Power Macintosh 8500 Processor Upgrade?

#1 Tue, 6 May 2008 - 03:00

Received a 250MHz 604e processor a while back and have had no luck trying to get it to work with the 8500.

Or am i stuck with going for a faster 604 processor (currently 132 mhz) only or a G3 upgrade card?

Thanks

#2 Tue, 6 May 2008 - 06:37

The 250Mhz part is for a different motherboard and should not work on an 8500. You need a 225 or slower part or a G3 upgrade.

#3 Tue, 6 May 2008 - 06:42

Unknown_K is right. The 250MHz, 300MHz, and 350MHz 604e CPU cards require a different motherboard power voltage, and they have built-in "inline" L2 caches. Both of these features make them incompatible with the 8500 (and all other similar Macs, except the special 8600s and 9600s with the "Kansas" motherboards).

There are a few 233MHz 604e CPU cards out there (because Apple did produce a 9600/233) - but for anything faster than that, you'll need a G3 card in your 8500.

The good news is that even the slowest, and therefore cheapest, G3 card will make your 8500 faster than even a 233MHz 604e would.

Best,

Matt

#4 Tue, 6 May 2008 - 15:24

The prices on low end G3 upgrades for PCI Macs have been dropping off a lot lately. You can probably pick up a 250 or 300 mhz G3 for almost nothing now and it will be faster than any 604.

#5 Tue, 6 May 2008 - 23:31

Cheers, something to look around for

#6 Wed, 14 May 2008 - 07:00

Are we sure about eh 604 CPU speed?

I have a 300MHz card and a 350MHz card that work just great in my 8500. They have been replaced of course by a G4, but are damned fast. I still have the cards buried somewhere. I was thinking of putting the 350 back in just for fun.

#7 Fri, 7 Nov 2008 - 15:34

I want to upgrade my Power Macintosh 8500's processor as well. I have some great programs on it such as Photoshop, Word:Mac, Powerpoint:Mac, etc. but they run very slow on the 120 MHz processor. The OS 9.2 also takes a while to start up. So if you can upgrade the processor to a G3, does this mean I could install a 900 MHz G3? If so, that would be great. A 900 MHz G3 would run those applications, along with OS 9.2 very well. I appreciate any info, thanks.

#8 Fri, 7 Nov 2008 - 19:00

^^better, you can get a 1Ghz G4. With the Alti Vec plugin photoshop will scream.

http://www.sonnettech.com/product/crescendo_pci.html

#9 Fri, 7 Nov 2008 - 22:41

^^better, you can get a 1Ghz G4. With the Alti Vec plugin photoshop will scream.http://www.sonnettech.com/product/crescendo_pci.html

I want one of those. [

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#10 Sat, 8 Nov 2008 - 20:58

^^better, you can get a 1Ghz G4. With the Alti Vec plugin photoshop will scream.http://www.sonnettech.com/product/crescendo_pci.html

Thanks! That sounds great!

#11 Sun, 9 Nov 2008 - 05:10

Can't beat it for $100, either.

#12 Sun, 9 Nov 2008 - 16:34

I am surprised. Usually it is very difficult to find people still selling processor upgrades...