Upgrading Powermac G4

Hi there!

Does anyone have any experience in upgrading an old mac? I have a Powermac G4 - the old silver front type.

I would like a brand spanking new one but, times are hard!!

I was wondering whether it would be viable or indeed possible, to upgrade the one I've got. I'm running OS 10.5, which is ok, but, it's not as fast as I'd like it to be, even though I've totally wiped the hard-drive clean before installing. All my tunes and pics are on an external.

Believe it or not, I've only got the old USB1, which I'd like to change and the hard-drive is the old ATA 80gb. What's the best I can do with this and how much could it cost in anyone's opinion?

If you require any more info, please let me know, and I'll post it!

Many thanks in advance!

ggallin said:

I'm running OS 10.5, which is ok, but, it's not as fast as I'd like it to be, even though I've totally wiped the hard-drive clean before installing.

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Of course it's not as fast as you would like it to be...it's a 9-10 year-old computer!!! Plus running OS 10.5 is probably slowing it down somewhat as well (compared to 10.4).

You pretty much have to accept the fact that a 9-10 year-olsd computer will not be as fast as you want it to be...and almost any upgrade you do to it will not be worth the money (dollars spent/performance gained).

It's time for a new/newer computer. That doesn't mean it has to be a "NEW" computer...it could simply be a newer used computer. Since your Powermac G4 is about 10 years old...you have lots, and lots, and lots of used computers to choose from that would be faster.

- Nick

Hey Nick, thanks for your reply!

Can you suggest a reasonable upgrade? And what kind of spec should I be looking for?

Cheers!
Lyn

ggallin said:

Can you suggest a reasonable upgrade? And what kind of spec should I be looking for?

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When you say upgrade...are we talking a newer/used computer model than the Powermac G4 you have? And if so...what sort of budget do you have?

- Nick

As Nick has suggested a CPU upgrade is not really worthwhile now. When Leopard was released purchased a 1.4GHz Mercury Extreme CPU upgrade from OWC for my 400MHz Gigabit Ethernet, which worked well enough and ran Leopard fine, but still slowed down by the 100MHz system bus speed. Assuming you have a MDD when you talk about the shiny front.

For what it is worth, put the cost of the CPU upgrade towards a later model machine.

Assuming it's a Mirrored Door (has 4 holes to the base front facia), you can add as many as 4 ATA/133 Hard drives to the mac. Any Brand will work and just need to be formatted to Mac OS Extended using disk utility. You could change out the Optical drive for a DVD +RW if it's not already superdrive. Also check that the memory is at or near the 2 gig limit. You can also upgrade the graphics card. Think this mac will support the Geforce 6600gt used in the Original G5 AGP tower. However, the cost of a processor upgrade will be pretty much the cost of a used G5. The bus speed of an MDD is 167mHz and addresses DDR ram (PC2700) from recollection. Add 4 sticks of 512MB DDR 333 unregistered, unbuffered (ie PC2700u), which you can rob out of old Pentium 4 2gHz PCs if you have any- what I'm saying is don't buy new, find a recycling centre near you and enquire there!!!! Oh and the G4 MDD has at minimum 1gHz processors on board and the fastest G4 Procs available are 1.42gHz, so there's little gain to be had on that front.

On the other hand, if it's a Quicksilver (silver front facia to only part of the Mac), you're more limited. Hopefully it's not a 733 as these had limitations on the size of partition (128GB), which hampered them. In the same vein, their motherboards only had 3 memory slots, all PC133, which limits any upgrades.

I'd suggest saving the cash from a processor upgrade and buying a used G5, which will set you back $300-$400 (about the same as a G5 upgrade card- if you can find one!)

Or even better saving towards an Intel machine as PowerPC has had its day.

It all comes down to what your going to use it for. If its to do the latest stuff your buddies all do...youll need a new machine. Or mess around on forums and check email like Im doing right now.... on a Quicksilver running 10.4.