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New acquisition: MDD 1Ghz Powermac

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sos_nz

macrumors member
Original poster
Feb 11, 2022
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Just picked up a 1Ghz FW800 MDD with 256MB RAM and a 120GB HDD with both Sorbet Leopard and 9.2.2 installed and working (boot selectable by holding the "option" key @ startup).

All good, except the graphics card, via DVI out (I don't have an ADC to DVI adapter) is giving odd artefacts in both OS9 and OSX. It's an ATI 9000 [edited - originally thought is was a 9600) from what I can gather, with 64MB VRAM. Trying to run it at 1900x1080, but have also tried lower resolutions. Tried res-eating the card, cleaning the pins etc. The caps look OK.

Basically vertical lines running up and down the screen (in OSX an 9), and a square blob where the mouse pointer is (OS9), and an overall yellow tinge to the screen (OSX).

Is there anything else I can try, or should I be looking for a replacement AGP card?
 
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sos_nz said:
Just picked up a 1Ghz FW800 MDD with 256MB RAM and a 120GB HDD with both Sorbet Leopard and 9.2.2 installed and working (boot selectable by holding the "option" key @ startup).

All good, except the graphics card, via DVI out (I don't have an ADC to DVI adapter) is giving odd artefacts in both OS9 and OSX. It's an ATI 9600 from what I can gather, with 64MB VRAM. Trying to run it at 1900x1080, but have also tried lower resolutions. Tried reseating the card, cleaning the pins etc. The caps look OK.

Basically vertical lines running up and down the screen (in OSX an 9), and a square blob where the mouse pointer is (OS9), and an overall yellow tinge to the screen (OSX).

Is there anything else I can try, or should I be looking for a replacement AGP card?
Click to expand...
Congrats. I've been wanting an MDD for some time but have never gotten one. It's the only G4 I've never owned or actually used.

Anyway, I'd be looking for a new card. However, in the meantime here's a couple of things to try for OS X. I can't help with OS9.

1. Removing the Radeon kext files. You can do that one of two ways, either boot into Safe Mode and remove them or enable the root user account and remove them and then restart.

Located here: System>Library>Extensions

Find all the kexts that start with 'ATI Radeon' and move them to a safe place.

Don't trash them, just put them in a folder somewhere where you can move them back later.

The downside to this is that it's going to disable Quartz Extreme. If you use your MDD for gaming, that's going to have a big impact.

2. Download ATI Displays. This is going to install an ATI control panel in System Preferences and that CP will allow you to underclock your card. Underclocking it will reduce performance, but it'll also reduce heat and I suspect that's ultimately what is causing the problem.

You could also just repaste the card, but I'm not 100% certain the problem is heat related.

The first two things I've done for a 9800 Pro and an X1800 XT in order to reduce artifacting and lines on the screen so I know those work. If they do not with your card then that's just verification you're going to need a new GPU.
 
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Thanks - the seller hopefully has a spare GPU lying around he will send. Will report back in due course.

As there are issues under both OSX and OS9, I'm not going to muck around with software solutions, and if the replacement card works properly, then I'll look to revive the existing card as you've outlined.

One question: how does one safely remove the black aluminium heat sink on the GPU itself? There are no screws or mounting hardware, so I assume it's glued on somehow.
 
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If that is actually a Radeon 9600, not the factory Radeon 9000 the MDD would’ve came with, the card won’t have any acceleration in OS 9.
That doesn’t have anything to do with the artifacts you’re experiencing, the GPU is probably going out.

But if the seller ends up sending another 9600 that works, OS 9 will function but without any acceleration and probably the wrong resolution. But the card will work in OS X (panther and up?)
 
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Update: it's actually a Radeon 9000 that's in the machine at present. Interestingly, OSX reports Core Image is supported (Sorbet).
 
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sos_nz said:
Update: it's actually a Radeon 9000 that's in the machine at present. Interestingly, OSX reports Core Image is supported (Sorbet).
Click to expand...
Are you sure it doesn’t say “Software” in terms of CI support? That means “Yo d00d, the GPU ain’t good enough so the CPU has to do all the work.”
 
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You're correct! It says "Software" for Core Image support.

