upgrade g4 processor

dogBoy · Post by **dogBoy** » Sun May 21, 2006 1:22 pm

I'm looking to upgrade my G4 1.2 single processor to a dual processor.
Will DP4.61 use it? Any thoughts?
Thanks

mbeazley · Post by **mbeazley** » Sun May 21, 2006 5:56 pm

I run a GigaDesigns Dual 1.4 gig upgrade processor on a Gigabit Ethernet G4. It's awesome! And it was cheap. Just make sure that your particular g4 can support the dual processor. There's a test you can run to verify the compatibilty in advance. I can't remember where I got it. Here's the GigaDesigns link:

http://www.gigadesigns.com/index.asp?Pa ... Category=3

wvandyck · Post by **wvandyck** » Sun May 21, 2006 8:30 pm

DP 5 is running fine with my Giga dual 1.8.

dweiss · Post by **dweiss** » Sun May 21, 2006 10:23 pm

Keep in mind that used G5 dual 1.8 Macs are selling for around $1K on Ebay now. If it was me I'd buy one of them and sell the G4 rather than dump another $500 into an old machine. Just another opinion.

richardein · Post by **richardein** » Mon May 22, 2006 12:54 am

I couldn't imagine adding voluntarily another potential breeding ground for gremlins into the nightmare of troubleshooting an early 21st Century computer music system. Especially one as fundamental as an alternate CPU.

Don't get me wrong. I'm glad that some folks have managed to upgrade their g4's processors. But my guess is that the moment there's a mysterious problem with a hot-rodded Mac the first thing any person you'd ask for for advice would mention would be the replacement processor. That might not be the ultimate culprit, but you'd have no way of knowing for sure.

Now, me, there's enough uncertainty already to contend with, what with weird ram quirks, software screw-ups, dongles, power surges, cosmic rays, and a world gone mad because of (add your favorite peeve here).

I'd get a G5.

zandurian · Post by **zandurian** » Mon May 22, 2006 1:59 am

a gigadesigns dual 1.4 did get my dual 500 g4 into the osx world, but the ram limitations soon forced me into a g5. do the g5 if at all possible - many advantages

dogBoy · Post by **dogBoy** » Mon May 22, 2006 5:54 am

Thanks for all the responses . I already have upgraded once , from 450 to 1.2 gigadesign which has worked very well. The question of Ram and
the idea of buying a used G5 have me thinking.

thanks

bluesdudeo · Post by **bluesdudeo** » Mon May 22, 2006 5:56 am

www.macupgrades.co.uk this site is good to find out what you can do and I'm sure Sonnet will be on sale in the USA

grimepoch · Post by **grimepoch** » Mon May 22, 2006 1:38 pm

Has anyone actually taken a project from a dual 1.8 G4 and compared it to a dual 1.8 G5 and looked at the CPU performance? I'd be interested to know how different they ran.

dogBoy · Post by **dogBoy** » Mon May 22, 2006 2:10 pm

Me too.

carrythebanner · Post by **carrythebanner** » Mon May 22, 2006 2:52 pm

Also to consider:
Sometimes manufacturers quote a certain machine as a minimum requirement for reasons other than pure clock speed -- bus speed, available expansion ports, video card support, version of OS supported, AltiVec support, etc. -- so even if your machine meets the speed requirement for X piece of software or hardware you might not be able to upgrade for another reason, or you'd have to drop more cash to get that aspect of the machine up to snuff.

emulatorloo · Post by **emulatorloo** » Mon May 22, 2006 2:57 pm

richardein wrote:Don't get me wrong. I'm glad that some folks have managed to upgrade their g4's processors. But my guess is that the moment there's a mysterious problem with a hot-rodded Mac the first thing any person you'd ask for for advice would mention would be the replacement processor. That might not be the ultimate culprit, but you'd have no way of knowing for sure.

MOTU recommends Sonnet CPU upgrades on thier website.

These things are highly compatible, not like the old days of Krazy upgrades for our Kwadras.

But at any rate, you gotta do a cost benefit analysis. A g5 might be great for some, but not so great for those that have a few PCI cards that won't fit or work in a G5. OTOH if that is not an issue, then G5 dual 2.x can look really good.

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dweiss · Post by **dweiss** » Mon May 22, 2006 8:45 pm

grimepoch wrote:Has anyone actually taken a project from a dual 1.8 G4 and compared it to a dual 1.8 G5 and looked at the CPU performance? I'd be interested to know how different they ran.

No, but I went from a dual 1 gig G4 to a dual 1.8 G5 and the difference was night and day. Projects that just about broke the bank on the G4 cruise along on the G5. Keep in mind the buss speed you gain too.

Also, a used dual 1.8, 2.0 or any of the earlier G5s have PCI-X which should be compatible with most older cards.

grimepoch · Post by **grimepoch** » Tue May 23, 2006 7:38 am

Yeah, I use a Dual 1.8 G5 as well and wont be upgrading till the whole Intel thing gets further a long, since the only thing I use that runs on the Intel is ONE softsynth (Microtonic)

From a software synth perspective, I'd like to have some way of gauging how much synth power it can deliver.

Do you all have DP5?

Maybe we could create a project and select a particilar patch in Modulo that's a bit CPU intensive. 120BPM and create a little looping part, then see how many instances we can get going on each machine till we get red-lines.

No, this won't test a lot of the hard drive bandwidth, but I can run DP on a Pismo and stream 8-tracks of audio. I'm not worried about that. What I do want to do is look at the synth capability.

For $500 I can take a G4 to a dual 1.8Ghz G4 (from 667). That's not a lot of money, I'd like to just understand the softsynth gain I'd get out of it to augment my system.

emulatorloo · Post by **emulatorloo** » Tue May 23, 2006 9:45 am

grimepoch wrote:Yeah, I use a Dual 1.8 G5 as well and wont be upgrading till the whole Intel thing gets further a long, since the only thing I use that runs on the Intel is ONE softsynth (Microtonic)

From a software synth perspective, I'd like to have some way of gauging how much synth power it can deliver.

<snip>

For $500 I can take a G4 to a dual 1.8Ghz G4 (from 667). That's not a lot of money, I'd like to just understand the softsynth gain I'd get out of it to augment my system.

Most of the vendors/manufacturers offer a 30day Money Back on CPU upgrades -- at least I know giga does. I would test this if I could but I am sadly G5-less. I would love to nominate you to do this test!!!!

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MOTUnation.com

upgrade g4 processor

upgrade g4 processor

GigaDesigns Dual 1.4 Rocks!!!