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drive-thru · Mar 11, 2005, 08:58 PM

I will be getting my first Powermac, a Quicksilver 800, in a couple of weeks. It will become my design computer, retiring my iBook G3 800 and it is coming with a 9000 64MB ADC and DVI card installed.

As this is my first Powermac I'm not sure about compatibility of cards, nor 100% sure about the performance of the 9000...
Is this a good card for mainly 2D graphics, web design and a bit of video work?
How does it compare to other cards for the QS 800?
What else should I look for, for a future upgrade?

I have done a fair amount of googling on this subject, but haven't found much conclusive info and I know you guys will be able to give me the answers.
Any advice/info/links would be much appreciated.

chris v · Mar 11, 2005, 10:11 PM

A radeon 9000 will be fine unless you're heavy into 3D or gaming. It's a good card, still.

MORT A POTTY · Mar 12, 2005, 04:53 AM

it should be fine for now. the only card you should really consider as an upgrade would be a Radeon 9800 Pro, which just a couple (two?) months ago had a 100 dollar price drop, and is the fastest that will ever be availible for the PowerMac G4s. definitely get one if you want Core Image to work. sure there is a lot of hoo-ha about the modded Radeon 9600s that will work, but the ADC port isn't powered after the mod, and it's still not as powerful as the Radeon 9800 Pro. if you plan on using Motion, you will DEFINITELY want a Radeon 9800 Pro.

drive-thru · Mar 12, 2005, 08:29 AM

Thanks guys, that's as I suspected so I'll be sticking with the 9000 for now.

Re: the 9800, I thought they were only available for the G5, but just found that welovemacs.com has a 9800 Pro for G4 and a diiferent 9800 Pro for G5s, so obviously I was wrong. The G4 version seems to have DVI, VGA and S-Video, whereas the G5 version has ADC and DVI.
Obviously this is the card you were talking about Mort.

I think the Quicksilver will be a perfect match for the type of work I do, and I'll start thinking about a processor and graphics card upgrade in the summer - I've heard good things abut the GigaDesigns Dual 1.2GHz, anybody using one here?

traktimino · Mar 12, 2005, 01:51 PM

I have one of the original gigadesigns dual 1.2 ghz cards, and apart from being rather noisy it's great; fast and rock solid.I think the newer models are quieter

Captain Egotist · Mar 12, 2005, 02:58 PM

I have a dual 1.33 gigadesigns.

drive-thru · Mar 12, 2005, 07:12 PM

Ok, so that's my upgrade plan for the summer - ATI 9800 and Dual 1.2GHz
Can't wait to get this Quicksilver.
Thanks for all the help guys.

Weezer · Mar 12, 2005, 07:37 PM

If you need an ADC port, get the Geforce4 Titanium.

Captain Egotist · Mar 12, 2005, 09:50 PM

Originally posted by Weezer:
If you need an ADC port, get the Geforce4 Titanium.

Werd. That's what I'm getting just because I don't feel like blowing $100 on a freaking adaptor. Plus I'd need 2.

- Rob

MORT A POTTY · Mar 12, 2005, 11:53 PM

yes, that is the Radeon 9800 Pro I'm talking about. I'm lovin' it

and for not much more cash you could upgrade to a dual 1.8Ghz processor upgrade

I bet you a bag-o-peanuts it'll easily go up to 1.86Ghz too.

Al G · Mar 13, 2005, 12:31 PM

The Quicksilver 800 is kind of a dog because it doesn't have an L3 cache. Nothing a CPU upgrade can't fix though. Even a 1GHz single with 1MB L3 will be a significant improvement.

As for the video card, aside from Motion or 3D, you won't see much of a difference between the 9000 and a 9800.

drive-thru · Mar 13, 2005, 01:33 PM

Originally posted by Al G:
The Quicksilver 800 is kind of a dog because it doesn't have an L3 cache. Nothing a CPU upgrade can't fix though. Even a 1GHz single with 1MB L3 will be a significant improvement.

As for the video card, aside from Motion or 3D, you won't see much of a difference between the 9000 and a 9800.

That's what I thought, but I'm getting a good deal from a friend on the Quicksilver and plan to upgrade it later this year. Even without upgrades it will be a big improvement over my G3 800 iBook which is currently my only computer and has to handle all my design work.

tooki · Mar 14, 2005, 03:36 AM

Right, but for design work, the cost of the Radeon 9800 is basically money thrown out the window. You won't see a difference.

There are only 3 things I can think of where it'd make a difference: 1. Motion (which has an unsatiable appetite for GPU power), 2. games, 3. Expose with zillions of windows open (not tragic if it gets choppy, though!).

As of right now, no design apps, none, take advantage of a faster 3D chip in any way whatsoever. There's no indication that this will change anytime soon.

For design work, you'd be much better off spending that money on more RAM and bigger/faster hard disks, or an upgraded optical drive, or a graphics tablet.

tooki

drive-thru · Mar 14, 2005, 08:48 AM

Thanks for your view tooki - I think you're spot on about the value of the 9800, at least at the current price.

