[saltines17]

Anyone know when the Powerlogix Series 100 Dual G4 upgrades are going to start shipping?

I'm anxious to upgrade!!

[you_are_right]

Originally posted by saltines17:
Anyone know when the Powerlogix Series 100 Dual G4 upgrades are going to start shipping?

I'm anxious to upgrade!!

I am also waiting. I ordered my dual 800 card at the beginning of September at OWC. The status of availability on their page is since the first day of my order, 15 days, so it looks like time stands still there.

I asked OWC about the status and they said, that the item is currently on backorder......

Looks like they also don�t know when the cards will finally be available.

Maybe still some technical issues: enabling the L3 cache, heat ..... ?

Looks like none of these cards have seen the normal daylight yet.

[kulverse]

I'm anxious as well. The announcement, made September 4th, states that they will be available in 2 - 3 weeks from then. Well....its almost 6 weeks, and we have not even an explaination as to when these things will be shipping.

[flip]

This appears to be a common problem with the upgrade cards. Sonnet is also back ordering their cards. They may not be as problem free as was originally thought.

[you_are_right]

Originally posted by saltines17:
Anyone know when the Powerlogix Series 100 Dual G4 upgrades are going to start shipping?

I'm anxious to upgrade!!

Powerlogix replied to me: they will get hundreds of these cards from their contractor this week and we should see them within the next 2 weeks.

[kulverse]

Originally posted by you_are_right:

Powerlogix replied to me: they will get hundreds of these cards from their contractor this week and we should see them within the next 2 weeks.

Hundreds? Looks like some of us will be waiting a looooong time. I'll guarantee that more than a few hundred are on back order.

[spacefreak]

(1) Do you think these "contractors" also provide unit design services?

(2) Can I call a contractor up and have him make me 1000 - 800Mhz processor upgrade cards for the following units....etc?

(3) Is there be a possibility that both Powerlogix and Sonnet upgrades are the same design (cosmetic differences) and from the same manufacturer?

So many questons......

[kulverse]

A response I got today from PowerLogix:

They are going to the distributor this week.

R
--
----
PowerLogix
8701 W. Parmer Lane, Suite 1120
Austin, TX 78729
512 401 9902 x107
512 401 9943 fax

[BobW]

Not all G4's can use the daul processor from PowerLogix. They have a small download to check your system, on their site.

[macaddled]

The little green light went on next to the Dual 800 upgrade at OWC. anybody who sees benchmarks please post a link here, thanks.

[kulverse]

yeah...i noticed that too today. Just happened today. Hopefully mine will ship tomorrow. If that happens i'll have mine on Friday.

[srcleaves]

I ordered a 133 series dual 867 card in mid september when the OWC site said shipping mid-October. Then I got mail saying they would ship around Halloween. Now I note that their site says shipping in mid-November! I was afraid this was going to happen based on their earlier announcements/real ship dates. Oh well, its not like its critical, but it would be nice to get it sooner than later. Till then my dual 533 still serves me well.

[99switcher]

Sonnet tells me that, after an OEM heatsink fit problem was corrected, their Encore/ST G4 series (single 1GHz and 800 MHz) is shipping this week. Sonnets' been doing this sort of thing for a long time and I've used their products before with great satisfaction. I want an upgrade for my Digital Audio G4 PM so I'll wait until Buy.com doesn't say "back ordered".

[kulverse]

Just installed mine. 2 thumbs up. Dual 800 Upgrade.

[saltines17]

Originally posted by kulverse:
Just installed mine. 2 thumbs up. Dual 800 Upgrade.

Congratulations!

Is sleep working ok for you? (there's some problem posted on xlr8yourmac.com)

[kulverse]

Nope. No issues here....Yet anyway.

My old Dual 450 sure feels like a brand new computer though.

[saltines17]

Originally posted by kulverse:
Nope. No issues here....Yet anyway.

My old Dual 450 sure feels like a brand new computer though.

Awesome, I can't wait to upgrade my single 450

[kulverse]

My boot-up is 24 seconds (including the apple thing at first), compared to a minute before the upgrade. PhotoShop just opened in 10 seconds.

[elzinat]

OWC's just published benchmarks here for all of the upgrade cards except for the powerlogic dual 1GHz, the powerlogix for the 133 MHz fsb machines, and the Sonnet 800 MHz (which they say should be in in the next week).
i just got the single proc PowerLogix 800 this week. enormous step up from my 350, but got a problem-- every time i try to enable the L3 cache, my comp crashes. i shall be investigating this further, see if i can find anything over at xlr8, etc.

