Upgrade Firewire G3 to 900mhz?

[sjjordan]

I have a G3 firewire powerbook running at 400 mhz. Do you guys think it's a good idea to spend the $350 to upgrade it to a 900 mhz machine?

I can do it through powerlogix

Think it'd make a difference? I'm still running on an 8 mb video card. ouch!

Steve

 

[utilizer]

I'm contemplating doing the same thing, however, IBM did just release their 1.1 Ghz G3 chip for the iBook. Note that at the beginning of the year at MWSF, PowerLogix release the upgrade you're talking about at 800 mhz then as soon as the iBooks got a refresh, it got bumped up to 900 mhz. So now I'm waiting for the 1.1 Ghz iBooks to debut and then will anxiously gaze in the direction of PowerLogix.

 

[StrongGlad]

I have the same machine that you do, and I was contemplating the 800 MHz upgrade a while back, as well as the 500 MHz G4 upgrade. I ultimately went for the G4 uprgrade, since I felt that my uses would benefit more from Altivec, and they weren't yet shipping the 800 MHz (it had only just been announced).

The price was $300 for the G4, and definitely worth it. There was a noticeable speed boost across the board, even in non-altivec apps. My guess is that you'll be more than pleased with the additional speed of a 900 MHz chip. Powerlogix does fine work, too.

If you haven't already done so, give the machine LOTS of RAM. Going from 320 to 768 MB made quite a big difference for me, even before I upgraded the CPU.

Also, you might consider a 5400 RPM HD. I got the one from Toshiba, since it had the largest cache (16 MB), and it also provided a significant performance bump.

The Firewire G3 PB is, in my opinion, one of the best machines Apple has ever made.

 

[utilizer]

Originally posted by StrongGlad


The Firewire G3 PB is, in my opinion, one of the best machines Apple has ever made.

I've got to agree with you on that one. I remember when the Pismo was on the front page of Apple one day and I knew I had to get one. If only Apple would incorporate the curves of this machine into the Al-finish and stick in G5 architecture. Now that would really be a sexy beast.