Safari with an iBook G4 (1.33Ghz)?

With OS X 10.5(.8) Leopard, the real limit appears to be

as high as version 5.0.6, since newer ones won't work.

Not sure of older ones either since these are included

with the system.

While my Macs (three run 10.5.8) one is an intel-mac

the other two are G4, so they are more limited in other

options with no further upward direction in Safari at all.

I use TenFourFox, iCab, SeaMonkey-PPC, and have a

few older ones (including Safari 5.0.6 last update 2011)

that do OK but have no security update or support...

Used to prefer Camino, Opera, and FireFox. And keep

the Safari because I can use its preferences to assign

any other browser I have to be a default, system-wide.

There is no current version of Safari for use in PowerPC

Mac, so there is no supported version for 10.5.8. And

a matter of the last supported (outdated) Flash player

is a careful look into Adobe archives. A way to hack

Flash player to run a newer version in an older label

does exist. I have not used or tried that yet.

And OS X 10.5.8 in Intel-based Macs has a few options

in that one of them is to upgrade via retail 10.6 DVD to

Snow Leopard, sadly not available for powerPC Macs.

So, I am not sure if I've answered a question.

In any event...

Good luck & happy computing! 🙂

I was led to the last PPC issue of the Safari 5 webkit here http://powerpcaccess.blogspot.co.uk/2013/02/best-powerpc-web-browser-v2.html having come from the discussions on the best apps for ppc iBook here http://scriptogr.am/nordkril/post/10-essential-apps-for-powerpc-macs

My iBook G4 mid 2005 with Tiger is used mainly as backup for occasional use and travel; but the Webkit I downloaded a few weeks ago via the first link above has so far worked very well, no bugs and faster than the Safari used previously.

Safari on PowerPC is really outdated and wil have security issues now

You may like to try TenFourFox which is updated frequently:

http://www.floodgap.com/software/tenfourfox/

Ten Four Fox by default does not enable the flash plug-in but if you google how to enable it then that can be done

Also on PowerPC flash is outdated but again a websearch can bring up modified PPC versions of flash for that functionality

You're absolutely right, TenFourFox is the one now aimed specifically at our situation with PPC. Trouble is as I've just checked, workarounds do tend to have to keep coming obstinately into play with these old iBooks. I'm in the UK and looking at the BBC football page, the embedded videos there don't work using TenFourFox, I get the message You need to update your Flash. Actually I have for months been using the PPC Flash workaround you refer to, which if you Google the word Nordkril will get you to it; and this does work on the embedded video when using Safari and the Webkit Safari.

Another browser it works with which is kept up to date is iCab. But that is shareware and costs you $20 Again I have been using that for years as an alternative to Safari and Firefox on both my Snow Leopard desktop and Tiger iBook. There are different version for different Mac systems here http://www.icab.de/dl.php

You could try a version of SeaMonkeyPPC, derived from Mozilla Firefox code.

http://sourceforge.net/projects/seamonkey-for-ppc/

Used to host from google until downloads were affected.

While I have a version of SeaMonkeyPPC, they didn't get it right for the older G4s and the last versions run slower than acceptable in mine. So I have an older version that runs adequate to the hardware limitations in my G4 Mini 1.5GHz with only 1024MB RAM and 60% free drive space.

The iCab will run in demo, free, indefinitely; an occasional reminder will appear on top of the browser, click on it to make it go away. If you like it, then pay the license. And save a licensed copy in case the Mac runs amok. iCab uses less system resources than TenFourFox in CPU cycles, & RAM.

Hopefully this helps.

Good luck & happy computing! 🙂

The WebKit site that you went to

http://powerpcaccess.blogspot.co.uk/2013/02/best-powerpc-web-browser-v2.html

has a Leopard download as the topmost link, so that would be the OS X.5.8 download for you . If it isn't working I don't know why that is happening, on my iBook with OS X.4.11 the Tiger download, the second link, works fine. Sorry not to be more helpful, if the Leopard download isn't working at least there are the other options. At the moment I have iCab as my first choice on my Snow Leopard desktop and iCab as a fallback to the Tiger WebKit on my iBook.

If you choose to try a version of SeaMonkeyPPC, note the latest version appears to be based on a similar code to the base one shared by tenfourfox, with variations, so it may work OK in a slower PPC G4 Mac. Mine is a vintage SeaMonkey 2.13 from last year, I reverted (& saved most dmg or zip files for later use) to this after testing out three newer versions earlier this year. The older versions are available on the site, too.

iCab is worth having in the Dock. SeaMonkey if not a hog, too. Tenfourfox, if you use it sparingly. The newer TenFourFox uses Tabs by default, but there is a Mozilla add-on to make them less evident when you have only one window open in 10.4Fx. I have the add-on since I usually run several windows at once, to drag/drop content or do separate searches at the same time. And to copy-paste web page URLs, etc.

Hopefully the options work out OK for you.

Good luck & happy computing! 🙂

Implied by the use of words: out-of-date and lack-of-support; is

that security is the last thing to go, & is the first reason to update.

Part of the reason why some later browsers for powerPC Mac OS X

10.4.11 and 10.5.8 have their Adobe Flash Player plugins disabled.

Noteably TenFourFox does not ship with Flash plugin, for security.

A hack to make a later Flash player use a newer partial code in an

older version the browser and OS can see, it out there.

Anyway, hopefully the input helps to make a fair choice, under the

circumstances of outdated and unsupported hardware versions.

Good luck & happy computing! 🙂

Pommeg I'm really sorry to hear all this. Of course like everybody on these forums I'm just another Mac user albeit some are more knowledgeable technically than others. I've been using Macs since the early nineties, never used a PC. My suggestion re WebKIt was because having seen on the Nordkril pages someone say it was the way to go with PPC, the webpage where it is sited contains comments up to December 2013. So I reckoned that it was still at least unofficially found good by some users, which is why I gave it a try and found it snappy myself. Regarding the Leopard I wouldn't have downloaded it with those caveats printed and would have warned you had I known they were there.

There's no official version of this Webkit as it stopped being run in 2009 with the demise of the Safari 4 to which it applied. The questions you are being asked would have been something you would have been able to take up with them when it was extant; the whole point of a WebKit was it was an ongoing try-out with dialogue between the ordinary users reporting back discovered bugs, and the Safari developers. It was a stage towards the provision of a more uptodate browser. My only decision to try it out was because looking for the best browser for these old iBooks has been a recurring problem the older they get. I surmised that if this webkit was being recently still recommended by some, perhaps it therefore had reached a stage of useability when last updated that meant it could still be worth using in our circumstances now. But when things go wrong as is happening with your Leopard, there's nothing I could suggest other than try a software update.

In truth as K Shaffer has indicated maybe it's TenFourFox is the best current browser for us, but as I have mentioned I couldn't get the Flash workaround to work in it; and on a personal quirky note I just don't like Firefox and its variants. A personal thing to do with that there's no toggle key shortcut for hiding the navigation toolbar, and that has always irritated me. Browser use is subjective.

I'd go with iCab, that way you could use the Flash workaround and be certain of the browser being kept securely updated. There is the matter of $20 though (which gives you a registration number you can use again whenever you put iCab on another machine) but you can try it out as has been suggested, free; there's a kind of see-through advert hovers on and off occasionally to remind you to pay if you want to use it properly.

Again my apologies for what of your hassle is down to my advice.