Picture 1.png
 
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Ta! Since I already have a dual G5 for playing around in OSX (thanks for the Atlona, btw!), I'll prioritise getting an OS9-capable card. Probably another 9000 if a quick recap doesn't fix this one (unlikely), since they seem a little more available than other options.
 
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Card remained corrupted despite replacing the 5 larger caps (470uF 16V SMD and four 470uF 10V through holes). Interestingly, it's supposed to be a 64Mb card, yet OSX is only seeing 32MB as per the screenshot above. May mean half the RAM or the memory controller is broken?

Either way, awaiting a replacement card now.

In the meantime, have sucessfully installed OS9, Tiger and Sorbet on three separate partitions on a 256GB SSD.
 
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[EDITED: the 9000 is now outputting video once it reaches an OS, but no boot screen/boot picker/open firmware on screen i.e. no "early" video output.]

The replacement Geforce 4 MX card arrived and it didn't output any video image (but I could tell it was still able to boot to OSX, thanks to the volume keys making sound and the eject key ejecting). Reinstalled the corrupted 9000 and it booted fine, albeit with the corrupted video as above.

I then, out of the blue, got an odd "the memory configuration has changed" error when booting into OS9.

Then I could no longer open the system picker (holding 'option' @ boot), with the display flickering several times, then the machine would boot straight to an OS.

So I used the terminal in OSX to disable open firmware's "auto boot?", intending to use the system picker. Now there's no early video image at all.

The power "bong" still works, fans spin, and it does get to open firmware headlessly (I can type 'mac-boot', and it does load OSX or OS9 in the background, and other commands such as 'eject cd' work, and I've reset the nvram from the open firmware terminal blind).

I've taken all the cards out except the video card, and pulled all the attached drives, airport card, and tried each individual RAM chip in different slots. No early video output.

Also pulled the PRAM battery and left the machine unplugged for an hour. All to no avail - still no early video signal.

Thinking it could be a dead/dying PSU, I've even re-wired up a spare ATX (according to the various guides) and got the machine to power on OK, but otherwise same as above - no early video output.

Now hoping a VGA-only video card (Rage 128) may at least show the machine *can* output an early video signal properly!
 
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Sweet success!!

So I ended out buying a Radeon 9650 w/256MB VRAM. For it to work in the MDD's AGP 4x slot, I removed resistors R15 and R60, cut the rear tab off, slotted her into the AGP and she booted into OS9 first time, with early video (open firmware and boot picker) available again. Yay!

*But* the mouse button wouldn't work. So I booted into Sorbet Leopard (screenshot of card details attached), and downloaded the ATI 2005 OS9 drivers (https://www.macintoshrepository.org/1357-ati-os-9-drivers-january-2005-).

Reinstalled the dodgy old card, booted into OS9, installed the drivers, resinstalled the 9650, and now OS9 works perfectly, at least for 2D stuff.

In brief, the lack of early video output above seems purely down to a dying card - annoying, but there you go.

Lastly, a loose stick of RAM needed reseating to get the startup chime back, and to get rid of the OS9 startup message "the built-in memory test has detected a problem".

V. happy after the trials and efforts. Now at least I have a working ATX to MDD adaptor for if/when the time comes to fit an ATX PSU, and a *much* better working knowledge of the MDD G4 :)

Picture 1.png
 
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As the owner of something of "home made" dual 1.25 GHz MDD, I can say that its only real failing is that the Radeon 9000 just isn't powerful enough for late PPC Mac games. I can only imagine the Radeon 9650 doesn't suffer from the same problem. It's probably the better tradeoff, considering most apps for OS 9 that use 3d Acceleration I can think of off the top of my head got OSX ports.

And for anything that doesn't, I can heartily recommend this: https://forums.macrumors.com/threads/vintage-jaguar-just-enough-os-x-for-classic.2336900/

Jaguar's classic really is better.
 
