G4 MDD Upgrade Advise

[Deleted member 329]

G4 MDD Upgrade Advice

Hello,

I recently got a MDD G4 second hand with the intention of creating a home server that in theory should kick ass when compared to what you I could do with the same money.

I was thining about getting a time capsule but in the end decided that for the same money i should really be able to do what time capsule does and more.

I now have the G4 arrived today

So ive installed leopard client atm although i am thinking of getting the server edition down the line if its needed.

I have a few issues with it that i am hoping to solve .

#1 I can seem to get 1650 x 1080 resolution to work - My monitor is a 22" Acer with VGA connection and i am connected via DVI - VGA adapter.
My monitor resolution is not listed at all
I have a the Radeon 9000 Pro in the system which should really beable to output that res.
Listed are much higher resolutions which are supported.

So far i have tried a third party programme to enable the res ( cant remember what it was called, but i found it during my initial search for answers )
This actually crashed my mac and i had to reinstall leopard.

So i am thinking maybe its somthing to do with the ROM version on the card?
I am really struggling to find ANY information regarding the latest ATI 9000 Pro ROMS on apples site or ATI's site.
So its a bit of a problem.

#2 I need to get USB 2.0 in this machine so i can connect external hard drives and other USB 2.0 gear to it.
I really want to make sure i get the right one as i hear that some chipsets via?? might be problematic with the G4

#3 I would like to get SATA II into this machine so i can add some SATA and SATA II hard drives to it.

Any advise you could offer would be very helpful
thanks

 

[Deleted member 329]

I don't think with Leopard Server it's going to end up cheaper than the Time Capsule somehow

My money for the resolution problem is its an old dvi output on the card (i think thats what you were using) that cant do such big resolutions (older gfx cards are a bit weird), try it over vga only (if possible)

yeah? hmm that would be a bit of a shame . i have an Geforce FX5500 which I am going to attempt to flash to mac. Tried already buy i failed for some reason. Whenever I plug the card into the mac it refuses to boot, as it i get nothing no power or anything - if i plug the old card back it it works again. Kind of annoying - hopefully i can get it fixed - it has VGA connector too

 

[Deleted member 329]

UPDATE -

I FIXED IT


- the monitor wasn't plugged in all the way at the monitor connection end.
it was plugged in enough to get a signal but not quite enough for the mac to detect it and display the correct resolution.

I am a happy man

So know i have the FX 5500 / 5200 in there and its working fine, I am guessing that the old GFX card would have also worked had the monitor end been fully plugged in!

So which GFX card should I use?

Radeon 9000 Pro
or
FX 5500

cheers