9.1 update to Panther

[Leighsah]

I have a iMac flower power running 9.1 with 320 megs.

(Yes, I know I am behind the times, but I still have vinyl and only started buying cd's in the last two months.)

Anyway, the time has finally come to upgrade the OS. Should I wait for Tiger or just go with Panther? I've reviewed the Tiger forum and there seems to be some confusion if Tiger requires a DVD or not. The flower power does not have a DVD (and I only got my first player this past Christmas).

So what should I do? Upgrading the ole 'puter isn't an option right now, but I'd like to play some more with the iTunes and have discovered there are lots more features available on later versions than my 1.0.1.

So the questions are...
1. Panther or Tiger?
2. Will I need more memory?
3. Is there anything else I'll need to update?
4. I'll have the Apple Store transfer my data, but is there anything else I need to be aware of?

Many thanks in advance.

Leighsah

 

[bankshot]

1. Panther or Tiger?

If you've waited this long, I'd personally wait for Tiger. It will have a whole new set of technologies that will change the way you work (ie, Spotlight), so you'll get more bang for your buck in this upgrade.

That said, it's often wise to wait until at least the first minor revision of a new version (10.4.1) since that will contain a bunch of bug fixes that didn't make it into the initial release. Usually the first one comes along within a month or so, so it isn't a long wait. Though I can't say I've followed this advice myself - I installed Panther within a day or two of its original release and had no problems. Depends on how safe you want to be. Definitely check forums like here to see if anyone with a similar computer to yours reports anything other than success.

2. Will I need more memory?

You'll get by just fine with 320 MB but it will be slow at times. The general rule with OS X is that more memory is always better. It depends a lot on what applications you will use, and how much you will be multitasking and switching between programs (needs more memory) versus using one program continuously (may need less memory).

From my personal experience, 256 MB with Panther was very, very slow. My PowerBook had problems with some third party memory, so while waiting for a replacement, I was back to the original 256. It was painful, because switching applications took 5 - 10 seconds as the computer had to use the slow hard disk for extra memory. When I got my memory back, it was like night and day (it has 1 GB).

At home I have 640 MB on two machines and it feels about right for most things. Sometimes they bog down too, and I wish I had more. Case in point - Safari is currently using 627 MB of virtual memory, so a lot of that is swapped out to disk. It pauses for several seconds when I close a window because of this. Maybe I'm just a power user though - I usually have several windows open, with 5-10 tabs each. I guess that's a lot to have going at once!

See how OS X runs with your 320 and whether it's too slow for you. If the screen takes a while to redraw, or you're waiting a lot for things to respond, you probably need more, and you can always add it later.

3. Is there anything else I'll need to update?

You may need to update the firmware in your iMac if it doesn't have the latest. http://docs.info.apple.com/article.html?artnum=75130 appears to have the latest for your model, but also see http://www.apple.com/support/imac/g3/ for more general information.

4. I'll have the Apple Store transfer my data, but is there anything else I need to be aware of?

Can't think of anything. Good luck and enjoy OS X when you get it!