Re: Overclocking a Rev A Beige Desktop that's been upgraded to a G4
On May 4, 3:48 pm, deadwinter thecar...@gmail.com wrote: I have a Rev.A Beige Desktop G3. maxed out in RAM, with the stock 4GB HD. I upgraded the CPU to a G4, so now it's up to 500MHz. OS is 10.2.6. Strangely, with the L2 cache enabled (I'm assuming that if I ran the Sonnet enabler and I can see it in the System profiler it's enabled), performance has not gotten much better. I am willing to believe the real bottleneck is disk i/o, but I was wondering...could I overclock this thing? Most articles I've read focus On overclocking the G3 CPU up to 500, but mine is already at 500. How far up can I go, and has anyone done this? I have a number of upgraded beige G3s running Tiger with XPostFacto. There are several things you can do to improve the performance. First off, if you are using a Sonnet G4 500 MHz, moving the board jumpers won't change the processor speed, Sonnet processors set the speed to 500 no matter where the jumpers are placed. A better hard drive will make a world of difference, I use 15,000 rpm/ 16 MB SCSI drives and ATTO PCI SCSI cards. The cards are easy to find and cheap, same with the SCSI drives now that so many people going with SATA. An added bonus, you don't need to worry about the 8GB limit when you use a controller card, your OS X partition can be any size you like. There are several video card options. The Radeon 7000* is one, Radeon 9000 or 9250 are better, GeForce 5200/5500 or 6200 are the best in my opinion. *if you go with the Radeon 7000 you are going to have trouble with XPostFacto and OS 9.2.2. You need OS 9 for XPostFacto but the 7000 will only work with the extensions from 9.0 or 9.1, so either leave it OS 9 or 9.1 or you can copy the 9.1 extensions and replace the 9.2.2 extension with the copies. To use XPostFacto partition your hard drive with 3 partitions, one for OS X, one for OS 9, and the 3rd for OS 9 that will be used by OS X for Classic. All these tips can still be found on the XPostFacto page. There is not much activity on the XPF forum anymore, most other Mac users have moved beyond beige. -- You received this message because you are a member of G-Group, a group for those using G3, G4, and G5 desktop Macs - with a particular focus on Power Macs. The list FAQ is at http://lowendmac.com/lists/g-list.shtml and our netiquette guide is at http://www.lowendmac.com/lists/netiquette.shtml To post to this group, send email to g3-5-list@googlegroups.com For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/g3-5-list
Re: Overclocking a Rev A Beige Desktop that's been upgraded to a G4
Damn, DC, thanks for all the info. I will now proceed with caution and not try to deal with those tiny jumpers. Also, I was *this* close to getting a cheap 700 on eBay. Clearly I need to do some more research. Cheap is good, but I don't really want to spend time getting over incompatibilities with 9.1 Wait, there's a GeForce 6200 for the Mac? -carlos On May 5, 7:57 am, dc dbc...@verizon.net wrote: On May 4, 3:48 pm, deadwinter thecar...@gmail.com wrote: I have a Rev.A Beige Desktop G3. maxed out in RAM, with the stock 4GB HD. I upgraded the CPU to a G4, so now it's up to 500MHz. OS is 10.2.6. Strangely, with the L2 cache enabled (I'm assuming that if I ran the Sonnet enabler and I can see it in the System profiler it's enabled), performance has not gotten much better. I am willing to believe the real bottleneck is disk i/o, but I was wondering...could I overclock this thing? Most articles I've read focus On overclocking the G3 CPU up to 500, but mine is already at 500. How far up can I go, and has anyone done this? I have a number of upgraded beige G3s running Tiger with XPostFacto. There are several things you can do to improve the performance. First off, if you are using a Sonnet G4 500 MHz, moving the board jumpers won't change the processor speed, Sonnet processors set the speed to 500 no matter where the jumpers are placed. A better hard drive will make a world of difference, I use 15,000 rpm/ 16 MB SCSI drives and ATTO PCI SCSI cards. The cards are easy to find and cheap, same with the SCSI drives now that so many people going with SATA. An added bonus, you don't need to worry about the 8GB limit when you use a controller card, your OS X partition can be any size you like. There are several video card options. The Radeon 7000* is one, Radeon 9000 or 9250 are better, GeForce 5200/5500 or 6200 are the best in my opinion. *if you go with the Radeon 7000 you are going to have trouble with XPostFacto and OS 9.2.2. You need OS 9 for XPostFacto but the 7000 will only work with the extensions from 9.0 or 9.1, so either leave it OS 9 or 9.1 or you can copy the 9.1 extensions and replace the 9.2.2 extension with the copies. To use XPostFacto partition your hard drive with 3 