Thread
B&W G3 300 MHz
Just collected a B&W G3 today, which I got off eBay for £10 ($14.39). Just updated the firmware and installed 9.2.1. My first PowerMac and this will be my main system for running OS 9 for all the old software/games I like. I can now say goodbye and good riddance to Basilisk and Sheepshaver.
Project plans, in order of priority:
- Up the RAM, currently 320MB.
- Get a Sonnet, or other brand, of IDE controller so I can use larger disks. This is a Rev. A model, so unfortunately the on-board IDE controller completely sucks.
- Then put in a nice large capacity HD.
- Somehow make the case fan and PSU fan quieter, or alternatively install a quiet ATX PSU and do a little trickery to make it work.
- Upgrade the graphics card from Rage 128 to Radeon 9200.
- Get a faster processor - what I *want* is a 1.0 GHz G4 Sonnet Encore/ZIF, but they are too expensive for me.
- Get a fast Ethernet card?
- Add more USB ports via a PCI card?
- Upgrade CD-ROM drive to a CD/DVD combo that is fast and quiet.
Will post pictures soon -- the case is in decent condition, some scratches and other marks, and one side of the door doesn't close flush to the rest of the case. But for a computer TEN years old, this aint bad at all. ;D
Project plans, in order of priority:
- Up the RAM, currently 320MB.
- Get a Sonnet, or other brand, of IDE controller so I can use larger disks. This is a Rev. A model, so unfortunately the on-board IDE controller completely sucks.
- Then put in a nice large capacity HD.
- Somehow make the case fan and PSU fan quieter, or alternatively install a quiet ATX PSU and do a little trickery to make it work.
- Upgrade the graphics card from Rage 128 to Radeon 9200.
- Get a faster processor - what I *want* is a 1.0 GHz G4 Sonnet Encore/ZIF, but they are too expensive for me.
- Get a fast Ethernet card?
- Add more USB ports via a PCI card?
- Upgrade CD-ROM drive to a CD/DVD combo that is fast and quiet.
Will post pictures soon -- the case is in decent condition, some scratches and other marks, and one side of the door doesn't close flush to the rest of the case. But for a computer TEN years old, this aint bad at all. ;D
Did everything you are proposing to do, and I can say that you will not be disappointed. My $9.99 B&W started life as a stock 300 MHz Rev. A, and is now quite happy with maxed ram, a big ATA hard drive, a DVD-RW drive, a Sonnet 1 GHz G4 processor upgrade (finding a cheap one of these was a big help), and PCI USB 2.0, Radeon 9200 & ATA-133 cards. Most of these parts were hand-me-downs / surplus, and didn't cost an arm and a leg, either.
Running Tiger, it's hard to believe that this is a 10-year old machine.
Good luck with your project!
Running Tiger, it's hard to believe that this is a 10-year old machine.
Good luck with your project!
I stuffed a g3-400/1mb with 1GB of RAM, Radeon 7000 mac edition video, 40gb, 20gb, 6gb for OS 9.2.1/osx 10.3.9/dump drive) along with a SCSI card and a ATA/66 card in the B&W in my room. I have a g4-450/1mb, Radeon mac edition, 512MB RAM, 64 bit SCSI card with 9GB scsi HD , Matrox RTMAC video editing card, and 2 10 or 20GB HDs for OS 9 and osx 10.3.9 in that machine. Both machines are revision 2 IDE, the G4 has a DVD reader while the G3 has a 40x liteon cdrom drive. Nice cool running machines and you can still use all your old ADB stuff.
