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Rumor · Feb 14, 2006, 05:24 PM

I just purchased a G4, 400mhz with AGP vid for $150 from a friend that upgraded to a Dual Core G5. I've been a long time PC user, building systems and what not since the good ol DOS Shell days. Anyhow, I was thinking about upgrading the processor and hard drive on this Mac. Hardware setup seems fairly similar. However, I'm not sure what to do about the processor and if I have to swap the motherboard also. Another thing, is it possible to upgrade the Video card? This one is running 16mb, bleck! I've done a little research on Macgurus.com and leads me to believe the processor is upgradable without a new motherboard, but they say the vid card isn't. I'm running 10.2.8 if that makes a difference, though I plan on upgrading to 10.4 after I upgrade the hardware.

Lateralus · Feb 14, 2006, 05:26 PM

Hi,

You picked a nice machine. It may be a little old, but it's venerable.

You can upgrade to 2GBs of RAM in the form of four 512MB PC-100 or 133 DIMMs.
The processor can go to a 2GHz 7447A G4, possibly Dual 1.8GHz 7447As depending on the motherboard version.
And the the video card can be upgraded to a 128MB Radeon 9800 Pro.

MacGurus is currently running a sale on the GigaDesigns 1.8GHz 7447A G4 for $280. You may want to look into that. Excellent bang for the buck.

Rumor · Feb 14, 2006, 05:28 PM

Wow. Any recommendation for a place to purchase parts?

Lateralus · Feb 14, 2006, 05:49 PM

MacGurus is probably as good as it gets as far as processors. I've ordered from them in the past and couldn't have been happier.

As for the rest of your needs, I suggest checking OWC, as they're pretty much the de facto Mac parts shop. Excellent customer service as well.

Oh, and by the way, one little warning; The 7447A processor upgrades require a firmware update in order to work. It's a fairly simple and straight forward thing. But the firmware updater requires that you be running at least 10.3 and sometimes 10.3.5 to work. I suggest upgrading the OS version before you get too knee deep in hardware goodies.

mduell · Feb 14, 2006, 07:00 PM

CPU from MacGurus, RAM from Crucial or Newegg, and video card from SmallDog.

Rumor · Feb 16, 2006, 04:56 PM

OWC is telling me that I can put a Radeon 9200 PCI vid card in. It's 125 less than the 9800. Worth my time or not?

John Stalberg · Feb 16, 2006, 10:04 PM

Originally Posted by Rumor

OWC is telling me that I can put a Radeon 9200 PCI vid card in. It's 125 less than the 9800. Worth my time or not?

An upgrade from what you have now will enable Quartz Extreme. This will free your CPU from doing a lot of graphics calculation and put it on the GPU on the graphics card instead. It will also enable some nice features of OS X wich is disabled on g-cards with only 16 MB. Definitely worth both time and money! The big win is you get this from a relatively small upgrade. It just have to be enough for enabling QE.

Lateralus · Feb 16, 2006, 10:47 PM

Originally Posted by Rumor

OWC is telling me that I can put a Radeon 9200 PCI vid card in. It's 125 less than the 9800. Worth my time or not?

It's PCI; No.

John Stalberg · Feb 17, 2006, 03:38 AM

Missed that. You should get an AGP as Lateralus pointed out. Sorry!

bowwowman · Feb 17, 2006, 05:52 AM

The best card value for that machine is the Radeon 8500 AGP. They can usually be found on ebay for around $50-75, you have to look in the apple section though.....

ALthough the 9800 is a sweet (and expensive) card, IMHO it is overkill for your machine, unless you plan on doing ALOT of 3D work or gaming, in which case you would have probably gotten a newer/faster system to start with anyways