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Powermac 9500 & 8600 Mashup? Anyone attempted?

macuserman

Well-known member
Alright so I'm curious if anyone has attempted this and if so do you have any tips for me. I have a rough 8600, that has several dead memory slots among other issues but it does work. I also have a 9500 motherboard that seems like it would be quite an upgrade, I have checked and fitment wise it seems to line up perfectly other than having to swap around a couple of the plastic clip in tabs to account for the larger board everything else seems to fit. Which makes sense since the 8600 uses the same case as the 9600 so has already got the extra room.

The issue I've run into so far is that the PSU connector is not the same, does anyone have any documentation on this difference? Would it be better to try and adapt the connection from 8600 to 9500, or do an ATX PSU swap and adapt that? The PSU in the 8600/9600 style machines seem to be pretty solid still so I haven't seen much on converting those to ATX out there. Anyhow just curious what your thoughts are with 9600 machines still holding decent value a 9500 board swap which is readily available due to the crumbling 9500 cases or in my case I already have it even, seems like it might be a nice upgrade. Anyhow wide open to thoughts on this! Discussion please! :)
 

joevt

Well-known member
Did you figure out the plastic clip in tabs on the 8600 that are used to hold the motherboard? You have to lift the back end half a millimeter and slide it toward the front 3 millimetres.
 

macuserman

Well-known member
Did you figure out the plastic clip in tabs on the 8600 that are used to hold the motherboard? You have to lift the back end half a millimeter and slide it toward the front 3 millimetres.
Yep that was no problem, I didn't even break them! 3 need to be removed, and there are already two at the very bottom of the case for the bigger board after that it fits perfectly. Ports line up and everything, I just need to figure out power, and probably do some quick two wire extensions for the power button and speaker since those are in different place but that should be super easy.
 

Quadraman

Well-known member
I am also curious about whether this is possible or not. If the 8600 PSU is an issue, would the 9500 PSU be swappable? I would think that as long as it physically fits, and all the connectors reach the motherboard, that it should work, right?
 

Phipli

Well-known member
I am also curious about whether this is possible or not. If the 8600 PSU is an issue, would the 9500 PSU be swappable? I would think that as long as it physically fits, and all the connectors reach the motherboard, that it should work, right?
I... Think... From memory, the PSUs are significantly different in size and shape. I am probably wrong.

The aim would be to make the 8600 PSU work rather than fit a 9500 PSU.

But it's late, it's Friday, and I opened the port.
 

s_pupp

Well-known member
I took a different route myself. Frustrated by the various incompatibilities between the 9500 and the 8600 case, I bought a 9600 logic board and put aside the 9500 logic board to be framed and used as art.
 

Quadraman

Well-known member
I was trying to avoid buying a 9600 motherboard. I really want the extra PCI slots in my 8660 case, though, that's why I thought of swapping in the 9500 motherboard. My 9500 is usable, but I wanted the easier access of the 8600/9600 case.
 

Phipli

Well-known member
I was trying to avoid buying a 9600 motherboard. I really want the extra PCI slots in my 8660 case, though, that's why I thought of swapping in the 9500 motherboard. My 9500 is usable, but I wanted the easier access of the 8600/9600 case.
It should be doable.

Have a 9500 board I've been slowly repairing. I haven't tried to power it up yet. To be honest I was going to ATX it.
 

trag

Well-known member
Unless you get a "Kansas", AKA Macintosh 9600 Enhanced logic board, the only difference between the 9500 and the original 9600 is the power supply connector and a slight ROM upgrade. The Power Macintosh 9600 Enhanced has other changes, like removal of the onboard 512K L2 cache, a slight change in the wiring of the CPU socket, and another ROM upgrade. This last ROM upgrade does have the advantage that if you use a G3 upgrade in the machine, you can leave "Speculative processing" enabled, if your upgrade software has that option -- but it's not that great an advantage in the real world.

Almost forgot to mention, there were guides on xlr8yourmac.com on doing ATX to X500/X600 power supply conversions, but I think Mike has since taken them down. They might be available on the Wayback machine. But really, all you need is the relative pinouts and a scheme (there are a few) to convert from Mac Power-on circuitry/signal to ATX Power-on circuitry/signal.
 

macuserman

Well-known member
Almost forgot to mention, there were guides on xlr8yourmac.com on doing ATX to X500/X600 power supply conversions, but I think Mike has since taken them down. They might be available on the Wayback machine. But really, all you need is the relative pinouts and a scheme (there are a few) to convert from Mac Power-on circuitry/signal to ATX Power-on circuitry/signal.
That would be super helpful. Love to be able to drop in the 9500 board and have fully working slots again.
 
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