Old Beige Gets a Boost With Brain Upgrade
In today’s multicolored Mac world, it isn’t easy being beige. Consider: Apple’s $799 iMac is dramatically faster than the Power Mac 9500, which sold for $4,200 in 1997.
Steve Jobs would have you replace your basic beige Mac with something more colorful, and with Apple slicing prices to reduce inventory and reverse an earnings slump, this might not be a bad time to do just that. But there is another alternative: a processor upgrade.
In most Power Macs made since 1994, the central processor resides on a removable card. Several companies sell processor-upgrade cards containing G3 and even G4 processors, and one of these brain transplants can put a new spring in an old Mac’s step.
A processor upgrade makes the most sense if you have a large investment in an older Mac--lots of memory, big hard drives and Small Computer System Interface, or SCSI, -based scanners and other add-ons. Using these items with a new Mac is either impossible or impractical, and replacing them would add significantly to the cost of a new system.
I tested processor upgrades from three companies: Sonnet Technologies (https://www.sonnettech.com), XLR8 (https://www.xlr8.com) and Newer Technology (https://www.newertech.com). My test bed was a 1996-vintage Power Mac 7600, whose stock processor is a Power PC 604 running at 132 megahertz. The results were dramatic. Programs started 70% to 80% faster, and common tasks such as opening windows and scrolling were noticeably snappier. No card matched the hype on its box, but all of them made the old beige mare kick up its heels and break into a canter.
Performance was even better when I tested G4 upgrades using programs optimized for the G4’s Velocity Engine technology--a list that includes Adobe’s Photoshop 5.5 and 6 and Casady & Green’s SoundJam MP3 ripper. With these programs, Old Beige approached the performance of a graphite Power Mac G4.
But it didn’t match it. A computer’s performance is also determined by the speed of its hard drive, memory, video card and internal data pathways. An upgrade doesn’t address those key components.
So which new engine to buy? None of the cards I tested significantly outperform similar competitors. For example, all 500 MHz G3 upgrades perform more or less alike, as do all 400 MHz G4 upgrades.
This means your decision will be based largely on prices, which have fallen in the last month. Sonnet Technologies’ 400 MHz Crescendo/PCI G4 upgrade sells for $399, down $100 from November. Its G3 upgrades cost even less, with the 400 MHz Crescendo/PCI G3 going for $299. A slower version sells for $199. Newer Technologies also has cut prices. XLR8’s upgrades are costlier, but they have a unique advantage: on XLR8’s Mach Carrier family, the processor is removable, enabling you to upgrade your upgrade as faster processors become available.
Should you buy a G3 or a G4 upgrade? If you don’t run G4-optimized software, consider putting your cash into a faster G3 card. A 500 MHz G3 will outperform a 400 MHz G4 with such programs as Web browsers and word processors, which aren’t optimized for the G4’s Velocity Engine. Older Macs also lack the Universal Serial Bus, or USB, and FireWire expansion ports that are built into nearly every modern Mac. Sonnet Technologies’ $139 Tango Peripheral Component Interface, or PCI, card provides two USB and two FireWire ports, but my experience was mixed: Apple’s iMovie wouldn’t recognize a connected digital video camcorder, though other DV editing programs worked fine.
XLR8 says its $119 MachFire PCI card works with iMovie and most other DV editing programs, but the company’s site cautions that “other applications may also be compatible but are not supported.”
The forward-looking design not only gives old Macs a longer life span than Windows PCs, it’s spawned a culture of Mac upgrade enthusiasts. Check out the Low End Mac at https://www.lowendmac.com and Accelerate Your Mac at https://www.xlr8yourmac.com for reviews of upgrades and more tips for bringing new life to old Macs.
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Jim Heid is a contributing editor of Macworld magazine.
