[gio.vanni]

Well, you guys have helped me fix, install, and help troubleshoot my damn Quicksilver and it's going STRONG. Handles a lot of the audio work and everyday tasks that I throw at it. Now, I believe it's time to upgrade.

It's a Dual 800Mhz G4 Quicksilver with only an 80 Gig drive and 768MB RAM. What I was thinking of doing?

Another 80 Gig internal drive and another 256MB RAM stick to = 1GB of Ram and 160Gigs of storage. Here's what I was looking at:


256MB PC133 CL3 168 Pin SDRam for ALL P... (OWC133SD256328) at OWC

and

80GB Western Digital Caviar 7200rpm 8.9ms 8MB... (WD800JB) at OWC

That's all folks. Let me know what you guys think or if I should go a different route.

[Lateralus]

Why not just max out the RAM on your Quicksilver? SDRAM is only going to get more expensive.

As for the hard drive, I wouldn't call that a great price for an 80GB. Might wanna look at NewEgg for both your RAM and hard drive.

[reader50]

It would cost about $60 per stick to get 512 MB modules. Another store offers them for $45, though I've never bought from them. I wouldn't buy 256 modules at all.

About the HD, you can get a 160 from newegg for ~$50. Your Quicksilver is affected by the 128/137 GB limit, so that's as high as you could go with your stock controller. I'd buy a FireWire case for less than $30 (got the Azio myself - Oxford chipset), and a 500 GB drive for about $100.

[Waragainstsleep]

80GB is well below the sweet spot for price per gigabyte these days. (Its more like 300GB just now) I'd go for a 120GB since yours won't support anything larger properly.

[reader50]

The current sweet spot is 400 - 500, depending on what's on sale. A 160 GB presently lists for less than a 120 GB on newegg, and it would format as 128 GB - with about 20 GB left over, unreachable.

[gio.vanni]

I can get a 320 Gig external drive for $120. I bought one for my Dad and his PC and he loves it. Problem is it's USB2.0. Would it be cool to just grab a PCI USB2.0 card and just get that external drive? If so, which USB2.0 PCI card would be good for my Mac? I was looking at some but had no idea which ones are good for Macs.

As for the RAM... does anyone have the links on NewEgg for the EXACT ones I would need? There is so much stuff to pick from I get so confused.

Another quick question. I bought this drive:

Amazon.com: SmartDisk 80 GB USB 2.0 Firelite Portable External Hard Drive (USBFLB80): Electronics

Problem is it isn't getting recognized by my Mac anymore. It worked fine at first now it's shot. I did some research and people are having the same problem. I was wondering what type of external HD case I would need to swap the drive from this thing into an external USB or Firewire case so I can use that as well.

Thanks as usual guys.

[Lateralus]

Why not just look for an external drive that supports FireWire?

[yikes600]

for RAM I'd check ebay. I got 3x512MB kingston modules for my digital audio (same as your quicksilver) for $70.
for storage, put in an ATA/133 or serial ATA controller. Acard sells these through newegg, and it's like $60 the last time I checked. Then, you can use any of the 400GB or 500GB hard drives you see everywhere without the hassle or speed penalty of USB 2.0 or firewire.
if you still want USB 2.0, ANY generic PCI card will do, based on the NEC chipset. I got an "Intek21" brand card from my local Fry's for $10. OS X recognizes it natively-- no drivers needed.

[gio.vanni]

Originally Posted by Lateralus 

Why not just look for an external drive that supports FireWire?

I think I may have found one. A 500Gig drive for $160. I might just go that route.

yikes, what RAM exactly should I be looking for? I really need to upgrade this Quicksilver to get the most out of it when doing some intense sessions. Thanks!

And the question I asked before... which external case will hold this drive?

Amazon.com: SmartDisk 80 GB USB 2.0 Firelite Portable External Hard Drive (USBFLB80): Electronics

Thanks as usual guys.

[drdaldds]

From my experience...they still make this memory...and it is plentiful. The price seems to drop daily, and I always buy new. I do not see this becoming very hard to obtain, or expensive, any time in the near future. I have many 512MB and 1GB modules...unopened and in their package right now. Most comes from Taiwan or singapore, where my sources tell me, it is still in production. It was made for an awful lot of machines!

If there is a market...they will make it.

[gio.vanni]

Wanna sell me some 512mb modules?

[gio.vanni]

Ok ladies and gents. Back again with a simple question. I need a good, budget minded USB 2.0 PCI card for my Powermac Quicksilver DP G4. 2 ports just isn't cutting it and most audio gear needs to be run direct plus I have an open PCI slot so which card do you guys recommend?

Would this work in a Mac?

Newegg.com - Koutech PCI to USB2.0 Card Model IO-PU520 - Retail

[BelugaShark]

why a usb drive?? firewire is much faster and does not require resources when reading or writing.
if you're only using this drive for your quicksilver you should consider installing it internally.

another thing to consider: if you're not going to be backing-up your data, and you're planning on using this drive for crucial data, you should consider 'mirroring' incase the drive should fail. drives do randomly fail.

[BigBadBiologist]

Theoretically, any generic USB2 card with a VIA or NEC chipset should work. My sawtooth was a little picky and would only take cards with NEC chipsets, but I tried a VIA in a couple of other G4s and it worked fine. The one you link to seems to have an NEC chipset and looks exactly like the one in my sawtooth.

[reader50]

That card will work. Hint: look at the specs, then load the pictures. The specs say it's an NEC chipset. The pictures of the box have a Mac logo and specify Mac OS 8.6 or higher.