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Best video card for G4 sawtooth?
- Thread starter rabidz7
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The radeon 9800 card is the best card you can put in these puppies. It has 256mb vram and can be had for less than $100.
99% of the 2x compatible 9800 are 128MB not 256 so not sure where you got that spec from. Only the rare 256MB SE is 2x compatible. All the other 256MB only have one space in the pins which means 4x and 8x only.
You also forgot the part where a 9800 of any VRAM size needs a 300W+ PSU and the stock Sawtooth PSU is only 200W with a max load capability of 237W. The OP would need to modify a 20 pin ATX PSU to work in a Sawtooth.
Your post is what happens when people base their advice on nothing more than things they they read (and read incorrectly in your case) online somewhere. Remember that reading something gives you nothing but an empty fact in your head. You need legitimate experience and use with something to know what you're talking about.
Hi,
I have Radeon 9000's installed in my Sawtooths. One is 64MB, the other is 128MB. Both work great, no problems, and no need to upgrade the Power Supply.
As you likely know, you are looking for a video card for a 12 year old computer, so you will likely have to buy it used, and you probably don't want to spend too much...$250 could probably get you a decent, used Mac Mini.
Be aware that you will want the Mac version (i.e., you can't simply drop in a PC version of the same card). Some people "flashed" PC versions to work on the Mac, and apparently it worked (there were websites devoted to that topic, I can't remember their names).
I want to know why this is even a thread, couldn't the person asking for help just check the faq or do a 2 minute search online. This doesn't have to be a whole dang thread!
I think I just won't post for the next 6 months I'll still be around, waiting watching and learning. Your a very knowledgeable guy zen, but I have a lot to learn.
Lil Chillbil
Lil Chillbil
No need to go that far. Why not just help when it's something you can legitimately help with. Everyone knows something better than someone else so there must be things you can help with. Like people who need help with Macs or hardware you know.
I can be a bit stern at times but I certainly didn't intend to get you to stop posting.
You have my respect just for having a passion for PowerPC hardware.
Ok I think i''ll still post but I will be posting a lot less often and reading more information on this forum.
btw my specialty is imac g3s my garage is filled with them
It's all cool, bro.. we are all PowerPC community members. Even Zen sometimes says I give wrong advice. We are all learning. But I have to admit asking about flash continuing on PPC was stupid.
Back to the question first asked....when I was in the shower and massaging my scalp/brain, it occurred to me that the question to ask is:
What program do you want to run? (and why do you want to run it now, after getting by without it for so long?).
I just want to make sure you are not trying to run something that won't run well or at all on a PPC.
The main reason I made a fuss about it is that if the OP had bought a 256MB 9800 like Lil Chillbil suggested it would have a very very high likelihood of not working at all. Even if they bought the proper 128MB 2x capable the PSU would still be overpowered.
A Sawtooth will boot and run with a 9800 and the stock PSU but the video and everything will be underpowered in much the same way it was on PowerPC mac mini's. Anyone who owned a G4 mini and ran it at 1680 or higher res knows what I mean. Issues like horizintal lines of mostly blue and sometimes yellow colour because everything in the system (esp. the GPU) is getting too little power. The issue is even worse on a 9800 in a 200 watt PowerMac.
The most powerful yet easy option is to buy a pre-flashed Geforce 6200. It's the most powerful GPU that can run on a 200W G4 with the stock PSU. If you can find a pre-flashed one it's as simple as buy and plug in.
A Sawtooth will boot and run with a 9800 and the stock PSU but the video and everything will be underpowered in much the same way it was on PowerPC mac mini's. Anyone who owned a G4 mini and ran it at 1680 or higher res knows what I mean. Issues like horizintal lines of mostly blue and sometimes yellow colour because everything in the system (esp. the GPU) is getting too little power. The issue is even worse on a 9800 in a 200 watt PowerMac.
The most powerful yet easy option is to buy a pre-flashed Geforce 6200. It's the most powerful GPU that can run on a 200W G4 with the stock PSU. If you can find a pre-flashed one it's as simple as buy and plug in.
Minecraft web maybe civilization 5.
