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I love retro computing in general, and despite never really using it back in the day, I have a soft spot for pre-OSX MacOS. It manages to feel retro without feeling clunky at the same time.

And I think it's that clunkiness that prevents me from doing more. Having to set up (or write!) a proxy to do something is, for me, a bit too much. This is doubly true since I don't have the programming chops to do anything like that, although with a more modern, networking-like language (thinking something like Go or C#), maybe it wouldn't be so bad?

Anyway, I thought very seriously about picking up an old PowerPC-based Mac from eBay awhile back, and really the only thing that stopped me was desk space. Well, that and the fact that a CRT would probably use more electricity than my work laptop, M1 Mac Mini, and two monitors combined :)

Have you seen any of the projects that seek to emulate/re-create OSes from that era in a web page?

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~interipelli wrote (thread):

fwiw, if you do want to go eBay hunting again, a PowerPC G4 Mac Mini with the hacked up Mac OS 9 CD-ROM that's found on macos9lives works very well and doesn't take up much desk space.

It's not a beige box, but given enough of a suntan, it'll come naturally!

The biggest issue I had in setting it up was that it's suggested to get a DVI to VGA connector and plug in your monitor through VGA (either via an HDMI-to-VGA convertor box or natively), since the included Mac OS 9 display ATI drivers don't play as well with DVI as standard VGA.

Some models of G4 Mac Mini also have trouble with OS 9 audio, though I think the problem's limited to the fastest and most sought after ones. The slower the Mac Mini, the better.

I ended up getting my G4 Mac Mini through Mercari, where they're mostly regarded as slow Mac OS X machines. They absolutely rock on OS 9.

~tatterdemalion wrote:

I've seen Infinite Mac, at least. I'm pretty sure there are others I haven't tried.