I have an opportunity to get one for 150 euros, would that be a good price or just too much for what it can offer? I have checked the specs and it is a Powermac7,3 - 1047 model.

Would love to hear from the existing owners, please share your experience on the MorphOS 3.4 performance on this beast. I hear it can be pretty loud on Mac OS when several programs are open and processing the data when needed... how that works on MorphOS side?

I already have a Mac Mini G4 32MB version (waiting for the 64MB to arrive), but since this is a rare opp for me to get one without having to pay a heavy price for shipping, would it be a good move to get one?

What would be the main advantage over the Mac Mini G4 64MB, besides CPU speed and much more VRAM?

Please share any thoughts, views, experience... thanks much!

P.S. Also, I am not a pc tech, so have no idea how to fix the liquid cooling thingy.. the existing owner says everything's working great and all, but don't want to risk the failure in the next few weeks, months, so how would one go about, having no knowledge about doing it themselves?

If the cooling system hasn't been overhauled allready you will have to do it ASAP.
If you don't have a way of doing it yourself -> there is your answer.

Otherwise it's the fastest currently supported computer (and will probraly stay that for the forseeable future).

I have one. Currently without a working gfx card, which seems to have broke when I tried to use a DVI cable directly on it instead of a VGA adapter (so a fair warning there. Don't know if it's just me or not though).

But besides this heavy setback, I'm very happy with it. It's fast and not so loud in my opinion. And with 3.4 I can even show true HD H246 compressed movies in full speed. Not bad for a single cord

I paid 300€ for mine (they are rare in Stockholm) so I think this is a good price. Probably as good as it gets.

I havn't checked my cooling system (my philosophy is to play with it until it breaks) since I'm not technical enough myself to fix these kind of things but during the 6 months before the gfx card accident I used it for hours every day without problems. And even if it does break, there is a good chance of fixing it afterwards. It does cost to fix it so it might be cheaper to just buy a new one.

But it really is the best MorphOS computer I've played with because it's so damn close to what you would expect a modern computer to do with a modern OS. And this on a hobby OS with 7 year old hardware!

Do yourself a favour and buy it! But if you can, ask the guy to look for leaks first.

@nobrainer

At the very least, open the side panel and look inside for signs of leaking cooling system. There is a cloth pad at the bottom, if it is wet or there is signs of corrosion be weary.

@Yasu
Don't wait until it breaks or your CPU will be dead.

I have one and Im happy. Only that mine is very noisy. Fan madness.
Perhaps I have to check the cooling system.
A very fast and responsive machine.

@redrumlua

I don't know how to do that. But it's a good hint to open it and have a quick look if there are any leaks. I did that myself.

Powermac G5 dual 2.7 are the fastest G5 we have to run MorphOS though we are using a single cpu. The difference is touchable on playing video (as Yasu wrote) and surfing with OWB but is visible in every aspect of OS: responsive and fast at high levels. I bought two of them+one motherboard and two cpu: one of those has cabinet damaged, maybe the psu and one of the two cpu has thermal sensor damaged but I have spare parts to count on (motherboard, cooling system, etc). I payed almost 250 euros for all. I guess the price for your possible G5 is really good and with a good graphic card (it's possible to flash an ATI Radeon for pc to use in the Apple side) you will really enjoy MorphOS and all the software related. I bought my licence yesterday and now I'm running MorphOS on this G5 setting up to make it my main machine (I use MorphOS as main system).
I'm not agree to use a liquid cooling system without checking and/or overhauling it. Leaking could damage motherboard and/or psu in a not-so-funny way: since Delphi (the manufacturer) use to put corrosive coolant inside you can bet that if this liquid should leak somewhere will cause serious damages (dead psu for sure, mobo and cpus high risk). I refurbished my liquid cooling unit and I've explained all here:
Refurbishing G5 Cooling System
and yes, it's not that simple but not that difficult too. Maybe you can ask help to someone who is able to. But refurbishing the cooling system surely can save your G5.

I also want to point out that you are going to have to take a risk regardless when you buy used hardware. Never buy with money you can't afford to loose.

With that said, all my buyings have been good so far

And...I decide myself that 400MHz was not worth the risk and bought a 2.3 (the fastest without liquid cooling).
Once I figure out how to air cool 2.7 GHz processors I may switch.

@Yasu:
Agree! Old hardware may be risky anyway =)
By the way they are enough rock solid too!

@Kronos

Thanks for your clear answers! :)

@Yasu

Sad to hear your graphics card went down hill. You're talking about the Radeon 9650 or some other model?

300€ wow, I may better grab mine then. With 2.7Ghz the speed must be great huh? I wonder if someone has used SSD in their G5 yet? I know it can be done in Mac Mini.. is G5 somehow different in this matter? I'd use m-SATA SSD + 5v 44-pin IDE-mSATA adapter, would that work ok? I have also asked the seller for some close-up HD pictures (he's a pro photographer so that shouldn't be a problem :)) and to check for potential leaks in there. Thanks for sharing Yasu!

@redrumloa

Yeah, I've asked the seller to check for the leaks inside.. still waiting for the some HQ HD pics…

@tolkien

Hm, that's something I prefer not to have.. fan noise up all the time.. that's why I love Mac Mini.. cat's purr. :D

@Jambalah

Thanks for sharing your experience and advice too, this is priceless, thanks guys!

Is yours loud too or are the fans not as disturbing? Do you have it on the desk or on the floor.. guess that can make much difference regarding the noise?

Thanks for sharing the link, reading it now.. but my head already hurts juts thinking about going about disassembling it and all that work. :( Would you offer such a service to me if I've send it to you? Just wondering, as I am very close to your country.. we actually share a border to be precise.. think east from you.. :)

@Yasu again..

