[G4] SCSI card for G4

[John Niven]

Adaptec have NOT made any drivers for OSX. Therefore the only cards that can be used are the ones that do not need drivers.

ATTO on the other hand have downloadable current drivers. But I am currently using the built in Tiger drivers with a UL3D (they just work). I'm not surprised ATTO would recommend a UL4S or UL4D but they are overkill unless you are using U320 SCSI drives. The UL3S and UL3D support U160 speeds and are probably fast enough for this list. BTW they are full-length 64bit pci cards so match the G4's 64bit capable slots. Those run at 33MHz which is a bit slow by modern standards but if you have a 64bit pci card that is equivalent to 32bit at 66MHz so its a very good LEM usage :-)

I like the idea of using fast U160 10Krpm SCSI drives with old G4 towers, as the price of used gear is now very reasonable. I read somewhere that using a scsi pci card and drives instead of the built in ata interface frees up tasks from the CPU, giving a performance increase, but I'm not knowledgeable about that. 

I can say that at work I use a G4 dual 450MHz AGP, with a flashed PC GeForce2 MX, 1Gb of RAM, running 2 18Gb Quantum Atlas V 68pin drives in a RAID 0 stripe, one on each channel of a ATTO UL3D. I run Tiger, M$ Office 2004, use Entourage for mail and calendar with the companies exchange server, LOVE BBEdit and X11 for working with the companies Unix systems.

I would prefer a Mac Pro :-) but this is a "covert" computer to our IT group. No friends there :-( I would rather use my LEM than their precious DELL's anyday.

Cheers,
John


--- On Mon, 7/21/08, Kathi Anderson <kathialexis at cox.net> wrote:

> From: Kathi Anderson <kathialexis at cox.net>
> Subject: RE: [G4] SCSI card for G4
> To: "'A place to discuss Apple's G4 computers.'" <g4 at listserver.themacintoshguy.com>
> Date: Monday, July 21, 2008, 12:37 AM
> SNIP
> > I remember discussions in the past about the best SCSI
> card for a  
> > 733MHz G4, but I guess I wasn't paying very good
> attention. I  
> > checked the archives and did not see anything.
> > Could anyone please tell me what would be the best bet
> for a SCSI  
> > card in a 733 MHz G4, or possibly my 1.23 gig MDD. Is
> it Adaptec  
> > or ?. And is there a particular model number that I
> should know about?
> >  I want to finally transfer my SCSI scanners and CD
> burners from my  
> > old 266 beige G3 to my newer G4. I love that old G3,
> but I need the  
> > space. I am ready to move the G3s out and have a room
> with G5s and  
> > G4s.
> > Any help would be appreciated.
> 
> 
> If you have not done so already, you may wish to read the
> following  
> Apple Support document, especially with respect to ATTO
> dual-channel  
> SCSI cards:
> <http://docs.info.apple.com/article.html?artnum=58256>
> 
> I have one in a Server G4, and it has served me well for
> years.
> SNIP
> 
> Thank you Fabian...
> I was leaning toward Adaptec, but it looks like ATTO is the
> way to go.
> Kathi
> 
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