Graphics card for G4/PCI (Yikes)

Dekatophil

Dekatophil

Registered
Hello everyone,

I'm thinking of giving my G4/400 Yikes a new Graphics Card. What would you recommend ?

I was looking at the Radeon 7000 (PCI).
What does Nvidia have ?

Any suggestions ?

Thanks for your help !
 
I don't think NVidia has a card that will go in that machine... I think they're only selling AGP-based video cards for Macs.

I have the same machine as you -- A G4 Yikes! and I put in a Radeon 7000 PCI card -- BIG improvement. If you play games, you'll notice a phenomenal increase in quality and speed. Other than that, QuickTime movies are a bit smoother. On top of those two things, it allowed me to move my original Rage 128 card to a separate PCI slot and connect another monitor -- BEAUTIFUL! I don't know how I survived so long with only one monitor.

Don't expect window-resizing or window-moving to speed up dramatically, or at all. That's dependent on OS X, not the video card as much at this point, and even with the new Jaguar 10.2 coming out, we won't ever be able to take advantage of Quartz Extreme. We'd need an NVidia card or an AGP Radeon card... and I don't think NVidia will be releasing a PCI video card anytime soon if at all.

All in all, for the money, it was a worthwhile upgrade. Well-priced and it gave my system a little boost. I also highly recommend getting an ATA card (I got a Sonnet Tempo ATA/100 with 7200RPM 40GB and a 7200RPM 60GB) with a fast hard drive to put on there. BIG improvement over the internat ATA bus. And, of course, more RAM. I maxed mine out with 1GB (4x256MB) and OS X hasn't swapped memory out yet.

I know that seems like a lot, but for about $400, I breathed new life into this aging machine. Next on the list: processor upgrade, $300 for 500MHz. Not bad for a 20% increase in overall system speed.
 
Wow, that's about the best info (real experience) I could hope for. Thank you!
Well, I was aware that Quartz Extreme isn't for us, so GUI sugar candy will continue to drain on the CPU... The other points sound encouraging and seem to make the purchase worth while. I'm currently at 512MB RAM. That works pretty okay but, yes, there are occasion you notice you could do with more... Waiting for prices to come down tho'.
As for the 500MHz upgrade... MMMhhh. I don't think I gonna do that. $300 seems still too much...
I'm still sorta hoping that there'll be a "decent" processor upgrade in the future. Like 800-1000MHz. Comes in handy when doing video. I'd really like to keep the machine up-to-date because it has done a splendid job so far.
Again thanks for the info. Maybe a wonder will happen and Quartz Extreme will eventually come for us too. Remember Apple's DVD player ? We had to wait real long to get that to work with Yikes...but in the end it was there. So, who knows ? :rolleyes:
 
Well, unfortunately, my Yikes! machine lacks DVD support... I got the stripped-down regular CD model.

I read something about some 800-1000MHz processors coming -- I know they support the later AGP-based Macs, and there are some that go on a PCI card for older PCI-based Macs, but nothing specifically mentions the G3/G4 machines like ours with a ZIF socket.

I am encouraged, though -- the PCI card that goes in the older PCI Macs like the 7600 and stuff do use a ZIF processor/socket combo on that PCI card, so maybe... just MAYBE... we'll be able to buy an 800-1000MHz processor for our machines. There's only so high the bus multiplier can go, so there's a theoretical maximum speed our motherboards can support -- ours can go to 8x, meaning our maximum speed we can get is 800MHz (100MHz bus speed x 8). I'm still hopeful, though!
 
Ooops, about the DVD thing. Actually, I bought the CD drive one too. However, I upgraded it with a Toshiba combo (was available for about $160 2+ years ago). That one does CD(-RW) and DVD. Works great with Apple's DVD player. The combo was never advertised for the Mac (it's supposed to be PC only). However, as I said, it works with Apple's DVD player (even without hardware support on the graphics card). Burning with Toast and DiskCopy works nicely, too (out of the box, of course, after all, it's a Mac ;-).

Okay, so the max would be 800MHz. That's fair enough I think. Let's wait and see...
Yepp, the upgrades are there... As of now, nothing is announced for the Yikes but then... At least we have a decent bus speed (100Mhz). If demand is okay, they might as well put out something for the Yikes...
That'd be :cool:
 
I second that hearty recommendation for the Radeon 7000. One of the best things I put into my B&W G3. I'd rehash all that was said, but that would be redundant. Just get the card! You can find it as low as $105 - 109 shipped. Check pricewatch.com.
 
I picked up a ATI Radeon 7000 in hopes that it would allow me to play war3 on a g4 400mhz... didn't really help :( So i'm returning it and picking up an imac 700mhz :D
 
Thank you all for your input.
I actually ordered the new card.
lasmith5, that's strange. I have absolutely no problem playing WarCraft 3 even with my old graphics card. Perhaps more RAM would help ?
 
Originally posted by Dekatophil
Thank you all for your input.
I actually ordered the new card.
lasmith5, that's strange. I have absolutely no problem playing WarCraft 3 even with my old graphics card. Perhaps more RAM would help ?
Click to expand...

