Hacking a PC Graphics Card into my G4 Cube!

[@RhodderzX]

+1 for Druaga reference.

[@FireStriker_]

Hello smokers

[@CantankerousDave]

“We’re gonna have to Druaga the shit outta this.”

[@victorfigueroa9385]

hell yea

[@WantBadtime]

“Hey smokers, Druaga1 here, and today!...”

[@crackzonemobile2264]

The "+1" reminds me of Google+

[@markinius8866]

Nice druaga1 reference there, but still lacking some smoke

[@ВалерияРоманова-ю1м]

And SSD

[@ВалерияРоманова-ю1м]

@Bob Ross i am impressed by your visual skills, still wish it was a fattydove one! have a great day, bob ross, my hero!

[@m4ttii_]

hey bob ross i've seen you in a different video, i think a MattKC one?

[@abhay17381]

I've never owned a Mac and I probably never will but this channel somehow draws me into watching weird Mac related videos,that are somehow super interesting to me . It's like a weird Action Retro drug!

[@CotyRiddle]

mac's from the past were actually impressive little machines and you could* upgrade most of them unlike macs of modern day with soldered ram emmc and stupid shit like that.

[@FS--ew3se]

I've never owned a mac also but I want to hackintosh a trash picked pc just to see how well mac os is holding up

[@TuNnL]

I did own a MacBook Pro, but it died on me just before the pandemic, and I don't believe I'll have the money to replace it anytime soon. I am shocked at how cheap used Mac desktops can purchased online, which is why Sean's channel particularly interests me. The real debate for me is whether or not Mac OS Snow Leopard or Sorbet Leopard will run Final Cut Pro 7, Apple's flagship software product, and the reason I purchased a Mac in the first place. I have not found a channel that adequately answers that question yet. 💁🏻‍♂️

[@puwazatza]

that's the magic of his hand gestures

[@cossasomi]

On any AGP machine with chipset-integrated graphics, the integrated VGA is also wired through AGP. An external AGP card (even if flashed with non-PC VBIOS) _will_ disable the integrated card. Having integrated and dedicated graphics running at the same time is only possible if at least one of those is PCI. This limitation was gone with the arrival PCI-Express.

[@ActionRetro]

Thank you!

[@CotyRiddle]

yet some manafactures (acer for example) will still disable integrated graphics if a PCI Express gpu is used. (which is a bummer for me becasue intel quicksync is pretty nice and it would be nice to offload some things to a different processor other than the main gpu

[@cossasomi]

@@CotyRiddle Oh yes, I was talking about pure hardware limitations. OEMs doing nonsensical things it's another kettle of fish, especially Acer. I once had a motherboard of theirs based on a SiS630 chipset (socket 370 and onboard graphics with no AGP slot). While build quality was very nice, its stupid BIOS decided that if I install 256MB of RAM (or more), then 128MB of it MUST be set aside as shared video memory with no way of changing it. For a chip that was at best at Rage Pro levels of performance.

[@CotyRiddle]

@@cossasomi seen that plenty of times. the integrated shitt never had the power to utilize anything more than 32 mb at best.

[@summer_xo]

Glad I found this channel. Lots of Windows "hacking"/restoration content on YT, LGR etc, which I love (probably my fave channel), but im very glad theres some great Apple content as well. Grew up on a Mac so its great to see them preserved and given the spotlight.

[@ActionRetro]

Thanks man!

[@MrVitalic85]

In my shenanigan of converting pc card to ppc, ati flash and nv flash gave me so much headache that I learned to unsolder the eeprom and reprogram it with a cheap programmer. Much more easy and you can correct mistake afterward. I made a couple cards that way.

[@ActionRetro]

That's amazing!

[@radcheckinski6300]

How did they give you trouble? I've been flashing cards since 2005... its literally bulletproof.

[@grantfaber]

At 17:55 and placing my bet: Based on your famous trial & error methodology, I eagerly expect that it won't fire up on the first try! No major damage; possibly the Scotch tape will need to be adjusted. Hope it works, but if it doesn't, I'll still be entertained. I enjoy watching you kludge your way to victory, since I usually find myself fumbling around in the same way.

[@JessicaFEREM]

Alternative Title: Shoving a WANG into a G4 cube

[@mediocrefunkybeat]

That's going to be sore in the morning.