partitions, one for OS X, one for OS 9, and the 3rd for OS 9 that will be used by OS X for Classic. All these tips can still be found on the XPostFacto page. There is not much activity on the XPF forum anymore, most other Mac users have moved beyond beige. -- You received this message because you are a member of G-Group, a group for those using G3, G4, and G5 desktop Macs - with a particular focus on Power Macs. The list FAQ is athttp://lowendmac.com/lists/g-list.shtmland our netiquette guide is athttp://www.lowendmac.com/lists/netiquette.shtml To post to this group, send email to g3-5-list@googlegroups.com For more options, visit this group athttp://groups.google.com/group/g3-5-list -- You received this message because you are a member of G-Group, a group for those using G3, G4, and G5 desktop Macs - with a particular focus on Power Macs. The list FAQ is at http://lowendmac.com/lists/g-list.shtml and our netiquette guide is at http://www.lowendmac.com/lists/netiquette.shtml To post to this group, send email to g3-5-list@googlegroups.com For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/g3-5-list
Re: Overclocking a Rev A Beige Desktop that's been upgraded to a G4
On May 5, 11:22 am, deadwinter thecar...@gmail.com wrote: Damn, DC, thanks for all the info. I will now proceed with caution and not try to deal with those tiny jumpers. Also, I was *this* close to getting a cheap 700 on eBay. Clearly I need to do some more research. Cheap is good, but I don't really want to spend time getting over incompatibilities with 9.1 Wait, there's a GeForce 6200 for the Mac? There are PCI versions of the GeForce 5200, 5500 and 6200 that are PC cards and can be converted to work on a Mac, or you can buy the modified cards; you can find them on some popular auction sites or on the LEM Swap list: http://groups.google.com/group/lemswap/browse_thread/thread/883bca2c3b2eb8e0# Bette hurry, $50 is a great price for this card! A lot of the Radeon 7000s are flashed PC cards, that's the only way to get a 64 MB VRAM 7000. They work fine is OS 9 - OS 9.1 and in all versions of OS X. It's only 9.2 that has the extensions issue with the 7000. My beige G3: OWC G4 533 MHz, 768 MB RAM, 15K/16MB SCSI drive ATTO PSC card, GeForce 6200 /256 MB, Pioneer DVR-109, Sonnet USB Firewire combo card. I added a 40mm Silenex fan in place of the small speaker to deal with the additional heat. -- You received this message because you are a member of G-Group, a group for those using G3, G4, and G5 desktop Macs - with a particular focus on Power Macs. The list FAQ is at http://lowendmac.com/lists/g-list.shtml and our netiquette guide is at http://www.lowendmac.com/lists/netiquette.shtml To post to this group, send email to g3-5-list@googlegroups.com For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/g3-5-list
Re: Overclocking a Rev A Beige Desktop that's been upgraded to a G4
On May 4, 2010, at 12:48 PM, deadwinter wrote: I have a Rev.A Beige Desktop G3. maxed out in RAM, with the stock 4GB HD. I upgraded the CPU to a G4, so now it's up to 500MHz. OS is 10.2.6. Strangely, with the L2 cache enabled (I'm assuming that if I ran the Sonnet enabler and I can see it in the System profiler it's enabled), performance has not gotten much better. Yup. You're not going to get a whole lot better. I am willing to believe the real bottleneck is disk i/o, The real bottleneck is probably a close thing between the 66 MHZ memory bus and the slow HDD. Upgrading the HDD will help a little, but the best visible performance enhancement would be to stick in a better video card, like a Radeon PCI card. When I stuck a Radeon 7000 into my Beige, the difference was quite noticeable. -- Bruce Johnson University of Arizona College of Pharmacy Information Technology Group Institutions do not have opinions, merely customs -- You received this message because you are a member of G-Group, a group for those using G3, G4, and G5 desktop Macs - with a particular focus on Power Macs. The list FAQ is at http://lowendmac.com/lists/g-list.shtml and our netiquette guide is at http://www.lowendmac.com/lists/netiquette.shtml To post to this group, send email to g3-5-list@googlegroups.com For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/g3-5-list
Re: Overclocking a Rev A Beige Desktop that's been upgraded to a G4
