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| OS 9 and the PM 7300 Upgrade |
Posted by: rpaxton32 on 2008-07-28 09:36:58
Hello, I have a Power Mac 7300/200 running OS 9.0.4 with 48 megs of memory. Currently, the processor in this machine is a 604e, but I recently purchased a Sonnet G3 upgrade from the internet. How much better should I expect my machine to run?
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Posted by: equill on 2008-07-28 18:31:35
Given more RAM, to at least 256MB, preferably matched and paired (interleaved), and an upgrade to at least OS 9.1, or 9.2.2 with OS9Helper, much better. 'Better' however, depends on what you wish to do with it. The 7300 was amongst the last of the Beige 'G2' models, despite its lower model number than the 7600, and can give a good account of itself as long as you do not expect that it will equal a native G3 machine in all respects.
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Posted by: Unknown_K on 2008-07-28 19:03:41
Depends on the G3 you purchased and how much cache it has (512K or 1MB). To get a faster system you need more RAM, an ATA/66 IDE card or a fast wide SCSI card and some decent HDs.
For example my 8500 has 704MB RAM, g3-400/1MB, a rage 128 video card with 16MB RAM, an ATA/66 IDE card with 24x IDE cdrom and 2 x 10GB IDE HDs, plus USB/Firewire. The machine feels much faster then the stock configuration. if you look around on ebay and LEMswap on google groups you should be able to find the parts you need to upgrade failry cheap over time, if you want to keep and upgrade that system. If you want something faster with less investment you can get a fast Beige g3 or B&W G3). I have upgraded Beige G3s and B&W's but I still like upgrading the older machines.
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Posted by: equill on 2008-07-28 21:21:37
At a guess, based on the many Sonnet processor upgrade cards that I have, both ZIF and PDS, yours will have at least 512kB of L2 cache, and very possibly 1MB. Sonnet is always more generous in this respect than was Apple, at least in the model generations being referred to here.
System RAM and VRAM upgrades will allow you to make the most of your 7300 and a newer OS. Unknown K makes the valid point that either or both of whether you wish to push the 7300 to its limits just for the sake of doing so, or whether you wish to devote it to a specific task will influence your further choice of upgrades: drives, bus controllers, specialty PCI cards, and so on.
Perhaps an extreme example is my 9600/G4/800MHz with 45GB of storage in four fast SCSI drives. That's an extreme ratio of processor to bus speed, but the 9600 appreciates the change from being what was a fine machine in its day to a yet finer Mac.
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Posted by: Bunsen on 2008-07-29 10:15:20
Even another 64MB or so of RAM will certainly help pick up the pace, and I second the call for maxing out the video RAM.
OS 9.0.4 should be upgraded forthwith to 9.1, through the free download from Apple. os9forever.com will tell you how to get the rest of the way to 9.2.2
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Posted by: Quadraman on 2008-07-29 12:15:54
Here's a little Photoshop comparison from BareFeats
http://www.barefeats.com/Photo.html
The single G3 300 easily beats even the dual 604e 200.
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Posted by: Unknown_K on 2008-07-29 17:29:14
The later 604EV with full 1MB cache on the cpu card should give a g3 a good run for its money.
I would think photoshop is limited by CPU cache along with bus speed bottlenecks.
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Posted by: Bunsen on 2008-07-30 01:44:02
To get a faster system you need more RAM, an ATA/66 IDE card or a fast wide SCSI card and some decent HDs. "Need"? That's a bit excessive. Yes, more RAM. Yes, stick the G3 in there and give it a whirl. But really, the rest is entirely up to the individual's need for speed, budget, and care factor.
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Posted by: Quadraman on 2008-07-30 09:28:08
The later 604EV with full 1MB cache on the cpu card should give a g3 a good run for its money.
I would think photoshop is limited by CPU cache along with bus speed bottlenecks. The 604ev can't be used in a 7300. You need the Kansas motherboard from the 8600/9600 250, 300 or 350.
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Posted by: Unknown_K on 2008-07-30 09:47:52
To get a faster system you need more RAM, an ATA/66 IDE card or a fast wide SCSI card and some decent HDs. "Need"? That's a bit excessive. Yes, more RAM. Yes, stick the G3 in there and give it a whirl. But really, the rest is entirely up to the individual's need for speed, budget, and care factor.
The point I was making is that just slapping in a faster processor does not realy speed up the machine a whole hell of alot because other parts are holding it back. You can slap a G4 into an old Nubus PPC machine and it will still be slow because of slow video, scsi, and low ram limits. It would not be as usefull as the same chip in a beige g3, which would not be as fast as the same chip in a B&W g3, which would not be as fast as the same chip in a real G4 machine.
The major issues with CPU upgrades is people are tempted to install a much newer OS because of the upgrade, and the slowness of the other components or hardware limitations come to light as a result.
If you upgrade the CPU and keep everything else the same you will notice speed increases depending on what you are doing, but sometimes a faster HD or more RAM might have been a better option.
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Posted by: Quadraman on 2008-07-30 15:54:25
Just remember the old saying. RAM is the cheapest accelerator you can buy. You should bump up the RAM as much as you can afford before you start playing around with CPU upgrades, video cards and faster hard drives. You also need to be conscious of the limitations of your hardware. Don't waste money buying super fast components that your computer can't fully utilize. Once you reach the machine's throughput limits, anything beyond that is overkill.
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Posted by: porter on 2008-07-30 16:24:47
Just remember the old saying. Adjusting your expectations is the cheapest accelerator you can buy.
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Posted by: Bunsen on 2008-07-30 20:29:00
Unknown_K and Quadraman, you both make good points. But rpaxton already has the Sonnet in his hands, so Definitely RAM would be the next thing.
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Posted by: sircabulon on 2008-09-03 20:07:30
You can slap a G4 into an old Nubus PPC machine and it will still be slow You can get a G4 for a nubus mac?????
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Posted by: Unknown_K on 2008-09-03 23:47:18
Yes g4's exist for Nubus, a slow one not worth bothering with (240Mhz?). Any apps that would make use of a G4 would choke on a Nubus machine.
If you already have the CPU then stick it in and see how it goes. It might turn out that the CPU boost is not what as expected and further money sunk into the project might not be worth it. I still upgrade my PCI macs, but the cost is almost nothing since people are dumping them for free or almost free. I would love a G4 1Ghz for my 8500 (currently with a g3-400) but I sure as heck would not pay much for it since a real G4 with a 133Mhz memory bus would be a much better investment.
From a collectors standpoint it is better to wait for equipment to get to the worthless for "real" work stage and snag it then to grab it when it is still usable or has gone up in value as a collectors item. I might have waited too long to snag a 9600.
From a users standpoint it rarely is worth it to upgrade machines more then 5 years old with prices so cheap today.
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Posted by: sircabulon on 2008-09-04 20:34:43
haha it is all pretty much nostalgia, but it is my hobby! My beige is 128MB of being maxed out!
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Posted by: Unknown_K on 2008-09-04 21:20:42
I have the full 1GB in my B&W so I know what you mean.
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