G4 Sawtooth: Geforce 6200 256MB or Radeon 9800 PRO 128MB?

Hi-

Though the 6200 is a better card than any of the OEM Geforce cards, or even the Radeon 9000,
the Radeon 9800 Pro is +at least+ twice as fast as the 6200. More like 3x faster in some applications.
The architecture of the 9800 is much more performance oriented.

If you don't have major, multiple upgrades in the Sawtooth, the OEM PSU will be fine.
That is to say, with a single processor upgrade and a single hard drive, the PSU will still handle the 9800 with ease.

Hi-

Really, considering all that can be done inside a G4 case, a 350w PSU will pretty well cover it.
Go up to 550W with no real "waste", but beyond that is totally unnecessary. It's getting harder to find less than 500W anymore, so settling for 500W is fine.

As far as makers go, Antec, Seasonic, Enermax and Zalman all produce high quality, quiet PSU's.
A PSU like this Antec would be more than sufficient, and isn't too pricey.
Staying with a single 80mm fan cooled PSU, or a dual 80mm PSU, is better for the G4 case than the common 120mm cooled PSU's. The linked PSU is a single 80mm cooled PSU.
This Thermaltake is an example of a dual fan model.

I use the Zumax 520W dual fan PSU in my Sawtooth. A bit noisier than the above recommended makers (no worse than the OEM PSU), but, here in Japan, the above makers all get a premium price (call it 3-4x what I paid for the Zumax). Still, a solid, cool running PSU.

Placing an ATX PSU into a Sawtooth isn't too hard, but requires changing a couple of wires on the mobo connector.
This article explains: ATX G4 Conversion

One nice thing about newer PSU's is that they have SATA power leads built in to the harness. This helps with cleaning up adapters, and guarantees the drives have enough power on the voltage rails.

A final note about PSU's is, they are better by the pound. That is to say, higher quality PSU's are typically heavier than their lower quality counterparts.

The monitor receptacle on the PSU is an "Apple thing"- others don't have it.
A new PSU will come with a new power cord.
Take the OEM power cord and plug it into the shrouded end of the monitor cord. Then, plug this long combination directly to a power strip.

Just in case I failed to think of all alternatives, are there any faster nVidia cards, suitable for this 2x AGP Sawtooth machine, that are comparable in peformance to the Radeon 9800 Pro

The Radeon 9800 Pro is the fastest 2x AGP card available, in any flavor.

If none are as fast, what is the fastest nVidia, and how close does it come to the performance of the Radeon 9800 Pro?

That would be the 6200, which we already discussed.
One note about the 6200, is that there are often problems with use in Leopard. If you were to upgrade the processor and move to Leopard, you would probably need a new graphics card.

Also, do you think a used Radeon 9800 Pro 256Mb version will be OK, in comparison to a brand new Radeon 9800 Pro 128 version?

A used one is 50/50- never know what you're getting. It is also a very rare bird.
As for performance, in graphics benchmarks (Open GL, XBench) scores only improve by 6-10% with the 256MB version. My experience is that the 256MB version only offers a frame or two per second (in games) real performance improvement over the 128MB version. If the 256MB version is a real good deal, OK. Otherwise, the 128MB version will not dissappoint.

Check flashed 9800 Pro cards. The 128MB version (new, but called refurbished) is only around $90 on eBay (linked seller is very reliable). A good performance buy, with no difference from the real Mac Edition at over $200.

This concerns any heat output or other issues potentially limiting the service life of the cards.

That would be the 9800's fan. It is notoriously short lived. Replace the fan with a Zalman VF700-Cu or VF900-Cu and all worries about heat and longevity are gone. (Go ahead and get an LED model, it's FUN!) 😉

Other than that, keep the interior of the G4 and the fan blades clean, and all will be fine. If you load up with hard drives and PCI cards, then you might think about a higher CFM case fan. Until then, no worries.

Hi John-

Classic is no problem. OS 9 will function fine, however, there isn't 3D acceleration support with either card in OS 9. Really, the same can be said for all cards that were released after OS X was released.
This is not a problem for most users, and would only affect games played in OS 9, not Classic. I have never encountered a problem in OS 9 (or Classic) with the Radeon 9800.