Update: I crashed my computer 18 times this evening . i'm having two problems, the L3 cache and a wake from deep sleep issue. if the comp is asleep for more than about 3 seconds, there is no chance that it will successfully wake. if i wake it immediately as i put it to sleep, it wakes most of the time. suggests that this is a power supply issue. then, the L3 cache is unstable. this seems a completely unrelated problem. i've now seen enabling the L3 cache work twice, but it has crashed far more times. at least when it crashes it always does so within about 5 seconds of being enabled. anyway, having the L3 cache makes a huge performance difference-- on Fractal Test it went from 2.6 Gflops to 3.25, or a 25% increase.
the information at xlr8 suggests these problems are widespread. PWL is supposedly working on a firmware update for the cards that will enable the L3 automatically to fix that problem (hopefully automatic enable_automatic crash), and blaming apple for the wake-from-sleep issue. hmmm

[boots]

I just got my dual 1 GHz upgrade.

Kernel Panic after about 10 - 15 minutes. Every time. Rebooted about 10 times last night. Thats about three times the cumulative number of times I've had to reboot since the PPP hang got fixed.

I plan on doing a clean 10.2.1 upgrade (have been running 10.1.5) tonight and will muck around to try to get it stable, but I am not terribly happy right now. If I can get it to stay running, then it will be an awesome upgrade. That puppy screams for the ten minutes I can have it up!

[srcleaves]

Is your dual a Series 100 or Series 133? I sent email to Other World Computing where I ordered my Series 133 Dual 867 but have not heard back. So far I'm not encouraged by the results posted here. The G4 500 we put in my fiancee's Pismo has been working great for a number of months now.

[boots]

100 series.

Got most of the issue worked out, but apps still crash once in a while ... still trying to make sense of the crash logs.

So far, the speed boost has been incredible, but the stability has been pretty disappointing.

I will be talking with the support people soon.

[boots]

Ok, after a little bit of frustration, it turns out that the L3 cache the upgrade cards are shipping with has some problems. I had the system working alright, but whenever something stressed to processor, the apps would crash. I emailed Powerlogix tech support, and within 2 hours, they emailed me back with a fix. All I had to do is disable the L3 cache, and the system is now rock solid and running at incredible speeds.

I am now VERY happy with the upgrade. I will say that application launch WITH L3 enabled was instantaneous, and now it is about "half a bounce," so it is noticable that the L3 is gone. It isn't that much of a difference though. Hopefully, they will get the firmware worked out so this can be enabled.

Anyway, the point is that the installation was a success, the upgrade works really well now, and I am very happy with the customer service provided. These are all key to my being a repeat cutomer, and I wanted to share this with people. For half the cost of a new dual 1 GHz G4, I upgraded to roughly the same performance. I think this probably added 2 or 3 years to my system's lifetime.

[kulverse]

Sorry to hear abut the misfortune boots. They were having the same issues with the cube's when enableing L3 cache i heard. They issued a firmware enabler that fixed the issue. They are working on one for the various towers as well. Hopefully that will fix your problem. L3 does make a HUGE difference. The sllep issue still is a problem on some computers though.

On a happy note, I've had my PowerLogix PowerForce Dual 800/100 in my Tower for about 3 weeks now, and Its been rock solid with no sleep issues. No problems with the L3 either.

[Mandricard]

I received my dual GHz upgrade for my Sawtooth500 last week, and have run into many stability issues as well. I have since removed it and replaced the now slow-feeling original, and emailed Powerlogix. I hope to hear from them tomorrow.

When it worked, it was blazingly fast, but it did not work for long. I have some questions about your situation, if you have time to answer them:

How did you fix the cache problem?

By disabling the cache is the machine solid? Or does it still sporadically freak out on you?

Did Powerlogix imply that the disabling is simply a temporary fix?

---M

[saltines17]

So I take it the Dual 800 upgrade is all nice and happy?

Hope to order one soon...

[boots]

Originally posted by Mandricard:
I received my dual GHz upgrade for my Sawtooth500 last week, and have run into many stability issues as well. I have since removed it and replaced the now slow-feeling original, and emailed Powerlogix. I hope to hear from them tomorrow.

When it worked, it was blazingly fast, but it did not work for long. I have some questions about your situation, if you have time to answer them:

How did you fix the cache problem?

By disabling the cache is the machine solid? Or does it still sporadically freak out on you?

Did Powerlogix imply that the disabling is simply a temporary fix?

---M

1) Cache problem was fixed by a firmware cache disabling program that powerlogix emailed to me. At least I think it is a firmware disabler. Anyway, the fix was to disable the L3 cache.

2) The machine is rock solid and has been up for 72 hours with intense processor use (I do a lot of molecular mechanics and electronic-structure work on organic molecules). Both processors are maxed at all times. No problems. No weirdness. Without the cache, it is a little bit slower when launching programs and logging in, but not to significant an issue.

3) I was led to believe that this is temporary. The issue is in the firmware. There were issues with the earlier cards too, or so I understand, and these have now been worked out. They told me they were working on the problem with the dual 1 GHz cards too.

I think you can download the cache control program and adjust it that way, but the program they sent me was "eeprom disabler" or something like that. You have to boot into 9 to run it, hence my belief that it is a firmware modifier.

