My 7-year-old blue and white Mac G3’s been down since last week. I can’t get it to boot, and the hard drive is gagging and coughing with awful retching sounds. Last time it was sick, it was the video card. I could tell because the computer was on, but the monitor showed nothing. So I bought an old G3 from my old day job and swapped video cards, and voila, the Mac was all better again.

This time, though, I’m pretty sure the hard drive’s hopelessly corrupt. I didn’t have a bootable emergency disc, so I got one, only to find out that the packaging pulled the wool over my eyes—the box said, “Includes bootable emergency CD-ROM.” The disc inside was a DVD.

My G3 doesn’t read DVDs.

Great.

So H.E. found a Mac repair place for me, and the Mac’s there now. Even if the Mac’s a goner, it’s there so I can get a copy of my hard drive files—mostly print book covers and magazine ads, but it’s stuff I need. Fonts, too. Not backed up because all I had were 100 MB Zip disks, and the external CD burner I have is old, old, old and refuses to be seen by the OS.

So here I am, considering getting myself a new Mac. I don’t really want to spend the money, but it’s time. Seven years in the computer world is 100 years in the real world.

It’s time to give up the G3.

Unless, of course, the Mac guy fixes it.

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