[@detenatron.3608]

The fans intensifies

[@SalvoDan]

If you had a spare AGP riser, you could disable pins 3 and 11 on that, rather to on card.

[@nomadic_shadow]

I like how you show your honest trial and error. Really cool project!

[@RetroBerner]

You should get a busted cube and put modern SFF hardware in it

[@ActionRetro]

This is an awesome idea

[@MLGPRO-dx8fg]

Yeah, take the guts out of a Intel nuc or something and built it into this, maybe with extra hard drives or something since there will be extra storage

[@dregenius]

@@ActionRetro put an M1 mac mini inside! Sure, the mini's guts would be hilariously easy to "fit", but there's just something poetic about leaving the G4 cube a RISC machine... except now it'll be the same RISC machine that's putting Intel into chapter 11. 😉

[@XxmatixX6videosdiariosdenadav]

@@dregenius if you think that losing apple will make intel bankrupt then you have no idea what intel even does

[@Michael-Archonaeus]

@@dregenius The new Mac Studio would be even better!

[@radcheckinski6300]

I used to put electrical tape over pin 3 and 11 on the agp connector of the card. This way all my cards were fully revertible. Electrical tape works very well because its very sticky, so it stays on and doesn't slide off. Personally, that is the best method. I bought a MDD tower recently and a 7800gs. Going to tape mod it instead. Also, electrical tape isn't see-through, so you can easily cut two little rectangle strips, stick them on and done.

[@theforerunnerreclaimer]

His channel inspired me to actually 3D print one and I got a raspberry Pi to boot straight into Mac OS X Tiger (I did what he did on the Mini G3 tower video) It's nice is pretty cheap to make, and doesn't have the drawbacks of old PCs. (it has 2 mini HDMI ports for up to dual 4k 60 monitors, USB 3.0 and 2.0, SD and can be attached to SATA, etc)

[@mediocrefunkybeat]

Lovely to see the channel starting to get some traction.

[@ActionRetro]

Thanks Duncan!

[@5thaltaccount547]

If you install ImpossibleCat (aka the beta snow leopard that people have been using on their PPC Macs), full hardware acceleration and quartz extreme/core image will be supported, since Apple continued supporting them for awhile. Someone with a G5 with I believe a GeForce 6200 was able to confirm working QE/CI.

[@PicksterTG]

The Rage 128. Wow. That's a blast from the past. My parents got a Pentium 2 back in 97/98 which had a Rage Pro (4mb) and the Rage 128 can be traced back to that card. It's just a bit bumped up. A little late on I got a PC with an All in Wonder Rage 128m. So that has TV tuner, video in etc which would have been around 2000/2001. It's also funny to me that what was the bargain bin version of the 6000 series is a maxed out upgrade for the cube. I actually have the guts of an old PC I want to get up and running. I managed to pick up a motherboard that supports both AGP 1&2 and also AGP 4. Most later AGP slots don't support the older AGP standard, and older boards with the old standard wont support newer AGP 4 or AGP 8 cards... I'm sure that's super interesting to everyone reading... The long and short of that is I can use my old Voodoo 3 in that system but also swap it out for a X800XT should the game require more grunt. Great video. I hope you enjoy the new upgrade. Giving these old pieces of tech new life is a great past time.

[@MacintoshMen]

Wow that's an awsome upgrade you did. Might be the world's fastest G4 cube you got there. That upgraded VRM board really payed off for you

[@xero110]

Just a tip for cutting the pins as you did. Nail polish works great and is easy to remove if you ever need to.

[@staso28]

Another great video. Love this PowerPC content ;) Thanks.

[@ActionRetro]

Thanks Ivan!

[@NickBouwhuis]

Your "weird pc" at 18:43 is exactly the model (or at least case) of computers we had at elementary school. This is the first time I've seen them since then.

[@braytonak]

While I miss seeing our fellow geek as presenting, I do approve of the hiring of Thing from Addams Family.

[@ActionRetro]

🤣🤣🤣

[@Kyle-xv5kv]

You could use the original bracket for mounting your card in that cube, cut off the mounting tab thats at a right angle and cut the excess off, but leave enough to mark and cut two holes in the bracket for the OEM screw holes, then secure it with some nuts and bolts. I hope that made sense...awesome work as always!

