[mmintler]

I visted my local Micro Center in Chicago (where I purchased my G4 450 about 9 mo. ago) While speaking to one of the sales people- I mentioned how frustrating it was that the MP450 cost the same as I payed for my single processor G4....(I know that's life...) Anyway- his reply was interesting. He had heard that soon authorized Apple repair centers would be selling replacement MP motherboards for single G4's.
Does anyone know if there is any truth to this??

Thanks

[Vision]

I HIGHLY doubt this would happen for a couple of reasons:
1) Apple sells computers. If they stll upgrade boards, they loose a sale of a computer. Especially with the G4, which is a high-margin machine, it's impossible to get the same profit from an upgrade card.
2) After the Performa 550 PowerPC Upgrade fiasco, Apple made a deal with the FTC regarding upgrades. If Apple releases an upgrade, they have to follow a ludicrous amount of requirements, including having the upgrade available for years and years.
3) The Sawtooth G4 has the processor speed soldered to the motherboard, not just using jumpers. If one wants to upgrade, they must unsolder and resolder resistors on the motherboard. It's not as simple as just putting in a new module.

Now, I'm not certain that Apple won't release MP G4 cards, but I just highly doubt it. I'm sure that accelerator companies are working hard to do so. Again, because of the soldered resistors on the motherboard, it makes it difficult to release upgrades. However, if Powerlogix (and other companies) can create custom BootROM patches (like for the B/W G3s) and custom BootROMs (like for the iMac), I'm sure they can come up with some way to upgrade a Sawtooth G4.

[JBracy]

Hasn't one of the upgrade companies already announced an MP upgrade?

Apple's agreement with the FTC was actually if they advertised a machine as upgradable, then they had to 1) actually provide an upgrade, 2) make that upgrade availiable for x years.

It says nothing about producing and upgrade as a separate product AFTER the introduction of a machine (they provided upgrades for the 9500's a few years ago)

[bstone]

All I know is that if I can get a G3 upgrade card via the L2 cache slot on my Performa 6400/180, anything can be done. For years I was under the impression I was never going to be getting an upgrade for that thing- processor being soldered onto the motherboard and all ::sigh::. Fear not, ye faithful! We will be provided....it just may take some time.

The processor in all G4 machines is **NOT** soldered to the board. In the Yikes! machines it sits in a ZIF socket and is easily upgradeable. In Sawtooth and the new gigabit ethernet G4s the processor is on a daughtercard with a non-standard socket. Despite minor motherboard changes, it may be possible to put an MP daughter-card in a Sawtooth machine. If I had the cash, I'd give it a shot I'm sure as the installed base of G4 users grow we'll see some companies like Newer, PowerLogix, and XLR8 start to offer upgrades.

The resistors are not soldered to the motherboard they are soldered to the CPU daughter card on the bottom side. MP G4's are not worth the effort untill OS X comes out. With the G4e coming out soon and at a higher clock speed than the 500 Mhz G4. Why wast time with the G4. Apple wants to sell new computers. BTW the G4e will require UMA2 & OSX. Imagine dual & quad G4e's @ 800 Mhz. This new machine won't be a smoke signal to PC advocates it will be a Flame Thrower.

[MacOS761]

BTW the G4e will require UMA2 & OSX.

Where did you hear that? I never heard of such a thing, plus an OS usually requires a processor, not the other way around. And how would Classic run on a G4e if that were the case? Are you saying that we won't see G4e's until January at the earliest, more like April (when X is expected to be standard installed)? I thought we would see 600 MHz G4e's before Christmas. Please back up your claim a little.

[larkost]

The G4e (or +) might well require the UMA 2 motherboard, specificly the MaxBus portion of the specification. While it is possible (and likely) that the upgrade companies will be able to overcome this limitation, you will still have a problem with the processor starving for infomation due to the fact it can't talk to memory as fast as it should.

On the orrigial point, I find it highly unlikely that Apple with provide dual processor upgrades, they have not done this in the recent past (Jobs Era 2), and it makes no buisnes sence for them. Now, the replacement motherboards for defective MP machines will be arriving at service centers soon, and if you were to pay for one of those boards as a service part... But since out of warentee (and this would be out of warentee work) parts are rediculouly expencive, you would probably be better off getting a new MP computer...

Apple may not _sell_ an MP upgrade, but that doesn't mean that you can't buy a replacement MP daughtercard from a service center. It would be awefully expensive though I'd bet.

And, according to Apple Dev Note for the G4, all current G4's already impliment MaxBus. Perhaps the UMA2 architechture expands on or fully impliments it. But I doubt that the G4+ REQUIRES UMA2.

To take advantage of the faster G4e (or G4+) CPU speed & the additional pipelines in a G4e will require faster memory than SDRAM. Thus the new UMA-2 will support DDR type of DRAM which is considerablly faster than SDRAM . Oh I suppose you might be able to put SDRAM into the new Apple UMA-2 machines but it would be a waste of the CPU. These things should be matched for optimal performance. OS X will support single, dual & quad CPU systems. Multi-Threading, Multi-Tasking. OS 9 doees not support these features. However PS will support dual processors and a few others. Most Software companies that sell major software will want to make their programs OS X compatible.

[MacNZ]

http://www.xlr8.com/News/Press/000719-MPe.html
There's a 3rd Party upgrade for you. Apple wouldn't themselves market one. Thats getting hopes up!