iBook G3 Snow, complete upgrade to PowerPC G4, superdrive, 512 MB RAM upgrade.

[christiann]

Hi. I have an iBook G3 Snow a Dual Usb, and I bought a Motorola 7410 to upgrade it to. I also bought 512 MB RAM to get rid of the current 64 Mb RAM. I am also interested in buying a SuperDrive.

Here are my questions:

-How do I perform the upgrade from a G3 to a G4.. I’ve seen people do it, but it looks hard..

-What SuperDrive do I have to buy? Will this one work? It’s from a G3. Or will this SuperDrive from a G4 work? Link here. Or will a Macbook SuperDrive work?

-Can I buy a 100 to 120 GB HDD to replace the current 30 GB HDD? If so, what are my requirements for a HDD? Size?

I bought OS X Tiger; it came, but I am going to install thru Target Disc Mode. I’m on Cheetah 10.0.3 right now. Wanted to know if I could install a superdrive/DVD drive.

I am planning on using it daily.

Here is the Motorola 7410 I bought.

Anything else I should know? Already bought the 7410 and the 512 MB RAM. I want to upgrade it to Leopard, if that is even possible. If you know any guides or steps to re-assemble, I’d appreciate it. Thanks!

 

[Project Alice]

Hi. I have an iBook G3 Snow a Dual Usb, and I bought a Motorola 7410 to upgrade it to. I also bought 512 MB RAM to get rid of the current 64 Mb RAM. I am also interested in buying a SuperDrive.

Here are my questions:

-How do I perform the upgrade from a G3 to a G4.. I’ve seen people do it, but it looks hard..

-What SuperDrive do I have to buy? Will this one work? It’s from a G3. Or will this SuperDrive from a G4 work? Link here. Or will a Macbook SuperDrive work?

-Can I buy a 100 to 120 GB HDD to replace the current 30 GB HDD? If so, what are my requirements for a HDD? Size?

I bought OS X Tiger; it came, but I am going to install thru Target Disc Mode. I’m on Cheetah 10.0.3 right now. Wanted to know if I could install a superdrive/DVD drive.

I am planning on using it daily.

Here is the Motorola 7410 I bought.

View attachment 922405


Anything else I should know? Already bought the 7410 and the 512 MB RAM. I want to upgrade it to Leopard, if that is even possible. If you know any guides or steps to re-assemble, I’d appreciate it. Thanks!

@dosdude1 would be the only one I can think of with any knowledge on this.
To install the G4, you have to de-solder the G3 and solder the G4 in its place. They are not CPU sockets. So unless you can do that, don't waste time on this project. Dosdude would probably do it for you for a fee, and on his own time if you are still wanting to do this but can't solder the chip. He did my Pismo's G4 upgrade. Myself and many other can vouch for his work.

Which iBook is this? If it did have a G4 put in they will all boot Leopard for sure but the 600Mhz and slower iBooks came with Rage 128 chips, which aren't supported in Leopard. It'll work but the performance isn't great. The Radeon iBooks would be essentially identical to an iBook G4 once upgraded.

 

[christiann]

@dosdude1 would be the only one I can think of with any knowledge on this.
To install the G4, you have to de-solder the G3 and solder the G4 in its place. They are not CPU sockets. So unless you can do that, don't waste time on this project. Dosdude would probably do it for you for a fee, and on his own time if you are still wanting to do this but can't solder the chip. He did my Pismo's G4 upgrade. Myself and many other can vouch for his work.

Which iBook is this? If it did have a G4 put in they will all boot Leopard for sure but the 600Mhz and slower iBooks came with Rage 128 chips, which aren't supported in Leopard. It'll work but the performance isn't great. The Radeon iBooks would be essentially identical to an iBook G4 once upgraded.

I’m on an iBook G4 Snow Dual Usb. M6497. I doubt he would do it. I actually just ran out of money to spend on it. I kind of know how, from researching and watching videos. I think my dad does. Oh well. I’ve fixed every computer, apple tv.. laptop, we have in our house, installed drives, cables..

