I tried Os X and hated it, very slow and cumbersome.
I am using a 500 MHZ G3 Powerbook and OS X works great. i think you should try 10.2 or 10.3 on your system. i have a friend running 10.2 on a 250 G3 imac and its smooth and nice too. Ebay has some great deals on 10.2 you should check out. I picked it up for only $40 US.