I realise that the only benefit I would see from a 9800 would be in running Motion and in CoreImage in Tiger (although it seems that no one really knows for sure what they're talking about on this subject anyway - especially me).
I know that this Quicksilver will be very well suited to my current requirements, which is why I will wait until at least the summer before thinking about CPU/GPU upgrades, and then the priority will definitely be CPU. Also by then we should have a clear understanding of how Tiger deals with the older graphics cards.

Any more suggestions are very much welcome. Thanks for all you help and opinions.

bossep · Mar 14, 2005, 09:24 AM

Originally posted by drive-thru:
Thanks for your view tooki - I think you're spot on about the value of the 9800, at least at the current price.

I realise that the only benefit I would see from a 9800 would be in running Motion and in CoreImage in Tiger (although it seems that no one really knows for sure what they're talking about on this subject anyway - especially me).
I know that this Quicksilver will be very well suited to my current requirements, which is why I will wait until at least the summer before thinking about CPU/GPU upgrades, and then the priority will definitely be CPU. Also by then we should have a clear understanding of how Tiger deals with the older graphics cards.

Any more suggestions are very much welcome. Thanks for all you help and opinions.

I am a bit surprised that Apple and their geniuses can't or do not want to answer about CoreImage and graphic cards! I believe the best way to speed up an old Mac is 9800 + cpu upgrade (1GHz+). I have been told that the 9800 is not to its advantage with a cpu less that 1GHz.

I feel right now as when in a shop with a salesman chatting too much, I will leave the shop without buying anything

!

MilkmanDan · Mar 16, 2005, 10:59 PM

9000 worked fine for me with my 867 Quicksilver. Its a good enough card for most everything.

drive-thru · Mar 17, 2005, 06:02 AM

Well the Quicksilver arrived yesterday - haven't had a chance to do much with it yet, but can't wait to finish work so I can get everything set up.
From the limited amount of time I had with it yesterday afternoon it seems like a great machine.
Thanks everyone.

loh · Mar 19, 2005, 02:50 PM

tooki.

You just convinced me into not upgrading my video card until I do away with this machine. I was debating on what video card to order, and it kinda sucked because my options are pretty limited with the MDD G4. I currently use a GF4MX w/32mb ram. I also use a Studio Display (ADC) which limits my video card choices even more.

I was thinking ordering a hacked 9600 and doing that solder mod to make the ADC work, but it sounds like a video card upgrade wont make much a difference for what I'm gonna do. I dont plan on using motion, I rarely use Expose, and I dont game. Now I can save that money for other upgrades (pro audio)

Thanks!

blakespot · Mar 21, 2005, 11:43 AM

Originally posted by Al G:
The Quicksilver 800 is kind of a dog because it doesn't have an L3 cache. Nothing a CPU upgrade can't fix though. Even a 1GHz single with 1MB L3 will be a significant improvement.

No L3 cache??

The Quicksilver dual G4 800 has 256K L2 cache and 2MB/CPU of L3! See the specs here. That's more L3 than any other Mac.

blakespot

drive-thru · Mar 21, 2005, 12:54 PM

Originally posted by blakespot:
No L3 cache??

The Quicksilver dual G4 800 has 256K L2 cache and 2MB/CPU of L3! See the specs here. That's more L3 than any other Mac.

blakespot

Yes, but the single G4 800 (which is what I have) has no L3 Cache - don't know why, considering that the dual 800 from the previous 'generation' has L3, but that's how it is. (Different processor maybe?)
I don't know how much difference L3 makes, I upped my ram to 1280MB this afternoon and this Quicksilver is plenty speedy for me.

bovie · Mar 31, 2005, 02:05 PM

I bought a Sawtooth 400Mhz G4 about 1 1/2 years ago.
Then I added a 1.3Ghz Giga CPU Upgrade with 2MB L3
And Added Ram to take it to 1GB and this thing is fast
Way faster than my 1Ghz Powerbook with 768MB DDR Ram.
Even faster than my friends Dual 800 Quicksilver during everyday use.

A 800mhz quicksilver with a CPU/Video upgrade would be nice.

Amacapart · Mar 31, 2005, 05:47 PM

Apple has a standard policy of leaving things off in initial release and adding later to make it seem like an "upgrade"

9600 Pro was missing 4 memory chips on back, next year the 9600 XT came out, WITH THOSE CHIPS ON !!!

I have 2 QS processors here. Both are 7450 dies. 1 (867) has 2 large RAM chips on it which are the level 3 Cache. The other (800) has all the pads to solder those chips on, just no chips. Despite being only 67Mhz different in clock speed, the L3 card is 20-30% faster in Q3 and other benchmarks. It truly makes a HUGE difference.

David Lee · Apr 1, 2005, 04:09 AM

I Have no benchmarks available, but from direct experience with an 800 no-L3 cache QS, I can say it feels very much like a 600MHz machine, not bad, but not really hot. I have a Sawtooth running an 800/2MB L3 cache G4 upgrade card at 900MHz and it is very much faster than the 800 with no cache. All subjective but that's how it feels.