I’ve been watching @dosdude1 YouTube videos and he has really good stuff. Actually very helpful. I’ve been digging and digging to find stuff online to help me with this. I actually ordered my SuperDrive,.. I couldn’t resist when I found it matched my iBook model,.. and it was a Snow DVD drive.

My iBook has a PPC G3, G4 MB of RAM.
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been using it and it is actually fast! I bought OS X tiger and I am going to install it via FireWire. I’ve seen posts of people working with dosdude1, to install a CPU. I’ve spent a lot of money on this project., so I don’t want to stop now.

I found a bunch of forums on how to solder the G4, and how to do everything. I think we can do it. Just have to wait for it to arrive...

Thanks for the quick responses!!

Appreciate your help!!

 

[dosdude1]

I’m on an iBook G4 Snow Dual Usb. M6497. I doubt he would do it. I actually just ran out of money to spend on it. I kind of know how, from researching and watching videos. I think my dad does. Oh well. I’m only 13.. I’ve fixed every computer, apple tv.. laptop, we have in our house, installed drives, cables..

I’ve been watching @dosdude1 YouTube videos and he has really good stuff. Actually very helpful. I’ve been digging and digging to find stuff online to help me with this. I actually ordered my SuperDrive,.. I couldn’t resist when I found it matched my iBook model,.. and it was a Snow DVD drive.

My iBook has a PPC G3, G4 MB of RAM. It was my moms school laptop, which she used to teach on for less than a year. Then it just sat in the closet.. I actually upgraded it and I use it every day. I just really want to upgrade the CPU but I think I will need a lot of help on that.
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View attachment 922436

I’m using it for school, Word, Excel.. I just really want leopard on it. I’ve been using it and it is actually fast! I bought OS X tiger and I am going to install it via FireWire. I’ve seen posts of people working with dosdude1, to install a CPU. I’ve spent a lot of money on this project., so I don’t want to stop now.

I found a bunch of forums on how to solder the G4, and how to do everything. I think we can do it. Just have to wait for it to arrive...

Thanks for the quick responses!!

Appreciate your help!!


View attachment 922437

Sorry to shoot this idea down immediately, but it is not possible to upgrade the CPUs on these Snow iBook G3s to G4 CPUs, simply because they use a variant of a G3 CPU (IBM PPC750CXe) that is not pin-compatible with any G4 CPU available. Therefore, it cannot be upgraded to a G4 of any kind.

 

[christiann]

Sorry to shoot this idea down immediately, but it is not possible to upgrade the CPUs on these Snow iBook G3s to G4 CPUs, simply because they use a variant of a G3 CPU that is not pin-compatible with any G4 CPU available. Therefore, it cannot be upgraded to a G4 of any kind.

Ahg! Is there a faster G3 I can use? Well thank you. Now I know I can’t run Leopard on it. Thank you all for the help.
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Sorry to shoot this idea down immediately, but it is not possible to upgrade the CPUs on these Snow iBook G3s to G4 CPUs, simply because they use a variant of a G3 CPU (IBM PPC750CXe) that is not pin-compatible with any G4 CPU available. Therefore, it cannot be upgraded to a G4 of any kind.

PS.. Thank u for the Catalina Patcher..

 

[christiann]

Just bought a Superdrive from an iBook G3 Dual Usb Snow.. once it comes I will be able to upgrade the OS X.

What kind of hard drive can I install? Don’t they have to be < 9.5 MM? Any cheap ones I can get?

The RAM is on its way!

 

[MultiFinder17]

Just bought a Superdrive from an iBook G3 Dual Usb Snow.. once it comes I will be able to upgrade the OS X.

What kind of hard drive can I install? Don’t they have to be < 9.5 MM? Any cheap ones I can get?

The RAM is on its way!

Pretty much any 9.5mm IDE drive should work fine. Most any drive you’ll find new today will be SATA, and those will not work in an iBook. Your best bet for a new drive is eBay. What I normally suggest to people is to get an old original 160GB Apple TV for about $30 and harvest the hard drive from it.

 

[christiann]

What about a Gen 2 apple tv...?

