Two G4 QuickSilver's found a new home

[CooperBox]

Here are the 2002 Power Mac G4 QuickSilver's I picked up in a thrift store very recently for 20€ ($22) - for the pair!
Both are 800MHz with 256k Ram, and 40GB of storage. The guy in the store didn't know if they were functioning, and it's only the last few days that I've had a chance to find out. Both booted up immediately to OS 9.2, so my 'pocket-money' gamble paid off.
At the time, I bought them because I didn't like the thought of equipment like this being trashed, as is so often the case in thrift stores if articles remain unsold over a period of time.

Must confess, I know little about these, so not too sure where to go from here. They are both in very good condition - both from a hospital laboratory from info on the applied stickers.
One I will definitely keep after maxing out RAM to 1.5Gb, and installing OS 10.4 as I have a copy.
I'd like to know if installing 10.5.8 would be more beneficial? (unsure what use it will be put to at this stage).
Any other upgrades worthwhile on these, or any other pearls of wisdom to be shared)?
Cheers, & Happy New Year to ALL!

 

[Altemose]

Must confess, I know little about these, so not too sure where to go from here. They are both in very good condition - both from a hospital laboratory from info on the applied stickers.
One I will definitely keep after maxing out RAM to 1.5Gb, and installing OS 10.4 as I have a copy.
I'd like to know if installing 10.5.8 would be more beneficial? (unsure what use it will be put to at this stage).
Any other upgrades worthwhile on these, or any other pearls of wisdom to be shared)?
Cheers, & Happy New Year to ALL!

Happy New Years to you as well!

@eyoungren is going to be the expert on these machines...

As for Leopard, I personally have run it on my dual 800 MHz QuickSilver and it ran perfectly fine. If you do some optimizations and use a 7200 RPM hard drive coupled with the 1.5 GB of RAM it will be decently speedy. I would recommend investing in a USB 2.0 card though as it is quite painful to transfer large files over USB 1.1.

 

[eyoungren]

Here are the 2002 Power Mac G4 QuickSilver's I picked up in a thrift store very recently for 20€ ($22) - for the pair!
Both are 800MHz with 256k Ram, and 40GB of storage. The guy in the store didn't know if they were functioning, and it's only the last few days that I've had a chance to find out. Both booted up immediately to OS 9.2, so my 'pocket-money' gamble paid off.
At the time, I bought them because I didn't like the thought of equipment like this being trashed, as is so often the case in thrift stores if articles remain unsold over a period of time.

View attachment 608272

View attachment 608273
Must confess, I know little about these, so not too sure where to go from here. They are both in very good condition - both from a hospital laboratory from info on the applied stickers.
One I will definitely keep after maxing out RAM to 1.5Gb, and installing OS 10.4 as I have a copy.
I'd like to know if installing 10.5.8 would be more beneficial? (unsure what use it will be put to at this stage).
Any other upgrades worthwhile on these, or any other pearls of wisdom to be shared)?
Cheers, & Happy New Year to ALL!

I use my Quicksilver for design work. Adobe CS4, QuarkXpress 8, Acrobat 9 Pro, Suitcase Fusion 3 and Office 2008.

Leopard is what I use and you can certainly make good use out of them.

I have a 1.8Ghz Dual processor (Sonnet), 2 1TB hard drives and a SATA DLSD. My system is entirely SATA. 6 Displays.

 

[QSDP-User]

Congrats, nice find! Quicksilvers are nice-looking machines.
They're sorta like a Jaguar XKE compared to the utilitarian Land Rover/GMC Sawtooth G4
Altho the MDDs are pretty elegant too (a vintage Cord maybe?).

I've both 2002's single 800Mhz & Dual 1GHz.
Their IDE controllers allow larger than 128 GB drives if you got any large IDE HDDs collecting dust.

