Today is 'family day' and the news is a bit late and rushed. I'll have lots more in tomorrow's update.
Rage128 - Better Drivers Soon? You heard it here first folks, the Yosemite Game Performance page has been updated with comments from ATI's 3D programmer that makes me feel a *lot better* about the Rage128/Yosemite game performance. He reaffirmed the comments I had made in the
analysis/summary on the page yesterday. More speed and better image quality is coming he says - so don't consider the current shipping Rage128 comments to be the final word. There is also new owner comments on Myth II on the updated page.
Another reader comments on Yosemite performance compared to the PC with Rage128:
"Hey Mike,
the RAGE 128's performance isn't that bad when compared to a PC also
using the RAGE 128. I found
this
page which compares the ATI Fury to a TNT and Voodoo 2. The system is a
400 MHz PII with the results 640X480@24.1 (fps) and 800X600@21.9 (fps). This is slower
than the Yosemite G3 400 MHz, [Not really - as noted at that page it was running 32-bit color mode - the Yosemite was running 16Bit color mode-Mike] and remember that the RAGE Fury has 32MB of
memory, while the RAGE 128 in Yosemites have only 16MB.
Also, this site lists
the RAGE Fury as having the best graphics quality of any PC 3D card, so what
is the "image quality" problem? I plan to get a Yosemite as soon as Apple
fixes the weird ATA bus issues and external USB modems are confirmed to be
available.
Mike Stitzer"
See the updated Yosemite game page for comments to me from ATI on better/faster drivers.
Yosemite Initial Impressions: A reader noted some initial impressions on his new machine
which seemed to arrive with a defective keyboard:
"
I went to the depot and picked mine up yesterday. I was under the impression
that these things were smaller that the old tower designs but that is not the
case - the new G3 is appx 4" taller and maybe 1-1.5" wider. It's definately a
different design, though; gonna take a little getting used to =)
I'm pretty sure the USB keyboard is bad. I plugged it into the machine and the
mouse into the keyboard, and although the keyboard power button worked, that
was about it - no mouse input, no key input. So I plugged the mouse directly
into the machine and it worked fine. I'm using ADB keyboard and mouse right
now, though, and since I have a wacom tablet and a Turbo Mouse, I probably
won't be going USB for those purposes anyway ...
I called Apple for support about the keyboard, but they aren't open weekends
(!!!!)
Otherwise, this thing is GREAT so far - startup times scream. Barely have
enough time to notice the extensions at the bottom of the screen (about two
and a half rows at 1024x768) before they go away and the desktop appears.
Default disk cache is _40_ Megs! [he later replied it was 4096K {4MB}-Mike] (I have the 12GB ATA drive). I'm not sure if
that's right or not, but it sure puts a crimp in the 128 MB of ram.
I'm just now finishing software xfer from the old machine (8500/120
w/Powerlogix 275 card), so I'll let you know how things work once they're
comfy ...
Take care, and hang in there, buddy!
matt"
4MB disk cache (OS setting) is normally the largest I run, as it's near the point of diminishing returns (see the SCSI page for an MB study on disk cache sizes vs scores).
OWC ZIF BuyBack Program: Just received this is reference to their $479 300/150/1MB ZIF Upgrade: "
Other World Computing is pleased to make an even better deal for
purchasers of the IBM 300mhz w/1024 G3 Zif Upgrade.
The current price remains an exceptional value at $479 w/free delivery
for online orders and additionally we now offer rebates for a Zif trade
in. The rebates and terms are as follows:
G3/233mhz Zif - $100 rebate, net cost = $379
G3/266mhz Zif - $150 rebate, net cost = $329
Zif module must be returned to OWC with proper authorization number
within 45 days of product receipt. 30 Day money back policy still applies
to purchase of G3/300 upgrade.
This buy back rebate is also available with the purchase of any Sonnet or
XLR8 G3 Zif upgrade products from our company.
Best Regards,
Larry
Other World Computing
800-275-4576
www.macsales.com
"
Today's Unreal Tips and Tricks page has some interesting comments on Quake lighting settings that dramatically affect performance (Frank wonders which setting was used for the MacWorld Demo and shows reasons why it might have been with shadows off (default/higher performance)), Myth II performance tests with out new MythII FPS Toolkit, news on upcoming Unreal maps and more.
Mac OpenGL Code is Conix's: As suspected, Apple apparently licensed the Conix3D source code for the MacOS. Here's the latest mail I received from Conix:
"
Hello OpenGL customers and Friends,
The culmination of four years work came to fruition last Tuesday at the
keynote address when Steve Jobs announced Apple OpenGL. Apple has licensed
OpenGL from SGI and purchased the Conix source code.
The keynote address was fantastic. With the incredible power of the new
G3s, multi-colored and faster iMacs for consumers, and the speed of ATI's
Rage 128 Apple's OpenGL games and applications will be awesome!
Bob Beretta and John Stauffer, the engineering talent behind Conix OpenGL
were aquired along with the source code. They have great plans for the
work they will do at Apple. Conix will continue to support our Mathematica
plug-ins: Conix 3D Explorer and Mechanical Systems (tech@conix3d.com) and
continue to update OpenGL for eXodus, MachTen, X-Ten and Code Builder.
At the MacWorld Expo last week, I sensed the enthusiasm and commitment of
the Apple OpenGL team. Many have been long time advocates of Conix and
OpenGL. I got the sense that Apple will be providing full support and
resources for OpenGL developers.
Information about OpenGL at Apple can be found at:
http://www.apple.com/opengl/, or our web page.
