": Just for XLR8 Your Mac readers,
TPC100SD512 512mb PC100 2-2-2 DIMMs w/Lifetime Warranty for G4 SawTooth and iMac 350/400/450/500 - $467.50.
Thats about $20 off our regular price.

3 Port FireWire Enclosure w/FireWire cable and software - $159.95. Our case has tested as the fastest out there, with only VST's case being equal in performance.

128mb PC100 G4 SDRam - $122.95
256mb PC100 G3 SDRam - $219.00
G3/400 Zif guaranteed to 466mhz - $225(limited supply left)
XLR8 Carrier G3/400mhz-$299
20gb FireWire External-$242.95
80gb FireWire External-$499

All deals are up on the deals page Plus some more. :)

Best Regards,
Larry O'Connor
Other World Computing, Inc."

" Hi Mike:
For those readers that own the Proformance 3 and use it in a new Gigabit Ethernet G4 desktop, I have a serious problem report...serious if you don't like restarting every time the Mac goes to sleep.

Apple Tech Support and yours truly have determined that there is some kind of incompatibility issue with the Proformance 3 PCI video card and the Apple "deep sleep" software and hardware feature.

As you know, Apple changed hardware and software control and codes to allow "deep sleep".

Apple tech support had me try various extension sets including Mac OS 9 All, but finally, after a couple of hours of frustration with trying software fixes, I removed the Formac board from my G4's PCI slot and the issue was gone.

This has been happening over and over this week, but strangely, I don't remember it happening last week (I've had this new monster just two weeks.. it was a custom build: G4/500MP; 30GB ATA 100 7200RPM (Maxtor...I didn't get lucky and get an IBM); ZIP; Apple Modem; Adaptec 2930 SCSI card)

I added a 60GB IBM slave HD, and arriving today is my IDE RAID setup...

In any case, I wanted to get this sleep issue figured out before I installed anything else...it's important to NOT HAVE TO WORRY about data or applications left open on the desktop and the system locking up because of some software/hardware issue with sleep. There is NOTHING quite so annoying as a new Mac like mine that has to be restarted every time it goes to sleep...and I'm not considering leaving on my expensive displays 24/7 to avoid the problem I've found.

I have a Hitachi CM813Plus 21" CRT and the SGI 17.3" Flat Panel LCD and when I'm not working on them, it's important to me that the sleep function works as advertised.

I just contacted Formac this morning, so we'll see what happens from their end. It is DEFINITELY their video card that causes the issue.

Using the Rage Pro and the CRT, everything's just perfect and the system will sleep and wake, repeatedly, over and over, at any interval I set it....the light in the front of the G4 facade does its pulsing up and down, and the internal workings of the G4 are absolutely silent...

We'll see what Formac does... I wish I could use another video card with my SGI display, quite frankly, but as of this moment there is only one choice and it's not working well in my new G4.

...I hope this benefits any readers who are using the Formac card in Gigabit G4's.
Later,
David"

There is a driver update due soon (5.9.3 I think) but this sounds like a ROM issue. BTW: A friend with the Artica LCD (SGI)/Proformance 3 bundle and a B&W G3 has not been able to run the card from a 66MHz PCI slot, despite the latest ROM update, zapping the PRAM, etc. (The Proformance 3 card I reviewed last year ran fine in my B&W G3 66Mhz slot, but it did not have the LCD module and used older ROM/drivers, I've not tested the card in a B&W G3 for some time.)

" This is truly a great start for Apple. I'm writing this mail in Mail.app right now.

Several huge things I should note:

My configuration is wholly nonstandard, and should have brought the installer to its knees. I have a platinum G3, rev B, with a non-Apple internal ATA CD-ROM drive, a second ATA hard drive, a three-button mouse connected to the port on a USB card, and a Rage 128 VR. Oh yes, and a SCSI Zip 100 and a serial 33.6 modem.

All of these devices work perfectly.

