Wallstreet processor upgrade Q.

Due to logic board restrictions, Version 2 Wallstreets can only use the microprocessors shipped with them.

Don't know where that came from. I maintain three Wallstreets for a friend and upgraded his 233 v2 to 300 and it made a real difference (BTW, going from 233 to 266, or 266 to 300 is not very spectacular--I've tried it and can't recommend the expense unless it's for hobby or learning purposes).

The only problem I found with the compatibility was that, when I installed the 300 card I also installed a full load of 2x256MB RAM modules. The 300 processor would not work with the set I got from a reputable vendor. They sent more and still no joy. Then I noticed there was a different chip density between the larger upper slot module and the smaller lower slot module. One had eight chips/side, the other had seven. This had no effect on the original 233 card or a spare 266 I had. Both recognized all 512MB.

However, the 300 card refused to boot until I matched the modules so the two cards had the same chip density, and the computer has been running this way for three years without as much as a burp. Doesn't mater if they are 7/side or 8/side as long as both cards are the same density.

As for dual boot, you almost have to set it up anyway. The Wallstreet is an "Old World ROM" Mac and has a limitation on the hard drive if you install OSX. OSX must be in the first partition and that partition must be just under 8GB. So, if you are upgrading to a nice 5400 rpm drive that say 40 GB, you have a lot of room left over. I put OS9 and XPostFacto in the larger second partition and OSX in the first. There was a time when one of my friend's Wallstreets had trouble with its OSX partition. I was able to boot to the OS9 partition and do some disk maintenance from there.

Oh, you cannot install anything higher than OS 10.2.8 without using a helper application, XPostFacto. Use XPostFacto 3.1, an older version, to install OS 10.3.9--it runs much better on a Wallstreet with at least 386MB RAM than did 10.2.8. Tiger 10.4 is, IMHO, pushing it.

and I hope you're still with this.

Oh, I am. The last few days have been crazy. I need to research the L2 cache thing but will get back. However, it may not be until tomorrow morning as teh rest of teh day looks pretty booked. I'm retired! Why an I so busy!

Hang in there.

AJ

OK, had a chance to refresh my memory.

There were two "families" of Wallstreets as you have pointed out:

• The first had the Apple name of "PowerBook G3 Series" but was informally called the PowerBook G3 Wallstreet Series I" came with procesor at 233, 250, and 292 and had three screen size options--12.1" (passive matrix), 13.3", and 14.1" (both active matrix). This series was introduced in May 1998. It is this variant in which the 233 has no backside cache.
• The second bears the Apple name "PowerBook G3 Series (September 1998) but is often called the PowerBook G3 Wallstreet Series II" or the "PDQ." Intro dates are quoted in various sources as August or September 1998. The 13" version was dropped, leaving the 12.1- and 14.1-inch sizes. In these the 233 processor has 512K backside cache.

I've looked all over for a way to differentiate the two and am not having much luck. The ports are all the same and the Gesalt ID is 312 for both in the 14-inch screen size. That leaves checking the serial numberagainst a date of production web site like this:

http://www.appleserialnumberinfo.com/Desktop/index.php

The serial number will return a date that is accurate to the week.

If your 233 is the later "PDQ" version made in or after Sept 1998 then you should have backside cache. It's possible that Apple System Profiler (see the Apple menu in OS9 and earlier) will show the cache. If you have the cache, you likeIy will not see a huge difference in user experince between it and the 266. It's there--any benchmarking programs should see the difference--but my experience in actual use they are not greatly different in that old intangible, "feel." However, if it's a Series I, going from no cache to a meg is probably enough to notice.

BUT...

That raises the question is whether a PDQ processor card will work in a Series I. I can't remember and our best resource on this subject, Cornelius, is currently hospitalized and not likely to be active again here for some time.

Let's start with checking the date of manufacture from the serial number and go from there.

Try this site:

http://www.chipmunk.nl/klantenservice/applemodel.html

I just tried that first one with a newer Mac's serial number and it didn't work for me either, but the chipmunk thing did.

Both versions of the Wallstreet have the M4753 model number so maybe the difference is in the order number, but the sources I normally use don't have the order numbers for Wallstreet. I'd looked at teh Apple article but, at least for me, it did not segregate the Series I from the PDQ.

July makes me think it's the Series 1 with no backside cache. Now we have to figure out if you can use a PDQ processor card in that model, or if you have to use the 250mhz or 292mhz cards. Even that might be a trick--the 250 and 292 use an 83mHz system bus while the 233 (and all PDQs) use a 66mhz bus. That could affect card compatibility.