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Hunter Rose
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 Posted: Mon Jun 25, 2007 8:15 pm Post subject: Suggestions for Souping Up a G4 Digital Audio |
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I have an (originally) maxed out G4 Digital Audio. 733 Mhz CPU, 768 Mb RAM, 133 Mhz bus, 57 GB IBM Drive. It's getting a little pokey for a few applications, especially Firefox which seems to cause a bit of thrashing. I'm considering a couple of HW upgrades, but wondered if anyone with experience would want to offer their insights. The range of possibilities includes:
1) Ram Upgrade to 1.5 GB
2) Install 10000 RPM Harddrive, move OS to this drive 3) Uniprocessor CPU upgrade to 1.5ish Ghz
4) Finding an optimized version of Firefox/Camino, and living with the current HW (most other apps are Okay)
Thanks for any assistance! |
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Greg Buchner
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| Posted: Mon Jun 25, 2007 10:25 pm Post subject: Re: Suggestions for Souping Up a G4 Digital Audio |
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In article <2VYfi.825$w2.274@trnddc01>, Hunter Rose <bmd@crossjam.net> wrote:
| Quote: |
I have an (originally) maxed out G4 Digital Audio. 733 Mhz CPU, 768 Mb RAM, 133 Mhz bus, 57 GB IBM Drive. It's getting a little pokey for a few applications, especially Firefox which seems to cause a bit of thrashing. I'm considering a couple of HW upgrades, but wondered if anyone with experience would want to offer their insights. The range of possibilities includes:
1) Ram Upgrade to 1.5 GB
2) Install 10000 RPM Harddrive, move OS to this drive 3) Uniprocessor CPU upgrade to 1.5ish Ghz
4) Finding an optimized version of Firefox/Camino, and living with the current HW (most other apps are Okay)
Thanks for any assistance! |
As someone who has a G4 Digital Audio (originally 533MHz) that I've upgraded, if you don't need 3D graphics for gaming, I'd recommend getting a Mac Mini.
I have 1.25GB of RAM, upgraded to dual 1.6GHz G4's and a Radeon 9800 and I find it lacking at time.
But, RAM would likely give you the most bang for the buck...
Greg Buchner
PS. I run a G4 optimized version of Firefox and don't really notice any difference between it and the normal Firefox. |
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Hunter Rose
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| Posted: Wed Jun 27, 2007 7:06 pm Post subject: Re: Suggestions for Souping Up a G4 Digital Audio |
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Greg Buchner wrote:
| Quote: |
In article <2VYfi.825$w2.274@trnddc01>, Hunter Rose <bmd@crossjam.net> wrote:
As someone who has a G4 Digital Audio (originally 533MHz) that I've upgraded, if you don't need 3D graphics for gaming, I'd recommend getting a Mac Mini. |
Thanks Greg, that was really helpful. A Mac mini is a little more than I wanted to spend, but maybe I can pick up a used one for cheap.
Would you care to expand on where you feel your upgraded machine is lacking?
Ciao!! |
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Greg Buchner
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| Posted: Wed Jun 27, 2007 10:42 pm Post subject: Re: Suggestions for Souping Up a G4 Digital Audio |
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In article <Q3Cgi.1149$w2.323@trnddc01>, Hunter Rose <bmd@crossjam.net> wrote:
| Quote: |
Greg Buchner wrote:
> In article <2VYfi.825$w2.274@trnddc01>, Hunter Rose <bmd@crossjam.net> > wrote:
>
> As someone who has a G4 Digital Audio (originally 533MHz) that I've > upgraded, if you don't need 3D graphics for gaming, I'd recommend > getting a Mac Mini.
Thanks Greg, that was really helpful. A Mac mini is a little more than I wanted to spend, but maybe I can pick up a used one for cheap.
Would you care to expand on where you feel your upgraded machine is lacking? |
I'd say a big one would be the memory bus. At only 133MHz of bandwidth, it's clearly lacking compared to what newer computers can do.
And, while a few years back the G4 was a pretty good processor, it really lacks compared to the Intel Core processors.
Basically I get slowdowns on occasion that aren't coming from virtual memory (pageouts don't increase during these slowdowns.) So I assume that it's because of the memory and processor speed. This occasionally hits either Safari or Firefox and it gets me a bit frustrated.
A lot of it is probably subjective, but if you go and add up all of the upgrades you were looking at, you'd probably get pretty close to a mini.
And yes, the HD's are slow. A faster RPM drive probably won't help that much given the speed of the ATA connection.
Greg B. |
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The New Guy
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| Posted: Thu Jun 28, 2007 3:19 pm Post subject: Re: Suggestions for Souping Up a G4 Digital Audio |
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| Quote: |
> Thanks Greg, that was really helpful. A Mac mini is a little more than I > wanted to spend, but maybe I can pick up a used one for cheap.
And yes, the HD's are slow. A faster RPM drive probably won't help that much given the speed of the ATA connection. |
2 choices might help, both involving used Mini's since your budget is constrained at the moment.