 

[z970]

@christiann Don't buy a spinner, get an mSata SSD w/ an IDE adapter. They are much faster, last longer, are much more power efficient, and are far more durable than any IDE spinner disk available. It may or may not run cooler as well.

Most of us here can speak highly of their effectiveness when revitalizing old notebooks, Mac or "PC".

One of these, inside one of these, and you're all set.

 

[christiann]

@christiann Don't buy a spinner, get an mSata SSD w/ an IDE adapter.

One of these inside one of these, and you're all set.

I did find an extra hard drive but it is way too big for the iBook..

 

[MultiFinder17]

What about a Gen 2 apple tv...?

The little black hockey puck Apple TVs don't have hard drives in them. The first-gen does, either 40 or 160GB. I've bought up two of them so far that burned their power supplies out just to harvest the hard drives out of 'em, as 160GB IDE 2.5" hard drives tend to go for more money than a broken Apple TV.

 

[christiann]

How would it react to a 300 GB HD? Way too much right?

 

[z970]

According to Low End Mac, no iBook G3s are able to see more than 128 GB of drive space, due to their lack of 48-bit addressing.

Not "too much", per se; it should work fine with a bigger drive, but it won't see its full capacity past 128 GB, unfortunately.

 

[bunnspecial]

There are ways to use larger than 128gb drives, but it's not straight forward.

Basically, you need at least two partitions. The first must be 128gb or less, and have the OS(s) installed. Once the OS boots, the software takes over and mounts any additional partitions.

Intech SpeedTools is one such solution.

 

[Project Alice]

I

Sorry to shoot this idea down immediately, but it is not possible to upgrade the CPUs on these Snow iBook G3s to G4 CPUs, simply because they use a variant of a G3 CPU (IBM PPC750CXe) that is not pin-compatible with any G4 CPU available. Therefore, it cannot be upgraded to a G4 of any kind.

I didn’t actually realize that. I assumed they used the same “socket” as 7400s/7410s. Just curious, is this all the white iBook G3s? They made quite a few different models as you know.

 

[Slix]

If you are simply interested in running Leopard, why not get an iBook G4 instead of spending money on the G3 you have? It would definitely be faster. The iBook G3s go up to 700 MHz, but according to EveryMac, yours is either a 500 or 600 MHz model, right?

That being said, nice job on the upgrades. I can vouch for the IDE to mSATA adapter, I use one in my Titanium PowerBook and it's quite fast. Tiger would fly with the upgrades you did plus a newer drive.

 

[bunnspecial]

If you are simply interested in running Leopard, why not get an iBook G4 instead of spending money on the G3 you have? It would definitely be faster. The iBook G3s go up to 700 MHz, but according to EveryMac, yours is either a 500 or 600 MHz model, right?

That is a really good point. I'm too up on iBook G4s(never really taken to them, even though I have several) but even if it were possible to run G4 swap a snow G3, you're still crippled by the GPU. The later ones top out at a Radeon 7500, while the older ones have a Radeon and even older ones are Rage 128. Leopard LOVES good GPUs(or more specifically CI-compatible GPUs), and Tiger likes them too to a lesser extent. At least the Radeon and later support Quartz Extreme, which helps a lot in all versions of OS X, but Leopard is a lot more enjoyable with a CI GPU.

All the G4s crank it up to at least a 9200, which again isn't the greatest in Leopard but I've run it plenty in various applications. The last iBook G4 gives you a 9550, which does give CI compatibility.

Don't get me wrong-I've done Leopard on a Rage 128, and if @LightBulbFun ever gets around to sticking a G4 in my spare Clamshell LoBo I have I will most certainly be running Leo on it. Still, though, there's a difference to me between proof of concept/playing(I love doing that and even though I often don't have the smarts to make them happen I'm happy to give access to hardware where possible) and practical. My experience on G4 Pismos has been similar, even though I don't currently have a working one. I wish I could get my G4 Lombard booting Leo.

