Welp, I've been vaguely planning some upgrades for my PowerMac G4 Cube. I was looking around for a CPU module from a "Sawtooth", "Gigabit Ethernet" or "Digital Audio" G4 tower (Apple never officially named these so we go with what we've got) - these are all very similar machines & the CPUs were on little daughterboards that could be swapped around. I actually put out a want ad on a local site, not expecting much, but that netted me this:

...a mighty Sawtooth G4/400 AGP. Nice, except the CPU in the Cube is 450MHz so what's the point?

Well,

Hot damn! A Powerlogix 1.7GHz dual upgrade board. NOW we're talking.

It came stripped of hard drives, but other goodies inside included a 16MB ATI Rage 128 Pro (not a bad card but I've got some better options), a Sonnos Tempo ATA133 card (behind the Rage) giving 2 extra IDE channels, and 2GB PC100/133 SDRAM. Here's a shot of the back of that accelerator board:

(I didn't want to take the heat sink off but yes, there are indeed two G4s on the other side.)

^^ This one even came with a factory Zip250 drive. Apple went on a binge of including zip drives for a while, to appease prospective buyers who were scared of the removal of the 1.44MB floppy. Uncertain times!

(Ironically this would be like Apple of today removing the headphone jack, but then including an 8-in/8-out professional recording interface to make up for it. IF ONLY.)

So yeah, now I'm not sure what I want to do. I was going to use the CPU board in the Cube but maybe I should just restore this one and get it set up instead? It does everything the Cube can do and has PCI(-X) slots. Hmm. Either way, yes, there will be a build thread coming.

@XJAS

If you ever get tired of it, please let me know first. 😀

^^ crude, but I laughed. 😜

Yeah figured you'd be into the duallie board. This is gonna replace my dual-2.3 G5 that died on me last year (PSU issues), either in cube or tower form, so it has a job for the time being. But sure, will let you know. 😉

(The guy I got it from mentioned he had the ORIGINAL BOX for the accelerator board too, will absolutely be grabbing that if he finds it!)

it's ironic that little red board is probably worth 10x more than the rest of the system combined.

Deksor wrote:

Received this beauty in the mail today […]
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Received this beauty in the mail today

IMG_20180222_200630.jpg

This was advertised as an IBM ThinkPad 380ED, but actually that's a 380XD ! The model number is 2635-9A0, I hope that's the model with the TFT screen (I looked at the video LGR made about another 380XD and he has the same model number, so maybe mine is exactly the same ? That would be awesome because that means I don't have to look for any other retro laptop 😁)

Only problem right now : I don't have the power adaptor so I can't turn on the damn thing 🙁
...
Yeah, 233MHz MMX to be exact, that's really good because I only expected a Pentium 166MHz MMX ^^. Plus the L2 cache is doubled.

I will finally be able to get rid of all my crappy/dead Toshiba laptops and some other retro laptops that I do not appreciate

You have no idea how jealous I am, I wish I had a Pentium 1 laptop with a TFT screen, all I got is a Toshiba 315CDS which is stuck on crappy DSTN. I should've fixed that Dell Latitude CP M166ST that I had as a tween instead of getting rid of it. 😢

EDIT: Quick question, does the NeoMagic 2200 audio chipset have good DOS compatibility? I can find some Dell Latitude CPi A-series laptops with that audio chipset rather than the Crystal CS4237 chip used in the CP/CPi D-series, so I need to know if the NeoMagic 2200 is any good for DOS before I decide on getting one of those laptops again.

LChackr wrote:

😁 😁 😁 😁

Awesome find! Let's continue the theme:

CT 1350 Rev 3, got it to go along and test with my CMS chips..Matching serials on the box and card.

A second CT 1350 Rev 3 as well..but not CT 1320 as the box would indicate on the lower left corner looking at the version information.

Have been enjoying my boxed LAPC a lot lately so decided to get a spare. Just a bare card..but at least now I can store my boxed one safely away.

However, best of all..not hardware but hardhead 😊

xjas wrote:

blurks wrote:

Creative Labs Graphics Blaster Exxtreme

What a strange box. The 3D marble-textured word 'Graphics' doesn't match anything else in Creative's product line [...]

This wasn't a one-off. 3D Blaster Voodoo² had a similar texture pattern. I believe there was another one, but I can't remember right now.

@rikukos: Sweet stuff!

rikukos wrote:

LChackr wrote:

😁 😁 😁 😁

Awesome find! Let's continue the theme:

Awwww damn nice! Been looking for a boxed SB 1,5 or 2 in that box because it was my first soundcard ever.
Missed one lately on Amibay and that was the only one I found in years 😠 😠 .

Quick update before bed: I chucked a spare 160GB IDE HDD into the G4 and got Leopard installed on it. The previous owner said he couldn't boot off or install anything onto the internal HDDs, but I think he was having trouble with the Sonos ATA133 card. I took that out and used one of the built-in IDE ports and it went without a hitch. Note that this model isn't even supposed to be able to boot Leopard (without a hack to bypass the minimum CPU speed check), but the CPU upgrade solves that. 😉

Please press 'restart' within 29 seconds or setup will do it for you...

Every spec you could want, presented in the most obnoxious way possible.

This thing is a juxtaposition of oldschool & modern PC in a lot of ways - Leopard looks and works more-or-less like current OS/X versions & a near-2GHz dual-CPU system doesn't sound very "retro", but then you've got a 128GB IDE drive size limit (it just formatted my 160 as 128), USB 1.1 (I was wondering WTF copying files was so slow until I figured that out!), PC100 SDRAM, and a 16MB Rage card that makes dragging windows around the screen sluggish. I'm DEFINITELY gonna upgrade that, and will see if I have a USB2 card that will work too.

