I love my trusty B&W, its given me loyal service for 5 years now, but it isn't getting any younger. It is mostly used by my wife for web, itunes and pictures. I want it to last through the end of the year without any major upgrades. So to that end I bought a 120 gb hard drive for it today. Its current specs are: Sonnet G3 500 mhz, 512 mb ram, the original 16 mb video card and the stock 9 gig SCSI drive and a second 20 gig EIDE drive, those drives are stuffed to the gills with about 1-4 gig total available.... Staples has a special on a Maxtor 7200 rpm 120 Gb drive with the 8mb buffer for $59!!! find it here:

http://www.staples.com/Catalog/Browse/Sku.asp?PageType=1&Sku=499950

I figure the extra space will give Ol' Blue enough breathing room to keep its ghost for a while. I want to buy my wife an iMac g5 around Xmas and then go nuts modding the B&W. (look honey, it glows in the dark!)

Post edited by: mordaskyt, at: 2005/06/21 12:12

Post edited by: mordaskyt, at: 2005/06/21 12:47

Good for you man, the one I built my wife doesnt even get used. She hasnt even used it once!
-maestro

Tsk! Wives eh?

If the Smurf is a rev1, watch out for the IDE issues....

Its a Rev 2, the drive is great, and so quiet!. Now I've got the bug, so look out, I think I'm going to do the dual optical drive mod to it.

Post edited by: mordaskyt, at: 2005/06/22 10:49

My Rev. A has 2 ultra SCSI drives and 3 ATA drives (PCI ATA 133 added) and its no louder than my Quicksilver G4.

Rev. As can take hard drives with a pci controller. I used an sata and now it reads faster than a
quick silver. Yeah the are quiet, but have you ever read the temps on a fully loaded one?
I have a fan controller and new fans that kick in when the going gets tough, which is rare, but
it will be needed when it gets server duty.
-maestro

I don't want to even know how hot it is running. It would probally make me have a heart attack! :pinch:

yes, a new HD can help bring new life to a B&W. you should also consider a video card upgrade. find a radeon 700 or 9200 pci on ebay cheap. it will make photos come up much faster for your wife.