On May 4, 2010, at 4:01 PM, Bruce Johnson wrote: On May 4, 2010, at 12:48 PM, deadwinter wrote: I have a Rev.A Beige Desktop G3. maxed out in RAM, with the stock 4GB HD. I upgraded the CPU to a G4, so now it's up to 500MHz. OS is 10.2.6. Strangely, with the L2 cache enabled (I'm assuming that if I ran the Sonnet enabler and I can see it in the System profiler it's enabled), performance has not gotten much better. Yup. You're not going to get a whole lot better. I am willing to believe the real bottleneck is disk i/o, The real bottleneck is probably a close thing between the 66 MHZ memory bus and the slow HDD. Upgrading the HDD will help a little, but the best visible performance enhancement would be to stick in a better video card, like a Radeon PCI card. When I stuck a Radeon 7000 into my Beige, the difference was quite noticeable. How much effort do you want to put into this? If it is to tinker as a hobby, go for it. If it is for serious use, try and spring for an agp G4, which will be significantly faster. That being said, the upgrade options are the following: Radeon 7000 or original Mac Edition will give you the most speed up feel. A faster/newer HD will help, but you are limited to 120GB without an add in card. And the drive MUST be partitioned with the first partition being 8GB or less and that has to have your 10.2 install. A pci ATA/133 or SATA card will get you around these limits. BTW, do you have enough free space on the disk. a 4GB disk with a 10.2 install does not have a lot of extra room, you may be getting into a disk too full situation. How is the speed for your processor set? Some G4s use the motherboard jumpers and some are set by the card that actually holds the G4 chip. If it is the Motherboard jumpers, you can easily overclock it to 533MHz. The beiges have a maximum multiplier of 8x the bus speed, so 533 is the fastest you can go. If it is on the chip, I do not know how to overclock it. If you have one of the early beiges, you can check the rated speed of the Grackle (IIRC) chip. This chip is rated at either 83 or 66MHz. If it is 66, stop here. If it is 83, you MAY have a little room to play with. IF this is a toy and not a Mac you have to depend on proceed with caution. You may be able to overclock the motherboard bus speed to 83MHz, but you also need to have pc100 or faster ram, not pc66. Here are some instructions: http://lowendmac.com/ppc/j16.shtml HTH, Len -- You received this message because you are a member of G-Group, a group for those using G3, G4, and G5 desktop Macs - with a particular focus on Power Macs. The list FAQ is at http://lowendmac.com/lists/g-list.shtml and our netiquette guide is at http://www.lowendmac.com/lists/netiquette.shtml To post to this group, send email to g3-5-list@googlegroups.com For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/g3-5-list
Re: Overclocking a Rev A Beige Desktop that's been upgraded to a G4
Ah, but you see, Len, I have a plan that someone suggested earlier. It involves XPostFacto, cloning the drive to a firewire drive, setting the internal HD as a helper drive, and a chicken. This should remove the 8GB issue. That being said, the Radeon 700 seems like an easy thing to do. Since the machine was free, and I've already spent (between CPU, ADB KB/Mouse, RAM, etc) a fair bit on it, I'm just screwing around with it at this point. I do have a maxed out MDD I'm working on. But that's another story. -carlos On May 4, 5:27 pm, Len Gerstel lgers...@gmail.com wrote: On May 4, 2010, at 4:01 PM, Bruce Johnson wrote: On May 4, 2010, at 12:48 PM, deadwinter wrote: I have a Rev.A Beige Desktop G3. maxed out in RAM, with the stock 4GB HD. I upgraded the CPU to a G4, so now it's up to 500MHz. OS is 10.2.6. Strangely, with the L2 cache enabled (I'm assuming that if I ran the Sonnet enabler and I can see it in the System profiler it's enabled), performance has not gotten much better. Yup. You're not going to get a whole lot better. I am willing to believe the real bottleneck is disk i/o, The real bottleneck is probably a close thing between the 66 MHZ memory bus and the slow HDD. Upgrading the HDD will help a little, but the best visible performance enhancement would be to stick in a better video card, like a Radeon PCI card. When I stuck a Radeon 7000 into my Beige, the difference was quite noticeable. How much effort do you want to put into this? If it is to tinker as a hobby, go for it. If it is for serious use, try and spring for an agp G4, which will be significantly faster. That being said, the upgrade options are the following: Radeon 7000 or original Mac Edition will give you the most speed up feel. A faster/newer HD will help, but you are limited to 120GB without an add in card. And the drive MUST be partitioned with the first partition being 8GB or less and that has to have your 10.2 install. A pci ATA/133 or SATA card will get you around these limits. BTW, do you have enough free space on the disk. a 4GB disk with a 10.2 install does not have a lot of extra room, you may be getting into a disk too full situation. How is the speed for your processor set? Some G4s use the motherboard jumpers and some are set by the card that actually holds the G4 chip. If it is the Motherboard jumpers, you can easily overclock it to 533MHz. The beiges have a maximum multiplier of 8x the bus speed, so 533 is the fastest