[@resonancerim]

Isn't the card detected as 6200 (8:10) but the rom is for 6600 (10:29)?

[@sjanssen]

I was just thinking the same! Rom seems to differ (or he flashed a 6200 rom onto a 6800 card)

[@Dullahan_1]

flashing a 6200 bios into a 6800 maybe be the trick for keep the temps down , don't know how that would work since the 6200 and 6800 have different chips on them

[@marc6340]

I am really going to have to try this! My poor cubes have been just sitting on the shelf all this time!

[@ActionRetro]

Yes do it!

[@gumbyx84]

You are a far braver and determined man than I. I'm glad you eventually got a card flashed and working. I kinda wish I could afford (and had the space) to collect a few classic computers.

[@couldntmixapotnoodle]

The cube looks cooler without the case on. And that bracket for the back of the card you need can probably be found on ebay or among other mac enthusiasts.

[@CotyRiddle]

sheet metal :D

[@ThePsychoticWombat]

I would love to see some more gaming/performance tests. I had one of these and a similar upgrade path planned, but could finish due to not having the time or space for it

[@charlesdorval394]

For the bracket part, I'd say check if you could just cut up the bracket that came with the card and drill 2 mounting hole in the bracket so it fits the 2 original mounting holes in the cube

[@GeFeldz]

The GeForce 6200 AGP, A.K.A. the "Hey, we've actually put an actual discrete graphics card into this crappy prebuilt pc, i'll have you actually know!" GPU of 2004 and 2005. Alternatively; The GeForce 6200 AGP, A.K.A. the "Hey, this motherboard and CPU combo doesn't have integrated video, so here's a card to make your monitor light up and do stuff!" GPU of 2005 and 2006.

[@Storm_.]

Trust me, you're gonna need a heatsink and fan. First thing you will notice is sparkles on game textures which progressively get worse. Then crashes.

[@ActionRetro]

I did put a fan in the bottom of the cube previously, which does blow across the card. I think I'm going to try and fit a more powerful one in there though

[@axi0matic]

@@ActionRetro The base fan blows up the centre of the Cube - 0% of the airflow goes over the graphics card. It’ll cool the CPU, which will reduce temps generally in the Cube, but that’s it. Get a Titan CUV3 for the GPU. Does your Cube wake from sleep with the 6200 fitted?

[@axi0matic]

@Robert F I ask because it didn't for me. The Cube would wake up (fan, HDD etc.) but the screen stayed black. The Cube was only a hobby machine, not a Mac I'd use for anything serious, but this left it feeling unrefined / unfinished. I wound up fitting the similar FX5200 256MB (flashed PC version), which worked fine and is slightly faster for games (128-bit vs 64-bit VRAM). Though eventually replaced it anyway with a Radeon 7500, which had a bunch of advantages for me.

[@kaitlyn__L]

Oh man, what an ordeal! But that mid-00s computer case is a real beauty. That power button is big and proud and shiny. You can really tell it's from an age when people would actually shut down their computer, lol. Beautiful Apple monitor and keyboard, too :) nice to see more cube upgrades too. They boasted about it being expandable in the day, but then tech press said it wasn't really all that expandable, yada yada. But it's a hell of a lot better to work on than, say, a modern laptop!

[@kaitlyn__L]

Also I don't think I've really brought this up in other comments, but your Patreon credit screen always makes me smile. Because I like ducks a lot :D

[@ActionRetro]

Hahaha amazing!

[@robertchamberlin2362]

I just got me a g4 cube and cant wait to try this ,Awesome vid!!!!!!!

[@edism]

@18:51 yes I was wondering the whole time whether you had tested it first, also you can flash it while it's being used for the display. Cool upload, liked and subbed :)

[@SudosFTW]

8200 has a nonstandard pinout for the ATX connector. Used the same pinout as the early P4 Dells and the GX110. The 6200 should still get a heatsink with a fan, the 80mm slim fan won't be able to keep it cool for long. You should also consider doing a thermal compound job on the card, since it's going to be ancient at this point.

[@tobiwonkanogy2975]

could you unplug the vga cable temporarily from the graphics card put the connector on the outside and then plug the vga cable back in ? maybe even being able to screw it in from outside for support.

