Forums | MacLife

Unfortunately OS 9 web browsing is getting tougher. There are a couple of usable options but you may still get the error messages.

iCab as mentioned - the only OS 9 browser still being developed, or at least was not too long ago.

Mozilla which is built on Netscape and would be more compatible than the old Netscape versions. This WamCom build is the most current version of Mozilla:

http://wamcom.org/

And there's the old M$ Internet Exploiter which works on some sites.

It may be easier to get OS X running on your 7300 than trying to get anywhere with the old browsers. The 7300 is a good old Mac and many people are still using them with OS X via XPostfacto. You can probably find a install set of OS 10.2 Jaguar disks for less than $20.00.

But I really would recommend finding a B&W G3 that will run OS X easily and natively for web browsing on a budget. The B&W G3's are cheap and can be found for $20-30.00 if you look around and it's a pretty good machine for the money.

Pariah wrote:

There are no web browsers for OS9 that will work well with the modern web. None, Zip, Nada. As in you are just out of luck.
Believe me I tried everything and the browser situation is what finally made me make the move to OSX 4 years ago. My beard is indeed grey and I stuck with OS9 as long as I could.
Time to move on, OS9 just ain't up to it anymore.

I think I finally gave it up on OS 9 browsing about the same time. It was to the point where I was using 3 different browsers depending on what site I was browsing and it just got to be too much.

Sheesh, I went through the same thing several years ago. The OS 9 web browsers got older and no longer supported. iCab might be your last resort if you're too poor or cheap to upgrade. I tried out iCab, I thought it was OK for what it was, but somehow felt cheesy to me. I, like a few others here, put off upgrading to X for what I thought was as long as humanly possible (until I read your posting).

Having said that, there are ways to get into OS X cheaply if you're on limited resources. You could buy an older version of X disks that people sell when they upgrade — I paid $40 for used 10.3 Panther disks, which works like a charm on my Powerbook G3. I honestly don't know how well the 7300 will do with OS X (even with the 500 MHZ upgrade). I have run OS X quite well on B&W G3s, but suspect that going further backward is going reveal performance issues on older equipment. But as has been pointed out, you can get B&W G3s (and for that matter earlier G4s) pretty cheaply these days.

Try to find private sellers — stores usually want to charge more. In fact I just sold one of my B&W G3s for $50 through an ad. So check-out the listings of your local Craigslist.org or other classified ads venue. There's always someone trying to get rid of their old computer stuff inexpensively. Its just a matter of looking around. Web-browsing under X is much, much better than 9.

Another tip: even if your using an older version of X (10.2, 10.3) you can get the most up to date Firefox browser, which is the one I favor. There may be other browsers to look into like Opera, but I haven't bothered. And Apple seems to have prevented their browser (Safari) from being upgraded to the newest version, on earlier builds of OS X. Overall though, dealing with older versions of X is still much, much better than OS 9 when it comes to Web browsers (and it does loads of other stuff too).

Last edited by adamjg (2007-09-15 9:41 pm)