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Sawtooth Power Mac

D

DarkRevenant

macrumors member
Original poster
Mar 22, 2008
87
0
I have an old 466 mhz G4 Power Mac, its described as the "Sawtooth" edition. I was wondering if I could upgrade it to Dual Processors, and if so, what kind?

This whole project would just be for fun, so I don't want advice to tell me to get a new computer entirely. Thanks in advance
 
I've actually recently been thinking about doing this myself!

If you go to www.macsales.com and click the "g3/g4 upgrades" tab, then click on "powermac g4" from the list on the right, then select your model, they'll have some processors that should give you some idea of what you can do.

I believe, however, that if you're going to upgrade the processor, you also need to update the graphics card. They're also available there.

Once you have a rough idea of what you'd like, I'd do some digging to see if you can find what you want at the best possible price (ebay, etc.).

Good luck, and please let us know how things turn out!
 
check first, shop second...

just as a warning, several versions of logic boards out there, some will support duals, so not so much. sonnet has a decent pdf on how to check HERE that should be viewed before buying anything.

nothing worse than a new shiny dual sitting in a shipping box, and nothing to run it on...:(

best of luck.

EDIT: i should point out that this is for any manufacturer dual upgrade, not just sonnet. they just have the nice pdf that makes it easy to check and find the ASIC uni-x rev level.
 
If your logic board supports it like 4JNA posted, you can pick up a dual 500-550mhz processor from a Gigabit Ethernet G4 for cheap and slap that sucker on there. That and along with 2gb of RAM and you will have a really nice Mac.
 
OWC has a uni-rev checker utility too. For dualies, it HAS to be Uni-7 or later :)

And NO, you don't have to upgrade the video card just because you upgrade the cpu......but it sure makes a worthwhile addition....especially for running OS X.....

also be sure to mAxDaRam to 2Gb also :p
 
I was looking into this myself and I found it depends on how far you want to upgrade.

The 7448 G4s are a lot faster and lower powered than the old 7447 CPUs clock for clock and the fastest dual CPU I've seen is the dual 1.8ghz 7448 G4 for $599 at OWC.

That is the same model as UK dealers are selling for the equivalent price over here and you can buy a used 1.8ghz G5 in the UK from a mac dealer for just over £100 more than a dual 1.73Ghz 7448 G4 upgrade costs over here with VAT (£475 vs £370).

With a used G5, you get a faster system with support for up to 8Gb RAM, Native SATA, a giant cheese grater to put on your desk and an old mac you can still make use of with a KVM Switch and a cross over ethernet cable.
 
You don't have a Sawtooth so ignore the posts about the Uni-N revision. 466MHz is a "Digital Audio" G4 with a 133MHz bus. It's a step up from the Sawtooth with a 4x AGP slot rather than 2x.
 
just as a warning, several versions of logic boards out there, some will support duals, so not so much. sonnet has a decent pdf on how to check HERE that should be viewed before buying anything.
Click to expand...

I did that, and if the PDF is correct I can support dual processing.

That is the same model as UK dealers are selling for the equivalent price over here and you can buy a used 1.8ghz G5 in the UK from a mac dealer for just over £100 more than a dual 1.73Ghz 7448 G4 upgrade costs over here with VAT (£475 vs £370).

With a used G5, you get a faster system with support for up to 8Gb RAM, Native SATA, a giant cheese grater to put on your desk and an old mac you can still make use of with a KVM Switch and a cross over ethernet cable.
Click to expand...

Are you suggesting I just go for a G5 processor instead? That'd work?

You don't have a Sawtooth so ignore the posts about the Uni-N revision. 466MHz is a "Digital Audio" G4 with a 133MHz bus. It's a step up from the Sawtooth with a 4x AGP slot rather than 2x.
Click to expand...

I'm sorry if I misinformed you guys, it seems as if this is good news for me though, haha. I don't know what the AGP slot is, though.
 
The AGP slot is where your video card is. If I'm not mistaken, it should have a brown bezel around it while the PCI slots are white/black. The previous poster mentioned that for just a few dollars more, you can purchase an whole G5 Powermac then to just buy an upgraded processor card for your G4 mac.

With the G5, you get a faster bus, faster memory, faster hard drives(SATA), well... faster everything and one hell of a cool case. They look like the Mac Pros except with only one optical drive.
 
OrangeSVTguy said:
The AGP slot is where your video card is. If I'm not mistaken, it should have a brown bezel around it while the PCI slots are white/black. The previous poster mentioned that for just a few dollars more, you can purchase an whole G5 Powermac then to just buy an upgraded processor card for your G4 mac.

With the G5, you get a faster bus, faster memory, faster hard drives(SATA), well... faster everything and one hell of a cool case. They look like the Mac Pros except with only one optical drive.
Click to expand...

Ah gotcha, I see the point. Well, I would most likely just buy a possible upgrade processor on ebay and I've seen them as low as $40 (Thats just dual 500 mhz). I'm really looking to just have a fun time and learn a bit by upgrading my old mac.
 
I've been searching on eBay, and most of the dual g4s being sold are classified as MDD (Mirror Drive Door). Will this work? I'm still unclear as what is compatible and what is it.
 
DarkRevenant said:
I've been searching on eBay, and most of the dual g4s being sold are classified as MDD (Mirror Drive Door). Will this work? I'm still unclear as what is compatible and what is it.
Click to expand...

MDD processors are physically different and won't work in any other model of G4.
 
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