1: For around $300 used, pick up a used PPC Mini, then make a IDE adaptor so you can use a full size (or 2) 7200 rpm hard drive that will be faster and far cheaper and far larger than the notebook one it came with. By selling the notebook drive you get the larger, faster drive for free. Do the same thing with the slot loading drive. Except you will be able to replace that with a far cheaper full size optical drive and you can put that money towards a 1 gb stick of ram if it came with something smaller. The IDE adaptor will have to be made by hand, but anybody that can solder should be able to do it for you. You may even be able to sell off the top housing of the Mini to further lower your cost as it runs cooler that way. Just watch for dust accumulation if you're running it topless. The CPU fan housing is easy to disassemble for dust removal (clean the heat sink too of course). Remember to sell off any software it comes with that you don't need.
2: For a little more than $300 ($350 - $400 I think) pick up an Intel Mini and use a full size 7200 rpm Sata drive. Considering the hassle of hand soldering an IDE adapter for the PPC models, this might be a better way to go. You have to trim the Sata plug but it will bit. Hey, go nuts and pick up a 10k Raptor for real speed improvement. I haven't played with the Intel Mini, but I'm guessing you'll have to use an external optical drive in a firewire enclosure ($20-$40 for the enclosure) if you want to rid yourself of the slot loading DVD drive. It might be better to just keep it if it does what you need. At least its not much of a heat generator like the hard drive.
Run the Mini vertically for better cooling of the base. Another option I've been playing with is to mount the hard drive vertically behind the vertically oriented Mini and then place a large fan below it. It will cool both very well. That necessitates a frame or cage of some sort. These are available off old computers which were often built very well (rigid and strong).
To power either drive or burner that is external, you can use any generic ATX or AT power supply from an older PC. That might cost a whole $10. To keep it almost silent, reverse the fan so its pushing air in, and change the wires so its running at 5 volts. It will be almost silent and since its cooling itself with cool exterior air instead of hot case air (like in 99% of PC installations) it will run very cool indeed. Of course you can run multiple fans/drives off this thing. |
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Hunter Rose
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| Posted: Sat Jun 30, 2007 5:51 pm Post subject: Re: Suggestions for Souping Up a G4 Digital Audio |
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Greg Buchner wrote:
care to expand on where you feel your upgraded machine is lacking?
| Quote: |
I'd say a big one would be the memory bus. At only 133MHz of bandwidth, it's clearly lacking compared to what newer computers can do.
And, while a few years back the G4 was a pretty good processor, it really lacks compared to the Intel Core processors.
Basically I get slowdowns on occasion that aren't coming from virtual memory (pageouts don't increase during these slowdowns.) So I assume that it's because of the memory and processor speed. This occasionally hits either Safari or Firefox and it gets me a bit frustrated.
A lot of it is probably subjective, but if you go and add up all of the upgrades you were looking at, you'd probably get pretty close to a mini. |
I was only thinking of doing the one upgrade that gave the biggest bang for the buck as a stopgap, and then saving pennies for a new Intel Mac. Sounds like none of them would make a real difference in what's annoying me.
I also added a ATI PCI card, which is probably sucking up some of that 133 Mhz bus' bandwidth. |
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Greg Buchner
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| Posted: Sat Jun 30, 2007 10:27 pm Post subject: Re: Suggestions for Souping Up a G4 Digital Audio |
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In article <ifAhi.154$Np2.84@trnddc07>, Hunter Rose <bmd@crossjam.net> wrote:
| Quote: |
Greg Buchner wrote:
care to expand on where you feel your upgraded machine is lacking? >
> I'd say a big one would be the memory bus. At only 133MHz of bandwidth, > it's clearly lacking compared to what newer computers can do. >
> And, while a few years back the G4 was a pretty good processor, it > really lacks compared to the Intel Core processors. >
> Basically I get slowdowns on occasion that aren't coming from virtual > memory (pageouts don't increase during these slowdowns.) So I assume > that it's because of the memory and processor speed. This occasionally > hits either Safari or Firefox and it gets me a bit frustrated. >
> A lot of it is probably subjective, but if you go and add up all of the > upgrades you were looking at, you'd probably get pretty close to a mini.
I was only thinking of doing the one upgrade that gave the biggest bang for the buck as a stopgap, and then saving pennies for a new Intel Mac. Sounds like none of them would make a real difference in what's annoying me. |
Well, I'd get Memory Stick:
<http://www.versiontracker.com/dyn/moreinfo/macosx/13636>
And see how your memory stands up. If you are hitting VM a lot, then getting more memory would help.
If you aren't having memory problems, then a processor upgrade could probably help for the short term.
| Quote: |
| I also added a ATI PCI card, which is probably sucking up some of that 133 Mhz bus' bandwidth. |
This won't be sharing the memory bandwidth. The PCI bus has it's own connection to the motherboard controller chip.
All in all, memory was the most effective upgrade I did to my G4. Went from 384MB to 896MB to 1.25GB. Would like more, but I don't think buying a 512MB DIMM to replace my 256MB DIMM would be worth it.
Greg B.
PS. It'll be a while before I can respond again if you have any questions. Going on a trip and won't be bother with newsgroups during that time. |
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