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PowerPC G4 Upgrades Direct from Motorola?
Gizzmonic asks: "I was looking at PowerPC upgrade cards for my Mac G3 Blue-and-White and I couldn't help but notice that the offerings by PowerLogix and Sonnet are quite pricey. So, I started poking around Motorola's site looking for the G4 or my dreams. I could probably pull a few strings at work and get them to order a G4 direct. Is there any reason that a G4 from Motorola wouldn't work with the ZIF socket on my motherboard? (Yes, I know about the G4 enabler software) Ordering from Motorola or one of their suppliers could potentially save me a lot of dough, but I'd hate to plunk down the money for an incompatible CPU. What do you folks think?"
From http://maccentral.macworld.com/news/9901/29.upgrad es.shtml
Motorola's solution is more hazy. The company's website claims that AltiVec will be "100% compatible with the industry standard PowerPC architecture," but doesn't say whether processors with the added technology will fit into current ZIF slots.
Will the current blue G3s be able to handle either or both G4 processors? If IBM's roadmap is followed, it would seem most likely since clock-rate increases don't generally mean a radical shift in chip design. Since the Blue G3s are equipped with a ZIF (Zero insertion force) processor slot, a processor with similar size to the current G3s could be easily installed.
"So, I started poking around Motorola's site looking for the G4 or my dreams."
I like Motorola's G4 processors, but their dream department leaves something to be desired. I'm glad you went with the former option.
You'd still be crippled by the old mobo at 66 mhz (I think). You'd probably be better off buying one of the recently replaced (non-DDR) boxes. They have great discounts on these now. You could ebay your old system for around $500 and use that towards your new bitching quicksilver. Then you'd have it near the bleeding edge, get quartz extreme support, plus have it last a lot longer. A hundred dollar upgrade here and a four hundred dollar upgrade there and sooner or later you're talking real money. And just to be a bit off topic, but I'm really noticing an increase in Apple mindshare here on Slashdot. It's really becoming noticable. Nearly everyday they are on the frontpage.
Are you planning to build your own chip by buying raw materials from Motorola's suppliers? That's awsome! Put a website up about it (with pictures!)
Here before all but 8486 of you.
If the upgrades from two separate companies are both pricey, it probably means there is considerable engineering effort required to get it to work. It won't just be a matter of buying a processor fresh from the foundry, slapping some cache on it, and popping it in. Do you reall think all the surrounding circuitry is just window dressing?
Moto most likely sells in bulk. Also, you would probably lack the processor card. I don't believe Moto sells Apple processor cards.
Heh. I know he's only looking for his dreams but, speaking from experience, I think it's safe to say that that requires more than zero insertion force...
Having said that, heat dissipation can sometimes be a problem and there have been times when overclocking has been desirable.
Unfortunately, finding a suitable heat sink that doesn't interfere with operations can be problematic, although water cooling/immersion can be a more than pleasant solution - with the right component(s).
"Accept that some days you are the pigeon, and some days you are the statue." - David Brent, Wernham Hogg
--I would think maccentral.com forum might be a better venue for the question.
With that said get the sonnett and be done with it, and concentrate on your real job, you'll be happier and the machine will be zippier. That and ram, and learning to USE the ram in classic, as you have to manually assign it in the "get info" window for each app. Max out the ram by all means first before you do anything else. I've found they all seem to lowball what's needed, adding some megs to each prog always seems to work wonders for me. Also, I seem to remember some deal about there being a difference between the aluminum chips and copper based on the upgrade cards, the consensus was try to get the copper. I'm not an expert on these things by any means, but I've read about them, and am considering a sonnett upgrade for my 1400 PB, as g3 laptops are still pricey. Macs are good, and hold their resale value well. Good for owning and selling, bad for buying, but there ya go.
Good luck!
Have you noticed that your URL has an embedded space in it? Slashdot does that to posts. Go here. You just might learn something.
Umm.... why don't you ask Motorola? If anyone would know, they should