem. Him and I > both agree the CD-ROM is too slow. I'd like to add USB to it so he can > get a printer. Will USB work with 8.1 or do I need to update the OS? If > so, to what version? Upgrade the HD, unless your dad is very careful not to download everything he sees in the net. I don't see why the 4X is slow to you. Unless your father is a big gamer it is not a big deal, I still have mine, used it tonight (yeah I am using the 8500 now, just played Jewels of Oracle on it). Well what can I say the drive slowness can really add up if you're using image files in CD, but otherwise ok by me. > I've never owned a PCI Mac before (jumped from a 7100 to a G4) and a lot > of the upgrades the members of this list take for granted I'm totally > unfamiliar with. So the bottom line is this: A "Switcher" gets an old PCI > PMac. What are the best things to upgrade for a user (user: someone who > will never open the case, and probably never open the system folder > directly) I have never upgraded my 8500 in 4 years that I've had them (when it comes to PCI boards) so I don't see why you would. Only harddrive upgrades. I have 2 harddrives (an Apple original 4GB and an IBM UltraStar 9GB). The old 120Mhz I broke :( had 64MB and this one has 80MB. Don't really see why upgrade the RAM if you can just fix the problem by just getting a newer Mac. RAM upgrades don't really boost the speed of the Mac (unless you have less than 64MB), and if it does it's only about a 15-20%. The speed between my old 64MB120Mhz is not too different from the 80MB150Mhz I have now, really. -- ��Liliana�� Human is the only specie in the world that kill just for the fun of it, because they are the only specie in the world who's capable of hate. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Millions of animal species have become extinct because of men, there was only one time when humans where close to extinction; ironically it wasn't because of animals. -- PCI-PowerMacs is sponsored by <http://lowendmac.com/> and... 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