It has been recently announced that the venerable TenFourFox web browser for PowerPC (PPC) Macs was going to cease regular development, which rekindled my interest in playing around with my trusty PowerBook G4, which only gets occasional use if I’m testing a PowerPC version of some of my own software. Such is the way of aging hardware and software: the necessity to support them wanes over time, but it does question how useful can an 18 year old laptop be in 2021. Can it still be useful, or is it relegated to a hobbyist’s endeavors?
As usual, the internet and networking are the hurdles.
Check out frogfind!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xS6LX_Dnhr4
https://www.osnews.com/story/133302/frogfind-the-search-engine-for-vintage-computers/
My PowerBook G4 works great with MorphOS. It’s so fast and lightweight.
https://www.morphos-team.net
Web browsing is not a problem either, other than JS being a bit slow because no JIT yet in the WebKit based browser, but even YouTube and Google Maps work.
https://wayfarer.icu
To this day, my 2005 PBG4 is the best laptop I’ve owned. Good size, incredible I/O, easily upgradable, designed with practicality in mind.