Yeah, I know it's a risk but I don't care.. one can blow 150euro in a split sec anyway. :D

@Jim

Is your G5 loud? Are you happy with the speed/performance?

Again, thanks to all of you guys for helping out with the advice and all, much appreciated.

nobrainer,
Quote:

Why not use a Sata II* SSD Hard drive?

I used one, to be honest not that much difference with MorphOS, big difference with MacOSX though. I thinks that more to do with MacOSX's bloat than anything else.


*Sata IIIs are unreliable at best with the Onboard SATA 1, a SATA II worked fine.

stephen_robinson,
Quote:

Yeah, should have said SATA II* SSD... m-SATA are better for the Mac Mini as there is less space in there.

So you're using a SATA II in your G5? If I get my G5 I will definitely do a dual boot MorphOS / MAC OS X, because it comes with 250Gb HD + 1TB HD and 5.5Gb RAM.. guess it would be a waste of all that RAM since MorphOS can only use 1GB..

If you can, please share which SSD model it is so I know what to look for.. if not, no problem at all, thanks.

And G5 are a lot quieter than G4s. Still not the quitetest computers in the world though.

> I wonder if someone has used SSD in their G5 yet? I know it can be done in Mac Mini..
> is G5 somehow different in this matter?

Yes, it is. As stephen_robinson has said, for SATA SSDs you can directly use normal-size SATA2 SSDs on the SATA port of the PowerMac G5, whereas on the PATA port of the Mac mini G4 you need an adapter to mSATA and an mSATA SSD because of space constraints. Alternatively, you can directly use a PATA SSD in the Mac mini.

> I'd use m-SATA SSD + 5v 44-pin IDE-mSATA adapter, would that work ok?

Yes, in a Mac mini G4. But there's no need for any such contortions with a PowerMac G5. More there:

https://morph.zone/modules/newbb_plus/viewtopic.php?topic_id=9580&forum=11

@nobrainer

It was a 9600XT 128 MB VRAM. I have no idea why it broke. Or maybe it isn't broke but something else have crashed and burned. But before I try out a new gfx card I will not know for sure. But I'm certain that it isn't a MorphOS problem, and it's not a hardware bug.

I think 150€ is a very very good price. Have you looked at the price of Mac Mini G4:s lately? They are almost as expensive as the G5! My Ibook feels pretty weak by today's standard but the G5 is still fast enough for normal computing, even comparing to modern PC:s. That is my opinion

[ Edited by Yasu 28.12.2013 - 23:33 ]

I had a 2.5 G5 when they were first released. I got the Apple Care warranty on it since it was the first liquid cooling system they did and it made me nervous to have. Mine failed with no warning one day after about 3 years and a couple months. I remember being just out of the coverage window. In the end Apple did cover the repairs but it took some work and would have been a total loss if they didnt cover it.

CHECK the cooling system and pull it out. Its not a hard fix if you research it and take the time to do it. Its a fun project and will teach you more about the system and give you an opportunity to know more about it in the end.

I have to rebuild my 2.7 LCS. It's not that hard. the only complaint is that you have to buy more O-Rings than you need.

Chris

I'm using a 2.7 dualboot System (MorphOS3.4 & OS10.5)with a SSD and a Radeon 9800pro (Artic Silencer) The PowerMac is incredible fast compared to my PegII, I'm lovin' it - the best next Gen Amiga you can get. BUT you HAVE TO overhaul the cooling system, mine was in a good shape (no visible leakage and low noise) but during the rework I saw the upcoming problems. Sediments in the whole cooling system, missing cooling fluid (but there was no leakage!!??) I've build an external service valve to change the fluid and cleaned the whole system.
http://www.a1k.org/forum/attachment.php?attachmentid=75832&d=1381866743



The easy, but also important part is to clean all fans.If you can't do this overhaul by yourself forget the 2.7.

[ Editiert durch AMike 30.12.2013 - 10:31 ]

@Jim

Is your G5 loud? Are you happy with the speed/performance?

Since the model I purchased is unsupported as yet, the performance can only be judged under OSX (and appears to be better than a comparable AGP model).
Quiet? Yes, nothing is as loud as an MDD though.

nobrainer,
Quote:

Hi Nobrainer!
the G5 is really silent! The only fan I can hear is the one mounted on the 9800XT graphic card which is louder than whole G5 fans!! I put the 23 kg monster on the floor since my desk is fully loaded =)
But the noise is minimal: the fan inside the Quicksilver 1.8 is much more noisy.
For the question you asked you have a pm. And yes, we share a border ;)

Quote:

And a Quicksilver (like my first MorphOS system) is still very quiet.
The MDDs (particularly the early ones) are the loudest Power macs.

@Jim:
Inside my Quicksilver there is a Sonnet Encore 1.8ghz which needs the same treatment I performed for MDD: changing the fan.
I put a 120 mm Silenx Ixtrema fan which move a great amount of air (1400U/min - original MDD fan reaches almost 1800) producing only 18db of noise. I did the same with psu fans and now MDD is really quiet. So I will buy similar fan for the Sonnet so to silence it too.

Quote:

Good point. All can be silenced.
Although I had a 1700 MHz Sonnet upgrade and I didn't think it was that bad.
Is yours a dual cpu model?

I'm just trying to figure out where the rumor that G5s are loud came from.
They are quite quiet.

Quote:

Have you tried booting Mac OS X on one? :D

If I boot Mac OS X on mine, it instantly turns all fans on to full speed and it gets so noisy that I can't stand being near it for more than a few minutes at a time. On the other hand, on Linux and MorphOS, fans are run at close to the lowest possible speed setting.