Because I Can...

"Full of the sound of the Gran Fury, signifying nothing." (granfury) 06/16/2020 at 11:05 • Filed to: None

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I filled up the four remaining DIMM slots in the Z420 today. The machine worked just fine with 32GB, but since I was visiting my parts supplier I figured I’d grab a few cheap DIMMs. Sure, 64GB is not terribly uncommon today, but it must have been amazing back in 2012 when this computer was built. And expensive. At $48, this batch of ancient registered ECC stuff was quite reasonable just 8 years later.

Now to open a dozen tabs in Chrome. That ought to fill every byte...

ttyymmnn > Full of the sound of the Gran Fury, signifying nothing. 06/16/2020 at 11:32

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When I got my first G4 Mac in the mid 90s , I thought I was living large with a 10GB hard drive. RAM was measured in MBs. 

Aremmes > Full of the sound of the Gran Fury, signifying nothing. 06/16/2020 at 11:35

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Just leave one Chrome tab open overnight. Hopefully you put the swap file on a fast disk.

facw > Full of the sound of the Gran Fury, signifying nothing. 06/16/2020 at 11:39

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I’ve got 32GB sitting on my desk waiting to fill the empty slots in my machine. I am a bit worried about getting to the slots though, as I’ve noted before, my heatsink is too big:

Probably will have to remove it. But to remove it I need to remove the video card. But to get to the PCI-E lock, I need to remove the heatsink. Hopefully I can manage to get some sort of pry tool to stick on the PCI-E release well enough to actually get it free...

Full of the sound of the Gran Fury, signifying nothing. > ttyymmnn 06/16/2020 at 11:53

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Well, the first G4 didn’t come out until 1999, so you either had a G3 or a 68040 if it was the mid ‘ 90s . I bought my 450 MHz G4 desktop in 2000. I was going through my mail at my desk at work and found a letter from Kingston. I almost threw it away, but it was too thin to be a brochure so I opened it. In it I found a letter saying that I had won a free 128MB of RAM. Whoa - what was I going to do with all of that? I decided that this was a good time to buy my dream computer.

Since I had the memory, one of the more expensive things at that time, I decided to buy a custom G4. I bought the fastest processor (450 MHz since the 500 MHz unit had been pulled for some defect), minimal RAM and HD (I think the smallest was 10GB) and - hold on - a DVD- RAM drive. I believe that this set me back about $2,300. With upgrades it served me until 2009 when Microsoft paid for two thirds of a Mac mini thanks to a class-action lawsuit.

ttyymmnn > Full of the sound of the Gran Fury, signifying nothing. 06/16/2020 at 12:02

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Then I got my years wrong (I’ve slept since then) . Definitely a G4. I still have it, along with the mirror door G4 that replaced it.  I’ve been wanting to fire them up for fun.  

Full of the sound of the Gran Fury, signifying nothing. > facw 06/16/2020 at 12:03

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I put 32GB in my new build and have two slots left. Like you, if I need to add memory it’s going to be a bitch . Same problem - CPU cooler. I’ll need to remove the two fans to get to the hold-down screws, but I’ve taped the gaps on the fans for improved airflow, so that’ll have to come off first. Maybe I’ll toss in another 32GB if I ever decide to go with liquid cooling.

The only issue with the Z420 was that there is a module that includes a rear case fan and RAM fan that needed to be pulled. It was a tight squeeze, but I managed to get it out without needing to pull the CPU cooler . The power connectors for that thing required the use of hemostats to plug back in, but once again, it probably would have been easier if I had pulled the CPU cooler. I am running an upgraded one from a Z440 that I put in when I put in the 8-core CPU , and think that the stock one was offset and thus was easier to deal with. But it’s done and I shouldn’t have to open this machine again for the foreseeable future - it’s a workhorse that hasn’t given me a lick of trouble.

Full of the sound of the Gran Fury, signifying nothing. > ttyymmnn 06/16/2020 at 12:24

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As you can see from the lower picture I still have some G4s laying around. Thanks to Craigslist I managed to put in a dual 1.8GHz CPU upgrade as well as some SATA controllers and other goodies all for less than $100, and that was back in 2011-2012. I believe that the video card is a flashed GeForce 4Ti from a PC , the fastest thing available at the time, complete with some of the pins being taped off for compatibility - I don’t dare remove it. Other than it being the slightly slower (133 MHz vs 167 MHz) bus speed motherboard, it’s about as maxed-out as you could make a G4, and it can still run OS9 for the full retro experience. It does have a DVD-burner and a Zip drive as well.

My first one in 1999/2000 was the AGP Graphics model, but I upgraded to a Digital Audio a few years later so that I could go the dual-processor route . All the pieces and parts easily transferred from one machine to the next and booted up without issue, something Windows wasn’t able to do until Win10. I don’t think I’ve fired it up in the 8 years I’ve lived in STL, but it might be worth trying for the nostalgia - hopefully it won’t explode or blow a cap . I think I saw a copy of FS4 around on floppy, and I’ve still got a USB floppy drive...

ttyymmnn > Full of the sound of the Gran Fury, signifying nothing. 06/16/2020 at 12:30

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I was never any sort of tinkerer. The most I did was upgrade the RAM. I also have a eMac that is dual boot (9/10). I still use it from time to time  to play the old MacMAME emulator, for which I was able to snag a ton of ROMS back in the day.

SaigaShooter - He's got an Impreza > Full of the sound of the Gran Fury, signifying nothing. 06/16/2020 at 12:42

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What are you doing with the Z420?

I have a Z600 with dual E5530's and 20 GB of ram that I mess with from time to time. I’ve used it for VMware, Server 2016 lab, Free NAS, and a couple other oddball things.    

Full of the sound of the Gran Fury, signifying nothing. > SaigaShooter - He's got an Impreza 06/16/2020 at 13:09

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It does some, um, downloading, Plex, VMware, file serving and a few other odd tasks. It has a FirePro W7000 installed, so if I ever get back into CAD or related technical drawing it will be the ideal workstation for that purpose.

It’s up and running 24/7, and other than one of the fans occasionally making some noise (I haven’t figured out which one, but it’s not the CPU fan) it’s been 100% perfect. I’ve put more money into upgrades than I did for the base system, but considering I only paid $150 for it I’m doing fine. It’s just so much better built than consumer-grade PCs and one I prefer to use on a regular basis. I wish it didn’t have proprietary components, like the power supply, but it’s solid and reliable. Yeah, the specs and benchmarks aren’t anything to get excited about, but it’s not a gaming machine and gets used like the work computer that it is.