Power Mac G4 Cube for $120, is it Worth it?

[Dmac77]

Hi,

I have an opportunity to buy a G4 Cube for $120. It's pretty scratched up, and the OS is corrupted. I have a tiger disk to use it reinstall Mac OS X on it though. IT's a 450 Mhz, and has a DVD-ROM, other than that the guy doesn't know much about it and can't really find out more. Do you guys think that it is worth it? I might be able to get him down to $100, plus I've always wanted one of these computers. It will probably get a Processor upgrade within the year and get used as a media server.

Thanks for your input!

Don

 

[noodle654]

Hi,

I have an opportunity to buy a G4 Cube for $120. It's pretty scratched up, and the OS is corrupted. I have a tiger disk to use it reinstall Mac OS X on it though. IT's a 450 Mhz, and has a DVD-ROM, other than that the guy doesn't know much about it and can't really find out more. Do you guys think that it is worth it? I might be able to get him down to $100, plus I've always wanted one of these computers. It will probably get a Processor upgrade within the year and get used as a media server.

Thanks for your input!

Don

For $120?? Hell yeah!! Buy that, they are very rare to find and you could probably sell it on eBay if you fix it up a bit.

 

[Dmac77]

For $120?? Hell yeah!! Buy that, they are very rare to find and you could probably sell it on eBay if you fix it up a bit.

Thanks I will. I'll probably wind up putting a 1.8 ghz G4 in it and make it a very nice little media server. BY the way, can anyone tell me if the cubes have the 128Gb HDD limit, and if they do can I put a SATA controller in it?

Thanks!

Don

 

[bigrell486]

The cube is a good Machine.

I don't think there would be anyway for you to put a SATA controller in, Where would you put it?

 

[KingYaba]

The cube is a collector's item is it not?

 

[Dmac77]

True, what was I thinking, no PCI slots duh! Yeah it is nice machine, and I'll keep it on my desk and hook some external FW400 drives to it, will make a nice second computer to. Oh what are your opinions on upgrading the processor in it? Is there a noticeable difference? Is it easy, or hard? And could anyone recommend a video card? I know that it can't take full size cards, so I'm kind of lost on which cards would work with it.

Thanks!

Don

 

[G5power]

Before you buy make sure that the cube includes the external power supply as that would be expensive to replace. Also start from your Tiger CD and make sure that it will boot up that far.

I paid something like $175 for my cube last year with the standard combo drive. However the case was very clean and it came with the original little USB speakers, power supply and keyboard.

The first thing I did when I bought my cube was upgrade the memory. It came with only like 128MB and I removed that and installed 1.25 GB (2x512 and 1x256). The memory helped the performance. Also I have a 60 GB 7200 RPM drive to replace the stock slower 5400 RPM drive.

From researching online there are some video card upgrade options but they are more limited then the Power Mac towers.

I've decided that the expense of a processor upgrade doesn't make sense and am concerned that additional voltage / heat might effect the life span of other components.

The cube is hooked up to an Apple 17 inch LCD and I enjoy having it around as a collector / cool computer.

 

[tsice19]

If he doesn't no much about them, you might be able to get him to go cheaper. Other than that, buy it, enjoy it, and post some pics!

 

[iGrant]

Hi,

I have an opportunity to buy a G4 Cube for $120. It's pretty scratched up, and the OS is corrupted. I have a tiger disk to use it reinstall Mac OS X on it though. IT's a 450 Mhz, and has a DVD-ROM, other than that the guy doesn't know much about it and can't really find out more. Do you guys think that it is worth it? I might be able to get him down to $100, plus I've always wanted one of these computers. It will probably get a Processor upgrade within the year and get used as a media server.

Thanks for your input!

Don

I would get it. The G4 Cube was my first Macintosh and I still have mine. I just recently connected to a new Dell 20" Widescreen monitor that I got and with the stock video card, it was able to run the max resolution of the monitor which is 1650x1080.

However I will say this, the ram is an essential upgrade as it really helps the OS considering it only has a 450Mhz CPU. Second I would look into getting a Seagate Barracuda drive, its freaking insane silent and it runs cool which you have to be careful of since it has not fans.

As for the operating system, I would highly recommend install Mac OS X 10.3 Panther, you can pickup a used copy of it on eBay for nothing. I ran 10.4 on my G4 Cube for a while, and it did run great, but not nearly as good as 10.3.

. . . I also installed 10.5 on my G4 Cube 2 days after 10.5 was released due to a neat trick I discovered with Target Disk Mode. I hated it, the Cube was so incredibly slow it was insane.

Also, I would HIGHLY HIGHLY recommend getting an 80mmx80mmx15mm fan to install into you G4 Cube. I bought one of Newegg that also has Blue Leds in it that make the Cube light up blue, and the fan is not even as loud as the hard drive spinning inside. I does not move that much CFM of air . . . I think barely 20 CFM. However with that being said the Cube by designs moves . . . no CFM of air so its an improvement and it will DRASTICALLY lower the temperature of your G4 Cubes components.

-iGrant

PS I will post pics if anyone is interested of the G4 Cube glowing blue!!!