PowerPC PowerBooks: 3400c, 3500 & G3 WallStreet

The PowerBook 3400c was released on February 17, 1997. It featured a 180, 200, or 240 MHz PowerPC 603e processor and cost over US$4,500. It came with a 6x or 12x CD-ROM drive, featured a 1.3 GB or 2 GB hard disk, and came with System 7.6 preinstalled. The case design was essentially an extension of the 5300 design, made to fit the 3400c's 12.1" screen.

The 3400 performed well and was considered the fastest notebook computer available for a few months, but it was quickly replaced by the PowerBook G3 (sometimes known as the 3500), which shipped in an almost identical case with a 250 MHz PowerPC G3 processor, 32 MB of RAM, and a 5 GB hard disk. It featured hot swappable drive bays, and four speakers, selling for a hefty US$5,700.

The 3500 had a high price and a short life; the PowerBook G3 Series replaced it in 1998. This model was also known as the "WallStreet" G3. The base (233 MHz) model is sometimes referred to as the "MainStreet;" it uses a G3 chip like the others, but it has no level 2 cache, which meant that it's performance was less than might be expected for a G3.

There were several models of WallStreet PowerBooks. The base model had a 12.1" screen, a 233 MHz G3 processor (without a backside cache), 32 MB of RAM, and a 2 GB hard disk. The next model up had a 266 MHz G3 with a 13.3" screen, 32 MB of RAM, and a 4 GB hard disk. The high-end model has a 292 MHz G3 with a 14.1" screen, 32 MB of RAM, and a 6 GB hard drive. You could order your PowerBook from Apple in custom configurations as well.

The 3400c was an extension of the 5300 series design, made to be able to accept the 12.1" screen. The 3400 is almost twice as fast as the 1400 (performance will be similar to the desktop Power Mac 6400 series), which is not bad performance for an older laptop. The 3400 can be a good choice for those users who would like a decent laptop computer and don't want to spend a lot of money. The 3400 frequently sells on eBay for less than $300. As with the 5300 and 1400, if you are looking for one of these, make sure you get one with the amount of RAM you want already installed, since RAM is expensive for the 3400c. Unfortunately the 3400c is not G3 upgradeable like the 1400 (which explains the low price), so if you think you will need a G3, consider buying either a PowerBook G3 or a 1400 with a G3 upgrade.

The 3500/G3 is relatively rare these days. Because of the high original price many people did not decide to purchase one. However, if you find one now, its price is most likely going to be low, mainly because this PowerBook G3 is the only G3 not supported under Mac OS X. Since the 3500/G3 was basically a 3400c with a G3 processor, Mac OS X does not support some of the older parts that are in these machines. If you don't plan to run OS X, these machines are great. The G3 inside gives decent performance, and the four-speaker system sounds excellent.

The WallStreet PowerBook G3 was the first PowerBook to offer a 14.1" screen. WallStreet PowerBooks are OS X compatible, and also have a full compliment of legacy ports (ADB, serial, SCSI). They also give you two PCMCIA card slots, just like the 3400c and 3500, so you can use modern USB cards. The only major drawback to the Wallstreet series is the size and weight. They are large and heavy - but the price may make up for some of that. You can often find them for less than $800 on eBay. Make sure you stay away from the cacheless G3/233 model unless you don't mind buying a G3 with less than G3 performance; the speed of that compares better to a 6500/225 than it does to a G3/233.

Look around for deals on eBay. Lately I have seen some pretty nice machines go up for auction. If you use Internet Explorer 5.0 or 5.1 for OS X, you can even watch an auction so that you can bid on it if you are outbid. As OS X becomes more widely used, the older non-OS X compatible machines and early G3s will be retired - and they will sell for less than they are selling for now.

If you plan to run OS X in the field, you may consider something slightly faster. We'll look at the PowerBook G3 "Lombard" and PowerBook G3 "Pismo" models in another article.