Sonnet Encore/MDX G4 Duet upgrade or not??

Hi-

I am a fan of upgrades- mostly for the fun, but also the practicality of extending the serviceability of a machine.
If one is trying to get the most out of new software, though, I would think that a machine like yours will show less benefit than a newer, or new, machine would.

A bit of difference- probably. $600 worth, not so sure.
The Deut has a duel 7447 processor with L2 cache only. Though the L2 cache is twice that of your stock processors (512k vs. 256k), the lack of the 2mb L3 cache effectively reduces the performance of the faster processor in some areas. The main area of impact will be in graphics and video. Overall, I believe the upgraded performance would be the same, and in some areas, only slightly faster.
For discussion on the cache issue, get the White paper from the following:

http://www.powerlogix.com/press/releases/2002/020826.html

I would (as you, probably) like to see some benchmark comparisons. If you had, say, a DP 867mhz, or even a 1.0ghz MDD, I am sure there would be noticeable improvement with the 1.8 Duet.
The Powerlogix dual 1.8 (7447) shows the following benchmarks:

http://eshop.macsales.com/item/PowerLogix/PF47D1800DA/

Compare to a single 1.5 7455 processor:

http://eshop.macsales.com/item/Other%20World%20Computing/MEG42M1500/

Might run XBench on your machine to get some comparisons.

Well, for a little bit more then $600, you can get the base model Mac Mini-which will blow away any performance upgrade made to a G4 with the exception of graphics. I thought about upgrading my single 1.25 MDD with the Sonnet MDX 1.8 dual, but the meager speed increase does not seem to justify the costs. Believe me, I am attached to my MDD-so much so that I actually still find myself trying to convince myself that spending $1200+ to upgrade my MDD is still worth it (ATI 9800, Duet dual 1.8, two super drives, larger (and more) hard drives, etc, etc.). Personally, I like the idea of internal expansion, and the idea that I can add a video capture or sound card to my machine is generally what keeps it around.

Anyways....you originally posted this two months ago. Did you make the cpu upgrade? It would be nice to hear some first hand reports by actual users on the MDX Duet (as opposed to the typical 'bench mark' tests).

Hi again, sorry to interrupt, but Andre you brought up a good question since I am going in the same direction, except not with a 3rd party upgrade processor. Is it worth it for me to swap out my dp 1.25 for the dp 1.42 and will I notice any real speed/performance increase? Although, I can get the dual 1.42 w/heatsink for like 250(money is not a problem for me, and I don't want to goto a new machine at all), I was wondering if it would even be worth it?

Now for you, I don't see the real difference between a 1.42DP and the 1.8 or 1.6 DP. $600.00 for that is not worth it. What is wrong with your 1.42DP? Tell me, because I am asking the same question as to whether or not I would see any real benefit in speed increase/performance compared to the dual 1.25?

Also, why is the bootROM 4.6.0f2 and mine is 4.4.8f2? Whats the real difference other than bluetooth/airport extreme/fw800? Logic board revisions?

Hi Kenomikasa,

Where Andre posted that he wants to get a speed increase from the duet 1.8 and he has a 1.42DP, I was asking the same question for my 1.25DP. is it worth it for me to swap out the 1.25DP and put in the 1.42DP? I am not interested in going any higher than 1.42 and I don't see the reason to spend close to 700 for a processor upgrade - that I agree with, however as far as drives and video card? Thats not too expensive. And for what I use my mac for anyway, I don't think I would be a candidate for any intel based mac anyway. PowerPC all the way!

Nadav

Bottom line: Would Andre notice any performance if he got the duet 1.8 and swapped the 1.42 for it verses if I did the same for the 1.25DP going to the 1.42DP?

Again, if the speed/performance isn't really justified, then my question has been answered and will not go forward with getting the DP 1.42

If you use Photoshop, Final Cut, Logic, games, and other processor intensive applications-then yes, you will see a speed boost. How much so, I couldn't tell you, but I would estimate only a 20% increase tops. If that is worth it to you, I dunno. At the moment, I currently to do need to take advantage of an Intel-based Mac, so my G4 still suits me just fine. It is, however, getting long in the tooth and in need of some serious upgrades. I placed a mock order on OWC comprised of everything that I would need to max out performance and the total came to just over $1,100. For me, I am not sure if that is worth it since I can buy a decent G5 from ebay for around that price, or get a (non-upradable :() Mac Mini of entry level iMac-both of which will be, what, 400x's faster then any configuration that I can come up for the G4?