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beanman · Sep 13, 2003, 07:23 PM

Here's my situation...

I have a beige, 233Mhz G3 desktop that is currently sitting on my girlfriend's desk. I performed an experiment some months ago to see if it could handle OS 10.2 with great success. With Jaguar working on it as well as it is, I want to put some more speed onto the machine. Perhaps drop a PCI USB/Firewire card, up the RAM, and slap in a better video card. Of course the first step with all of this would be upgrading the processor speed, so I figured the ENCORE/ZIF 1GHz G3 upgrade from Sonnet would be a pretty good for this.

http://www.sonnettech.com/product/encore.html

My question is... Is this big of an upgrade worth it?

How much more life could I expect from this G3 by going this route? I would assume something like three years. On top of that, I would look into using it for audio production, some slight video production, and then graphics/web design. And the story would go on; replace the internal hard drive, sound card, and so on.

I know that sinking the money into a project like this would be worth buying a new G5, but, for starters, it's hard to part with your first machine.

I'm also interested in the idea of seeing what can be done as I have never really explored upgrading computers other than just replacing the old with the new. Perhaps those who have tried and succeeded or failed can help me out.

Luca Rescigno · Sep 13, 2003, 07:31 PM

I don't think it's worth it. Your beige G3 might work now, but the older a machine is, the flakier it is. A lot of the components will be less reliable simply because they're quite old. Also, beige G3s don't support Panther. The highest OS you can put on it would be Jaguar.

You'd be better off selling the beige and buying a used G4/450 tower or something for the amount of money you would have spent on a 1 GHz processor. I bet a Sawtooth G4/450 would be as fast as a beige upgraded to 1 GHz, even though it's such a lower clock speed.

no1allowed · Sep 13, 2003, 07:37 PM

Before my trusty old G3 Desktop/266 bit the dust, I had upgraded the hard drive, RAM, CPU and added Firewire, USB 2.0 and an U160 SCSI card.

The first thing that gave me the most speed cheapest was the RAM. I maxed it out to 768MBytes. Then the hard drive. This was a crowning achievement as I went with a 10K RPM 36GByte U160. The best part of this was I didn't have to spend all of this money at once. So I didn't go into debt. OS X 10.2 really takes advantage of a faster CPU, but RAM would be my first upgrade. Then the hard drive. Then maybe the CPU.

no1allowed · Sep 13, 2003, 07:47 PM

Originally posted by Luca Rescigno:
You'd be better off selling the beige and buying a used G4/450 tower or something for the amount of money you would have spent on a 1 GHz processor. I bet a Sawtooth G4/450 would be as fast as a beige upgraded to 1 GHz, even though it's such a lower clock speed.

Well you wouldn't get much for the beige, but Luca's right as you would get a much better subsystem in onboard USB and firewire (some things just work better) as well as bus speed and especially graphics. But if you do get a Sawtooth add a $100 for more RAM and a new mouse or keyboard. Of course when you upgrade from the G3 beige, to a new G5 down the road it is a whole 'nother world.

Kahpoosta Kid · Sep 13, 2003, 08:41 PM

I know that sinking the money into a project like this would be worth buying a new G5, but, for starters, it's hard to part with your first machine.

I'm also interested in the idea of seeing what can be done as I have never really explored upgrading computers other than just replacing the old with the new. Perhaps those who have tried and succeeded or failed can help me out. [/B][/QUOTE]

I upgraded a 266 tower for my X-spouse (and now switcher) with a 400-450mhz OWC processor, added 512 ram, 60 gig HD, firewire card and 8x burner. Not bad speed for a 'second' computer. I've upgrated 9600, 7300, and a 7500 through the years with great success. A modest upgrade with modest expectations might be best for that ol' 233. But a refurb'ed 1.25G4 would suit your creative juices better.

"You paid twunny tousand dollars fer dat car?? Man, dat's a lotta kahpoosta!"

MilkmanDan · Sep 15, 2003, 01:55 AM

You can get a 1.25 G4 for only $1300, and use your G3 as a file or webserver. I've got a 233 Beige running 10.2 server right now, and a 266 holding 480 GIGs of HD space on it (so much anime, so little time). I would say that you should just buy a new computer. If you've had your G3 for 5 or 6 years, you've gotten your money out of it by now. Find another use for it and buy a new G4, or even a G4 iMac. The new 1ghz model is very very nice. Only $1300. (same price my parents paid for their original iMac back in the day, and now after 5 years they're upgrading). It'll probably last you another 5 years.

-Q- · Sep 15, 2003, 08:52 AM

At this point, with the Beige G3s officially unsupported in the next OS release, I don't think it's worth it. You can get a decent used G4 for the amount of money they want for that processor. Heck, for a little more you could buy a brand new eMac.

Let the beige continue it's life as your server or something and save the cash for a good used G4.

Arkham_c · Sep 15, 2003, 09:07 AM

First of all, I have heard that Panther will not be supported on the beige G3, so that's a red flag if it turns out to be true.

Second, you can buy a Blue & White G3 for about $200. That is a much better platform for doing upgrades if you are really looking to go cheap.

denim · Sep 15, 2003, 10:06 AM

Originally posted by beanman:
My question is... Is this big of an upgrade worth it?

I wouldn't say so, no. I've upgraded mine over the years with a total of 512MB of memory, larger disks, a wide SCSI card, a USB/Firewire card, a Radeon card, and (latest) a 500MHz G4 processor from Sonnet.

The CPU upgrade made a difference, certainly. However, it's only really good for things which are CPU-intensive. The motherboard is still what it started as, and can't be changed. It's got the bus speed it was designed for, and that's all.

