Additional Internal hard drive question - Powermac G4 (MDD)

[thomasp]

Hi,

We have a PowerMac G4 (the first of the Mirrored Drive Doors generation), Dual 867MHz, 1.25Gb RAM, OSX 10.2.8 and the standard 60Gb internal HD.

Since the internal hard drive (along with our 160Gb external drive) is rapidly filling up, and we'd like some additional storage, aside from CD's, we considered fitting another internal hard drive, alongside the current 60Gb drive.

However, I don't have a clue what type of hard drive to buy, all I know is one that has at least 160Gb of storage. I saw this drive: http://www.cwonline.co.uk/details.t...=details&listing=subcategories&nocache=634328 on ComputerWarehouse, and wondered if it would work on the G4. According to the online datasheet for the computer, it has the following requirements for HD's:

• Four 3.5-inch hard drive expansion bays
—One 7200-rpm Ultra ATA/100 drive preinstalled in standard configurations: 60GB, 80GB, or 120GB (we have the 60Gb installed)
—Support for up to four internal ATA drives (two Ultra ATA/100 and two Ultra ATA/66)
—Support for up to four internal SCSI drives (requires PCI SCSI card, sold separately)
—Support for a combination of internal ATA and SCSI drives (total of four)

Will this hard drive work on our G4? If so, how easy are they to install and set up on OSX 10.2.8?

If not, can you still buy hard drives that will fit this "old" machine?


Thanks for the help

 

[smokeyrabbit]

That drive is a Serial ATA drive, the kind used in the G5. You need an Ultra ATA (or simply ATA) drive. An ATA/133 drive would work, also, since it is backward compatible.

The Serial ATA drives will work if you get a SATA controller card, like this one. This is a very easy upgrade to do yourself. Literally plug the card in, attach the cables to the drive, attach the drive to the case, turn the computer on, erase with Disk Utility, and there you go.

You can get 2 or 4 channel SATA controller cards, depending on how many drives you forsee yourself adding.

 

[thomasp]

That drive is a Serial ATA drive, the kind used in the G5. You need an Ultra ATA (or simply ATA) drive. An ATA/133 drive would work, also, since it is backward compatible.

The Serial ATA drives will work if you get a SATA controller card, like this one. This is a very easy upgrade to do yourself. Literally plug the card in, attach the cables to the drive, attach the drive to the case, turn the computer on, erase with Disk Utility, and there you go.

You can get 2 or 4 channel SATA controller cards, depending on how many drives you forsee yourself adding.

So if I was to get this 160Gb ATA drive ( http://www.cwonline.co.uk/details.t...=details&listing=subcategories&nocache=987940 ), would it just be a matter of fitting it into one of the bays on the PM and plugging in the neccesary cables, then formatting it?

I noticed in the user manual for the G4, certain types of drive have to go in certain bays (I think the ATA/100 drives go in a front bay and the ATA/66 in the back, but I'll double check) - as this appears to be a ATA/133 drive, would that matter? Which bay should it go in?


Thanks for the help.

 

[smokeyrabbit]

So if I was to get this 160Gb ATA drive ( http://www.cwonline.co.uk/details.t...=details&listing=subcategories&nocache=987940 ), would it just be a matter of fitting it into one of the bays on the PM and plugging in the neccesary cables, then formatting it?

I noticed in the user manual for the G4, certain types of drive have to go in certain bays (I think the ATA/100 drives go in a front bay and the ATA/66 in the back, but I'll double check) - as this appears to be a ATA/133 drive, would that matter? Which bay should it go in?


Thanks for the help.

ATA/133 is backward compatible with both 100 and 66. There would be an advantage to plugging it into the 66 side because only one drive per channel can be accessed at a time. I would plug your current drive into the 66 bus and plug the new one into the 100 bus. I'm pretty sure that your Mac can access the whole 160 GB. Most of the older ones can't see an ATA drive larger than 127 GB, so you would only be able to use 127 GB of your 160 GB drive if that were the case.

 

[thomasp]

ATA/133 is backward compatible with both 100 and 66. There would be an advantage to plugging it into the 66 side because only one drive per channel can be accessed at a time. I would plug your current drive into the 66 bus and plug the new one into the 100 bus. I'm pretty sure that your Mac can access the whole 160 GB. Most of the older ones can't see an ATA drive larger than 127 GB, so you would only be able to use 127 GB of your 160 GB drive if that were the case.

If I plug both drives into the same channel (both into the ATA/100 bays), what would happen? Would only one mount, or would they both mount and one would "freeze out" while the other is loading?