Well, I wrote to Sonnet last night in hopes if getting the definitive word on their 500MHz Crescendo G3 CPU upgrade for the Wallstreet PowerBooks. Here is what I wrote to them:
Neil from Sonnet Customer Service kindly responded a few hours later, as follows
Of course, I've not yet purchased the Sonnet CPU upgrade yet, but I wrote to Sonnet going under the assumption that the CPU card had already been flashed on a PowerBook G3 Wallstreet. And since it is not known if the PowerBook was in fact a PDQ edition, there is no way to know if it wouldn't have the same "dead video" as reported by a couple other users in those other threads. And since Sonnet says restoring the ROM to its pre-flashed state is now impossible, the only way to safely know if the CPU upgrade would work is if you know 100% that the upgrade had been flashed in the same exact "revision" model as the PowerBook you own.
In retrospect it seems quite foolish to me that Sonnet setup the card this way, as it put the support burden on them for reflashing. And now after all these years, it has become impossible to reflash the cards at all.
The other unclear point is about the requirement for the "stock 2GB hard drive" that some have reported. Let's say you acquire a Sonnet CPU upgrade that was flashed on another PDQ and you wish to use it on your PowerBook G3 PDQ. You would need to use Sonnet's Installer software, so it would install the appropriate extensions on your machine. But would that installer not work if you lack the stock 2GB hard drive (which many PowerBook G3 users do lack these days)? Or would it simply refuse to reflash the CPU upgrade, which cannot be done anyway once its flashed?
All said, I must admit I am rather disappointed.
Neil from Sonnet Customer Service kindly responded a few hours later, as follows
Of course, I've not yet purchased the Sonnet CPU upgrade yet, but I wrote to Sonnet going under the assumption that the CPU card had already been flashed on a PowerBook G3 Wallstreet. And since it is not known if the PowerBook was in fact a PDQ edition, there is no way to know if it wouldn't have the same "dead video" as reported by a couple other users in those other threads. And since Sonnet says restoring the ROM to its pre-flashed state is now impossible, the only way to safely know if the CPU upgrade would work is if you know 100% that the upgrade had been flashed in the same exact "revision" model as the PowerBook you own.
In retrospect it seems quite foolish to me that Sonnet setup the card this way, as it put the support burden on them for reflashing. And now after all these years, it has become impossible to reflash the cards at all.
The other unclear point is about the requirement for the "stock 2GB hard drive" that some have reported. Let's say you acquire a Sonnet CPU upgrade that was flashed on another PDQ and you wish to use it on your PowerBook G3 PDQ. You would need to use Sonnet's Installer software, so it would install the appropriate extensions on your machine. But would that installer not work if you lack the stock 2GB hard drive (which many PowerBook G3 users do lack these days)? Or would it simply refuse to reflash the CPU upgrade, which cannot be done anyway once its flashed?
All said, I must admit I am rather disappointed.