My install started off badly -- Open Firmware couldn't read from the non-Apple cdrom. I figured, "what the hell," and plugged in a Plextor 6Plex drive just to install from. Xbeta booted from this drive and installed...at 6x cdrom speed. (Not Xbeta's fault)

Then, while fidgeting and watching the system install itself, I noticed that my USB mouse did indeed function fully. Cool.

After the install completed, my Mac rebooted, and I found myself going through the setup assistant process. Pretty easy. Another reboot, and I log in. Bad me -- I used a null password for now.

Finder X is painfully, painfully slow compared to 9.0.4, but only because it's so heavily antialiased everywhere. I want to shoot myself. Experience? I feel like I'm stuck in a bad replica of Windows 95 Explorer, which to say the least is a bad impression. Even Windows 95 seems more "direct manipulative," to quote the Macintosh HIG book.

The dock is an entropic mess of icons. I don't understand it (yet?) so I won't say if it's me or the dock. The right side seems to be for window previews and the trash, and the left is for open apps and favorites customized by the user. When you open a program, you get a REALLY cute animation of the icon bouncing up and down. Interesting. On the other hand, I really don't like the magnification. It's jarring, and if you jerk the mouse, you can tax the screen drawing system so much that background apps freak a bit.

IE claims to be version 5.8 for Xbeta. This is another one of those IE versions that is only barely useful enough to get a better browser with before being tossed. Unless you enjoy pain, download OmniWeb. Try to do so using the Terminal; IE crashed too much, too quickly, too easily for my tastes.

Haven't tried sendmaild, ftpd, apache, etc etc etc.

The PPP client is fast and friendly; it connects/disconnects way faster than Remote Access in 9. Thank heaven for that buzzword-compliant TCP stack. It identifies my modem as an "Internal" Apple 56K modem, but I switched it to Hayes Compatible and left it on Internal; it dialed correctly, but I couldn't turn off the speaker. Dunno yet where the AT strings are stored.

I would like to see Apple include a utility similar to Windows' Registry Editor, but for the defaults database (defaults write xyz, etc). They are switching to XML property lists, but in unix, some things will never go away, and for this unix in particular, the defaults db will probably be there for a looooong time.

I feel like the world's biggest geek.

But hey -- I deserved this beta. I ordered it 3 hours after it appeared on the Apple Store page (I was still awake; I did NOT wake up just to get in line) and so got it today. Was worried that I'd be delayed like all those backlogged/backordered people I'm hearing about.

I don't see any of these supposedly grevious compatibility issues with hardware that some people are mentioning. It's in damned good condition for a public beta.

One last thing: my three-button USB mouse, that works with the default driver in this beta: I instinctively right-clicked due to USB Overdrive habits. The rightmost button actually brings up contextual menus in the Finder!!! This is in the standard Apple driver!
Cooooool.
***
Hope you publish this somewhere....I'm long-winded but excited. And tired now.
Wayne Chang"

Note: Remember to read the PDF install file before you attempt to install OS X Beta on any Mac. As it says there, backup your data and realize that you may not have the same results as others. If you install on an unsupported machine, always prepare for the worst.

Read my post in Friday's news about why I don't really recommend installing OS X Beta for now due to too many unsupported devices/PCI cards, upgrades etc. in my older Macs. I'd just lose too much functionality (and performance). I understand many are willing to experiment, but I hope everyone is aware this is a beta with very limited system and device support compared to the current MacOS.

And for owners of CPU Upgrades that require cache enablers, there are none that exist now - so you'll really take a hit with the backside cache disabled. Ditto for PCI IDE cards and most SCSI retail cards as they are not supported.

For those at insist on trying, here's one detailed report on how a Beige G3 owner installed OS X beta with a Voodoo3 card:

" Hey Mike,
My first description was pretty accurate. I just popped in the disc, hit the installer, and away it went. I did a co install on the OS9 partition, but later moved the MacOS to another partition to clear up some classic environment problems. (Like it not booting!)

