Just picked up a Power Macintosh Upgrade Card

[zackl]

Just picked up one of these guys:

http://www.forcedperfect.net/hardware/cards/applepowermacintoshupgradecard/

It states that it's a 66mhz 601 chip which "runs at twice the original 68040 processor speed of the computer it is installed in"

I'm missing something - it's @ 66mhz, but on an 840av (40mhz '040) it pops up to 80mhz 601?

Anybody have experience positive / negative with a quadra upgrade? I'm guessing on a 40mhz '040 most 68k native stuff will be much faster than emulating?

Z

 

[beachycove]

No pds slot in an 840av means that the fastest stock Mac one of these works in will be a 33MHz machine (Q650, 800, 950). What would happen if you were to put it in an overclocked machine is another matter.

DayStar (I think it was) made these for Apple, and themselves produced a later, faster version (or two?) under their own name.

You are right about 68k software generally working faster on the 840av. However, the superior performance of the 601 in applying Photoshop filters and the like still made the upgrade attractive among the design set back when new.

 

[CelGen]

The 601 card relies on the 040's crystal. Going from Appendix A in the cards documentation, In a 950 it operates at 66mhz. On the Centris 610 it's a measly 40mhz. At the time of print the 840 wasn't released but it makes sense that the card is running at 80mhz mind you it might be running hotter than usual since it's seeing a 14mhz overclock.

 

[Byrd]

A mate who owned a Quadra 700 purchased one when they were new. He was really happy, even @ 50Mhz it increased disk, graphics and memory speeds considerably. Of course you needed optimised PPC applications for this, otherwise it was a performance dog. Quite amazing to think that the cards even existed - going from 68K to PPC, different architectures is pretty impressive.

 

[CelGen]

I've been told otherwise. Ignoring the fact that a lot of the OS for a long time was for 68K and forced the CPU to emulate the 040 a lot of the PPC natives took forever to actually show an actually noticeable difference in performance. I remember when the 601 first came out the Computer Chronicles cited there really was no notable performance boost for the cost of the upgrade.

 

[uniserver]

i guess my thoughts on this is:

forced the CPU to emulate the 040

I thought the PPC emulated 68k as a 68020?

A mate who owned a Quadra 700 purchased one when they were new. He was really happy, even @ 50Mhz

i would assume running mac os 8.6?

that should be the best os for ppc yes? - PPC fully optimized - all 68k legacy stuff removed after 8.1?

My experience with the 601 has mostly been crap. - for the longest time i kept saying to my self what a dog.

I'd just rather use my LC475 @ 33mz, or just use the 840av /w mac os 8.1...

my experience with the PM6100 was not good originally.

However, mine happened to be one that let me overclock the heck out of it!

viewtopic.php?f=29&t=20459

Once i changed the oscillator , and got that PM6100 @ 90mhz it came A L I V E!

It was even worth investing in a couple 128 meg simms for it!

Not anything like how the old machine responded.

Turned it right in to a crazy fast machine. Witch after this I told my self, Ah ok... Now i get the point of the PPC601!

just like when i took my IIsi and changed its oscillator, now its running at 29mhz... Really.. its completely worth it! it came alive, GUI and everything else!

 

[NJRoadfan]

The built in emulator in PPC ROMs is for a 68LC040. Connectix Speed Doubler offered a faster emulator as part of its feature set. When the PowerPC Macs were released, they included was amounted to a fully emulated operating system since 7.1.2 was a quick modification to run on the machines. MacOS 8.5 should run faster on a 6100 since its mostly native PPC code, but that was offset by its higher memory requirements.

 

[uniserver]

Humm this where I saw a 601 only emulates a 68020

Conventional software runs in an "emulation" mode, which is functionally similar to the 68020 processor. The main differences between the 68020 processor and later processors are: (a) it does not have a PMMU (Paged Memory Management Unit), ( B) it does not support the SWAP16 instruction, and © it does not support a floating point unit. The first point is necessary because the PowerPC has a newer, better, memory management model. The second point is also addressed by improvements in the PowerPC chip. The third point requires different steps to work around; see the FAQ question below. Conventional software will generally run faster than a 68020, probably between Macintosh IIci and Quadra 605 performance, depending on how many references the software makes to the native "toolbox" in the computer.

http://support.apple.com/kb/ta34178?viewlocale=en_us&locale=en_us

But maybe the upgrade card hw is different somehow.

 

[NJRoadfan]

The 601 doesn't have anything built into it, just the onboard Apple ROM. A slight correction, it emulated a 68EC040 since the PowerPC handled MMU functions natively. The MMU-less EC 68k variants didn't see use in Macs, but did appear in some Amigas.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mac_68k_emulator

On the subject of Amigas, they were actually the fastest 68k "Macs" during the mid-90s when equipped with a 68060 CPU upgrade and running a Mac emulator like ShapeShifter. A 060 running code natively easily outran the emulated 68k of the PowerMacs for a few years.

 

[uniserver]

A 060 running code natively easily outran the emulated 68k of the PowerMacs for a few years.

that is pretty cool!

very interesting.

So i would assume the machine would have been A3000/4000 with a 060 cpu card in it?

 

[NJRoadfan]

Yes, the cards were made for the Amiga 3000 and 4000 CPU socket. There was a 060 card for the Amiga 2000 as well, but it is very rare. The most sought after CPU upgrade is the Cyberstorm PPC. It has both a PowerPC 604e and 68040 or 68060 CPU on board. Whats neat is that both CPUs could be active at the same time due to the on board memory management system.

http://amiga.resource.cx/exp/cyberstormppc

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PowerUP_%28accelerator%29

 

[zackl]

The most sought after CPU upgrade is the Cyberstorm PPC

Aaaaaaand I'm back after 20 mins researching that upgrade and potential of sticking a m68060 into an old mac. Not going to happen.

So cool. Dug up a Cyberstorm @ EBAY that recently sold + pic below too.

http://www.ebay.com/itm/Amiga-phase-5-Cyberstorm-PPC-CSPPC-68060-50MHz-604e-180MHz-128MB-RAM-/141014864046

 

[CelGen]

It's been known for many years that any Amiga to push past the 68030 (040, 060 or PPC) costs hundreds or thousands of dollars. In the end though they're only in demand because there's a few dozen die-hard amiga fans that are still alive and insist on running the latest AmigaOS.

Some people don't understand why mac users make shrines wherever they can. The same can be said for the Amiga users and their dedication to the system.

 

[trag]

NJRoadfan's comment regarding Speed Doubler is important. If you are using a PPC601 upgrade card in a 68K Mac or an X100 family PowerMac, Speed Doubler will substantially improve the performance of 68K emulation.

The 68K emulation in the later x500 PCI PowerMacs was improved so that it was about as good as Speed Doubler (I think Apple actually licensed the code from Connectix, but the memory is vague).

But for the early NuBus PowerMacs and the PPC601 upgrade cards, which have what amounts to a PM6100 ROM on board, Speed Doubler is really a must.

 

[Gorgonops]

The difference between the emulator in the early vs. later (PCI) PowerMacs is the later version uses dynamic recompilation combined with caching while the early version was strictly iterative.

Another note regarding the parallel thread going on right now about "Road Apples": one of the reasons the original 5200/6200 Performas generated so much hate is the original 603 (not 603e/ev) CPU didn't have enough onboard cache to keep the emulator happy (it had only 1/2 the total cache of the 601). They also had only half the bus width of the original 601 machines (6100/7100/8100), so those two factors made them uniquely sucky, arguably even worse than a Quadra with a 601 upgrade. (Clock for clock, anyway.)