Powermac G3 memory upgrade

Welcome to Apple Discussions EleanorO,

It will depend upon what kind of G3. We need to know the specific model.

One place to start looking is on www.mac-sales.com They have upgrade pages that walk you through models and types of upgrade to find the correct part.

Message was edited by: Limnos

You can spend months developing the expertise needed to get exactly the right kind of RAM for your Mac. But I do not recommend that.

• Buy from a Mac-savvy dealer, never from a department store or general electronics store. This rewards the companies that have chosen to provide real Mac support, not just, "I think these will fit Macs, too."

• Tell them what Mac you have, and they should provide you with the right memory, "Guaranteed to work in your Mac or your money back." That acts as an incentive for them to get it right the first time. If they are not sure, shop elsewhere. There are lots of reputable dealers who play by these rules.

• They should provide a lifetime warranty. If it ever fails, they will replace it. This is an incentive not to sell junk.

I like dealing with this company, because their prices are good, and they tell you exactly what they are sending. For me, it has always turned out to be true to its description and work first time, every time:

http://www.datamemorysystems.com/G3_Memory.asp

I have a Power Mac G3 also. I had four sticks of 128 adding up to 512, I looked and the Power Mac G3 only take PC133 Ram sticks. I upgraded all of the sticks to 256 to give me about 1 Gig and it seems to have worked. Just remember don't place all the sticks in at once. Remove one stick and replace it start the Mac up check to see if the Machine recognized it then power it down and do it again until all of your sticks of Ram are upgraded.

PC100 works just fine in a B&W. In any case, the chips must have the right configuration (don't remember which, but generally both sides of the stick should be populated for 128, 256 and 512MB parts).

I am not sure where you looked, but wherever it was, I suggest you not do business with them any more.

As mentioned above the original specification for the G3 Blue & White is PC100. SOME (not all) PC133 memories will work, provided they are also designed to be backward compatible to PC100. Some PC133 memories are not backward-compatible. PC133 RAMs are not better -- Some sites suggest using PC133 because they are Cheaper.

Your advice about adding one at a time and checking each one is very good advice indeed.

Thank you guys. I also don't request using a Power Mac G3. the only reason why i use one is because my iMac G3 Teal just kicked the Bucket after a long time and work just gave me a Power Mac G3 because they were upgrading all of the Machines to new 24 inch iMacs so. Its a nice machine but don't try to do to much with it.

Powermac G3s can only take up to 1GB of RAM memory though - just remember.

If you are looking for more memory for a Blue or White Power Macintosh G3 Tower. They can handle PC133 and PC100 but I think PC100 seems to make my computer a little faster then if I put PC133 in it even though they add up to the same amount of RAM. I have upgraded my Power Mac G3 and It will only hold up to 1 GB of Ram, I would not suggest that you try to make your G3 hold anymore than that. You can purchase Ram off of Tiger Direct/ COMP USA.

I've never had a B&W G3 machine be very "picky" about RAM. I've bought dirt cheap PC-133 SDRAM out of bulk bins at used computer shops and computer swaps and never have had a problem even when it's mismatched in a B&W G3.

Message was edited by: Joplin Imac

Message was edited by: Joplin Imac

CountryFan93 wrote:
Its a nice machine but don't try to do to much with it.

If you shop carefully putting about $50 worth of upgrades into them so OS X 10.4.11 can be installed and run reliably, you can do quite a bit with them.