The VooDoo 3 was the primary display when I started, but the installer ran on the BiV as primary. All I needed to do was move the menu bar in the monitors control panel to re-establish my VooDoo card as the primary display.

I really wasn't expecting it to work, but was very happy when it did! I am amazed that it worked with the non-Apple disk drivers. The right mouse button works fine, but the scroll wheel is inactive. I was a little surprised by that since the wheel worked in the installer portion of the OS!

Basic steps:

1) Boot into MacOS 9.0.4
2) Insert CD
3) Launch MacOS X Beta installer
4) Run through the installer
5) Use the monitors control panel to re-establish the voodoo 3 as the primary display.

That's it!

(I asked about available resolutions and if there were any problems switching them-Mike)

I get all the resolutions that were available before, either through the "sets" feature or through the custom settings button. I can't think of the res off the top of my head but it is 1280x1024 or something like that. I have a 19" Trinitron FD on the voodoo and a 17" shadow mask on the BiV. I can change resolutions on both displays without any problems.

Movie playback seemed about the same as in MacOS 9, but I will double check it when I get home.
Josh

(he earlier wrote with details on his system-Mike)

I was just writing to let you know that I have MacOS X Beta running on my machine without any problems at all. I was a little surprised since neither MacOS DP 1-4 or MacOS X Server will run on my configuration. I just popped in the CD, hit the installer icon and was on my way.

Beige G3 232 (OC 292) rev. a
17.2GB Maxtor drive on internal IDE with HDST drivers
dual displays (VooDoo 3 2000 primary, Rage II BiV secondary)
Entrega 4-port USB card
MS USB keyboard, logitech mouse (3 button + wheel)

The only configuration change I need to make was to switch the primary display back to the VooDoo 3. Other than that everything works great, it even uses the right mouse button for contextual menus!

There are a few things that are strange or that I miss (like the MS keyboard driver or the fact that the spell check in Word 98 doesn't work.), but it is beta after all and so far it has been a great preview. "

Another Beige G3 owner with a Sonnet G3 CPU upgrade noted he removed the Voodoo3 for the install and then replaced it afterwards.

" I have a rev. 1 Beige G-3 desktop w/Sonnet 366/1Mb upgrade. I removed my V-3 card to install OS-X. I just reinstalled the V-3 Card it and it works very well. The strange thing is that it seems faster that the on-board video. The most telling example is that the solid drag feature is smoother.

We need some OS X benchmark apps badly!

For problem reports, tips and other issues see the OS X forum here at bbs.xlr8yourmac.com (registrations are closed but anyone can view member posts there).

" Hey Mike,
I have a Umax S900 and have tried some things on getting OS X/Darwin to boot on my machine. The only way to get the system disk to open(and be effective) was to open a copy of the System Disk control panel in ResEdit, opened OFtb resource 128 and changing the first box to my machine's gestalt ID (67 or 69), closing that box, opening OFtc resource 128 and changing the box with AAPL,8500 to ????,8500 (if the machine were based on a 8500 motherboard that is). Then save, quit, and restart. It should now open, without error, and be effective for choosing a boot disk.
Kyle"

The S900 is based on the Tsunami (9500) 6 PCI slot motherboard with Umax changes (like 2nd cpu card slot, E100 slot, etc.).

Software Updates:
• REALbasic 3.0a8
• Audion 1.5 (OS X) (direct download link)

Apple TILs:

• AirPort: Wired (Ethernet) Clients Not Communicating With Wireless (AirPort) Clients
• Personal File Sharing: Volume Size Reporting Limitations
• Mac OS 8.0: Identifying Hard Disk Size
• Support for Former Claris Software Products
• Full Duplex, Half Duplex, Echoplex Discussion
• Macintosh: How to Use FireWire Target Disk Mode
• Software Fulfillment Options
  
