Power Macintosh G3 (Blue and White)

The Power Mac G3, referred to as "blue & white", is the redesigned successor to the original Power Macintosh G3 series, referred to as "beige".

Features
Introduced at the 1999 Macworld Expo, the blue & white G3 was the first new Power Macintosh model to be released after the iMac. Its novel enclosure positioned the logic board on the access door, which allowed easy access when swung down (this case style was also used on all Power Mac G4 models except for the Cube). These models used new copper-based PowerPC G3 CPUs made by IBM, which used about 1/4 the power of the Motorola versions. 300, 350, 400, and 450MHz versions were made. The logic board had four PCI slots: three 64-bit 33MHz slots, and one 32-bit 66MHz slot dedicated for the graphics card, an ATI Rage 128. Four RAM slots accepted PC100 SDRAM modules, allowing for a maximum of 1GB of RAM, running on a 100MHz bus. The onboard IDE was upgraded to Ultra ATA/33, but SCSI was no longer present, having been replaced by two FireWire ports. The serial ports were gone, too, having given way to two USB 1.1 ports. The ADB port remained, as did the option for an internal modem. 100Base-TX Ethernet was now standard, and audio was moved back to the logic board. Zip remained as an option, and some configurations included a DVD-ROM drive and a DVD-Video decoder daughtercard for the graphics card, allowing hardware-assisted DVD video playback. The blue-and-white Power Mac G3 was the first Power Mac with the "New World" architecture based on Open Firmware, as well as the first Power Mac without onboard SCSI. Initially, many buyers chose to buy the older platinum G3s instead, in order to maintain compatibility with existing peripherals.

Issues
Early blue and white G3s had IDE controller problems, which make it impossible to connect two hard drives and prevent the use of most hard disk drives produced after them. (Using newer drives in those units results in massive data transmission errors.) The "Rev 2" units have a corrected IDE controller which allows two hard disks, and works flawlessly with any drive, within the 28-bit LBA constraint. The Rev B units ship with a hard disk bracket designed for two drives and also have an updated graphics card.