[Zag]

I will get a power Mac 9600/300 that is useless in my work place....anyway I am thinkig in a CPU acceleration card and I am thinking between powerlogix or sonnet.
Also I would like to know what else do I need when adding an acceleration card....and if I can run OS X after all... thanks for your advice.

[DrBoar]

I have 10.1.5 running on a 7600/200 so you can actually hack a old X version to run on non G3. It is slow though.

The 604E/300 is quite fast in its own right, a G3 will give you more speed and better OS X support. The Sonnet G3/500/512 is very good deal at 150 dollars. A ATI 7000 radeon card is also almost a must. That combination is far better than a say a 800 MHz upgrade without a new graphical card (The IX Micro twin Turbo card is fast in 2D byt I do not know if it has any OS X support. If it has good X support you can skip the card)

The other trouble is the 4 GB HD that came with the 9600/300. By modern standards it is both small and slow. However if the OS and Applications fits I would not bother upgrading.

If you can manage with less than 300 dollars I would upgrade it. That is at the most a cheap G3 and perhaps a graphcial card and some RAM. However if you add a IDE card, IDE drive, USB card, USB mouse, FW card, CDRW and so on top of it it really becomes silly way more expensive and still slower than a eMac....

The 9600 might be built like a tank and be very upgradeable, it still does not make it a good idea. There is a time were old card standards slow busses and other things make it pointless to upgrade old computers.
The 68k have been dead for years
The nubus PPC as well
The PCI PPC is fading away as they have slow busses and no AGP, with the arrival of 970 CPUs way faster than the current G4 the reasons to upgrade old computer will drop even further

[Evangellydonut]

Only thing I think that box is worth is for a dedicated server of sort...file, print, web, whatever...but otherwise out of commission. It's just too far behind to be worth the upgrades...especially considering the bottleneck of the buses 'n such.

[OreoCookie]

Originally posted by Evangellydonut:
Only thing I think that box is worth is for a dedicated server of sort...file, print, web, whatever...but otherwise out of commission. It's just too far behind to be worth the upgrades...especially considering the bottleneck of the buses 'n such.

Ditto.

[kbata]

The first thing you would need is a CPU upgrade. OWC has some good prices. I would stay away from ATA cards because they seem to make sound problems in old world Macs worse. Look for a cheep Atto SCSI card on Ebay or at OWC. You can find cheep SCSI drives on Ebay. An OEM PCI Video card from a B&W G3 or an ATI 7000 helps.
I had a 7500 that had all these upgrades. I got a B&W G3 and moved the Atto card, drives, ATI Radeon card, and 450 MHZ G4 zif into the G3. My G3 runs on average 25% faster than the 7500 with all the same components. It can be a challenge to get it all working but in all the time I had the 7500 working I only had 1 KP with Jaguar and the speed was good for most applications. An eMac is inexpensive but it doesn't have any PCI slots.

[booboo]

If this is a 300MHz 9600, doesn't that mean it's MACH3?

And doesn't that mean it's not G3 upgradeable?

[Eric E.]

If I have a 9600 to play with, here are the things that I'd do to it:

1. Max it out with RAM (8 sticks of 128 mb each = 1 gig for around $200).

2. ATI Radeon 7000 PCI Video Card (around $130.00).

3. Sonnet 800 Mhz G4 Processor Card (I'm not really sure how much, but I think it's less than $350).

With the unit's 6 PCI slots, other extras can be added such as a Fire Wire & USB Combo Card, an ATA 133 card to attach up to 4 high speed ATA 133 drives, stuff for networking, etc. Also, after installing the Sonnet card, it will be able to run OS X. Please bear in mind that some of these upgrades may not be necessarily "plug & play" so your mileage will vary. Check out www.xlr8yourmac.com website for more info.

All things considered, you can get a decent desktop machine with my recommeded upgrades, but it will not be very practical or cost effective. Go for it only if you're the tinkering type.

