Which Upgrade Card to Go With?

[Bobdude161]

I fiddled around with the search forums section and found some useful advice on upgrading a G4 Sawtooth, but I want to take it one step further; Which company should I buy from. I was first going with Sonnet but read that some people condemn it. And then thought about Powerlogix and once again reading in the forums was shot down. So I'll give a list of upgrades that I am interested in and you can give me some input.

Giga Deigns Never heard of them till I saw them on eBay.

SonnetTech I've known this company for quite a while

I was going to post OWC but they don't have a fast enough speed (>1.6 Ghz)

Powerlogix Kinda sketchy on these people after reading some of the threads

If I missed a company tell me and I'll post it.

Also I know there are other options like buying a faster Mac but I love the Sawtooth's expandibility and I am not going to buy Intel anytime soon. I love PowerPC, mostly for my old school gaming and hopefully some new school when I complete all of my upgrades.

 

[spinne1]

I've read good things about GigaDesigns and they are generally cheaper than Sonnet or PowerLogix. Next, I have bought Sonnet and they are generally rock solid products, but usually pricey. FastMac is another good company to try, but they don't make dual upgrades I believe, so they would be good if you want a single processor. Personally, I would get the Dual 1.7 Ghz GigaDesigns as it is at the right spot between performance and price. However, that said, I think G4 upgrades are WAY too expensive compared to simply saving a bit more and getting Intel stuff (MacMini). I hope the prices will fall dramatically soon. If so, I'll upgrade my G4. If not, I'll just use it until I can afford a much faster computer.

 

[Bobdude161]

Are the upgrades truly overpriced? How much do you think it would cost for the companies to make those?

Also off a couple of tangents, do the upgrade cards require a different type of memory?

 

[spinne1]

Are the upgrades truly overpriced? How much do you think it would cost for the companies to make those?

Also off a couple of tangents, do the upgrade cards require a different type of memory?

To me they are overpriced because of the performance you can get for just a bit more money. For example, a MacMini Core Duo 1.66 Ghz computer with much faster ram, a much faster frontside bus, etc. compared to a Sawtooth G4 will run you $799. The GigaDesigns Dual 1.7 Ghz card runs about $459. The performance of the MacMini over the upgraded G4 should be very significant. The main disadvantage of the mini setup is the graphic card situation. Having a ATI 9800 Pro in the G4 could make up for some of the performance difference, but the card was $250 last time I checked, so now you've spent $709 to upgrade the G4.

To get me to upgrade, the Dual 1.7 would have to come down to under $300.

How much it costs to build them isn't really important. Why? Because in the computer world it is all about what comparable product you could get for the same money. Let's say for example that a company would try to build computers now with Pentium III chips. The cost to manufacture them would be close to the same (within a few hundred dollars), yet the market would only be willing to pay a fraction (if anything) for the computers. Therefore, it is not in the companies' interests to manufacture that product. The same will hold true for the G4 upgrades at some point. The demand will go way down unless the price goes down to keep the demand rising. The only way the companies can make money is if they made enough profit on the units they already sold to make up for the loss they will one day have to incur to sell off the older stock of G4 upgrades that will one day be sitting around some warehouse. It may be that they don't keep a large stock on hand to thwart this problem, but either way these companies may be in trouble, being that there is no conceivable way yet to upgrade any Mac computers after the G4s. What will these companies do when the well runs dry on G4 upgrades?