what to do with 4 mac g4 towers?

[blackbeardlion]

i got 4 of these power mac g4 towers. they all "appear" to be working but i need a monitor for them. question though. can i use a regular usb mouse with them? if not will i be able to do so if i'm using linux? are they compatible with most pc pci cards? do i need a mac video card for them? most most importantly what should i do with these damn things! before you tell me to throw them out the window i'll tell you that i already tried and it's too small.

[Cobalt Crimson]

If you lived in the US i'd say mail 2 to me parcel post lol. can you strip them for parts?

[DonHighCard]

I finished about half of this answer when, totally unexpected by the way, my freaking browser crashed. Thanks, firefox :veryangry:

Anyway, I'll try to reconstruct it (which will be one heck of work, but oh well, surprisingly I've got the time to do it today)


You say you've got 4 of them, each with the following specifications (I'd assume so):

Processor
1GHz PowerPC G4

Frontside Bus
133MHz MaxBus

Cache
256KB on-chip L2 cache
1MB DDR SRAM external L3 cache at 250MHz

Memory
256MB DDR266 SDRAM

Memory Slots
Four DIMM slots

Hard Drive
60GB 3.5" 7200RPM Ultra ATA/100 hard drive
3 free bays

Optical Drive
5.25" tray-loading Combo
1 free bay

Graphics
NVIDIA GeForce4 MX with 64MB DDR SDRAM on a 4x AGP card
Dedicated AGP slot

USB
Two independent USB 1.1 ports

FireWire 400
Two

FireWire 800
One

Ethernet
10/100/1000BASE-T ethernet port (with Auto-MDIX)

Modem
56K v.92 modem

AirPort
AirPort Extreme ready

Bluetooth
Internal Bluetooth module optional

Expansion Slots
Four 33MHz 64-bit PCI slots


Okay, here are the options that I'd suggest:
- take the parts of 2 of them (especially the memory, HDD and PCI(USB)-cards) and put those into the other two, get rid of/sell the gutted ones
- sell them (there might be some guys out there that actually want them for small bucks)

Putting all those parts into one of them seems to be a quite good idea if the data sheet I have is correct...it would result in a:
1 GHz
1 GB DDR RAM
4 x 60 GB HDD
8 x USB

computer...might be quite good a a subtitute-PC for when the good one breaks.


Moving on to the "regular USB mouse" problem.
If my sources are reliable it works quite simple: 'glug 'em in and play'
Meaning: as long as they are USB 1.1-compatible and the driver is installed on those things regular USb mice should work just fine.
You can always try, you shouldn't lose anything from simply trying.

As for the same problem under Linux:
The same answer. Drivers and USB 1.1-compability needed. that's all.
The USB-ports MAC uses shouldn't differ from 'normal' ones.

The Power MAC G4 has 4 free PCI slots for expansion.
As long as your cards are 33MHz and 64-bit they should work. That's the result I came up with after a bit of research. There is but one catch. You need a compatible OSX-driver for the PCI card you want to put in. No driver - no card. Better look for the driver beforehand.

A mac video card?
For what reason?
They should have an NVIDIA GeForce4 MX already built in. If not, you could buy one and put it in.


Re-reading I think I've answered all of your questions. If not, tell me ;-)

[blackbeardlion]

well uh... a few models back >.>. three have 450mhtz processors and one has a 533. i just ordered a dual proc 1.2 ghtz for the 533 one which i will upgrade one of the others with. i was also thinking of installing yellow dog linux on them so i can use them with some sata cards in and using it to store movies and music.

[DonHighCard]

Nonetheless, I think the best option is to upgrade one or two of them at most using the spare parts from the other two and buying a few additional parts. Though for storing music I'd install a 500GB/1TB HDD but I don't know of your needs...to me it (almost) doesn't matter how much space I have, I'll get it filled up if I want to XD

[blackbeardlion]

i think it's max is 120 :P i'm going to get a sata card for the digital audio one and hopefully a sound card and a vga-rca adapter. i also might modify one of the processors based on a mod i found to boost it from 450 to 500mhtz

[Cobalt Crimson]

that just gave me a good idea on what to do with this extra PC I have. BBL, be ready for me to ask all kindsa dumb questions lol.