Upgrade Processor or New Mac? Opinions Please.

[TimOz]

Hi all,
I have been debating the upgrade of my computer for awhile now, playing the waiting game to see what apple does, now that the new ones are here I'm trying to work out what the best option for me is. At the moment I have a beige G3/266 192mb ram 4g 5400rpm system drive and a 9g and 30g 7200rpm drives for audio, all internal IDE. Also a sony scsi cdrw connected to the built in scsi port. The options are a new G4/466 or a G3/500 3rd party processor upgrade. The new G4's have a much higher bus speed and disk cache but I'm not sure if this makes much difference to PT. The only problem a have had is the (held of interupts to long.....) error, but this is only on 24 track 24 bit sessions with alot of edits and automation , Oh and this is a 001/PTLE system.
Any suggestions and opinions much appreciated.
Thanks.
Tim.

[KamaSutra77]

i'd hang loose for a few months if you can, ive seen the mac rumors page suggesting that there will be faster macs comming out around july. Your 266 g3 if it works is good to go for some time I’d think, unless liek you said your pushing the envelope. Most of the advantage of the G4's is altivec and fastr buss speeds, but that becomes not a huge issue for PT nless your really decking out a system (say a really fast and expansive scsi card and drives). Pro tools dosent seem to be benefit form too much ram, just enough is the same as too much sisnce it doesnt use ram like Photoshop or similar programs do. All the rowkrs in realtime using the cache and the bus throuput and buss rate and burst. ( I think im not a tech guy-second hand knowledge). Also the upgrade cards are not as reliable for PT Ive seen many threads. Save for a 833 or 1ghtz mac, or a current model when those faster ones comeout. If your in a pinch try last years G4 model like mine ( 450), very stable and only a bit more than a fast upgrade card -pluss all the benefits. Then spend the extar dough on a little more ram and a Deckstar ata drive (60 gig). Hope that helps you out.

[ThomCat]

I upgraded PowerCenter Pro clone to a NewerTech G3 300/1MHz card a couple of years ago, and while it ran everything else better, when I bought a Digi 001 and ATTO SCSI card, all hell broke loose, and I was dead in the water until I finally relented and bought a DP G4 500. While this was truly a rogue system and may not be a good example, it's enough for me to vote against the upgrade card. I now try to stay within the Digi approved guidelines. Caveat Emptor!

[DonaldR]

I updagred a 7600 to G3/250 couple of years ago. It turns a rock steady computer to a nightmare.

Better option is to buy new G4 and keep old G3. Buy an ethernet hub and make a small network between both (pretty easy). Keep all your scsi stuff on hold one but share it across the network. You can also install games, utilities, internet access on that old G3 without affecting new G4 and you won't get problems with PCI-busy errors with scsi cards.


------------------
Donald Robidoux
President
Design Relationnel inc.
www3.sympatico.ca/design.relationnel

[coaster]

many people here including shawn parr and myself have upgraded 8600's to g3/400 or better.

i have had nothing but fantastic results with this upgrade.

the only upgrade problem i had was with my third video output card. the 3d engine driver included with the card is not compatible with os9.1 so i removed it (i dont play games that would ever take advantage of this card anyway) and all is well.

i can run signifigantly more plug ins than before, and screen redraws are at normal spped now (instead of snail paced)

[s.d. finley]

Hey Tim, i have a beige G3 that was origanally @266mhz, upgraded to 466mhz, and upgraded RAM to 384. I can run about twice as many plugs as i could prior to upgrade.
After some tweaking my system is solid.
Check out www.xlr8.com, they have a new dual cpu upgraded made for beige g3s. Macgurus,
www.macgurus.com, use a beige g3 upgraded w/ said cpu upgrade as one of their servers and love it.
I might purchase that upgrade, just because i have so much stuff(external scsi harddrives, DVDRAM,cdrw on the internal scsi)
hooked up to my beige g3 already, i would hate to have to basically rebuild my whole setup! Might be different for you.
Long live the Beige!!

peace

sdf