 

[bobesch]

I’m on an iBook G4 Snow Dual Usb. M6497.
[...]
My iBook has a PPC G3, G4 MB of RAM. It was my moms school laptop, which she used to teach on for less than a year. Then it just sat in the closet.. I actually upgraded it and I use it every day.
[...]
I’m using it for school, Word, Excel.. I just really want leopard on it. I’ve been using it and it is actually fast! I bought OS X tiger and I am going to install it via FireWire. [...] I’ve spent a lot of money on this project., so I don’t want to stop now.

Oh, congrat's to your closet-finding! I very like the iBook-G3 Snow with that translucent acrylic-case.
Upgrading RAM with that 512MB brick and install dual-boot os9.22/Tiger&Classic onto an optional mSATA+IDE-Converter-Combo is the best you can do and you've already found out that on your own! And that will keep the iBook in it's original condition.
Tiger and also os9 do offer a lot of connectivity options.
- IMAP-email: Tiger's email-Client or Classilla(os9/Classic)
- webDAV: Tiger's unbuild "Goto/Connect Server" or Goliath (os9)
- web: run TFF with TFFBox for single websites and use the tricks to reduce traffic (which others have explained much better within this forum)
- ScreenSharing/VNC, FileSharing/FTP: ...
- MS Office: I'd stay with Office'01/Classic (best use of screen-size and even within Classic-emulator faster, than it's OSX-successors), keep my Office-files in the 97-03-file-format and use OpenXMLConverter, to import newer docx/xlsx/pptx-files. Or use Office'04 (faster) or Office'08 (slower; supports docx/xlsx/pptx-files) with Tiger.
There's also Libre/OpenOffice for Tiger, PDF-Tools, Acrobat5 (os9) etc.
So Tiger is a very good option for that iBook - especially when it comes to speed, compared to Leopard.
For WLAN either a cheap (e.g. VONETS) WLAN-To-Ethernet-Brigde (os9/Tiger) or an Edimax mini-USB-WLAN-stick (only for OSX. And mind, that traffic's bottleneck is the USB1-port).

As @Slix said, for Leopard better look for G4 >1,0 GHz and keep your iBook G3 as a fine dual-boot os9/Tiger-machine in it's original condition - there are not many left anymore, if you compare it to the numbers of offered G4 iBooks.

PS about os9: I've put my favorites & personal links into this posting (links about os9 at the bottom)

 

[weckart]

Pretty much any 9.5mm IDE drive should work fine. Most any drive you’ll find new today will be SATA, and those will not work in an iBook. Your best bet for a new drive is eBay. What I normally suggest to people is to get an old original 160GB Apple TV for about $30 and harvest the hard drive from it.

You can still get 320GB WD IDE 2.5" drives (the largest ever made) on eBay for about $35/£25 open box but unused, according to listings, from China if you are prepared to wait for shipping.

e.g.

Western Digital 320GB WD3200BEVE 5400RPM IDE PATA 2.5" Laptop Hard Disk Drive | eBay

Model: WD3200BEVE. 1piece Western Digital 2.5" IDE 320GB Hard Drive. Capacity: 320GB. 1x 320GB Hard Drive. All hdd hard drive ,we test before sending. Spindle Speed: 5400 RPM. This item by us carry a Full One-Year Manufacturer Warranty.

www.ebay.com

but that's brushing up against the current cost of 240GB mSATA/M.2 drives plus a cheap IDE adapter.

 

[christiann]

Ah! Sorry, I don’t get notifications. It’s the 500 MHZ. Apparently the Snow isn’t pin compatible with the 7410.. Yeah it’s the white dual USB “Snow”. It won’t boot from a usb either.. I force booted it on a Tiger installer via Open Firmware and it booted up to a smashed finder folder... how weird!

Yeah, I was going through looking for the iBook because I knew it was in the closet somewhere.. I’ve spent $150 on an IBOOK! 😤 I have an IDE, but it’s from this really old 2002 or so PC tower... It has important info, I can live with the small storage.

I just got two free MacBooks (one working running Lion 10.7.5, it’s the A1181 2008 White and updating to Yosemite via SFOTT), a broken UniBody 08, and another IBOOK G3!