Im running osx 10.5 with 512mb of ram, and graphics set to their lowest... mouse crawls and game doesn't look too hot since i lowered all the settings. Do you have something different setup?
 
512MB, that certainly sounds alright. Well, I just used the default settings on a 15" TFT display.
It really runs okay. I would have to check the settings... However I didn't alter any of the parameters, if that helps you...

Well, perhaps the question should be put to more ppl in order to find out the reasons for the apparent difference in performance...
 
Originally posted by ElDiabloConCaca
Next on the list: processor upgrade, $300 for 500MHz. Not bad for a 20% increase in overall system speed.
Click to expand...

You could try overclocking it to 450 Mhz for free. (Well, I paid $10 for a small fan that hangs underneath my CDRW drive.) I've been running stable for 8 months, so far. I think we're the last machine to be able to overclock it by just setting the jumpers.

http://www.xlr8yourmac.com/G4ZONE/G4YIKESOC/

http://www.xlr8yourmac.com/systems.html

If you're brave and/or can solder (not me!):

http://www.xlr8yourmac.com/G4ZONE/G4YIKESOC/500MHz_yikes.html
http://www.xlr8yourmac.com/G4ZONE/G4YIKESOC/peltier.html

Hope this helps....
 
Well, I have War3 with full graphics setting on my LCD iMac (700mhz) and it runs perfectly, with 512mb ram... so yeah, it can happen.
 
The Yikes! G4 is the earliest model G4 there was. I don't know the exact history....

Actually, just found it here:

http://www.apple-history.com/quickgallery.html?where=g4pci.html

Apple basically slapped a G4 chip on a modified version of the Yosemite B/W G3 motherboard.

The Yikes! has its advantages and disadvantages. No airport support, no "option key booting" to select which System to boot from, no Quartz Extreme support since it has all PCI slots (no AGP), slower Ultra ATA 33 controller chip, etc. But it's one h<sum>ll of an easy overclock.

Mine shipped a day before the big "speed dump"--remember that? I got an email the next day saying that Apple was sorry, but they weren't able to fill my order for a 400 Mhz G4, (which I had already paid for in full ), and would offer me a 350 Mhz G4 instead!!! Well, like I said, mine had already shipped, so it didn't matter for me. Apple eventually decided to reverse that decision--anybody who ordered in the past and were waiting for their order to be filled, would get what they paid for, but from that day forward, the 3 available models were all 50 Mhz slower than before (but priced the same as they were before....

Hope this helps....
 
I ordered my G4/400 Yikes! machine the DAY they were released -- actually, I had a G3/450 on order, and Apple politely cancelled that order the day the G4s went on sale... needless to say, I promptly ordered the base model and have been happy with it ever since.

I'm not going for the overclock -- this machine serves as my livelihood as well as my personal home computer, so all the mods I make to it won't put my warranty or the health of my computer at risk. I tried to go to 450MHz once -- I barely tried, though. I got the jumper block off, but the pushpin method didn't work for getting the jumpers out -- apparently mine are wedged in that block REALLY well! Perhaps I could spend about a buck and get a new block from Radio Shack, but 400MHz is fine for me, and I'm patiently waiting for that 800MHz ZIF upgrade to be released!
 
I can but agree. Me too, I'm not going to mess around with my machine because I rely on it home&work.
Actually, I got the very first G4 in town ! I went to the only shop that had it. The guys wouldn't even sell it, telling me "it's the only one I got !" (apparently they wanted to fiddle around with it first, hehe). Anyways, it was another week when everyone was (re-)supplied.
It is a very solid piece of hardware and I do hope that it remains upgradable.
 
Originally posted by ElDiabloConCaca
but 400MHz is fine for me, and I'm patiently waiting for that 800MHz ZIF upgrade to be released!
Click to expand...

I received word from PowerLogix asking them whether 800/1000MHz upgrades would be made available fot the Yikes (and BW G3s for that matter) as well. The answer was "Yes".
 
That would be a godsend if they did that. I'd put off buying another machine for a few years if I could get this one to 800MHz. I don't see how they'd implement 1000MHz processors, though, for these machines since the bus multipliers only go up to 8x...
 
Dunno about the 1GHz. That's the text of the email I got:
I wrote:
Dear,

is there a chance we'll see upgrade cards for G3/G4 PCI based systems that go beyond the current 550 MHz ?
In the light of the recent advent of 800/1000MHz upgrade cards for AGP based systems, I wondered whether such speeds will be available for the above mentioned systems (especially the Yikes G4) as well.
They answered:

Yes.

Thanks for your inquiry!
Robert
 
This is all great news to me, I have a 350mhz B&W G3 tower, the price to upgrade to a 500mhz G4 seemed just a bit too high to be worth it for me, I was considering just getting even a 500mhz G3 upgrade. Right now I have it overclocked to 400mhz...I tried 450 for a while but I think I need to install another fan or two to get that to run stable. But if they release 800/1000mhz G4 upgrades I could use I'd most definately buy one of them. I'm also ordering a Raedon 7000 soon as I get paid this week, I can't wait :D
 
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