Special thanks are in order to John Schimpf at SGI who helped us when we
were a company of two, Scott Jenkins (formerly of Apple) for early and
continued support, Chis Bentley, who worked with John to provide an
excellent ATI driver and accommodate our customers needs, the QD3D Team,
Brian Coleman, Bill LaBate, Kathy Tafel, and many others who worked behind
the scenes for OpenGL at Apple, Rebecca Gulick (remember Conix Man!), our
customers: New River Kinematics, Molecular Simulations, Hash, NewTek,
auto*des*sys, Strata, Questar, Synergy, Laminar, and others, John Carmack
of ID Software, and the media and press who've been our continual ally.
Warmest Regards,
The Conix Team
Conix Enterprises, Inc.
http://www.conix3d.com
"
More DV/Firewire feedback: In response to a problem reported from a new G3 owner in the Yosemite page yesterday, Dan Baldwin replied:
"
Hi Mike--
We have successfully been capturing DV from our Sony VX700 camcorder
to our new G3 400mhz using Premiere 5.1-- We haven't tried it with Premiere
4.0 and probably won't. We just followed the tips in the DV video article
which is in the Firewire folder on the new G3s.
Thanks,
Dan Baldwin
"
PowerBase OC Hack: The author of the PowerComputing Speed Bump (see links page OC section) writes:
"
Hi Mike!
A fellow in France who saw my Power Computing CPU card ratio hack figured
out how to do the same to his PowerBase 603e card. He successfully
changed his 200 MHz card to 240 MHz, and figured out all the possible
ratios. He made a web page outlining how to change things around, but so
far there is only available in French. He claims to have an English
translation in the works. It is possible to figure out though. He has a
page in English with some other useful Mac-related hacks, and a link to
the Powerbase page. Here is the URL:
http://bigiup.univ-lemans.fr/~p9548/mac_hard_uk.html
I provided links to this on PowerPC.ORG as well.
One more important thing:
The surface mount devices that you change on the Powerbase's card are
actually resistors, not jumpers like the 604e cards have. One will want
to use the appropriate value resistor when changing ratios around!
Beware! If someone is not sure what they are doing, they may want to wait
for the English translation! ;) [Update: Go to: http://babelfish.altavista.com which will translate pages to other languages]
George
Webmaster, PowerPC.ORG &
PowerComputing.NET
Nashville, TN
http://www.powerpc.org
http://www.powercomputing.net
ftp://ftp.powerpc.org
"
As always - overclocking will void your warranty and may not be reliable in your system. You assume all risk of damage when you perform any overclocking modifications.
UMax 604e/233 Card in 8500: Brian Gery writes he had verification (SCSI) errors
burning cdroms with this combination:
"
Hi-
I have a PM 8500/120 in which I recently installed a UMAX 604e/225MHz
CPU card. The machine seemed to work great for a few months until I tried to use
my Teac CD-R55S CD-R drive. I started getting funny verification errors when burning
CDs. After alot of screaming and hair-pulling (and some expert advice from
Brent at Adaptec) I put the old 120 MHz card back in and found that everything
seems to work fine again. It seemed that there were occasional bit
errors being written to the disk during a burn which would fail the disk verify after the
burn was complete. It looks like there is a slight incompatibility
between the UMAX card and the cache from Apple.
I don't really have the time to
figure it out completely, so I am going to sell the UMAX card (which works BEAUTIFULLY
otherwise) and look around for a G3 card that doesn't cause the problem.
From what I understand, the UMAX cards were never meant to work in a PowerMac,
and so there may be slight timing problems that only show up under certain
circumstances.
Thanks for the great site!
Brian Gery
"
I assume he tried Zapping the pram or resetting the CUDA (Cpu reset button) as noted
in the FAQ but that may not be the answer. One possible culprit is that the bus speed of the 233mhz card (usually 46MHz) was too high for the
stock 8500/120 cache, which often times will not run reliably over 45mhz on some early
models (see my L2 cache page for more info on the two cache dimms I saw in 8500's). Normally cache issues show up quickly in general use however (failure to boot, lockups, etc.).
If you missed yesterday's News, it was updated as late as 9PM. A summary is below.
Yesterday's News Summary
- Yosemite game performance page posted with Unreal results
- Virtual Game Station Performance Tip
- Yosemite page updated with DVD RAM, GB Ethernet and other news
- IXMicro 3dfx Banshee shown at Macworld (and link to image of display)
- Yosemite Firewire DV capture problem report
- Carmine's TIL and Net News Feed
- MacWorld in Pictures page posted
- Report of no IR port on 266MHz iMacs
- More on Keyspan Serial port PCI Cards for Yosemite
- Rumors of Sony suing Connectix (unverified)
- IE 4.5 - mixed bag of reader reports
- Reader report on Japanese pricing of Macs and software
- More playstation emulator feedback
- Reader discovers his G3/233 had a 266MHz CPU ZIF module
- Unreal News page updated with exclusive screenshots of new level and more
- Other Net news
For other recent site news/features links, see the Recent Site Features page.
Note: Before sending tech support related questions please check the Freq. Asked Questions, Site Contents, CPU Card reviews/articles, SCSI reviews articles, Graphics card reviews, Tips/Misc, Message Boards and Help pages - in many cases the answers to your questions are there and they have far more detail than I can list in an email. For Apple G3 system info - see the G3-ZONE. For links on recent articles, see the Recent Features page.
Please try the Men in Mac Help page as an alternative on requests for tech support to help me be able to spend more time on reviews. Thanks.
Make a Difference: Be the Difference
Randy Mita, Brad Lau and I came up with a new slogan and theme for Mac advocacy - "Make a Difference: Be the Difference". We're asking that all Mac owners take advantage of every opportunity to let others know the Mac advantage. It's a grass-roots approach that will surely help. You might save someone from a lifetime of Windows in the bargain.
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