Powerbook 500 with PowerPC

[martinws]

Well the two old powerbooks (190cs and 500 with PowerPC) arrived yesterday.

I must say, wow! the Powerbook 500 was really built well. Compared to the 190cs which creaks and groans when you pick it up, the 500 is solid in comparison.

Anyone know much about the Powerbook 500 with PowerPC?

Lowendmac and Apple-History do not have an entry for it, I would have thought it should since it was appears to be a separate version (MacTracker lists it separately).

Was it just for European market? How long was it marketed?

Given the build quality I'd rather have had one of these than the 190cs.

Thanks,

Martin

 

[MacMan]

I recently read something that desribed the introduction of the PowerBook 5300 and the negative impact it had, and that Apple produced the PPC upgrade for the 500 series as a response so users could have a well-built notebook with a PPC processor. The PPC 500 series was basically a stop-gap before the release of the PowerBook 1400.

The upgrade cards themselves are very rare and probably mostly lurk inside long-forgotten 500 series PowerBooks. I'm still blown away by how cheaply you got it!

 

[beachycove]

No, the 500 series was marketed as ppc-upgradeable. So were other late 68k powerbooks like the 280c. It was standard marketing fare c. 1993-94.

There were several 603e ppc upgrades for the 500 series, at least one of which (Newertech) ran at 117MHz, which I recall because I have one. Apple produced a slower (100MHz?) upgrade card, and Newertech a variety at even higher speeds, up to somewhere just short of 200MHz, I believe. I suspect that these latter cards would be exceedingly rare, as by the time of production, the 1400 series must have been available.

 

[tyrannis]

Anyone know much about the Powerbook 500 with PowerPC?Lowendmac and Apple-History do not have an entry for it, I would have thought it should since it was appears to be a separate version (MacTracker lists it separately).

Was it just for European market? How long was it marketed?

There are a few different PowerPC upgrades out there for the 500 series. I think you must have a unit with the Apple card; when you shipped your 5xx to Apple to have the PowerPC daughtercard installed, they would also replace the Powerbook 5xx nameplate tab at the top of the screen with a tab bearing a "PowerPC" decal.

 

[martinws]

The upgrade cards themselves are very rare and probably mostly lurk inside long-forgotten 500 series PowerBooks. I'm still blown away by how cheaply you got it!

Well perhaps the machine was cheap (99p) but the SCSI replacement card is going to hurt £60+ 8-o

 

[martinws]

There are a few different PowerPC upgrades out there for the 500 series. I think you must have a unit with the Apple card; when you shipped your 5xx to Apple to have the PowerPC daughtercard installed, they would also replace the Powerbook 5xx nameplate tab at the top of the screen with a tab bearing a "PowerPC" decal.

That makes sense, the decal does feel a little rough and sticks out a little as if it's been added later. :beige:

Thanks,

Martin

 

[MacMan]

Well perhaps the machine was cheap (99p) but the SCSI replacement card is going to hurt £60+ 8-o

Although the SCSI Compact Flash adaptors are a good idea, the price is silly. The manufacturer would sell loads of them and probably make more money on the whole if they were to lower the price.

Rant aside, there is another possible solution which I am currently investigating. There were PCMCIA expansion modules made for the 500 series PowerBook that fit into the left battery compartment and connect via a PDS slot. I have one of these modules and currently I'm trying to get my 520c to regognize and boot off Compact Flash cards plugged into the slots via an adaptor. With my small selection of cards, the only ones that seem to work are the 32MB standard speed cards, which will boot the PowerBook just fine. I have also tried a 512MB card and two 1GB cards but they don't seem to work, causing freezes. I think this may be due to the speed of the cards: my 512MB and 1GB cards are all high-speed cards which may be causing issues with the 520c's interface. Or perhaps it is due to the larger capacity of the cards... More experimentation is in order because I would like my PowerBook 520c to run off a Compact Flash card of a useful size.

 

[Sludgedragon]

wow! the Powerbook 500 was really built well.

But I always had a problem with the batteries sliding out. Had to use a giant rubberband to keep them in!

 

[martinws]

wow! the Powerbook 500 was really built well.

But I always had a problem with the batteries sliding out. Had to use a giant rubberband to keep them in!

Luckily, mine appear to be pretty secure.

 

[freudling]

Checked my website, and here is what it says:

Yes. 4 upgrade chips were made for the 500 series PowerBooks. Newer Technologies made 3 upgrade chips for the 500 series PowerBooks (1) NUpowr 183mhz PowerPC® chip with 128K of L2 cache (Price: NA. Availability: NA) (2) NUpowr 167 PowerPC® 603e chip (Cache: NA. Price: $935. Availability: NA). (3) NUpowr 117 PowerPC® 603e chip. Apple Computers® made 1 upgrade chip that ran at 100mhz (603e PowerPC®) - cache: NA. Price: NA. Availability: NA. Try OUTPUT ENABLERS to obtain a chip booster ($45; might increase your chip speed to 76 MHz).

http://thisoldmac.ca/specs/PB540.html

 

[dading]

Hi! i have one of those powerbooks 500 with a nupower PPC 630e at 117mhz, and like you said... that's a really solid notebook, the innards are made of steel! 8-o , very impressive.. i don't know if it runs great cuz my pb540 doesn't even turns on (psu misconection blow something inside). any way.. is a rock solid machine.. don't let it go away

 

[AtariMacGuy]

Hello All,

I've obtained a Nupower 117MHz Upgrade for my PowerBook 540c but do not have the software to install it! Can anyone help me? W@hat do I need exactly to run System 7.6.1 or 8.1 properly? Anyone have a disk image of the Newer Tech upgrade/drivers floppy disk they can send to me?

Thanks, Rob, AtariMacGuy

(sagittae@mac.com)

 

[beachycove]

I would have thought that it should work straightforwardly under 7.6.1; the ppc upgrade cards reportedly required only 7.5.2 (buggy) or above. There was a NuPower extension that went with the card, but I do not recall that it was required for the system to boot. (I have one of these cards, but prefer the 68LC040 in my 540c.)

If it will not boot, I would suspect that the card itself is dead, or that ram needs reseating, etc.

 

[Bunsen]

IIRC, for 8.1 you need to install the OS as a "fat binary" system containing both 68k and PPC code. I think you do this by selecting to install "For any Mac"

 

[Byrd]

You can find the drivers here on Newertech's legacy support software page:

http://www.newertech.com/tech_support/support_legacy.php

... download NuPowr Cache 1.2 and NuPowr System Update

... you don't need these extentions to install an OS - about the only use I've found them is to correctly report the CPU speed. The cache extension isn't necessary as your card doesn't have onboard cache.

JB

 

[J English Smith]

Would love to see some photos of the 500 if you get a chance. I don't know this model, is it like the form factor of the 520 and 540 ("Blackbird") models?

 

[tyrannis]

Would love to see some photos of the 500 if you get a chance. I don't know this model, is it like the form factor of the 520 and 540 ("Blackbird") models?

The "500" in this thread refers to the 5xx ("Blackbird") series - 520/540/550.