Anyway, good luck. Its worth the tinkering!

[Mandricard]

Thanks!

I am looking forward to hearing from their apparently excellent tech support team. It was amazing: I could create a kernel panic on command just by stressing the processor--not only by using multiple applications, but by even stressing the finder (moving the mouse over the dock quickly, etc).

I am glad to hear it has eliminated the problem for you. Are you primarily running X or 9?

--M

[pman]

I also got my dual 1ghz/100 the week before last. The upgrade is fast, but the system was seriously unstable. If you banged away at the processors, the box ran for about 10 minutes, then it would freeze. I did a bunch of testing and found that by using a room fan to blow onto the processor board, the system would be stable. The upgrade has been sent back to powerlogix and I'm waiting. Tech support never had me try disabling L3.

[Mandricard]

Originally posted by pman:
I did a bunch of testing and found that by using a room fan to blow onto the processor board, the system would be stable. The upgrade has been sent back to powerlogix and I'm waiting. Tech support never had me try disabling L3.

Interesting: I found the processor to be very hot when I removed it, but the stability did not suffer over time i.e. how hot the processor got. As I could produce a KP at will, I do not think it was a heat issue, though I do remember thinking that the heat seemed quite high. What machine were you running pman?

Boots: did you notice any heat issues?

--M

[pman]

My machine is a gigabit 500DP. When I pulled the processor it was rather hot, got to thinking you could cook eggs on this thing.

Hopefully the problem gets isolated and resolved. The upgrade does fly when it works.

[boots]

I did notice it ran pretty f*ckin' hot, but its a dual 1 GHz. I expected that, and the fan mounted on the card seems to be alright. It did not matter how long I had been playing with the system (i.e. the card was hot or cold), I could reproduce the kernel panic every time simply by running iTunes screen effects in full screen mode. Any other stress on the processor also wiped it out. The crash log files looked like a memory addressing issue.

Mandricard's experience sounds exactly like mine. I would be surprized if it is anything other than the L3 cache given that this has been a problem for Powerlogix before, and that my experience was very similar to his/hers before disabling the cache.

Regarding the tech support: Yes, it was speedy and to the point. I assume this was because I was describing problems they were seeing from other users. I also described the crashlogs and kernel panic info as implicating a memory addressing issue (which is what the L3 cache really is) that wasn't there before the upgrade. I may have simply gotten lucky, but they seemed really on the ball.

[Mandricard]

I have disabled the L3 Cache.

Although I notice a slight slowdown as noted above, the machine has so far been solid. No wake from sleep issues, either.

(Keeping my fingers crossed.)

Hope they find a fix for the cache soon, but so far (after the initial glitches) I am very happy with the card.

--M

[boots]

Glad to hear it has stabilized. I have abused the h#ll out of my processor trying to get it to crash, but I have had no glitches since disabling the cache.

I hope it stays up for you, the performance difference before and after the upgrade is very nice.

[driven]

Now that they re-stopped shipping the Cube version of the Dual 800's due to the DC/DC converter issues with the Cubes I was thinking about a single 800 or a single 1Ghz for the moment. Since they have a trade-up program I can always go to the dual later. (I'll probably do this in December or January depending on how much a pending car-repair bill runs me.) <<-- Transportation is important you know.

Does anyone have any comparisions of the PowerLogix upgrades vs. modern new Macs?

(Example: Single 800 vs. new iMac 800, Single 1Ghz vs. QuickSilver 1Ghz, Dual 800 vs. MDD Dual 867?) I know that the PowerLogix upgrades have a larger L3 Cache than the new PowerMacs (assuming they work!) so I'd be curious as to how they stack up.

[joe]

Originally posted by driven:
Does anyone have any comparisions of the PowerLogix upgrades vs. modern new Macs?

(Example: Single 800 vs. new iMac 800, Single 1Ghz vs. QuickSilver 1Ghz, Dual 800 vs. MDD Dual 867?) I know that the PowerLogix upgrades have a larger L3 Cache than the new PowerMacs (assuming they work!) so I'd be curious as to how they stack up.

OWC has some comparisons of Sonnet and PowerLogix 800-1GHz single (and dual PL) installed in an upgraded G4 Sawtooth 400Mhz Tower. They compare to the latest iMac 700 and 800 models only though. However they do show results for both a stock Rage 128Pro and the upgraded Radeon 8500 in the Tower. Definitely a good read:
http://eshop.macsales.com/Reviews/Fr...100/page1.html

I'm thinking about one of the 1GHz upgrades for my Cube (currently a dual 500). regards......joe

[Mandricard]

So far so good, except that iTunes now crashes.. or "unexpectedly quits" when importing songs from a cd. I have not upgraded to 10.2.2 yet, so that might solve the problem. Still waiting for my L3 cache to be reactivated.

--M