Quicksilver motherboard & G4 400 processor

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mrx
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Quicksilver motherboard & G4 400 processor

hello there,

I have through necessity installed a G4 400 processor to a Quicksilver 800 machine (the original 800 cpu was faulty). The machine is running okay with one exception the firewire bus is not operative - that is devices are attached but are not mounted on the desktop or appear in the system profile list for firewire.

The processor is detected as a G4 566 which i guess makes sense 400 x 133 system bus. Could this overclock cause problems with timings on the Firewire bus and thus the problems experienced.

I doubt anyone has done this as it is not normal procedure to underclock a quicksilver OR to put a 100hz system bus processor on a 133 board. I am planning to buy a Quicksilver 800 or 867 processor but am hesitant if the board has a faulty firewire bus(I use a DV camera).

Any ideas,thanks?

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sounds like to me your lucky

sounds like to me your lucky it even boots, though i would have tons of cooling on that thing being overclocked that much.

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Joined: Jan 14 2007 - 14:34
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Re: Quicksilver motherboard & G4 400 processor

hello there,

I have through necessity installed a G4 400 processor to a Quicksilver 800 machine (the original 800 cpu was faulty). The machine is running okay with one exception the firewire bus is not operative - that is devices are attached but are not mounted on the desktop or appear in the system profile list for firewire.

The processor is detected as a G4 566 which i guess makes sense 400 x 133 system bus. Could this overclock cause problems with timings on the Firewire bus and thus the problems experienced.

I doubt anyone has done this as it is not normal procedure to underclock a quicksilver OR to put a 100hz system bus processor on a 133 board. I am planning to buy a Quicksilver 800 or 867 processor but am hesitant if the board has a faulty firewire bus(I use a DV camera).

Any ideas,thanks?

I am curious, you comment that the chip is running at 566? 4x133 should give 533, so if you're machine is reporting 566 something may be awry. Otherwise, it seems like a lucky thing that the 400mhz chip is tolerating an over clock in excess of 25%. This may be why the firewire bus is not showing up for the party. You will probably have to tune back the multiplier for the cpu card. If you look in xlr8yourmac, you should be able to find the settings for the cpu card. You may have better luck setting the multiplier for 3.5, to get 466. This will be less of an over clock, but should yield better results/stability. While I can't speak for the quick silver board being tolerant of a cpu card it never was designed for, the G4s starting with the Sawtooth up to the 02 Quicksilvers have for the large part, interchangeable cpus. There are exceptions such as variations in multiplier, and the need to provide a 12v supply when you use a Quicksilver cpu in an eariler system like a DA, or GigE or Sawtooth. Aside from those concerns, the chip shouldn't do anything odd.

I guess it could be possible, that since the cpu in the machine died, that it may have suffered a power spike or something else that would have damaged other parts of the system. So, before I spent the money on a new cpu, I'd clock the spare you have at a 3 or 3.5 multiplier and see if the firewire port starts working again. Also, when you do go cpu shopping, I'd look hard for a qs 867 or 933 cpu. Both of these are the only cards outside of the MP cards that shipped with any L3 cache. The l3 makes a huge difference esp. since these machines are hamstrung by a 133mhz bus. Otherwise, the dual 800 and 1ghz are good, but there are also a variety of aftermarket cards that offer much higher clock speeds and better thermal characteristics. Some also have features which enable easier tinkering, such a jumper blocks or DIP switches to control clock multiplier and the CPU core voltage. I'd recommend the OWC Mercury Extreme, or anything by GigaDesigns. PowerLogix and Sonnet are ok, but neither offers any of the 'tweakability' you can get with the OWC or Giga cards. I've bought the OWC which was rated for 1.467 in a QS, and am successfully running 1.6ghz. Its a big jump from the dual 1gig QS card I had been running.

mrx
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Joined: Jul 14 2005 - 23:31
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Oops! 4 x 133 =

hello gochi,
quite right perhaps a little late to be sending messages of help Smile The processor is detected as a 533. I will try the multiplier settings and see how it goes. So far the machine has cost around $75 so not much to lose at this point.
Thanks for your thoughts

mrx
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Last seen: 16 years 11 months ago
Joined: Jul 14 2005 - 23:31
Posts: 4
Oops! 4 x 133 =

hello gochi,
quite right perhaps a little late to be sending messages of help Smile The processor is detected as a 533. I will try the multiplier settings and see how it goes. So far the machine has cost around $75 so not much to lose at this point.
Thanks for your thoughts

The Czar's picture
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Last seen: 13 years 2 weeks ago
Joined: Dec 20 2003 - 10:38
Posts: 287
Are you sure that the Firewir

Are you sure that the Firewire device itself is functioning? I thought that the firewire bus on my Quicksilver had given up the ghost (right after installing a PowerLogix Dual 1.6Ghz G4 CPU card), but when I tried the same device on my iBook, it also failed to work. I narrowed it down to a dodgy firewire port on the external HD I was playing with.

Also, did you hit the CUDA switch on the motherboard? I found that my QS wouldn't play ball with a different processor until the CUDA was pressed.

Something to check before investing any more coin in fixing this problem.

Cheers,

The Czar

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