I am going to disassemble this iBook, maybe it has good stuff inside of it, it’s dead though.. Bummer.

And yeah, Tiger and Classic are fine. Actually i’m picking up an iMac G3 700 MHZ 2002, the last iMac G3 made, in Graphite. I’ll see if I can swap the drives, but now I’m going to work on the iMac too..
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Well, I don’t know if I want to buy a G4 if I got my G3 for “free”. I don’t know that much about soldering, I just turned 13... I’ve been working on all my 6 computers every day... Sigh. I wish the Snow CPU were pin compatible because it would be nice to see Leopard on it just for “show”.. Now that I have a MacBook, I feel stupid spending a lot on the iBook. I’ve successfully installed the RAM, that was easy. 512 MB. Still says 64 MB, I have no idea why. This iBook has a really weird story on how it got to cheetah 10.0.3:

This is how.

So around 5 months ago, I began working on the iBook.

It was on OS 9. Had a bunch of old work files on it and stuff.

I decided I wanted to use it. I got permission and got rid of some stuff.

I really wanted to update it to Tiger, so after 26 burned CDs, one of them FINALLY booted. It was a CHEETAH cd! But it upgraded itself straight from 9.1 to 10.0.3 without me having to set it up or anything. So creepy. I holded X and it worked. On the downside, this weird OS X it’s running has NO applications, it’s a waste. Can’t do anything really on it, except in the Classic Environment. Some parts came so can’t wait to get started! It’s 4 AM, i’ve been working on my Mac all night, need to get rest. Bye all- thank u!!

 

[DearthnVader]

It's just cheaper to get an iBook G4, the latest 12" sell for on the cheap and have a Radeon 9550 that supports Core Image.

I think I paid $20+shipping for my 1.33Ghz off eBay, tho it came with a very weak battery and no power adapter.

I understand the cool factor of upgrading what you have, but only the Clamshell iBooks can take the 7400/7410 upgrade, and it's not easy without and SMD rework station and lots of knowhow and experience.

 

[Amethyst1]

the A1181 2008 White and updating to Yosemite via SFOTT)

You're in for an absolute nightmare due to no graphics acceleration. Mountain Lion is the last version you can run on it that provides full acceleration.

 

[christiann]

Will an iMac take a 7410? They can handle a 7400 though. Well yeah. I’m trying to get this iBook Clamshell online, listed at $16, but the seller is rude, takes forever to answer, and barely responds.
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You're in for an absolute nightmare due to no graphics acceleration. Mountain Lion is the last version you can run on it that provides full acceleration.

Yeah, couldn’t I just download a third party app to control the sleep/lighting? Comes with it. I’ve been trying the RMC OS X Patcher but it is too confusing, yet so simple.

 

[Amethyst1]

On the downside, this weird OS X it’s running has NO applications, it’s a waste.

The Cheetah Thread (Mac OS X 10.0)

Mac OS X 10.0 Cheetah Supported Hardware: Power Mac G3 (Desktop, Mini Tower, All-in-One, Blue & White) Power Mac G4 (Yikes, Sawtooth, Gigabit, Digital Audio, QuickSilver [requires 10.0.4 build 4S10]) Power Mac G4 Cube iMac G3 iMac DV PowerBook G3 (excluding Kanga) PowerBook G4 Titanium...

forums.macrumors.com

Even then, Cheetah is still a total waste of time.

 

[christiann]

The Cheetah Thread (Mac OS X 10.0)

Mac OS X 10.0 Cheetah Supported Hardware: Power Mac G3 (Desktop, Mini Tower, All-in-One, Blue & White) Power Mac G4 (Yikes, Sawtooth, Gigabit, Digital Audio, QuickSilver [requires 10.0.4 build 4S10]) Power Mac G4 Cube iMac G3 iMac DV PowerBook G3 (excluding Kanga) PowerBook G4 Titanium...

forums.macrumors.com

Even then, Cheetah is still a total waste of time.

Yeah probably... I just don’t know why it upgraded itself and messed up the computer the way it did..