I got a B&W G3 and am truely considering maxing it out as much as possible with a 1Ghz G4 Processor upgrade, Serial ATA card upgrade with (2) 250GB Hard drives Pro Video card and a "Superdrive". I'm just not too sure if this is all possible with the Mac. any one know or try please inform me. sMACkintush

This 'superdrive', is it what apple calls a 'superdrive' (1.44 meg floppy) or something else? - i miss the floppy drive, i still have uses for it, and would like to put an imation 1.44 meg/120 meg drive in my B&W..was this what you were referring to..you'll have to remove the zip though as theres no where else to put it ( that's if yours has one). Re:the G4 upgrade..i don't know if a 1GHZ G4 chip will work or not..i have no idea which G4 chips it will upgrade to..but i do know that if you want to do this *do not* install the B&W G3 firmware update 1.1..it will cripple your mac from ever being able to upgrade to G4..i think the apple system profiler can tell you whether you've got that update installed or not... As to the harddrives, i see no reason why you cant just drop 'em in..i don't know about 250gig, but i'm running two 60 gig 7200 rpm EIDE's and i just plugged'em in to the main board- ...although the cable's designed for two drives i also re- added a SCSI card ( mine originally had one anyways, but it was yanked out by the previous owner) so i can add a third internal (SCSI) drive ,if i so choose, and an external drive. Although a bigger video card can be useful,instead i've just obtained an older Canopus 3DFX Pure3D Card to add to the standard ATI Rage 128..havent found the drivers yet, and these things will eventually wind up in my 6500 anyways, so i'm looking for a better card myself..i don't think you would have any problems with any video card (keeping in mind that the rom has to support MacOS), and i know you can flash the roms of cards that don't so that they do, but it's a risky business and i've heard of people making cards permanently unusable by doing that . Also keep in mind that the best video cards are AGP, which aint gonna work onb a B&W (again , i heard of someone getting one to work, dunno how they did it!). Since jumping headfirst into the deep end of the mac 'pool' after discovering them a few years ago, ive upgraded and switched parts around in well over a dozen macs ( ive a sizeable collection by now :)...but i've never found one as ridiculously easy to upgrade and work on than the B&W G3's ! ( i expect the G4 Quicksilvers would be pretty much the same there)....

IMHO, The question becomes, at what point does it become cheaper to just buy a new Mac? A B&W G3 is a fairly old machine to be making such an investment (time and money) in, since you're talking about replacing just about everything inside your Mac. Consider the cost of all the new hardware, plus the money you might make selling the old G3 on eBay, versus the cost of new eMac, which would probably offer even better performance, plus the security of a warranty.

dude listen up forget whatbthese bojos r sayin its not gonna cost a G to upgrade the way u want... so dont go blowinyour money on a new "emac" (which by the way is almost not upgradable you cant upgrade its processor... yes you can put a superdrive which by the way is in no way a "floppy" it is a combo drive that allows u to read and burn cds and dvds jesus how did that dude think that superdrive was a floppy!!!!!!!!!! Damn... anyway you put any size any brand HD in your powermac g3 blue & White ram is also expandable to at least 1gig if you wanna do it go for it give a gig of ram a 250 gig hd a new video card i reccomend nvidea's product line there the best uot there as far as processors go the G5 is now available for powermacs but some G3 and G4s are rated at faster speeds make sure you check to see there m/ghz rating b4 you buy ex. there r G3s that r rated upto 1ghz G4s start at 300mhz and range to close to 2ghz and the G5 from 1ghz upto ??? anyway point being a G3 1ghz processor vs a G4 1ghz processor only difference Noticable anway THE PRICE!!! you might be better off just getting a newer G3 Processor that goes 1ghz or 900mhz the difference between a 900mhz and a 1ghz is not much at all (100mhz difference)which aint shi... anyway if you got the money go for it the end result will be one kick ass computer thats still cheaper than a new one you should shop amazon.com applestore.com or ebay.com for the best prices on new Hardware... Good Luck if you got more questions Email me... always happy to help a mac bcome more :) <-_->!!!