Karnydoc
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Q: I recently bought a used PowerBook G4. Which drive, larger than 80GB, will it accept?

According to the seller, its 1.33GHz logic board died recently and was replaced with a faster 1.5GHz board. Along the way, its 60GB hard drive was replaced with a 40GB drive, which has Leopard 10.5.8. Its model number is A1095.

 

This "new" PowerBook was meant to replace an older, slower one with an 80GB drive. While this "new" machine has certain defects, some of which can be corrected relatively easily, I would definitely like to upgrade its hard drive to something larger than 80GB; what larger size drive would be supported by this architecture?


Another question I have is the maximum RAM to which I can upgrade. The lower slot is dead, with the upper one occupied by a 1GB DDR SDRAM memory module. Assuming there is no way to "restore" this lower slot to operational status, how big a memory module could I use in the remaining slot, to help improve performance?


Thank you for your time.

 

Dieter

PowerBook, Mac OS X (10.5.8), Model A1095

Posted on Sep 15, 2014 11:45 AM

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Karnydoc

Q: I recently bought a used PowerBook G4. Which drive, larger than 80GB, will it accept?

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  • by Allan Jones,

    Allan Jones Allan Jones Sep 15, 2014 10:54 PM in response to Karnydoc
    Level 8 (35,321 points)
    iPad
    Sep 15, 2014 10:54 PM in response to Karnydoc

    PowerBooks use a PATA/IDE hard drives and, due to their being largely made obsolete by newer SATA drives, are getting harder to find. My "old reliable" vendor has but one, a 60GB Toshiba listed. NewEgg may have more. I have seen 2.5-inch PATA drives in sizes up to 320BG; there could be larger ones about, but you have a bit of a trasure hunt facing you.

     

    The maximum RAM later PowerBook G4s can use is 2GB--one 1GB module in each of the two slots. If you have one dead slot, you are already at max possible RAM. As you are "stuck" at 1GB RAM and running OS 10.5, you may wish to reconsider "installing extra money" into this particular computer. A bigger, faster hard drive won't help if the computer is starved for RAM. Yes, I know people run Leopard 10.5 on 1GB RAM but there is big difference in performance with over 1GB RAM. You can't achieve that with your failed-slot logic board.

  • by Karnydoc,

    Karnydoc Karnydoc Sep 16, 2014 2:50 PM in response to Allan Jones
    Level 1 (0 points)
    Sep 16, 2014 2:50 PM in response to Allan Jones

    Allan, thank you for your response.

     

    Permit me to share some background, which I couldn't do because of a character limit in the details section of the question.

     

    As much as I would love to buy Apple's latest MacBook Pro with all the bells and whistles, I cannot do so at this time, as I do not have the wherewithal. Thus, I'm stuck buying used machines that still work.

     

    That being said, my question regarding larger hard drives was to permit me to use this newer machine to replace the one I currently use, which plods along at 667 MHz with an 80GB hard drive. However, the biggest stumbling block is the hard drive, which has HALF the capacity of my current machine. Therefore, I want to replace it with a larger-capacity drive, so I don't get the ""Your startup disk is almost full" message, which I've encountered too often. The larger replacement drive doesn't have to be faster than the 80GB drive in the other machine, just roomier.

     

    This "new" PowerBook - on which I'm writing this reply - is meant to replace the current machine. I don't do graphics-intensive work on it, or gaming, so it doesn't need to go to Warp 8. All i want is for it to function as it should, for my online activities and spreadsheet and word processing activities.

  • by Allan Jones,

    Allan Jones Allan Jones Sep 18, 2014 7:16 AM in response to Karnydoc
    Level 8 (35,321 points)
    iPad
    Sep 18, 2014 7:16 AM in response to Karnydoc

    Well, here is the most complete offering of PATA 2.5-inch laptopo drives I can find:

     

    http://www.newegg.com/Product/ProductList.aspx?Submit=ENE&N=100007605%2060048445 8&IsNodeId=1&name=IDE%20Ultra

     

    As you can see, they are no longer as cheap as they once were. However, it does list capacities up to 320GB.

     

    I like the WD Scorpios. I've updated three older Powerbooks with them and all are running fine some seven years later.