[Monstermind]

I'm strongly considering installing a 500 mhz Sonnet G3 card in my Perf -- er, Power Mac 6500.

Can anyone tell me why I shouldn't? Does anyone here have any praise / horror stories they'd like to impart?

Thanks in advance.

[wlonh]

Sonnet's are great, period... i have put three different Sonnets into three different Macs: 6360, 6500, 8600

these are my nephew's and sister's Macs. they are rock solid stable, no troubles whatever.

[Monstermind]

Wow. Now THAT'S service.

OK, now, does installing a Sonnet G3 card mean I have to finally ditch my Geoport modem and get a real one? And what of system software. I'm currently running system 7.6.1.

[wlonh]

no but you should... those modems are awful and you likely know it i don't know about the Sys softw question, it may be ok w/ 7.6.1, my family is addicted to upgrading OS'es ASAP

check with www.sonnettech.com , i think that is the url

[This message has been edited by wlonh (edited 05-18-2000).]

[Monstermind]

"those modems are awful and you likely know it"

True dat, true dat. A page called Daria's 6500 Modem Page explained a lot about how lame my pack-in modem is, and how to go about replacing it.

As for Sonnettech.com, I'm kinda in the market for an opinion from someone who's not actively trying to sell me something (hence these-here posts), although I'll probably end up buying a card anyway, barring news that they cause bizarre mutations or something like that.

Thanks aplenty.

I've got a 240-266MHz card in my 6100 (kinda different) and it's been great... I even took it as an excuse to install and partition out a 3.2 GB HD so that I have almost all OSs on it and can use the one I want: 7.1.3, 7.5.5, 8.1, and 8.6 (I'm not doing 7.6.1 because it wasn't much of a dramatic upgrade (as I see it) or 9.0.4 for memory constraints (72MB RAM) ).

I went from processing SETI@Home units in >120hrs to 11:45. Very fast.

[Monstermind]

A 6100, you say? I used to have a 7100 before I bought this gem. I sold the old machine for $250 -- a tenth of what I paid for it -- to a co-worker whose husband later smashed it with a baseball bat. Long story.

Speaking of upgrades, I'd love to be one of those people with a Color Classic with a 603-or-better processor under the hood. I'd keep it in the trunk of my car in case of emergencies.

Anyway, my would-be purchase is sounding better and better.

You may like to take a visit to the site http://members.aol.com/_ht_a/tmk12v/home.html

[wlonh]

that article means practically nothing... it does not even state WHICH Sonnet is in question (like, which MHz model Sonnet are they even talking about?) the article gives very sketchy info, and i can tell you from firsthand info that i put a Sonnet 400MHz into a 6500 (my nephew's) and it performs as advertised... and ONE person reporting some dubious info re: a Sonnet means exactly nothing, could be the person reporting has other issues on his/her Mac ya dig?

but thanks for the dose of FUD

[This message has been edited by wlonh (edited 05-19-2000).]

I have a Sonnet G3 300/512 in my 6500. It was the best upgrade I have ever purchased. Rock Solid and much faster, very worth the money.

[Monstermind]

Rapture. It's worth mentioning at this point that I did in fact order a Sonnet G3 500 card this past Tuesday, along with System 9 and a Global Village 56k modem (to replace the one that came with my 6500, since (a) I doubt my current modem is compatible with G3s OR OS9 and (b) according to a great many sources, the pack-in modem for a 6500 chews compared to other modems).

Thanks, all.

By the by, what does FUD stand for?

[wlonh]

Fear, Uncertainty, and Doubt... FUD

[Monstermind]

It's me again.

Fate has dealt a wicked blow to my upgrade plans for this weekend. While my Sonnet card and OS9 have arrived, my Global Village modem has been sent separately, and will arrive on Tuesday.

I REEEALLY want to install at least one of these gems in my 6500, but not at the cost of my internet access. So I am forced to ask the questions hinted about in a previous post:

Does the 6500's Default Modem have issues with the G3 card? Is the 6500's DM OS9 compatible? Is the Sonnet G3 card System 7.6.1 compatible? Or should I sit tight until the UPS Cavalry arrives on Tuesday?

[wlonh]

go for it, i'd say you've nothing to fear... just remember to press the CUDA switch when you are done inserting the upgrade card, before you try booting

The 6500 internal modem works fine with the sonnet upgrades. Just make sure that if you do a clean install of 9 you remember to get the modem extensions...or the modem will not work.

In my opinion, the cheapest Sonnet cards (250-300 Mhz/512) are the best buys.
You will pay much more for a 500 MHz but you won't see any additional speedup of the graphics. The slowest components of your Performa will be a bottleneck.
I bought 2 Sonnet cards for in 8100 nubus Macs. They have accelerated the CPU (+400%) much more than the disk (+10%) and the graphics (+40%)
The 1 MB cache version was slightly faster in the graphics. (+40% instead of +30%)
(I am glad I didn't spend more money for a 400 Mhz version.)
And I hope you have at least 4 MB VRAM otherwise the graphics speed of your Performa will be slower than my 8100.
Anyway, I was happy with the Sonnet cards because they are stable and have made my old Macs much faster. I had better speed results with 8.6 than with 9.04...

[Monstermind]

I'm back.

It took me this long to get back online after the debacle that was Replacing My Modem.

First of all: Park, the 6500 internal modem is NOT - repeat NOT - compatible with OS 9 OR the Sonnet 500/G3 card. The instruction book says so. Ditto Apple Tech: in fact, the Geoport modem isn't even compatible with OS8.

Secondly, the card installation went flawlessly. Ten minutes and I was up and ready. When Sonnet says it's easy, well, believe 'em. In my experience, leastways. OS9 was equally nonproblematic.

The problem lay (?) with the Global Village TelePort 56k software that shipped with it. (At least two versions old, as it turns out.) After installing the GlobalFax software and restarting, the machine would semi-freeze (cursor blinking between arrow & wristwatch) after loading all control panels and extensions. The culprit was, as it turned out, something called "GV Address Book Engine" that was made in 1998 -- BEFORE OS9. AND I couldn't get online to download any updates; my friend Ed had to do it for me. So now, after much screwing around, I have GlobalFax v.2.6.8 AND online access. Halle-frickin-lujah.

New problem: having removed the old internal 56k modem and "un-plugged-up" the 6500's external modem port, the thing says the port is "in use." Always. The only reason why I'm on now is that the GV modem's plugged into the printer port and my printer is now currently not hooked up to anything.(Plugging the printer into the Modem port doesn't solve anything. i tried.)

Anything I should know about the external modem port for a 6500 which previously had an internal modem? People?

Have you been here yet?
http://members.aol.com/_ht_a/TMK12v/home.html

It's the 6400 Zone, but in spite of its name a lot of the information applies to 6500s also. You will probably find some answers to questions that come up while you are upgrading.

[Monstermind]

Never mind. I sussed it out.Something to do with my TCP/IP control panel settings. It's all good now.