[@MrVitalic85]

Do you know if a ati 9600 mac edition ( the one with ppc + pc bios) would work ? Its a passive card that dont generate a lot of heat. Anyway, thats a nice upgrade to your G4 cube.

[@ActionRetro]

I think technically it would work, but it doesn't fit - if I'm remembering what I read on forums.

[@thewallduck2022]

Use with a riser maybe? It would be janky and hang out of the cube but it should technically work

[@stevef6392]

18:00: Yep, 100% it'll work first try. I performed a similar Power Mac video card upgrade a few years ago. In my case I stuffed a GeForce 7800GS AGP card in a G4 MDD, running an even older version of OS X: 10.4.11. It fired right up and even had a driver ready to go. I don't think any Mac ever shipped with an AGP 7800GS, so the fact that freakin' Tiger actually had a built in driver just amazed the hell out of me. Edit: And...I was wrong. But hey, not much you can do about a bad video card. Edit 2: Huzzah!!

[@goclunker]

It had a driver thanks to the g5s😉

[@bramvandenbroeck5060]

You could actually take the bracked that came with the broken card, cut the lil lip on the bottom, and cut the L shaped lip from the top off, make it round shaped like the accomodation of the cube, and than with those standoffs you screw normally on either side of the connectors, you could use only 2. If you have the cube lying on its side like on 17:30 you screw the left one from the dvi in and the right one of the vga one, and you could than try to put some strong double tape on the left side of the vga and the right side of the dvi (or if you want it to be permanent, you could just superglue them to the bracket, make sure to sand down the inside of where the glue goes so it has something to grip on to), and it should be strong and sturdy, just don't jam a vga cable on there, but be nice and gentle when you plug it in and it should last for a very long time.

[@chasewilliams3949]

What I would do for a bracket, is to take the original GPU backplate, and just snip off or bend back the part that would screw into the case, and maybe drill holes in it so that it can properly mount to the screw holes already in the cube.

[@SuperNicktendo]

oh nice - I got a cube a while back and it would be really nice to crank this up to 11. Was debating on dual booting Amiga stuff as well.

[@ActionRetro]

Oh that would be awesome!

[@velocity211]

Awesome work getting the 6800 to work with the cube. I bought an old P4 pc to perform the flashing process, but once installed in the cube, bunch of artifacts showed up. Must have been a bad GPU.

[@kylejones8392]

For the bracket I would flatten out the long standard one, mark it where the case holes are, drill it, and then use some short bolts and nuts to hold it in place.

[@luqasxXX]

The rom upload didn't work because the file name was too long. Dos can handle only 8 character file name set, and abbreviates everything with suffix ~1. That causes that the directory does handles ~1 file name lookups/requests. If you would shorten (rename) the file from cube_n~1.bin to just cube.bin the firmware upload would be successful. Hope I helped :)

[@KiraSlith]

You can really easily 3D print one, you just have to keep the build plate temperature very consistent and pull the part as soon as the print finishes, since thin parts curl easily.

[@BobyTheDragon]

Maybe it would be possible to flatten the bracket (So the tab on the end is not 90 degrees anymore) and drill some holes into it to help secure it in the G4 cube? The only thing your damaging is a bracket. Which can be easily replaced for $2 -$5 off eBay.

[@gira93]

I've done that ages ago to install MorphOS on a Powermac G4 quicksilver; it had a rage 128 (which was incompatible) and i've flashed and installed an Ati 9200 Pro, same steps as the video, including the tape! Strangely it worked on first try :)

[@alerey4363]

Great video; I went the same route back in the day installing a Voodoo 3dfx pc-version, reflashed in a pc with a mac ROM and enjoying Quake 3 Arena in my desktop beige G3, with a PC PSU (yes, the G3 had a toggle switch in its logicboard accepting a PC PSU, after the original smoked and was supes expensive to replace I threw in a cheap tower pc PSU)

[@seanwieland9763]

Back in the day I had to use clear nail polish to do something similar - the PC version of a video card was half the cost of the Mac version to upgrade a G4 tower, as long as specific pins were disabled and the ROM flashed.

[@beatricemeyers4640]

Not sure if anyone has a bracket for this card already, but you could probably get one laser cut from Ponoko cheaply enough if you know your way around CAD or a vector graphics program. You can prototype the dimensions on a 3D printer at least.

