How to watch youtube on a G3?

[DamiNooki]

Please Help!​

So, my iMac G3 is my daily driver, since my PowerMac G5 was broken since I bought it second hand, and the issues with that are Horrendous, so I just gave up with that thing, anyway, with the iMac G3, I'm trying to watch youtube videos, which for most other computers is a simple task, but for a computer thats older than this website, its pretty hard to do; I've tried to download Miro, until I failed to find a mirror to the download, since I cant get to the Older Version page, YouView (not the british TV provider) has also failed me, it cant load videos without errors, I have tried multiple videos, same error (it is not an error with the machine, it is purely an issue with the app.

If you can help, here are my specs​

Machine - iMac G3
Model - PowerMac4,1
Processor - PPC4,1 500 MHz
Cache - 256 KB
Ram - 256 MB
OS - OSX 10.4.11 (Tiger)

 

[Raz0rEdge]

You're just going to have a really tough time accessing websites with a computer/OS/software that is 15+ years in the past. You are a full 8 version behind on OS X alone. I would strongly suggest that you try to get into some vicinity of the current generation of Macs. Even if you have to go down the used route or the cheaper Mac Mini route as opposed to going with an iMac or Macbook/Macbook Pro..

Sounds like you've gotten your full worth out of that G3, but it's time to upgrade..

 

[DamiNooki]

I have a faster computer, infact, the newest OSX Version so far (Sierra), a 2014 Mac Mini 1.6 GHz, 4 GB, 500 GB Storage.

However, I simply don't like using it, I use my G3 because its quick enough for me to use, and that Mac Mini has 16X more RAM, a CPU which is 3X faster, and at least 20X more storage, but I don't use it because i use a mac for E-Mail, Web Browsing and Entertainment, using my G3, i use ThunderBird, Camino, VLC and the built-in DVD Player, so all my boxes are ticked, But YouTube might just be the final draw for me to box this old thing up, and finally use the newest tech.

 

[Raz0rEdge]

You've gotta get up to date with technology at some time. There's something to be be said about using the latest version of applications without having to jump through hurdles to do simple things. Anyway, the answer to your dilemma is to use the Mac Mini..anything short of that is silly IMO..

 

[pigoo3]

From my experience back in the day when G3 & G4 based Apple computers were current technology...watching You Tube video's on these computers 10-12 years ago wasn't that great. You had to watch them in small resolution windows...and the videos were choppy.

Now 10-12 years later...YouTube video's are more complicated (more data)...and there's all the YouTube advertising to deal with.

- You need newer web browsers (that a G3 iMac can't run).
- You need newer versions of flash or Java or HTNL 5 (that a G3 iMac can't run)
- You need newer Mac OS versions to run those newer versions of Flash, Java, HTML5.

Bottom line is. A G3 iMac didn't really run YouTube videos well 10-12 years ago. Running YouTube videos in 2017 is more complex...and even if a G3 iMac could run them...they would run very very poorly.

- Nick

 

[harryb2448]

And with 256MB of memory hardly anything will run. I think your error was buying the Mini with only 1.6GHz processor.

I think you are very brave even taking it online with Tiger's complete lack of protectiopn.

 

[DamiNooki]

Success!!!
So, for the past few days, I was learning some programming, on the way I was making crappy games, and recently I attempted to tackle the YouTube problem myself.

How I did it
(excuse grammar)
i started with the youtube's HTML files from a few years back (i got the last working version, from 2009 or something)
chopped it all down so it was just text and a rendered down thumbnail (which made it somewhat quick to load a page), then i got the new HTML5 code from current youtube (FEB 2017 was last update) which i used to put back into the old files (which converted it to HTML5, i dont know how) and then rendered down the videos to 144p (i think thats the lowest) and then compressed literally everything i could, and now i have YouTube!

Disclaimer
Help from Jordan Collins, Ethan Berrisford (DamiNooki), (*Wish to be Unknown*). and the explanation is not complete, with needing to bend the truth a bit, as to protect the real coding.©JC-Filming2017

 

[DamiNooki]

... That worked...

Okay, so after... 1 month of working, youtube changed something, i don't know what, but it changes.
Now it's back to not working, and so far 3 weeks we have been testing our stuff, its a fruitless effort.

Upgrading is my only solution, that iMac G3 has served me well in using disk utility for my PowerMac G5 and Mac Mini.

Packing it up as i type this.