IMHO, if you want to make a real difference with this machine, give it a Radeon for Mac card, as you mentioned. It makes a big difference! The processor, OTOH, returns less on investment at 500MHz. A 1GHz processor for this machine is ridiculous. Think of trying to pass a waterfall through a drain sized for a bathtub. You'd be much better off buying a newer machine and using this one for some less demanding task, like as a web server or whatever.

beanman · Sep 15, 2003, 01:31 PM

Thanks for the feedback everyone. I think I'll let the old guy go away peacefully. The only thing that I might do now is drop an USB PCI card into it. Other than that, it'll be sad to see it go.

So now, I'll dream about my G5.

olePigeon · Sep 16, 2003, 06:23 PM

Be careful!

I have a beige G3 233MHz and I can't upgrade past 300MHz without shelling out another $80 for a ROM upgrade.

Before you invest in a ZIF upgrade make sure your G3 can support it.

Originally posted by beanman:
Here's my situation...

I have a beige, 233Mhz G3 desktop that is currently sitting on my girlfriend's desk. I performed an experiment some months ago to see if it could handle OS 10.2 with great success. With Jaguar working on it as well as it is, I want to put some more speed onto the machine. Perhaps drop a PCI USB/Firewire card, up the RAM, and slap in a better video card. Of course the first step with all of this would be upgrading the processor speed, so I figured the ENCORE/ZIF 1GHz G3 upgrade from Sonnet would be a pretty good for this.

http://www.sonnettech.com/product/encore.html

My question is... Is this big of an upgrade worth it?

How much more life could I expect from this G3 by going this route? I would assume something like three years. On top of that, I would look into using it for audio production, some slight video production, and then graphics/web design. And the story would go on; replace the internal hard drive, sound card, and so on.

I know that sinking the money into a project like this would be worth buying a new G5, but, for starters, it's hard to part with your first machine. I'm also interested in the idea of seeing what can be done as I have never really explored upgrading computers other than just replacing the old with the new. Perhaps those who have tried and succeeded or failed can help me out.

denim · Sep 17, 2003, 11:46 AM

Originally posted by olePigeon:
I have a beige G3 233MHz and I can't upgrade past 300MHz without shelling out another $80 for a ROM upgrade.

I put my Sonnet upgrade into a Rev. A "beige". I don't know who is telling you you need a ROM upgrade, but I suspect you should buy somewhere else.

I WAS the One · Sep 17, 2003, 02:04 PM

forget all opinions!

listen to a guy that use macs since 1989,
it is worth it. make the upgrade, you will be surprised.

I did it, and it is working like a cheetah! and what the heck if it only work with Jaguar, Jaguar is better that Panther in my opinion, I will buy it, of course, but I like more Jaguar, I hate an upgrade that starts from zero again and again... still with what you know, remeber it is a tool, use it wisely! keep your G3, thats the machine that start a new era of Power Macs.

L L T K!!!!!

denim · Sep 17, 2003, 02:27 PM

Originally posted by I WAS the One:
forget all opinions!

Even yours??

olePigeon · Sep 17, 2003, 06:49 PM

Originally posted by denim:
I put my Sonnet upgrade into a Rev. A "beige". I don't know who is telling you you need a ROM upgrade, but I suspect you should buy somewhere else.

You're right, I got it mixed up. It's the voltage regulator.

I tried purchasing a Sonnet myself, 450MHz G4 ZIF upgrade. I put the jumpers in and installed the CPU and the computer would not boot.

Anyway, make sure your Mac can work with it. Mine's pretty much doomed.

LtKernelPanic · Sep 18, 2003, 03:10 AM

I vote no. A GHz G4 on a 66 MHz would suck. I wouldn't put a GHz G4 in myself. What I did do was put a G4/400 ZIF in my beige tower. It gave a nice speed boost over the G3/300 that was in it before. I've seen 'slower' G4 ZIFs for fairly cheap which may be worth wild if you want to use it as a file server. I don't use that Mac much but it still runs most things decent enough.

denim · Sep 18, 2003, 08:53 AM

Originally posted by olePigeon:
You're right, I got it mixed up. It's the voltage regulator.

Oh, that. Yeah. Mine didn't have that problem. Isn't it still possible to get one which will work with the upgrade?

a2daj · Sep 18, 2003, 01:43 PM

The last I heard, Panther isn't supported on the Beige machines, so you might have to wait for one of those OS X installers which allow you to install OS X on unsupported machines.

olePigeon · Sep 18, 2003, 05:39 PM

Originally posted by denim:
Oh, that. Yeah. Mine didn't have that problem. Isn't it still possible to get one which will work with the upgrade?

Yeah, but they charge $80.

Captain Obvious · Sep 18, 2003, 06:42 PM

Originally posted by a2daj:
The last I heard, Panther isn't supported on the Beige machines, so you might have to wait for one of those OS X installers which allow you to install OS X on unsupported machines.

Really? I figured that any Mac supported by Jag would also offer support for Panther. Where's the info on what is and isn't supported?

olePigeon · Sep 18, 2003, 08:06 PM

Originally posted by Captain Obvious:
Really? I figured that any Mac supported by Jag would also offer support for Panther. Where's the info on what is and isn't supported?

Apple's offering refunds to Jaguar owners right now for anyone with a Beige G3, iMac G3, G3 PowerBook, or original iBook, or something like $20 off Panther if you with to continue to upgrade.

The reason is that Apple has stopped support for pretty much anything without a G4 (with the exception of the B&W G3s and the iBook) but were forced to refund money because of their claim that OS X would run on a G3 or newer (which it doesn't.)

I'll see if I can find the link. It was mentioned on Slashdot last week, I think.