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repairedCheese said:
I can only imagine the Radeon 9650 doesn't suffer from the same problem.
Click to expand...
Yeah, it's really nice. But then again, neither does the x1900GT I've got in my dual G5 ;)

I am looking forward to taking the 8500 for a spin once she arrives.

repairedCheese said:
Jaguar's classic really is better.
Click to expand...
I'm lucky enough to be able to run a 2-machine strategy. The G5 for purely OSX PPC stuff, and the G4 in native OS9 in preference to Classic, for OS9 only stuff. Vintage Jaguar does look pretty cool though!
 
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sos_nz said:
Yeah, it's really nice. But then again, neither does the x1900GT I've got in my dual G5 ;)

I am looking forward to taking the 8500 for a spin once she arrives.


I'm lucky enough to be able to run a 2-machine strategy. The G5 for purely OSX PPC stuff, and the G4 in native OS9 in preference to Classic, for OS9 only stuff. Vintage Jaguar does look pretty cool though!
Click to expand...
Going all in with a Radeon 8500, I see? Legend has it only the Geforce4 Ti 4600 is more powerful, but if anything, I'm happy to have found a like minded individual in these parts. My own G5 isn't quite as powerful, being a lowly PCI model, but that doesn't stop it from letting me mess around with PPC64 Linux and higher end OSX apps. Seeing that it has an AGP port, you can imagine it's a little more hobbled.

I don't expect people to love OS 9, I don't expect OS 9 to be able to work as a daily driver for most tasks, if only because of our reliance on the internet in the last 20 years. But, being able to run it fully and properly opens up a library of software that can be so much more of a pain to emulate.

But for what OS 9 can't do, there's always Basilisk II: https://macintoshgarden.org/apps/basilisk-ii-20091004

Sometimes I just want to be able to run the entire software library.
 
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Amethyst1 said:
Can you get 2560×1440 at 60 Hz from the 9650's dual-link DVI port in OS 9 and/or OS X via the Atlona AT-DP400?
Click to expand...
Good thought! I'll hook it up in the next couple of days and let you know.

Can't see a reason why not, although 1920x1080@60Hz is fine for OS9 as those icons get pretty small, and the software isn't really designed for 2k resolutions and above.
 
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Running the Atlona via DVI on one port of the 9650 results in a maximum selectable resolution in OS9 and OSX of 1920x1080. On the other DVI port, I get no output on the Atlona and it's a bit garbled under OS9 via a direct connection DVI to DVI, albeit at the higher res of 2560x1440.

Looks like I'll be sticking with the perfectly serviceable res. of 1920x1080@60.
 
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sos_nz said:
Running the Atlona via DVI on one port of the 9650 results in a maximum selectable resolution in OS9 and OSX of 1920x1080.
Click to expand...
Sounds like this one is a single-link port. (On the 9650, one port is single-link and the other is dual-link.)

sos_nz said:
On the other DVI port, I get no output on the Atlona and it's a bit garbled under OS9 via a direct connection DVI to DVI, albeit at the higher res of 2160x1440.
Click to expand...
You mean 2560×1440? Do the monitor and the cable support dual-link DVI?

sos_nz said:
Looks like I'll be sticking with the perfectly serviceable res. of 1920x1080@60.
Click to expand...
If you fancy playing with SwitchRes2 and SwitchResX, you could try 2560×1440@41 which is doable via single-link DVI using CVT-RB timings.
 
Amethyst1 said:
2560×1440?
Click to expand...
Ooops. Yes! Edited.
Amethyst1 said:
On the 9650, one port is single-link and the other is dual-link
Click to expand...
Ahhh. That's helpful to know. Will give it a bit more of a trial this weekend and see where I get to. Yes, the monitor (an LG 27GL850 is a 1440p x 144Hz Freesync IPS monitor, and the Atlona and cable are simply swapped across to the 9650 from the x1900GT, which does run 1440p@60Hz.
Amethyst1 said:
If you fancy playing with SwitchRes2
Click to expand...
Not so much for the G4, thankfully. Happy to roll at 1920x1080 in OS9, and it's buttery smooth anyway, and reasonably sized. Myth already looks far less impressive in a small window than I remember it looking full screen back in the day!
 
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sos_nz said:
Will give it a bit more of a trial this weekend and see where I get to.
Click to expand...
Looking forward to your results. Pricking the Atlona’s “Reset” button sometimes helps when it shows a black screen IME.
 
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