Become a MacRumors Supporter for $50/year with no ads, ability to filter front page stories, and private forums.

gavinstubbs09

macrumors 65816
Original poster
Feb 17, 2013
1,386
256
NorCal boonies ~~~by Reno sorta
So I tend to have a lot of broken PPC macs between my G5 Quad, 466MHz DA, and my FW800 MDD.

This MDD I bought off my coworker for $25, originally a FW800 single 1GHz machine, he purchased a dual 1GHz processor card and installed it, however the machine only saw it as a dual 800MHz G4 due to the 133MHz vs 167MHz bus the dual processors required. Machine worked great but I wanted faster speeds so I removed the resistor to allow it to run at 167MHz. Ran great for a while then it started to lock up and freeze, and a few minutes before that happens the ethernet would stop working and so would the extra PCI ethernet card I installed. Tried messing with the usual PRAM, SMC, swapping ram, pulling PCI cards, etc to no avail.

So I think the board is toast because I removed that resistor, but I am considering ordering one from eBay that came from a 1.25GHz dual machine already with the 167 FSB. Board would cost $38.44 and I would receive 2GB ram with the board, I think I may have to do just that.

I guess you can say I am returning from my break to the PowerPC game :)
[doublepost=1465241703][/doublepost]The guy has two boards for sale both from a DP 1.25GHz FW800. Only difference is one has a modem and the other has a bluetooth card. I already have a modem, so I think I'll go with the bluetooth card listing.

Ordered! Time to make the MDD live again.
 
Last edited:
  • Like
Reactions: oi! and eyoungren
In preparation I gutted it and removed all the IDE cables. Figured I might as well add in a SATA optical drive while I'm at it!

IMG_1016.jpg
 
So today's update!

Received the new logic board at work and swapped in the new board as well as adding a SATA optical drive.

At first I noticed it had 4x512MB of OWC ram sticks, which I'm sure wasn't cheap back in the day! So I put it all together and at first it didn't show anything on the display, removed all PCI cards, saw the finder icon, reinserted all the cards back and the machine successfully booted.

Happy to say it has yet to kernel panic and ethernet has been working flawlessly. I'm stoked to have it again!

Coolest thing is I have a Apple Wireless Keyboard (2xAA battery model) laying around that I can use with this thing because it now has bluetooth.

I did run the serial number and found out it was actually pulled from a 1.42GHz MDD, and I think in the near future I'll upgrade this to either a 1.33 or a 1.42. I found on ebay a 1.42 and the copper heatsink for $133.60 shipped to my door.

IMG_1044.jpg
 
  • Like
Reactions: oi! and Ih8reno
So today's update!

Received the new logic board at work and swapped in the new board as well as adding a SATA optical drive.

At first I noticed it had 4x512MB of OWC ram sticks, which I'm sure wasn't cheap back in the day! So I put it all together and at first it didn't show anything on the display, removed all PCI cards, saw the finder icon, reinserted all the cards back and the machine successfully booted.

Happy to say it has yet to kernel panic and ethernet has been working flawlessly. I'm stoked to have it again!

Coolest thing is I have a Apple Wireless Keyboard (2xAA battery model) laying around that I can use with this thing because it now has bluetooth.

I did run the serial number and found out it was actually pulled from a 1.42GHz MDD, and I think in the near future I'll upgrade this to either a 1.33 or a 1.42. I found on ebay a 1.42 and the copper heatsink for $133.60 shipped to my door.

IMG_1044.jpg
Nice Cisco phone. Probably should update to a 7961 or something.... Looks sharp dude
 
Nice Cisco phone. Probably should update to a 7961 or something.... Looks sharp dude

First true VoIP phone I've got to use, I like it!

This is off-topic, but, a Lord Gabe picture? Really? :p

You'd love our medusa picture, it's her face with black power cords hanging around it!

But yeah, it's a computer repair shop and we love our pictures! We have "ayyy lamo" printed on two sheets of paper to cover holes in the wall where a TV used to be mounted :)
 
Register on MacRumors! This sidebar will go away, and you'll see fewer ads.