Increasing the cache of my machine

Discussion in 'General Mac Discussion' started by mymemory, Jul 30, 2002.

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  1. mymemory, Jul 30, 2002

    mymemory macrumors 68020

    mymemory

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    Miami
    #1
    I was talking with my friend (the one that owns the Apple store) and he is doing freaking stuff with his machines. He asked me if I wanted to place 6MB of cache to my Pismo. I'm thinking about it, I may do the experiment. He told me he does it with all his powerbooks (he changes every week). He can do it with the Power Macs too.

    Nice to have a friend who owns a Mac store and besides, like to mess with them. He is selling me a refurbish 17" flat panel display for $600, of course with one year warranty and service.

    Any way, does any body know about any trick like that? (besides incresing the bus speed).
     
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  2. Sun Baked, Jul 30, 2002

    Sun Baked macrumors G5

    Sun Baked

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    May 19, 2002
    #2
    Color me confused, because I had no idea the G3 could support that much external L2 cache.

    Nor that it was possible to mess with the size of the cache after it was soldered to the MB.
     
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  3. evildead, Jul 31, 2002

    evildead macrumors 65816

    evildead

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    #3
    6MB!

    6MB! that would be really nice. I wonder how reliable it would be to mess with it. It might be worth it if you trust you buddy to do it. I'm guessing that you have seen working Computers with the mod? What kind of proformance boost have you seen?
     
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  4. AlphaTech, Jul 31, 2002

    AlphaTech macrumors 601

    AlphaTech

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    Natick, MA
    #4
    I'd like to know how the hell he is doing that. I am 99% sure that the L2 cache is on the processor card in both the G3 powerbooks as well as the G4 towers. Even if it's not, and it's on the logic board, I wouldn't trust that it will function as well (or for as long) as what comes from Apple.

    You need to decide, is the potential gain offset the potential loss/harm that could be caused by that kind of modification???

    Try experimenting with the cache settings (in the memory control panel under OS 9). That will give you some idea as to what would be gained from increasing the physical cache.

    Goes back to the saying, just because something CAN be done, doesn't mean that it SHOULD be done.
     
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  5. Sun Baked, Jul 31, 2002

    Sun Baked macrumors G5

    Sun Baked

    Joined:
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    #5
    Does this amount of cache show up in the Apple System Profiler?

    No matter where it's soldered -- it still seems odd to me.

    I can't recall ever having seen support for that much external cache on the G3s or G4s, plus the fact it's an odd amount of cache. 512k, 1024k, and 2048k are the normal amounts used for external cache (whether L2 or L3) for the G3 and G4 series.

    The next chips may use 4MB or 8MB but why would anyone use 6MB -- it's not a normal amount of addressable space, especially for an external cache.

    I can see replacing the external cache RAM with something faster, so you can increase the speed multiplier using a cache control program. But changing the size to such an odd size seems a little odd.

    And where does it spec 6MB of addressable cache for the 750s?

    http://e-www.motorola.com/webapp/sps/site/taxonomy.jsp?nodeId=03M943030450467M98653

    I can't seem find it in any of the specs ...
     
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