I recently purchased a PowerMac G4 on ebay and i am wanting to upgrade the processor, memory, and eventually the graphics cards. I dont have much knowledge on what to look for while looking for these parts and i dont really know if they make the parts specifically for mac or pc. As you can tell im not the type of guy to know much about computers and their parts so i joined this forum in hopes to find some help and education. I hope to get some good help from you all!
Upgrading a Power Mac G4
- Thread starter Tored
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Check out http://www.newertech.com/ for some processor upgrades for your new machine
Tored... PowerMac G4 which one? The Quick Silvers and Mirror Door are all upgradeable by complete novices. I should know, lol. Can be upgraded relatively cheaply too.
Reaperman- Joined
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I've got a fairly upgraded Sawtooth model.
It was originally a G4-500, now it's got a Powerlogix 1.4GHz CPU upgrade (I went with one of the 7455A processors because it doesn't not require any firmware flashing). The 7447 CPU will require firmware updates (but are often faster). The 7455 CPU has more onboard cache, so it is actually a little faster than a 7447 CPU at the same speed.
I also added an ACARD RAID PCI card. Not so much for the RAID (though I do use it that way), but to get "big" drive support. The IDE bus on the Sawtooth models only support drives up to 128MB. There is a software solution to allow bigger drives, but I trust that the same way I trust firmware flashing to support unsupported processors.
Finally, I've upgrade the video (twice). My first upgrade was an ATI 8500 Mac edition. It made things feel much quicker. The upgrade also allowed iMovie 6 to work better (there are realtime Quartz previews for transitions, and the original card doens't support Quartz Extreme).
Well, iMovie 7 came along, and suddenly I couldn't play anymore. It requires a graphics card with Core Image support, and the ATI doesn't have it. I ended up with a flashed nVidea 6200 card (PC card flashed for Mac support). Now I have iMovie 7 working. It isn't very fun though, lots of dropped frames when editing, etc.
The ATI and nVidea test about the same with XBench, so I'd go with the cheaper ATI if you don't feel the need to have Core Image support (I think Front Row also requires Core Image).
I've also upgraded the DVD drive a few times. I went from the worthless DVD-RAM drive that I "upgraded" to with the computer to a DVD burner, then upgraded again to a dual layer DVD burner (Pioneer each time).
Scott
It was originally a G4-500, now it's got a Powerlogix 1.4GHz CPU upgrade (I went with one of the 7455A processors because it doesn't not require any firmware flashing). The 7447 CPU will require firmware updates (but are often faster). The 7455 CPU has more onboard cache, so it is actually a little faster than a 7447 CPU at the same speed.
I also added an ACARD RAID PCI card. Not so much for the RAID (though I do use it that way), but to get "big" drive support. The IDE bus on the Sawtooth models only support drives up to 128MB. There is a software solution to allow bigger drives, but I trust that the same way I trust firmware flashing to support unsupported processors.
Finally, I've upgrade the video (twice). My first upgrade was an ATI 8500 Mac edition. It made things feel much quicker. The upgrade also allowed iMovie 6 to work better (there are realtime Quartz previews for transitions, and the original card doens't support Quartz Extreme).
Well, iMovie 7 came along, and suddenly I couldn't play anymore. It requires a graphics card with Core Image support, and the ATI doesn't have it. I ended up with a flashed nVidea 6200 card (PC card flashed for Mac support). Now I have iMovie 7 working. It isn't very fun though, lots of dropped frames when editing, etc.
The ATI and nVidea test about the same with XBench, so I'd go with the cheaper ATI if you don't feel the need to have Core Image support (I think Front Row also requires Core Image).
I've also upgraded the DVD drive a few times. I went from the worthless DVD-RAM drive that I "upgraded" to with the computer to a DVD burner, then upgraded again to a dual layer DVD burner (Pioneer each time).
Scott
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I should have added more things to my post.
If you are planning to spend more than a few hundred dollars on a Sawtooth machine, don't. They just aren't worth it now. A dual core Mac Mini will out perform an upgraded Sawtooth in every category except disk speed. An external drive on the Mini will solve that. The price difference just isn't that high.
Scott
If you are planning to spend more than a few hundred dollars on a Sawtooth machine, don't. They just aren't worth it now. A dual core Mac Mini will out perform an upgraded Sawtooth in every category except disk speed. An external drive on the Mini will solve that. The price difference just isn't that high.
Scott
I am not wanting to spend to much money on the uprgrade, i just want to make some things better than they are at the current moment. I dont plan to attempt to make a high performance machine out it, i just want a good desktop mac for a cheap price. I plan to purchase a new macbook later on around may. And thank you for all of your advice!
