What to Upgrade First?

if you feel the need to upgrade anything, i'd swap your video card, or add another hard drive for raid.

2gb of ram is pointless unless you use absolutely huge files (which would require the 2nd hard drive first, making me assume you do not use huge files).

 

I would change the video card and add a second hard drive if it were mine. I see no need for more memory at this point. I would love to have your computer. It is a fine machine, so enjoy

 

yeah, for it being the lowest-end G5, its still a great machine. you got a good amount of RAM in it already, so unless your working with heavy video editing, I wouldnt worry about adding more ram.

i'd say get a second hard drive. you can always use more space.

I would say upgrade your video card, but only if you think its necessary. are you playing any games? that would be a question to ask yourself before upgrading.

 

Definitely change the video card, it'll give you the most improvement. 2GB and Raptor RAID seems like a waste of money.

 

well for motion and photoshop work, you really could use all of these things.

the graphics card will increase the longevity and performance of your computer the most noticeably, this would probably be the first thing i would upgrade. a 9800 se would be a good investment as it's unlikely you would need more power, and it's going to be one of the last generations of AGP graphics, so it will last the life of your system.

a negative to the graphics card is it's "recycle-ability". your next machine will have a better graphics card, so this card won't have a further use, then again your G5 will be around indefinitely. let's face it, even at 1.6 ghz and a signle processor, that is one powerful computer.

the HD space is also pretty necessary especially in Motion and heavy PS'ing work. i find anything under 250GB to get pretty cramped pretty fast (i use Apple Lossless audio and store DVD's on disk, combined with multimedia work, space is a premium). the first thing i would do is max out the storage space and raid them for performance.

RAM is the only iffy one. 1.2GB of ram is alot, no matter the theoretical 1^64 GB limit or 8 GB practical limit. You will only notice a boost in performance when you're using some huge files, and multitasking at the same time. The RAM would be the last thing I'd worry about.

I'd upgrade the HD now, it can be used in your next machine.

Wait for the price on the 9800SE to drop (around time 6800 is widely available). Then upgrade to the 9800SE or equivalent.

RAM can wait until you really feel the need. Next machine's ram will most likely be of a different type.

didn't mean to imply your G5 is crap, just that you got the shaft thanks to apple's marketing. it happened to everyone who got the MDD's, and it most likely just happened to me when i bought my Rev. C powerbook. it happens to everyone. im still considering upgrading my G4 (until G5 tops 3+ or G6), so...sorry if i rained on your parade.

 

I upgraded my G5 with an extra 160 gig Drive, so I would say go for the drive.

 

Did you RAID 0 the drives? I'm thinking about doing the same thing... should increase read/write two-fold, right?

 

I have essentially the same machine... I went with the ATI Radeon 9800 Pro SE 256MB... a bit pricey but it has been WELL worth it.

RAIDING raptors huh? Maybe I'll look into that....

 

I added the second drive into the G5. I formated the drive and it works great.