OS on a 6500

[juan123]

I got a 6500PM with a G3 crescendo card in it.... I believe its a 400mhz G3....I'm wondering, is there any way to run OS X on this machine, using the upgrade? also, with which OS is this machine better off: OS 9.1, Linux, Mac OS X(if it works)? Well thanks...

 

[Dan 7.1]

yeah you can, using XPostFacto, but it will be horrendously slow. you will also need to make sure that you have the RAM maxed out to 128MB, otherwise it will be basically unusable.

and the machine works best with OS 8.6, thats what i have installed on my 225MHz variant. runs solid as a rock and relatively quickly.

 

[MultiFinder]

I have 96 megs in my 6500/225 and run OS 9 on it. It's okay. Takes its time starting up, but after that it's fine. It probably helps alot that I have the 256k L2 cache thingum in mine.

 

[Temetka]

Yeah L2 cache will make a huge improvement.

The 6500 series due to it's 'low' RAM ceiling is not a good target for OS X. It'll run classic just fine though.

Pick up a cheap iMac or B&W tower for $40 and runs OS X on it. It'll be far superior.

 

[Maccess]

Go for 9.22 with the patch kit from http://www.os9forever.com

The Max RAM for that machine is 256 MB with two pieces of hard to find 128MB EDO RAM. The 6500 can take advantage of EDO.

A fast IDE hard drive will help speed things up a bit. Heck you could even use a flash hard drive.

With two PCI slots you could have a firewire/usb card and a video card in there.

 

[MultiFinder]

Ooo, yeah. I forgot about that. ADD A USB CARD. It will make life 54309857034978 easier

 

[LCGuy]

Erm, Maccess, i regret to say this, but as far as i'm aware, the max that these machines can address is 132MB, thats the onboard RAM + two 64MB DIMMs.

 

[MultiFinder]

Erm, Maccess, i regret to say this, but as far as i'm aware, the max that these machines can address is 132MB, thats the onboard RAM + two 64MB DIMMs.

I always thought that too, with one exception. The 6400 has the 8 megs of onboard RAM. The 6500 lacks it. Other than that little nit-picky thing, I believe you are correct.

 

[Bunsen]

Yeah L2 cache will make a huge improvement.

The G3 card's in that slot, and it has its own cache.

 

[Quadraman]

Ummm..I don't think OS X will work with a 6500.

http://eshop.macsales.com/OSXCenter/XPostFacto/Framework.cfm?page=Compatibility.html

It says there are lots of problems and I don't think OS X recognizes the G3 upgrades for those models. Look for my thread about installing Tiger to a 603/604 machine. I think that might work better than an Xpostfacto install, but I still don't know if it will utilize the G3 upgrade.

 

[alk]

Ummm..I don't think OS X will work with a 6500.

Sure, it will install and run. But it will be slow, and it will not recognize a G3. Having a fat L2 cache will help things a bit. If you want ethernet, you have to use a PCI card (the CSII isn't recognized). On board video is the same as a Rev A G3 (slow to begin with, and not accelerated in OS X), so if you want good video, there goes your other PCI slot. Fortunately, ADB works fine, so USB is not a requirement.

For more, check out my stale thread on this:

http://www.ppcmla.com/forums/viewtopic.php?t=164

Peace,

Drew

 

[Dan 7.1]

Erm, Maccess, i regret to say this, but as far as i'm aware, the max that these machines can address is 132MB, thats the onboard RAM + two 64MB DIMMs.

I always thought that too, with one exception. The 6400 has the 8 megs of onboard RAM. The 6500 lacks it. Other than that little nit-picky thing, I believe you are correct.

yerp, both of you is right. instead of 8mb onboard ram, the 6500 series get 2MB dedicated VRAM and a RAGE II chip.

 

[alk]

I tried to hack in the 8 MB of RAM from a 5400 on my 5500. The 5500 should be equipped with all the necessary bits to add this extra RAM... It even has empty solder pads for the DRAM ICs.

So I lifted them off my 5400 and soldered them onto my 5500. The result? A non-booting 5500.

I never bothered to track down the problem. It could have been one of the following: I could have fried the DRAM by using a heat gun to lift it off the 5400, I could have created a solder bridge on the 5500 when installing the DRAM, I could have left a solder gap and not connected a critical line on the 5500, I could have accidentally torched something sensitive with the soldering iron on the 5500 that isn't directly related to the project, or I could just be missing some extra electronicson the board that cause the 5500 to not boot when the DRAM is installed (though I don't think that is likely).

Anyway, it's been a long time, but from my reading of the tech notes, the 5500 ought to be able to address motherboard RAM just like the 5400. What's more, it may even be able to address 64 MB of RAM on the motherboard if you can find DRAM ICs of the right density. I've never been motivated enough to do all the investigation necessary to complete this project, but it would be pretty darn cool to have a 500 MHz 6500/G3 w/ 192 MB of RAM.

Peace,

Drew

 

[Quadraman]

I tried to hack in the 8 MB of RAM from a 5400 on my 5500. The 5500 should be equipped with all the necessary bits to add this extra RAM... It even has empty solder pads for the DRAM ICs.
So I lifted them off my 5400 and soldered them onto my 5500. The result? A non-booting 5500.

I never bothered to track down the problem. It could have been one of the following: I could have fried the DRAM by using a heat gun to lift it off the 5400, I could have created a solder bridge on the 5500 when installing the DRAM, I could have left a solder gap and not connected a critical line on the 5500, I could have accidentally torched something sensitive with the soldering iron on the 5500 that isn't directly related to the project, or I could just be missing some extra electronicson the board that cause the 5500 to not boot when the DRAM is installed (though I don't think that is likely).

Anyway, it's been a long time, but from my reading of the tech notes, the 5500 ought to be able to address motherboard RAM just like the 5400. What's more, it may even be able to address 64 MB of RAM on the motherboard if you can find DRAM ICs of the right density. I've never been motivated enough to do all the investigation necessary to complete this project, but it would be pretty darn cool to have a 500 MHz 6500/G3 w/ 192 MB of RAM.

Peace,

Drew

Something I was looking at in that regard was the G3 upgrade Sonnet made for the 7200 that fits in a PCI slot. It also has RAM slots on it so you may be able to get G3 compatibility under OS X and increased memory at the same time using one though you'll probably have to hack Sonnet drivers, Xpostfacto, the OS X installer or all three to make it work.

 

[RadioPatrol]

I run 7.6.1 on my 6500 / 275 128 Mb of Ram just fine .......... one has to ask why you would torture yourself trying to run OSX on a system that supports a max of 128, even with the G3 upgrade ........ you limited to a slow system bus and lack of memory ......... good luck though