you can go. If it is on the chip, I do not know how to overclock it. If you have one of the early beiges, you can check the rated speed of the Grackle (IIRC) chip. This chip is rated at either 83 or 66MHz. If it is 66, stop here. If it is 83, you MAY have a little room to play with. IF this is a toy and not a Mac you have to depend on proceed with caution. You may be able to overclock the motherboard bus speed to 83MHz, but you also need to have pc100 or faster ram, not pc66. Here are some instructions: http://lowendmac.com/ppc/j16.shtml HTH, Len -- You received this message because you are a member of G-Group, a group for those using G3, G4, and G5 desktop Macs - with a particular focus on Power Macs. The list FAQ is athttp://lowendmac.com/lists/g-list.shtmland our netiquette guide is athttp://www.lowendmac.com/lists/netiquette.shtml To post to this group, send email to g3-5-list@googlegroups.com For more options, visit this group athttp://groups.google.com/group/g3-5-list -- You received this message because you are a member of G-Group, a group for those using G3, G4, and G5 desktop Macs - with a particular focus on Power Macs. The list FAQ is at http://lowendmac.com/lists/g-list.shtml and our netiquette guide is at http://www.lowendmac.com/lists/netiquette.shtml To post to this group, send email to g3-5-list@googlegroups.com For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/g3-5-list
Re: Overclocking a Rev A Beige Desktop that's been upgraded to a G4
On May 4, 2010, at 10:49 PM, deadwinter wrote with lots of snips: On May 4, 5:27 pm, Len Gerstel lgers...@gmail.com wrote: On May 4, 2010, at 12:48 PM, deadwinter wrote: I have a Rev.A Beige Desktop G3. maxed out in RAM, with the stock 4GB HD. I upgraded the CPU to a G4, so now it's up to 500MHz. OS is 10.2.6. Strangely, with the L2 cache enabled (I'm assuming that if I ran the Sonnet enabler and I can see it in the System profiler it's enabled), performance has not gotten much better. How much effort do you want to put into this? If it is to tinker as a hobby, go for it. If it is for serious use, try and spring for an agp G4, which will be significantly faster. That being said, the upgrade options are the following: Radeon 7000 or original Mac Edition will give you the most speed up feel. A faster/newer HD will help, but you are limited to 120GB without an add in card. And the drive MUST be partitioned with the first partition being 8GB or less and that has to have your 10.2 install. A pci ATA/133 or SATA card will get you around these limits. BTW, do you have enough free space on the disk. a 4GB disk with a 10.2 install does not have a lot of extra room, you may be getting into a disk too full situation. HTH, Len Ah, but you see, Len, I have a plan that someone suggested earlier. It involves XPostFacto, cloning the drive to a firewire drive, setting the internal HD as a helper drive, and a chicken. This should remove the 8GB issue. That being said, the Radeon 700 seems like an easy thing to do. Since the machine was free, and I've already spent (between CPU, ADB KB/Mouse, RAM, etc) a fair bit on it, I'm just screwing around with it at this point. Never tried to go over 10.2 on my beiges. Does the boot drive need to be OS X? If so, and you replace the HD, you still need to stick to the 8GB first partition, which your 4 gb drive does. You may want to stock up on the chickens. Beiges are notoriously finicky when it comes to X.anything. Some work with no problems, some will never take any version and I had one that I had to reinstall 10.2 after ANY boot into 9, but classic worked fine. And, yes, a pci Radeon will give you a pretty decent boost. Len -- You received this message because you are a member of G-Group, a group for those using G3, G4, and G5 desktop Macs - with a particular focus on Power Macs. The list FAQ is at http://lowendmac.com/lists/g-list.shtml and our netiquette guide is at http://www.lowendmac.com/lists/netiquette.shtml To post to this group, send email to g3-5-list@googlegroups.com For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/g3-5-list
Re: Overclocking a Rev A Beige Desktop that's been upgraded to a G4
It's already running 10.2. It was given to me that way. I've heard about the beiges, and I was frankly astounded when the Orange Micro card just worked. As per another old thread, what I am intending to do is this: http://tinyurl.com/2boq6n4 -carlos -- You received this message because you are a member of G-Group, a group for those using G3, G4, and G5 desktop Macs - with a particular focus on Power Macs. The list FAQ is at http://lowendmac.com/lists/g-list.shtml and our netiquette guide is at http://www.lowendmac.com/lists/netiquette.shtml To post to this group, send email to g3-5-list@googlegroups.com For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/g3-5-list
