Is it possible to link (run as one machine) my G5 PowerPC OSX 10.4.6 machine to my G5 INTEL running OSX 10.6.x or higher simultaneously? I want to run differing versions of OS X, and be able to use my Classic apps while still keeping up with Flash Player requirements. How can this be done?
MacOS – link two different kinds of Macs each using different OSes
adobe-flashg5macos
Related Solutions
Quick answer: No.
Long answer: Yes, you can. You can run Snow Leopard in a VM (virtual machine) on your computer.
There are paid solutions like Parallels Desktop and VMWare, but a great free solution is VirtualBox. There is a fabulous guide on how to install Mac OS X Snow Leopard here
Note: You will need a version of Mac OS X Snow Leopard to install on the Virtual Machine. If you don't own it, Apple is still selling it here.
Yes, it looks like it should be safe to remove /Developer if you have already installed version 4.3 or later of Xcode. The Xcode section of the Apple Developer Support Center actually tells you to do this (emphasis mine).
I've installed the latest version of Xcode from the Mac App Store, but a previous version of Xcode (4.2.1 or earlier) keeps launching. What should I do?
To run the latest version of Xcode, make sure you are launching Xcode.app from the Applications folder. Xcode 4.3 and later is packaged on the Mac App Store as a single application and installs in your Applications folder as Xcode.app.
Previous versions of Xcode placed the tools and frameworks in the Developer folder. You can delete the older version of Xcode by dragging the Developer folder to the trash.
Furthermore, as pointed out by bispymusic, /Developer no longer exists with Xcode 4.3. Specifically (emphasis mine):
The simplification afforded by repackaging Xcode 4.3 as a single app bundle eliminates the need for the
/Developerdirectory containing prior versions of Xcode. As a result, the Install Xcode application and theuninstall-devtoolscommand line script are also no longer needed.Note: The first time you run Xcode 4.3, you are prompted with a dialog to delete the Install Xcode application from the Applications directory if one is resident, and to remove any older installation of Xcode (Figure 4). These actions are optional, Xcode 4.3 can co-exist with older installations of Xcode on the same Mac. Some operations may require an administrator password to enable them if you switch from one version of Xcode to another.
Figure 4 Option to remove older versions of Xcode
If you choose not to delete these items on the first launch of Xcode 4.3, you can remove the
/Developerfolder and the Install Xcode application by dragging them to the Trash at any time.
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Best Answer
You can't really join seamlessly two separate macs, and have it all just work out of the box, eg having one Intel based Mac that can run the Lastest OS's and One older PowerPC Mac that can run all the Classic OS's and have it all work at the same time merged into a single OS where all apps just run together. Something like that may be theoretically possible but it has never been done, and would require Apples full support to do so.
So in other words Paying someone to port your old classic software to the latest version of OS X would probably be less expensive than the solution necessary for merging two independent operating systems and architectures into one, so lets not even go there any further.
The good news is that there are options that will allow you to independently connect two macs or emulate a classic mac enviroment within an Intel mac.
Options:
Just use both computers (each is working fine why mess with that) and connect them to make it work for you.
Connect them physically and use each one directly. What you could do is get a KVM and an extra monitor to share between them. A KVM would let you switch one USB keyboard, USB mouse, and monitor between the two Macs at the touch of a button or keyboard stroke. Additionally, the second monitor could be used as constant output, for example it could be showing video content as a second display from the Intel Mac while you are working on your Classic Apps on the Power PC Mac on the KVM connected / active screen.
Another solution would be to network your two Macs onto the same network and then enable screen sharing or VNC on the Power PC mac and then connect to the Power PC from the Intel Mac, effectively giving you a picture in picture view to your older Power PC mac while working within the Intel Mac.
Use only the newer computer and find an emulation solution to run your legacy classic application on the Intel Mac. For more information on emulating classic on Intel macs see How to run Classic (pre OS X) apps on Intel Macs