[Goofas]

I am going to replace my dual 800's in my powermac. I have noticed some of the upgrades have more L1 cache and no L2 cache...and some have less L1 cache and more L2 cache. Which one would be better?

[danman]

Eh, don't put any more money into a sinking ship. Sell the old girl on ebay and buy a new one.

[Lateralus]

Originally Posted by Goofas 

Sorry to disappoint you but I just bought her! It runs about like my imac g5 did right now. i can't afford $2500 for a new computer and this one should last me a few more years to come. i would really like someone's input not a smartazz response.

Do you want a single or a dual?

I've owned and upgraded to the teeth more Power Mac G4s than I can count. I never end up keeping them for whatever reason (I never keep any computer). My latest acquisition is in my signature.

The final incarnation of the G4 has finally hit the processor upgrade market; The 7448. It never made it into Apple's lineup.

I've been looking forward to the 7448's release for a long while now for the following reasons;

1) A die shrink to 90nm from 130nm. Essentially meaning less power consumption/less heat.
2) A doubling of the L2 cache from 512K to 1MB, which will alleviate a lot of the problems associated with the slow bus speed of all G4 systems.
3) An improved AltiVec engine, sporting ECC. Initial reports seem to indicate that the 7448's AltiVec is 10-15% more powerful than any incarnation previously available.

The only company currently offering 7448 upgrades is NewerTech/ That page lists both 7447A and 7448 upgrades. Pay only attention to the 7448s.

Personally, I'm looking at the 2GHz model. Partly because I don't want to drop $700 for the Dual 1.8GHz and partly because I'd like to overclock the 2GHz upgrade to 2.13GHz, a clock speed that, due to heat output, would mostly likely only be attainable on a single processor card.

That said, yeah, I wish people would stop being negative nancy any time a forum member asks for advice on a processor upgrade card. Some people love their G4s. Some people love upgrading computers. Deal with it.

[Goofas]

Sorry to disappoint you but I just bought her! It runs about like my imac g5 did right now. i can't afford $2500 for a new computer and this one should last me a few more years to come. i would really like someone's input not a smartazz response.

[himself]

Why can't people just answer the question posed to them if they're going to respond to it? Anyway...

From what I understand, L1 cache is the fastest and what will help the most, but L2 cache can also have a significant effect on performance, especially since L1 cache is always smaller. I'd suggest you go to a site like barefeats or google the processors you have in mind and do a comparison.

[Goofas]

Since my stock dual 800's have L 1&2, I guess my upgrade should have it too. I'll go with the dual 1.4's from fastMac for $419...they have L 1&2. Thanks.

[mduell]

To answer your original question, if the L2 is really big (2MB), that means it's off-core and really slow; avoid those. You want one of the final G4 revisions: 7447A or 7448.

[Goofas]

So far I have spent $500 for a dual 800, Sata DVD burner with lightscribe, twin 240gb sata seagate hard drives, 2 sonnett pci sata cards, 1 160gb maxtor 133 hard drive, 1.5 gb ram, os 9 and os x, Geforce 3 64mg ( I do not game ), pci usb 2.0/firewire card. Not bed at all for a "second" computer. $400 more on a processor upgrade would be my limit.

[SierraDragon]

...

[Lateralus]

Okay guys, final warning.

If you can't post to answer the OP's question, don't post at all.

Not a one of you is saying anything that isn't blatantly obvious to everyone including the OP. So why assume he is stupid by stating it?

[Goofas]

Man...tough forum. I had some some great help here a few years ago. i guess it is time to move on. Thanks for those who offered real advice. I am on my way somewhere else.

[wubrew]

Originally Posted by Goofas 

Man...tough forum. I had some some great help here a few years ago. i guess it is time to move on. Thanks for those who offered real advice. I am on my way somewhere else.

Goofas

PowerLogix PowerForce47 Dual G4/1.6GHz for... (PF47D1600QD) at OWC

I have very good experience with this upgrade and similar other parts ie HDx2, v-card with 128 ram, Firewire 800 PCI like yours. No problem what so ever except very ocassional " not waking up" after long sleep time. A lot of sceptical responses when I posted similar question back then. My souped up Quick Silver is still as loud as ever.