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SATA Controller Card for Quicksilver G4

C

cwright

macrumors 6502a
Original poster
I would like to buy a new 250 gb hard drive for my Quicksilver G4, but it already has 2 internal IDE drives and I know that it can only recognize 137gb of the larder IDE drives.

I'd like to know if I were to buy a PCI SATA Controller card, could I use that to add a 250 GB SATA drive, and would the computer recogize the entire drive? (not only 137 gb).

I would like to do this instead of an external drive because I could then easily add the drive to a G5 when I upgrade... and its a bit cheaper.

also... I'd like to buy the SATA card from NewEgg b/c thats where i'd buy the hard drive...but they have tons of different cards at different prices. Can anyone let me know if the cheapest one there will work? or if there is any reason to spend more money on another one?

Thanks! 🙂
 
Coincidentally I have performed the same upgrade on my Quicksilver G4, only with a 200GB hard drive. Everything went smoothly and it was well worth it. The upgrade for me cost about $250.

The only thing I would probably do differently this time, is shop for the hard drive more, you can sometimes get very good deals at your local best buy or Comp USA.

You can get the SATA Card here:

http://eshop.macsales.com/Catalog_Page.cfm?Parent=950&Title=Serial_ATA&Template=1

good luck,

-cody
 
wow, that SATA card is expensive...
here is the one I was planning on buying:

http://www.newegg.com/app/viewProductDesc.asp?description=16-126-001&depa=0&manufactory=BROWSE

this one is only $22 from Newegg.com and appears to do the same as the $60 card from macsales.com you mentioned.

Im kind-of on a budget here, and was hoping to get it all for around $200. At newegg I can get the $22 SATA card and a 250gb Hitachi drive for $152. add shipping and that fits my budget perfectly.

Can anyone let me know if the SATA card from newegg will work? as far as i knew, all PCI hardware works without drivers in OSX... i may be wrong though 😕
 
If you buy any old SATA card, you will quickly find out the the BIOS on those cards are usually PC only, and that no Mac drivers exist. This trend is changing, however, as I know of one major SATA RAID company releasing Mac drivers, and another on the way.

Make sure your $22 card has Mac drivers.

Max.
 
JFreak said:
is it even worth installing s-ata in a G4? the pci will limit its speed anyway...
Click to expand...
I think convenience, not worrying about the file size limit (not for a while anyway 😉) and the smaller cables should make up for it.
 
Just did the same thing...

I bought a SIIG SATA card from OWC for $60 and then got a 160gb Hitachi Deskstar 7K250 for $97.

Unfortunately the cards from Newegg won't work since they don't have a Mac ROM.

-j
 
Thanks for the feedback... I guess I really doubted that the cheap cards would work in the first place...

I still want to order from newegg just to save on shipping costs (buying the hard drive and some DVD-Rs from there too), so I found this one:

http://www.newegg.com/app/viewProductDesc.asp?description=16-123-109&depa=0&manufactory=BROWSE

Its also $65, but specifically says it works in OS X and this one advertises the fact that it can support drives over 137gb

thanks again for all your help....
 
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