New hardware or upgrade current HW ???

What would you do ?

  • Upgrade my mac

  • Buy a new one and can the old one(or whatever)

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AdmiralAK

AdmiralAK

Simply Daemonic
Well I am thinking ahead of myself here to the day I my 350 G3 becomes too slow for my needs.

To buy a completelly new system, or Max out the ram (1Gb I think), get what would then be a good graphics card (lets say now a GeForce 2 or 3), and add one of those upgrade cards (like now it would be something like an MP500 or when it comes out a G5 expansion)... and possibly up the HD and add another internal one as well.

what would u do and why


Admiral
 
I'd go new because:

- I hope to see more dual processor models. That'd be cool.
- With the price of RAM being so low, why not max out on 133MHz ram on a 133Mhz board instead of your 66 or 100 board?
- With new you can scalp your B&W of hard drives et all and make a kick ass storage machine. Or sell it.
- Warranty. You might need it. Honest. They make 'em pretty cheap these days compared to the 680x0 days.


I am personally waiting. I see big improvements down the pipe and I personally don't want to blow my dough until I can buy a machine shipping with OSX ONLY, ie. "Made for OS X"
 
Isn't it possible to create clusters in Mac OS X? Imagine being able to put all of your prior and present computing power in one virtual box. Things no longer become obsolete..... Instead of having two machines, one old and one new, you have one powerful machine.

old + new = better than new

Wow, i don't even know if that is possible, i think ill leave this one to the experts....
 
The thing about clusters...
I thought i would combine some old macs to create a "small" supercomputer. But as i read on you have to create specific code to do that. And even if you manage to do that, there is the problem with bandwidth. Old macs simply don´t (or can´t) pass the information quick enough to the other computers.:(
 
Now i really don't know anything about clusters, I've only read one article on them, ever. Whats the possibility of 2 G3's or a couple of G4's making a cluster?
 
ok... if we really want to talk about clusters, then feast your eyes on this:
http://cfp.ist.utl.pt/golp/epp/index.htm
very droolworthy.

As far as the decision goes to get a new machine?
I just upgraded my box recently, and made similar decisions.
I look at it as being very relative to what you do...
I dig looking at code now and then, but I am far from 3L337.
I'm a graphics dawg by heart, and enjoy gaming once in a while.
I did go with the new box, and I'll tell you, I don't regret a penny of it.
My old 350 G3 still gets good use, too. I can set it up for many types of tasks to do while I'm doing something else on the main machine.
Multitasking is nice, but when you can move some processes over to completely different hardware, it's pretty cool.

And scott... you are absolutely right about ram.
I just found a deal where I can get 512meg pc133 chips for my g4 for only $89US each. Sweeet deal. I bought two. I will now be maxed out at 1.5 gig when they arrive!

One big reason to wait a bit?
the upcoming Macworld might mean new product updates, which in turn, will lead to a few price recuctions.

Things to consider.
-Anton-
 
I would buy new.

these are the reasons:
1. cool new machine
2. upgraded capabilities that my previous machine couldn't handle
3. if I could, why not spend the money?
4. cool to add new computers to a network
5. I am sure that I have more reasons but these are the ones quick on my mind.
 
I would buy a new one:

You mentioned putting a GeForce3 into the old Mac for an upgrade. You won't be able to do that, because it is really unlikely that there will be a PCI version of this card.

I think the Radeon is all the PCI port can handle.

If you want to do some really graphic intensive 3D things (like playing games), you should definitly buy a new Mac.
 
Get the new machine, don't waste your money upgrading... You use a fortune and after a short while it is worth nothing... People which might buy your used equipment will NOT pay the price of the cards, HD, RAM etc you put in your machine...
 
I have a G4 400 Mhz Sawtooth and I upgraded it with a 7447 G4 2Ghz processor from Gigadesigns, spending 400$. I also have 512 MB of Ram which will be soon upgraded too. Now my mac is really really fast, as I have to use it with some video-editing apps.
 
without seeing the figures on just how much you would be willing to spend, then it's difficult.

the biggest change with a new machine over old would be the bandwidths.

the FSB to the processors, the ram (DDR2 PC3200) , the video card bus (AGP 8x / PCI-e 16X), SATA hard drives, usb 2, digital audio etc, native DVI support etc.... plus just faster processors out of the box, and the whole new machine sheen (no built up dust inside etc)....

but does that justify the overall cost of replacing that machine? if you you were replacing it, then it would probably have to be a full powermac. how cheap are they these days, headless?
 
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