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Not spending money rules out the processor upgrade I imagine. They start off at around US$160 unless you pick one up second hand.
Beef out the memory and perhaps an 80GB 7200 RPM 8MB cache HDD.
Beef out the memory and perhaps an 80GB 7200 RPM 8MB cache HDD.
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It can still run a couple hundred bucks to upgrade depending on if you go with new parts or not.
Ultimatly, here is a list of upgradeable components:
1) Processor (Most expensive, not worth it for a short term fix like what you describe)
2) Video card (Probably going to provide the most noticable improvement)
3) RAM (Get as much as possible)
4) HDD (You won't nessesarilaly see a performance improvement from upgrading this. Only upgrade if you need more space or the old drive is looking like it might fail soon)
I woudn't waste your time on USB 2.0 upgrade cards or anything like that since they can be more expensive then they are worth.
Since you say this is only going to be used for a few months, I'd upgrade the video card and RAM and call it a day. Don't go crazy with the video card. It's only a 2x AGP slot or a PCI slot so it will bottleneck some things a bit. Radeon 8xxx series will be sufficient for most things.
-MikeM
Well the deal is i want to still kepp the G4 for a desktop once i get my new laptop so would it be worth upgrading the processor so i can be able to run the new leopard opperating system? And i dont think the HDD is much of huge concern on this machine so im going to purchase 2gb of memory soon and you would say go with a new video card before a processor?
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Okay different thing altogether. Upgraded my Gigabit Ethernet from 400MHz to 1.3GHz using the OWC Mercury Extreme CPU upgrade. It was easy to install, cost then about US$250.00, and OWC after sales service has been brilliant even here to Australia.
The upgrade card is fast having 2MB L3 cache and handles Leopard very nicely. The advantage of our machines is the capacity to use 2GB RAM over 1.5GB with Quicksilver's and DA's.
Use a nVidia GeForce 6200 256MB SDRAM flashed video card purchased from a dealer in Hong Kong and it works beautifully. Advertises on eBay and this card cost US$74 plus postage and has a fan unit built onto the card.
The upgrade card is fast having 2MB L3 cache and handles Leopard very nicely. The advantage of our machines is the capacity to use 2GB RAM over 1.5GB with Quicksilver's and DA's.
Use a nVidia GeForce 6200 256MB SDRAM flashed video card purchased from a dealer in Hong Kong and it works beautifully. Advertises on eBay and this card cost US$74 plus postage and has a fan unit built onto the card.
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Here is a cost analysis to give you an idea.
$269.95 USD - Sonnet 1.8GHz Proc upgrade - New
$100.00 USD - ATI Radeon 8500 AGP Mac Edition (EBay)
$180.00 USD - 2GB PC100 (4x512MB) (Ebay)
________________________________________________
$549.95 USD - Total (Does not include the price of Leopard)
$599 USD - Brand new Mac-Mini with Leopard
From a cost and performance standpoint, you'd be much better off buying a Mac Mini then upgrading a G4.
-MikeM
Yeah i can see in what ways that would be better but it just doesnt seem like it considering the mini having one less gig of ram and about half the hard drive the same GHz for the processor and im guessing about the same video card? What is the reasoning for its better going with the mini?
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The GHz rating dosen't dictate the speed of the system anymore. They found other ways to speed up processors and were able to do four times the processing (or More) at half the speed. A PowerPC G4 1.8GHz is nowhere near the processing power of a 1.83GHz Core2 Duo. To use PC terms, the G4 I have compares to an early Pentium IV and the Core2 Duo is two generations newer and not to mention is a dual core processor (Essentially two processors). 1GB of DDR2 memory vs. 2GB of PC100 SDRAM. Again, DDR2 processes data at least 4x faster (probably much more then that actually) then SDRAM. Even spending a little more on the mini to get the 2GB of RAM is going to be a better value then upgrading the G4. I have a nearly maxed out G4 Power PC and it still isn't nearly as fast as say a Pentium IV 3GHz which is a three - four year old proc and much slower then the Core2 Duo.
There is also the fact that the Bus speed of the G4 is 100MHz - 133MHz depending on your model compared to the mini which is 800MHz or 1066MHz.
There is just no comparison between the two. If the upgrades were 1/2 of the cost, I'd say it was worth it but as someone who has done the upgrades, I know for a fact that the mini is much faster and the better choice.
-MikeM
There is also the fact that the Bus speed of the G4 is 100MHz - 133MHz depending on your model compared to the mini which is 800MHz or 1066MHz.
There is just no comparison between the two. If the upgrades were 1/2 of the cost, I'd say it was worth it but as someone who has done the upgrades, I know for a fact that the mini is much faster and the better choice.
-MikeM
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