I did like to use these Macs as dual boot: OS 9.2 & Tiger for 800 and OS 9.2 & Leopard for the Dual.
I didn't use these Macs as a serious workstation like eyoungren uses his powerful Quicksilver,
but more like using older software for fun & games or a hobby type of thing.
And I was looking on eBay for older Mac hardware like TV or capture cards to play around with.
I found this PPC forum good reading for help, techniques & tips for getting the most out of
older PPC Macs.

Well, since I got a hold of a PowerMac G5, my Quicksilver Dual has been pushed off the work table.
In fact, with a few serendipitous "I need to get rid of, cheap" sellers on Craigslist,
cheese graters have displaced the draw bridge boxes on the work table.
I still have a Sawtooth, two B&W G3s and a PM6500 KVM'ed & networked in a cabinet.
I plan to move the QS Dual in there so I'll still be playing around with it.

As discussed in this forum,
flashing the PC ROMs in a FireGL X3 video card and a PCI SATA card unfortunately don't work as
an upgrade in a 2002 Quicksilver. With the G4 MDDs they both work.
The flashed PCI SATA card works in a G4 Sawtooth.

The much more expensive, made for Mac Sonnet PCI SATA card works like a dream though.

Anyway, have fun with your new Macs!

(Edit: Fixed dyslexic typos & I keep forgetting to hit the "likes this" LoL!)

 

[CooperBox]

Thank you. You've all given me some valuable food for thought. Now looking round locally for more RAM and a USB 2.0 card.

 

[eyoungren]

Thank you. You've all given me some valuable food for thought. Now looking round locally for more RAM and a USB 2.0 card.

Sonnet makes a USB 2.0/Firewire Card. I got one on eBay for $20. Gives you the benefit of two more FW400 ports and if you use one of the USB ports with a USB 2.0 hub you get back any ports you may have lost with using a dual type card.

 

[CooperBox]

Sonnet makes a USB 2.0/Firewire Card. I got one on eBay for $20. Gives you the benefit of two more FW400 ports and if you use one of the USB ports with a USB 2.0 hub you get back any ports you may have lost with using a dual type card.

That's good to know. I'll keep my eyes open locally. Thanks.

 

[128keaton]

I love the QS. So upgradable! Mine is a 1Ghz OC'ed from 867MHz.

 

[redhatcode29]

I use my Quicksilver for design work. Adobe CS4, QuarkXpress 8, Acrobat 9 Pro, Suitcase Fusion 3 and Office 2008.

Leopard is what I use and you can certainly make good use out of them.

I have a 1.8Ghz Dual processor (Sonnet), 2 1TB hard drives and a SATA DLSD. My system is entirely SATA. 6 Displays.

View attachment 608281

I like the large studio display...20" ?

 

[eyoungren]

I like the large studio display...20" ?

Yes. Unfortunately, not the slightly larger HD display. I'm on the lookout for 6 of those.

Although with my current desktop real estate the thought lately is to just get six identical (and cheap) LCD displays.

 

[redhatcode29]

Yes. Unfortunately, not the slightly larger HD display. I'm on the lookout for 6 of those.

Although with my current desktop real estate the thought lately is to just get six identical (and cheap) LCD displays.

yeah the 22" would be fun....and six of it

i have a 17" which is the only one which i have come across locally, until i found another lately, the seller is not budging easily...gotta pass it!


True, normal lcds with a custom mount/stand ought to do it...

 

[eyoungren]

I got the 20" for around $80 from some music outlet in Atlanta. At the time I was looking for these displays, but could only find two 17" LCDs in my price range (around $50).

I wish I had done my research more effectively that day because what I didn't realize was that the shop in Atlanta had TWO auctions for two different 20" Cinema Displays, both at the same price. Had I realised that I would have had two 20" CDs and one 17" Studio Display instead of one 20" CD and two 17" Studio Displays!

But by the time I realized it my money had already been spent. Funny thing about the 17"s though. One I was able to do a local pickup on because the guy was only 20 minutes away in Tempe. The other shipped from Flagstaff.