  OS X Beta TILs
• Enterprise Object Framework Runtime Libraries Missing
• AppleTalk Name Not Visible to Other Computers
• How to Make Restart Available in the Special Menu
• File Sharing Is Turned Off but Users Can Still Log In
• Cannot Make Alias of Hard Disk Volume in Computers Directory
• System Preferences Window Shakes

• Powerlogix Zforce w/G3 300 ZIF in PowerCenter 132 ($139 OWC bundle) (rated 10)
• Sonnet G3/400 in PowerBook 1400 (rated 9)
  (detailed report with install notes and comments on using a NuPowr Video out card)
• Sonnet G3/333 in PowerBook 1400 (rated 8)
  (includes comments on OS 8.6 problems and clean install of OS 8.5 helping)
• Sonnet G3/400 in 9500 (rated 1)
  (boot problems with 2 cards)

• B&W G3/300 OC report

You can find these full reports by searching the database selecting the indicated Mac model and upgrade card brand/type. If you've upgraded the CPU on your Mac, please post an entry in the database. Search the database of over 4,500 entries from most every upgradable Mac model *before* you buy.

CDRW Drives:

• Sony Firewire CRX145e (10x/4x/32x) w/Beige G3 using Apple firewire card
  
  DVD RAM Drives:
• Que Firewire GF-1000 (5.6GB)
  (notes driver conflict)
  
  DVD ROM Drives:
• Toshiba IDE SD-M1402 in Beige G3
  (noting having to set the drive to Slave, not master. I did not need to do this with my Toshiba SM1212 model in my Beige G3)
  
  Removable Drives:
• Panasonic OEM ZIP in B&W G3
  (photos in the CDROM install guide here might be of help on the install)
  
  Hard Drives:
  
• IBM IDE 75GXP 30GB in 8500 w/Sonnet Tempo IDE card
  (notes DV firewire capture ok, but playback choppy)
• Maxtor DiamondMax (5400 RPM) 40GB in Beige G3 DT
• Maxtor DiamondMax Plus 30GB in Powercenter 132 w/Sonnet Temp card
  (notes MP3 audio playback dropouts)
• Maxtor DiamondMax Plus 30GB in 6500/300
• Maxtor DiamondMax Plus 40GB in B&W G3 rev 2
  (same system that I reviewed that drive in)
• Quantum SCSI Atlas 10K Series II 9GB in 8x00 Mac
  (using Initio Miles U2 SCSI card)
• Quantum IDE Fireball Plus LM 30GB in iMac
• Quantum SCSI Atlas IV 9GB in
• Seagate IDE 30GB in B&W G3 rev 1
  (notes data corruption issues, using Intech adjustable drivers to address this)
• Western Digital WD450AA 45GB in 8500 w/Sonnet Tempo card

If you've added a IDE, SCSI, Firewire or USB hard drive, CDRW, tape drive, etc. make sure you add a report to the database.

• Review of MetaBox's G4 450MHz 2MB Cache CPU Upgrade
• Photoshop 5.5 Performance: G4/450 MP vs G4/500 vs 1GHz PC
• Review of Newer Tech's PowerBook G3/466 CPU Upgrade
• Illustrated Guide and Performance Tests of IBM 20GB Hard Drive Upgrade in PowerBook Wallstreet
• FWDepot PCI Firewire card review
• Lacie's Pocketdrive USB/Firewire Portable Hard Drive (reader review)
• Formac ProG3/450 CPU Upgrade Review for Beige/B&W/AIO Macs
• Review of Newer Tech's iMac G4 CPU Upgrade
• Photos of the new Dual G4 CPU module and motherboard
• Review of the Voodoo5 5500 PCI Graphics Card
  (revised again 9/16/2000 for Unreal Tournament and Cinebench test results)

For many other reviews, articles and guides, see the topics page links in the sidebar and below the logo above. The FAQ also has over 750 answers and links to articles by Topic (including a how-to section). A long list of articles/reviews (newest first) is also at this page.