Up and Running with Tiger

My new PowerMac G5 arrived yesterday afternoon. Hoorah! And yes, I managed to wait until I was done with my work day to start on the Grand Migration (although Rich opened the box and unpack the G5 onto a convenient table.)

First, I had to back up all of the files on my G3 for copying to the G5. The new hardware includes a different I/O interface; I can't just plug in the old disk drives. The good news is I get a nice new 400 GB drive. The bad news is that the backup and restore literally took hours.

Then Rich helped me swap hardware, putting the G5 on my desk (where it fits with a little room to spare and opens on the right side, thank goodness!). We dealt with cabling (power, displays, USB, Firewire, and network). We dealt with troubleshooting and ultimately replacing the one screen that didn't light up. Then I booted 'er up, started copying in all of my files, and headed off to bed.

This morning there was tweaking and twiddling and installing of applications and extensions that can't simply be copied. By 9:00 I was up and working. I worked all day with nary a freeze or crash. Yes!

There are still the odd bits that need doing. I keep running into apps that need to be re-registered (they lost their registration info when moved to the new hard drive). I needed to re-install Windows Media Player. I needed to fix some links and aliases. I needed to hunt for a few new apps and configuration utilities.

The old iChat SmileyRemover script doesn't work with Tiger's iChat, but there's a workaround to solve the problem (I prefer "real" smilies ;-). The boot bong on a G5 is ReVERBerating! (I found a system preference to tone it down to where I can live with it.)

I deleted the Tiger "empty the trash" sound. It sounded like line noise to me.

There are some things to get used to. The G5 does the "turn the screen" effect for fast user switching. (I'll get used to it. :) The G5 fan occasionally sounds like it's ready for takeoff (but it's not constant).

My new 17" Samsung monitor, replacing the 15" NEC that wasn't compatible, is a joy and a delight (and supports a higher screen resolution).

Did I mention that the system is stable? That was worth every dime and every minute spent upgrading.

Up and Running with Tiger ( in category Random Thoughts , SciTech ) - posted at Wed, 07 Sep, 22:38 Pacific | «e»