Yes, I know minecraft isn't directly supported but it runs if you double click on the .jar in the minecraft package.
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I have one of those but it needs ti be flashed any ideas?
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I have a geforce 6200 but it needs to be flashed, any ideas?
> I'm pretty sure that no AGP Mac video card has more than 256MB RAM; one or two flashed NVIDIA 7800s have 512MB but the system only detects half that.
> How fast is your CPU? My dual 1.8 G5 CPUs bottleneck my video card and I've got about as good as it gets as far as PPC Mac video cards.
> How fast is your CPU? My dual 1.8 G5 CPUs bottleneck my video card and I've got about as good as it gets as far as PPC Mac video cards.
You'll be CPU limited for most things, partially depends on what GPU you've got at the moment? What've you got?
I upgraded a 466MHz Digital Audio tower with 1.25GB memory and a 16MB ATI Rage Pro 128 to a 128MB Radeon 9600XT that I pulled from my G5 tower when I upgraded it; anything remotely related to graphics is vastly improved.
Here are the benchmarks:
https://forums.macrumors.com/threads/1398460/
I was playing around a bit last night and experimenting with Leopard performance on a spare 400MHz Sawtooth. The performance was a lot better than I had expected but I did have Core Image support and 2GB but for gaming you should have at least a 1.2GHz IMO.
Even MacTubes played video perfectly for me on the 400. I had only tried it before in that speed range on a 450 running Tiger.
The 400MHz is fine for daily computing or playing SD video in MT or VLC. I was playing 400p XviD last night in VLC and was shocked to see it only use 29% of the CPU with ver. 1.1.12.
The 2GB RAM is a great start but if you add a 6200 and then down the rad a 1.2+ GHz you will be able to play many PowerPC games.
EDIT: I thought I would add a list of games that will play on the 400MHz.
Oni
Quake 1/2/3
Anything from 2001 back is a safe bet also but those are the only 2 games I know from experience will play fine. I still keep Oni and Quake 3 on current boot drives along with more modern favs. I love the 1995-2005 game era on Mac the most since thats when all the PowerPC games were developed.
Even MacTubes played video perfectly for me on the 400. I had only tried it before in that speed range on a 450 running Tiger.
The 400MHz is fine for daily computing or playing SD video in MT or VLC. I was playing 400p XviD last night in VLC and was shocked to see it only use 29% of the CPU with ver. 1.1.12.
The 2GB RAM is a great start but if you add a 6200 and then down the rad a 1.2+ GHz you will be able to play many PowerPC games.
EDIT: I thought I would add a list of games that will play on the 400MHz.
Oni
Quake 1/2/3
Anything from 2001 back is a safe bet also but those are the only 2 games I know from experience will play fine. I still keep Oni and Quake 3 on current boot drives along with more modern favs. I love the 1995-2005 game era on Mac the most since thats when all the PowerPC games were developed.
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To the OP:
If you are interested, there is a fellow on the 68kmla.net list who was trying to sell a MDD G4 1.25GHz DP. I don't think you would have a problem with any game from the PPC era with that thing.
Really, at this point, you may be better off getting an older Mac Mini, or something Intel cheap, that can run any newer games. Hang on to the older PPC for older game compatibility, but don't drop any more money into the old thing.
If you are interested, there is a fellow on the 68kmla.net list who was trying to sell a MDD G4 1.25GHz DP. I don't think you would have a problem with any game from the PPC era with that thing.
Really, at this point, you may be better off getting an older Mac Mini, or something Intel cheap, that can run any newer games. Hang on to the older PPC for older game compatibility, but don't drop any more money into the old thing.
piece o' junk 16 mb gpu, cant even play youtube.
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Yes, but I want to be able to brag about having a 12 year old mac and being able to game on it.
Playing YouTube has nothing to do with the GPU. If it can't play YouTube, start looking for a CPU upgrade.
I have a 20 year old Mac and game on it regularly. Sometimes at Starbucks at that, just to see the strange looks on people's faces and because I can.
I also have a Power Mac G4 AGP Sawtooth and I was wondering if my Radeon 9200 would work. Apparently I have to tape it and desolder it!?
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