The handle at the back really annoyed me:
Show Image
(http://geekhack.org/attachment.php?attachmentid=8314&stc=1&d=1268352649)
The heavy CRT outweights the flimsy plastic handle at the back. I'm surprised the "assembled in china, BUT, designed in california" handle didn't break off. It's very akward to carry.
We have a retired G3 iMac that I've had to lug around by the handle numerous times. It's not made of steel like old XT workstations, but I really don't think you could call the handle flimsy and I'm not sure if you'll ever find a CRT that's not awkward to carry around. Besides, if the handle irks you so much, why are you carrying it by the handle?
However, using Apple's mice (the oval white ones) aren't all that bad. It turns out OSX was programmed to handle mice in a very austere way (with my experience anyways). When I used even my IBM mice on OSX, it couldn't detect rapid movement and would feebly wobble around in the middle not knowing what to do. On my thinkpad however, it ran like a dream actively dragging the window right to left no matter how fast I shook it side-to-side. Even the oval Apple mouse!
There are few people who have any nostalgia for the puck mice. The size wasn't the biggest problem. For some people it's actually a feature. My wife has small hands and I couldn't convince her to ditch the crappy puck mouse when she was still using it.
The bigger problem was that because it was round, it became hard to tell which way it was pointing so if you'd accidentally grab it sideways and the mouse would move the wrong direction.
I often had to "lift and slide" any type of mouse when using OSX: I really can't stand that, mice shouldn't move more than an inch for the cursor to go from one edge to the screen from the other. Apple should at least predefine OSX with faster cursor speeds. Lifting and dragging a mouse all day could cause some wrist strain, that, and if you use an undersized circular mouse.
If you want to really get crazy, connect the G3 hockey puck mouse to OSX; it didn't work very well at all. Maybe others had better experience, but I certainly didn't think it was a good combination.
No thanks. I never owned one of those pucks myself, but I have plenty of bad memories of having to use them on other people's computers.
Anyway, I've always used non-Apple branded mice and other peripherals on OSX. I used to get accused of cheating because I had such good accuracy at headshots in Unreal Tournament. I did this on OS X and a PC mouse. I think your experience may be unique to that one mouse. It's a USB mouse. I don't see why a standard USB mouse would be so erratic on any computer of any make vs another.
Saw one of these at my kid's High School concert tonight running the mixing desk.
Show Image
(http://www.mrmartinweb.com/images/computer/macg3bluemonitor.jpg)
I had one of those monitors for a while. It eventually developed an odd electrical problem that caused the monitor emit a loud crack followed by the picture shrinking and expanding for a brief moment.
Now that monitor was one that was really awkard to move around. The three legged base was kinda cool in that it allowed you to reclaim some of the footprint of the montior as desk space, but it meant you had this unstable claw like object that you couldn't use as a hand hold and you and to be careful with as to not get it snagged on something while you were moving it.
The handle at the back really annoyed me:
Show Image
(http://geekhack.org/attachment.php?attachmentid=8314&stc=1&d=1268352649)
The heavy CRT outweights the flimsy plastic handle at the back. I'm surprised the "assembled in china, BUT, designed in california" handle didn't break off. It's very akward to carry.
After having to carry one for about 5-10 minutes yesterday, I definitely agree. I ended up having to kinda 'hug' it as I walked along because the handle was useless.
However, using Apple's mice (the oval white ones) aren't all that bad. It turns out OSX was programmed to handle mice in a very austere way (with my experience anyways). When I used even my IBM mice on OSX, it couldn't detect rapid movement and would feebly wobble around in the middle not knowing what to do. On my thinkpad however, it ran like a dream actively dragging the window right to left no matter how fast I shook it side-to-side. Even the oval Apple mouse!
When I plugged a standard Dell mouse into one, it started off only accepting the middle mouse button as the click. After some while it eventually decided to let me use any button for the job.
That's too weird for me. I like plain beige or black.
Can you imagine an IBM CRT in "bondi blue" or "fire red"?
Show Image
(http://odiguys.com/catalog/images/ibmg78black17monitor.jpg)
I don't like having equipment that is really rounded. Why? I lugged two of those CRTs down from 3 floors; they would have been difficult if they were rounded. Plus, I think things with edges (boxy) look more aesthetic.
Agreed.
You want to know why those CRTs have problems? Look at the components inside, they GLUED them together. And it's really sloppily done too. So when the glue gets old and cracks up, good bye capacitors. I'll try to take a picture of the capacitors inside one of those iMac G3s later; I've never seen a capacitor that big before.
As for the yellowing of macs; just cheap plastics and parts. But, they'd need a lot of flame retardants because, Macs get HOT. My hand got a bit burned by one of these "intel" macs:
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(http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/e/e8/Imac_16-9.png/250px-Imac_16-9.png)
The pathetic fan spins so slowly, and the ventillation isn't made properly (Apple released some update to make them spin faster).
And macbooks are fire hazards (http://www.appledefects.com/?p=15), they are officially stated by apple not to be used as laptops (http://www.appledefects.com/?p=15).
One might as well just rework them to be large LCD monitors. It's a shame that they use some of the best panel technology, but screw up making a good machine.
To be fair, the way that the Txxp (e.g. T42p/T43p/T60p) laptops have failed, I've nicknamed their video chipsets "OnFireGL". If you don't push the graphics chipset, they're fine.