The first generation Power Macs, while by no means cutting-edge,
are still capable of running a fair portion of modern games. For
the purposes of this article, the first generation Power Macs
include the 6100, 7100, 8100,
and their variants, and the Performa/Power Mac 5200, 5260/5300, 6200-6230, 6260-6310, and 6300/6320.
The key to getting the most out of your first generation Power
Mac is knowing how to upgrade it for maximum performance without
spending a fortune and which games to play. In this article I will
address upgrades, and in a future article I will address specific
games.
The two most important components to upgrade are memory and hard
drive. Early Power Macs often shipped with 8 or 16 MB of memory and
250 MB to 1 GB hard drives.
Even 16 MB of RAM is not much these days. Considering the low
prices of memory upgrades, it is advisable to add two 32 MB SIMMs
(first generation Power Macs take SIMMs instead of DIMMs), which
will give you plenty of memory to work with. This upgrade should
cost $100 or less. All first generation Power Macs have at least
two SIMM slots, with some having as many as eight. Apple lists 32
MB as the largest officially supported SIMM in these computers,
although adventurous types have reported success with 64 and 128 MB
SIMMs. If you are willing to risk unsupported memory, 64 MB SIMMs
can be a very good deal. Oempcworld.com sells them for around $50
each. If you do get SIMMs from them, or any other non Mac-specific
dealer, make sure you are getting Mac-compatible SIMMs.
Another very important upgrade, as I mentioned, is the hard
drive. While even a relatively modern system can run on a 250 or
500 MB hard drive, it does not give you much room to work. For
users who want to make the most out of their first generation Power
Mac, I would recommend upgrading to a 4 GB hard drive. I recommend
4 GB because I think that it is a good compromise between size and
cost. Prices on 2, 4, and 9 GB drives have been dropping fairly
quickly recently.
If your Mac uses an IDE hard drive, you will find IDE drives
cheaper than SCSI. IDE drives are cheap enough that a 10-20 GB
drive can be reasonable for a first generation Power Mac.
Memory and hard drive are the critical components to upgrade.
There are other options, too. Most of these computers shipped with
2x or 4x CD-ROM drives. A faster CD-ROM drive will be of no benefit
to some games, but will make a huge difference in others. Upgrading
to a faster CD-ROM is not a bad idea if the computer in question is
getting a lot of use, especially with CDs.
A number of video cards are also available for these computers.
For 61/71/8100s, if you are using the Apple HPV or A/V video card,
there is no reason to get another card unless you have a need for
the slot occupied by your video card. The HPV and A/V cards use the
PDS slot, of which there is only one, while third-party cards use a
NuBus slot. If you are using motherboard video, you may want to
install a PDS or good NuBus video card, because the motherboard
video support is not able to support very high resolutions. If you
are using a 52xx/53xx/62xx/63xx Power Mac, there are a few options
besides the built-in video support, but they are rarely
necessary.
The most expensive upgrade option, which is only available for
the 61/71/8100 series, is an upgrade to a G3 or G4 processor. These
upgrades will certainly provide a performance boost, but, as I have
noted in a previous column, they are not
usually a very good investment if your primary use is playing
games. This is because these old Power Macs do not have PCI slots
to take modern 3D accelerated video cards. Also, some games
actually require the PCI architecture to run, so they will not run
on a 61/71/8100 even if it has been upgraded to a G4.
These upgrades are somewhat more reasonable if you are also
planning to use your computer for tasks like web browsing, word
processing, and other business applications. Despite the
impracticality of these upgrades, they have always held my
interest. If I ever get my hands on one, I will be sure to report
its gaming performance.
Hardware is not the only upgrade issue. Much of the perceived
speed of any Mac comes from which operating system it is running.
Any Power Mac with enough memory can run any new Mac OS
through 9.0.4. However, running the newest OS will cause an older
Power Mac to feel slow, as well as use up a lot of memory.
The general consensus seems to be that Mac OS 8.1 is the
best choice for first generation Power Macs. It provides a good mix
of speed and features. You will want to have at least 24 MB of
memory, and preferably more, for Mac OS 8.1. Other choices include
Mac OS 7.6.1, which includes modern networking and will feel quite
fast, and Mac OS 8.6, which is newer and a bit slower but includes
more features. I do not recommend Mac OS 9 for these Power Macs,
but if you decide to install it, you should probably have at least
64 MB of RAM.
As you can see, there are several options for upgrading first
generation Power Macs. In my opinion, it is not out of the question
to spend at least $200 on upgrading a first generation Power Mac,
because once you have done this much upgrading, you will have a
computer that, depending on your needs, could still serve you well
for a year or two.
