greetings,

I have a cacheless QS 733 and am considering a G4 upgrade. is there a point where L3 cache doesn't make sense, such as when a cpu speed exceeds 1.5GHz? Or, is that L3 necessary. I use the machine for final cut, photoshop, iphoto, and now thanks to santa, isquint for my video ipod. I realize a nice dual G5 would give me that warm and fuzzy feeling but its just not in the budget now. happy new year everyone.

mike

---

dm - md123

L3 or not L3: that is the question:
Whether 'tis nobler in the dimm to suffer
The bytes and nibbles of outrageous cache space,
Or to take RAMs against a sea of videos,
and by computing, end them? G5: to buy;
No money; and by a G5 to say we end
The heart-ache and the thousand extra minutes
That encoding is heir to, 'tis a computation
Devoutly to be wish'd. G5, too steep;
Too steep; perchance to receive; ay, there's the way;
For in that birthday gift what toys may come
When we have cast off this iPod Shuffle,
Must give us pause;

I'd hold off on making any upgrade purchases for that machine. Take the money that you have allocated for the upgrade and save it. Save up for a factory refurbished dual G5.

TheTominator Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> L3 or not L3: that is the question:
> Whether 'tis nobler in the dimm to suffer
> The bytes and nibbles of outrageous cache space,
> Or to take RAMs against a sea of videos,
> and by computing, end them? G5: to buy;
> No money; and by a G5 to say we end
> The heart-ache and the thousand extra minutes
> That encoding is heir to, 'tis a computation
> Devoutly to be wish'd. G5, too steep;
> Too steep; perchance to receive; ay, there's the
> way;
> For in that birthday gift what toys may come
> When we have cast off this iPod Shuffle,
> Must give us pause;
>
>

LMAO, The Bard must be rotating in his grave.

[www.barefeats.com]

towards the bottom of the page is a nice discussion of L3 vs no L3. I was really thinking about upgrading my machine (same as you've got), but I thought I'd need to upgrade the video card as well... so I think I'll hold out longer for a G5 refurb (although the new G5 iMacs are just looking great!)

They don't make it easy to find, but OWC has benchmarks for all of their accelerators.

[eshop.macsales.com]

thanks, that benchmark comparision is really interesting.

---

dm - md123

I just upgraded my Digital Audio G4/533DP with a Giga Designs 1.8GHz DP (7447A CPUs with no L3 cache), and it's very, very fast. Cost=$498, and it was worth every penny.
[forums.macresource.com]

G5s don't have L3 cache, and they're the best, fastest machines Apple makes. I also have a G5 1.8GHz DP (Rev. A with 6GB RAM), and the upgraded DA machine seems to be only about 10-15% slower, overall than the G5, both by testing and subjective measurement.
Your Quicksilver would be transformed by an upgrade, IMO, and if you've been happy with the machine so far you'll be pleasantly surprised by how it works with an upgrade like mine.

______________

---

What's the difference between reality and fiction? Fiction has to make some sense.

I just installed the Giga DP 1.8 in my QS 733. It has been worth it, as this Mac will now last another 2 years before I replace it. by 2007, enough s/w and h/w changes will have occurred that I will need to replace it.

This is very interesting as I have a dual 533 and have been holding
off until Macworld to see what pops up. This 1.8 dual upgrade may
be the way to go after all.

---

Grateful11