Anyway if you have absolutely nothing better to do with your next five minutes, enjoy this video of its post-install first boot that I edited on the G4 itself. In iMovie of all things. As a stress test it did just fine, doesn't even seem to be running hot. Rendering out takes about as long as you'd expect. You could run a Youtube channel on one of these, just not in 4k.

This pointless vid.

Obligatory inception joke.

Anyway, if I recall correctly, this thread has been running for more than ten years. More than ten years, and people still love retro computer hardware.

a power supply for IBM netvista. Seems the fan in the original one didn't spin.

Kreshna Aryaguna Nurzaman wrote:

Anyway, if I recall correctly, this thread has been running for more than ten years. More than ten years, and people still love retro computer hardware.

Here's to a decade more *Raises drink*

@rikukos Awesome! That's a great find.

@Murugan same here. I have pictures from Christmas morning when I got my first Sound Blaster in that box. It's long gone, sadly. Finding the Pro 1.0 in the box from that era was really nice and unexpected though.

Creative Labs Graphics Blaster Exxtreme

Yeah. Creative Labs was really good about their box design and artwork but these in particularly make me cringe when I see them. They are just over-the-top and absurdly cheesy. That fake "Warning" sticker too ... UGH. 😒

TheAbandonwareGuy wrote:

https://media.giphy.com/media/avVqQ7EoaTXb2/giphy.gif […]
Show full quote

Kreshna Aryaguna Nurzaman wrote:

Anyway, if I recall correctly, this thread has been running for more than ten years. More than ten years, and people still love retro computer hardware.

Here's to a decade more *Raises drink*

Cheers!

Who's the guitarist, by the way?

xjas wrote:

Quick update before bed: I chucked a spare 160GB IDE HDD into the G4 and got Leopard installed on it. The previous owner said he […]
Show full quote

Quick update before bed: I chucked a spare 160GB IDE HDD into the G4 and got Leopard installed on it. The previous owner said he couldn't boot off or install anything onto the internal HDDs, but I think he was having trouble with the Sonos ATA133 card. I took that out and used one of the built-in IDE ports and it went without a hitch. Note that this model isn't even supposed to be able to boot Leopard (without a hack to bypass the minimum CPU speed check), but the CPU upgrade solves that. 😉

1.jpg

Please press 'restart' within 29 seconds or setup will do it for you...

2.jpg

everyspecatonce.gif

Every spec you could want, presented in the most obnoxious way possible.

This thing is a juxtaposition of oldschool & modern PC in a lot of ways - Leopard looks and works more-or-less like current OS/X versions & a near-2GHz dual-CPU system doesn't sound very "retro", but then you've got a 128GB IDE drive size limit (it just formatted my 160 as 128), USB 1.1 (I was wondering WTF copying files was so slow until I figured that out!), PC100 SDRAM, and a 16MB Rage card that makes dragging windows around the screen sluggish. I'm DEFINITELY gonna upgrade that, and will see if I have a USB2 card that will work too.

Anyway if you have absolutely nothing better to do with your next five minutes, enjoy this video of its post-install first boot that I edited on the G4 itself. In iMovie of all things. As a stress test it did just fine, doesn't even seem to be running hot. Rendering out takes about as long as you'd expect. You could run a Youtube channel on one of these, just not in 4k.

This pointless vid.

render.png

5.jpg

Obligatory inception joke.

If I recall correctly, the Power Mac G4 wasn't allowed to be sold outside the United States, because it was so fast (at that time) that the U.S. government considered it a supercomputer. Am I correct?

I believe (correct me here) that is the guitarist/lead singer from AC/DC.

bjwil1991 wrote:

I believe (correct me here) that is the guitarist/lead singer from AC/DC.

That is Angus Young. He is the lead guitarist of ac/dc. The lead singer is Brian Johnson. (I don't count Axl Rose).

Kreshna Aryaguna Nurzaman wrote:

If I recall correctly, the Power Mac G4 wasn't allowed to be sold outside the United States, because it was so fast (at that time) that the U.S. government considered it a supercomputer. Am I correct?

Nope, it got sold in Europe just fine.

yawetaG wrote:

Kreshna Aryaguna Nurzaman wrote:

If I recall correctly, the Power Mac G4 wasn't allowed to be sold outside the United States, because it was so fast (at that time) that the U.S. government considered it a supercomputer. Am I correct?

Nope, it got sold in Europe just fine.

Just looked that up - there's actually a grain of truth to that, sort-of - basically it ran afoul of an incredibly poorly written regulation that was already in the process of being updated when it was released, but Apple's marketing took that and spun the hell out of it anyway. There's a good explanation of the real story here. In 1999 the law restricted (not banned) export of computers capable of over 2000 "MTOPS" (Million Theoretical Operations Per Second) which the G4 ran afoul of. By 2002 that had been raised multiple times to 195 000. It's a bullshit metric but interesting example of how unprepared everyone was for the late-'90s progress rush.

In reality it's not that fast, it was a high-end workstation but comparable to a good Pentium 3 or Xeon system from the time too.

Got an iMac G4 for $9.99 and a new CardBus 802.11g wireless card for $4.99 on my thrifting adventures (pics to follow). Passed on an NES, games, and accessories since they wanted over $200 for the whole lot.

bjwil1991 wrote:

Passed on an NES, games, and accessories since they wanted over $200 for the whole lot.

That's so typical.