hello,
i went ahead and downloaded and installed be pe max v3 on my old pentium ii computer. it really did make a huge difference in terms of responsiveness, when i boot on win2k, the computer runs as fast as molasses; when i boot it on be, it runs as fast as a new pc.
however, i did get into a bunch of hiccups that i overcame (mostly): despite having the matrox g200 listed as a supported video card, it did not work. fortunately i had a riva tnt card laying around that i could use. i also run into problems when i installed x11. before installing the bwindow mode, the xbeos app would just trash the computer (i could not do a thing, half the screen was black, the other half showed the be desktop, but the keyboard and mouse where unresponsive.) i had more luck after i installed the bwindow version. i can open an xterm, load twm, etc. i now have other problems: (1) unfathomably, the ssh client does *not* have an X option to enable x11 forwarding (although it does have an x option to disable it.) does any other client have this option? (2) something goes very bad with the display. when i log in to a remote server and get the reponse to enter a password, the password *shows in clear text* on the screen! and when i hit enter nothing at all happens. does anybody know what could be going on? after closing the x session, the terminal that i used to open it also has its display all messed up. (3) x11 runs as slow as in windows under cygwin, so i am not getting the performance advantage as was hoping, while losing a lot of functionality (cygwin is a more complete unix environment as far as i can tell.) what could be the problem?
finally an unrelated problem: does anybody know how i can share the dsl connection on my other pc (running win2k) with this one (running be)?
sorry for the long message, tia for any responses...

Get on beshare for advanced questions, there is a wiki.bebits page I made for xonbeos (search).
There are a few different versions of x for beos. You will have to choose the most stable.
See bebits for a newer driver for that video card.
I use a proxy app by analogx but any internet connection sharing app will share the connection. Be sure to point your browser to the correct nic address of the proxy and port numbers.