Hey,
I have an old Power Mac g5 gathering dust at home, and I was asking myself:
“What can I do with this old man ?”
I first thought of just taking the case, but it’s not optimal to build a PC :P
It is also too much power consuming to make it a sever.
Do you have any idea ?
Thanks !
I had either debian or Ubuntu on an old ppc Mac laptop around 2007/2008. Worked well. Doubt there is much currently going on in the dev community though.
If you like Amiga Workbench, you can always try MorphOS. But that is not a straightforward process to get into. And it's not free software...
If it's an earlier model, they make great 'retro' games and software machines. Install 10.4 Tiger, set up the Classic (OS 9 environment). That gives you a decent chance of running stuff from System 6-ish (late 80s) up to mid 2000s. Not like Macs had a lot of games or unique software, but it can be cool for the heck of it.
Also, with their FireWire ports, it can be handy if you still have old DV or HDV camcorders, pretty straightforward to capture old tapes. The later models are better for this purpose, more processing power and better graphics cards.
If neither of those use cases appeals to you or sounds like an applicable use case, the G5 towers are the best to use for ATX case mods. But you did mention you didn't see a point in that. Therefore... Recycle it or pass it on to someone who is interested in tinkering with it. After 20 years, just like a lot of computers from that era, they don't have alot of justified use cases... And that's okay!
Hold down a decent pile of paper? Block a door from squeaking open when the house settles in the night? Keep a cat from rolling down a gentle hill? Make a child cry when they unwrap it some holiday morning?
It’s not forever useless, but it requires a fair bit of fabrication.
I passed on one years ago because it looked like way too much of a project. If I remember correctly, nothing would fit stock and the case was somehow divided by a bunch of stuff that would have to be cut away.
If you don’t install some new smaller hardware in it, make art of it, throwing it off a building (just kidding, don’t do that) or painting it in cool colours or why not make it a jukebox!
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