There is another question you are not asking. What is the latest OS that will run reliably and rapidly on the 601 chip. I just went down stairs to test 8.1 on the 8100 and realized that 8.1 was already loaded. Had been using it for years.
I have several drives in each computer and each with a different OS. I boot from a different drive/OS depending on if I am using Mac Draft from 15 years ago or Filemaker from 22 years ago.
May I suggest that you find an external CD-ROM drive at a thrift store, pull the rom drive and put in a hard drive. ( Don't forget to change the SCSI ID) Leave the case lid off for convenience. Now pull drives from LC II vintage computers that are being thrown away and load up several different systems. This will let you test multiple systems for multiple needs. If you have a newer drive, partition it and test accordingly.
I have also used 8.1 on my G3 for years. I would rather have a fast older system than a newer OS that slows down older processors. For example, 8.5 was a waste, 8.6 had defects right out of the box ( be sure and add the mandatory driver/extension and font updates). 8.1 has been solid from the start. 8.6 did have better graphics capabilities and loaded images faster from the internet but the time saved there was lost to crashes because of conflicts with the browser.
Do you want a fast car that crashes or a reliable car that gets you where you want to go, every time, year after year. Partition a drive and have both.
