PowerPC Non-Intel Mod Thread

[SkippyThorson]

I've always wanted to know what people here are doing with their old Macs when they aren't used as primary computers anymore. I know a ton of PPCs go to work as a secondary computer, but what about those that go to serve another purpose?

I've been particularly interested in iMac G4 mods, but as of late, I'm wondering what others are doing with all of their old computers. Any really cool mods, or ideas out there? I think this would be a good place to share the stories.

There are many who want to give their PPC Mac the Intel upgrade, but I'm particularly interested in seeing all those Macs that have gone on to live totally different lives. Let's hear it!

 

[WGoins88]

I use mine as my main Mac. It's been upgraded, and does what I do daily, including eBay, forums, news, Youtube, Hulu, certain games, etc.

G4 MDD, upgraded to 1.25GHz Dual just today... was a Dual 1.0 with 1MB L3 cache per CPU, now it's 2MB per.

Geekbench - http://browse.geekbench.ca/geekbench2/view/375534

2GB Corsair XMS DDR with cooling thingies
XFX GeForce FX5200 Video card with 256MB of memory
2 80GB HDs
Dual layer DVD burner
OS X 10.5.8

 

[jchase2057]

Coolest that ive personally been involved with was helping a buddy put a mini in his g3 imac. It was fairly simple since we replaced the crt with an lcd and had lots of room to work with. I believe he's goona be putting the new mac mini in it soon as he just bought one not too long ago. If youre fine with 1024x768 then its a really cool mod and pretty easy to do. Plus its cheap to do since g3 imacs go for like 15 bucks on craigslist and 15 inch lcd monitors arent much either. With the mini you have lots of options depending on your budget.

 

[SkippyThorson]

One of my many goals (that I'll probably never get the chance to finish) is to make an all-in-one console mod. All-in-one computers have gotten big, but the fact that gaming consoles have remained headless is interesting to me.

I've always thrown around the idea of an Xbox or the tray loading PS2 in a G4, but those probably aren't realistic. Jberg44 (Dremel Junkie) put the idea out there to use a GameCube.

My first reaction was to stick that in an Apple Cube to make an AppleGameCube.

Someone here once threw out the idea of an Xbox in an iMac G3. There's certainly a lot of space to work with.

Both machines mentioned are pretty cool, too!

 

[-Ken-]

Two iMac G3s. Macquarium and another to play around with. I never had a Mac until this year. My first PC was in '83 (IBM PC Jr.)

 

[SkippyThorson]

Is your Macquarium finished? Care to shoot along a picture? Love to see your results of the finished product!