Eric

[OreoCookie]

Originally posted by Eric E.:
If I have a 9600 to play with, here are the things that I'd do to it:

1. Max it out with RAM (8 sticks of 128 mb each = 1 gig for around $200).

2. ATI Radeon 7000 PCI Video Card (around $130.00).

3. Sonnet 800 Mhz G4 Processor Card (I'm not really sure how much, but I think it's less than $350).

With the unit's 6 PCI slots, other extras can be added such as a Fire Wire & USB Combo Card, an ATA 133 card to attach up to 4 high speed ATA 133 drives, stuff for networking, etc. Also, after installing the Sonnet card, it will be able to run OS X. Please bear in mind that some of these upgrades may not be necessarily "plug & play" so your mileage will vary. Check out www.xlr8yourmac.com website for more info.

All things considered, you can get a decent desktop machine with my recommeded upgrades, but it will not be very practical or cost effective. Go for it only if you're the tinkering type.

Eric

That'll be close to 700 $. Kaching. Save the cash.

[nvaughan3]

Originally posted by Evangellydonut:
Only thing I think that box is worth is for a dedicated server of sort...file, print, web, whatever...but otherwise out of commission. It's just too far behind to be worth the upgrades...especially considering the bottleneck of the buses 'n such.

you'd be surprised. At my newspaper where I work we've been using a 9600/180 as our main computer for handling 7-15MB photos on a daily basis. Sure it sucks but it's workable. Before about a year ago they were using a 7200/180. We finally bitched enough and monday we got a promised G4-a 466.

[terrancew_hod]

I upgraded a Powermac 8500 to a G3 500MHz (then a G4 800MHz) and a ATI Radeon 7000. It works well as a general email, web browsing machine. More graphics intensive tasks (On OS X 10.2) seem to take a toll on the 50MHz bus.

Sonnet has tool for installing OS X (especially if you have a Sonnet processor) on old world Macs. It costs around $30. I have it and it works pretty well. OWC also a free XPostFacto tool that does the same thing.

I just wouldn't invest too much money in it, especially with Panther around the corner. With some of the new rumored graphical features, those older macs probably won't cut it. I think OS X 10.1.5 works the best with the tool, especially since it is pre-Quartz Extreme. Save your money and try to get more up-to-date hardware, especially with an AGP bus...


Terrance

[drjoe]

Originally posted by Evangellydonut:
Only thing I think that box is worth is for a dedicated server of sort...file, print, web, whatever...but otherwise out of commission. It's just too far behind to be worth the upgrades...especially considering the bottleneck of the buses 'n such.

Exactly. That is what I use an 8500 for: web, mail, print and file server. Put in a 500 Mz G3, 500 MB of ram; it had a pair of 18 GB SCSI drives, a $15 USB card and an old 15" Dell monitor. Total cost of upgrading was less than $200 and it runs 10.2.6 like a champ. Apache for web serving and Tenon Post-office for free [less than 8 email addresses], built in file and print serving. Really nice.

[COmie JOe]

Originally posted by booboo:
If this is a 300MHz 9600, doesn't that mean it's MACH3?

And doesn't that mean it's not G3 upgradeable?

I believe you are thinking of the Mach5 systems, which would be the units with inline cache vr side cache. I know for sure the 350 version is, but not 100% sure about the 300's. but regardless both of them are G3 upgradeable.

[thefamousmred]

Both the 300 + 350Mhz 604s were Mach 5, yup. They're upgradable to G3/G4.

[hempcamp]

G3 Upgrade: $150

ATI Rage 128: $50

4 x 128MB RAM: $100

Sonnet ATA/133: $80

40GB ATA Drive: $60

USB/FW Card: $30

Showing your "peecee" friends a 7 year old computer that runs OS X:

PRICELESS!

--Chris
(Proud owner of a ridiculously souped up PowerMac 7500. And if you still think a 9600 is worthless, I'd be happy to take her off your hands! )

[Zag]

Thank you all for your kind responses.