[@PhilXavierSierraJones]

Wasn't the white slots on the Dell mobo for PCI cards, not AGP?

[@lordhostile]

I've done this mod on a G3 and a G5, I used packing tape and an xacto knife...but the 2nd time I used the wifes clear nail polish although I suspect colored would work fine too and can remove later with a little acetone and cotton swab

[@williamrogers5367]

You do love that cube ❤️

[@rustyshakelford2]

Cool project! I'd be interested to see if the cube can still boot into OS9 with this card installed.

[@rider68-12]

The bracket is easy. You can cut the top tab off and drill a single hole in it and the case, then put a single screw in it. I have done this method several times.

[@macnerd93]

really looking forward to installing a Radeon 7500 into mine. I had one laying around inside an old Quicksilver machine, just need to adapt the I/O Bracket and its a straight fit inside

[@miguimau]

Nice video!!! That Cube flies, now. Can you do a expanded video on SSD adapters for PowerMac G4, with links? Thanks a lot.

[@ryderrepairs]

Should not be to long until you reach that point,,you rock!

[@noahpaulette1490]

I've never covered agp pins but for pci I would use that amber colored thermal tape. You can get it really thin and the adhesive is decent.

[@ActionRetro]

Thanks!

[@russrh]

I'm amazed it worked property. On some boards if you put a pci card in the top slot, and an AGP card they share resources and bad things happen

[@radcheckinski6300]

I've been doing this since 2005 when running powermac g4s as fulltime drivers. You didn't ruin the card, it was probably bricked. Never had that happen. With a wrong rom it wouldn't boot, but it was always revertible.

[@squeeeb]

Nice upgrade!

[@Maxtraxv3]

me thinking did you select the video card you wanted to flash first, or did you just flash your PCI card since that would be the first in slot...?

[@eg1885]

Great video. Try using backup.rom from the good card to reflash the bad card to possibly get it working.

[@philippbuschmann4125]

Very amazing ... keep going with more mods

[@bryandrobny7690]

Arnold Schwarzencube going to Pump you up! Get to the Chopa!

[@Dex99SS]

Why not just 3d print a bracket? Or fab one out of metal? Or fab one out of plastic? Or at the very lazy least just use (sparingly use) some hot glue to keep the ports secure?

[@hi-friaudioman]

Unsolder the s-video connector and attach the old gfix card bracket. It should work since the vga Conn is on a ribbon cable, it would just need a little modification.

[@uptimefpv]

I would take the original bracket, flatten it, and drill holes in the top and bottom of the bracket so that it could screw into the G4 case.

[@bobfromsoireegames4309]

I had one of these a few years ago. It was a nice, silent backup Mac.

[@parintelebaiazid80]

23:36 Anybody else can hear the in-game music just by seeing the ID Software Logo?

[@jamesthompson7694]

The cube out if the case with just the metal look pretty dang good. Very industrial/scifi/post-apocalyptic

[@piterb.5444]

Just cut off the L side of the original bracket and then make the new holes for the Cube screws.

[@SirSmilie]

you could probably reuse one of the standoffs for screwing a dvi cable into the video card and thread it through the case back into the video card to anchor it better to the case. Would be a quick fix for it being loose.

[@DavidStahlOLDHAPPyMACs]

Hi Sean I Have Also The Geforce 6200 256MB NVIDIA Card In My G4 Cube Graphics are fantastic . I Modded The The Original back plate from the 128 rage card with a drim tool looks great I'm using the VGA port for now

[@jonathan21022]

For future reference a lot of premade pc's have a none standard pinout for the power supply. So by plugging in a universal power supply you may have burnt out that board or just stopped it from booting.

[@EvilTurkeySlices]

Those old dells don’t, they use standard ATX. There’s really only a few where it’s not obvious that it’s non standard. Most prebuilts that use non standard hardware use custom connectors that are physically different from ATX. Dell did use a different pin out ATX connector, but much later.

[@charlesjmouse]

2:22 Apple - "Screwing with established hardware standards since 1976". 11:40 Yep, NVFLASH is an absolute pain... especially if you're flashing 'blind'. 18:40 Very bad luck!

[@milagrofrost]

About 13 years ago, I used to buy 9800 PC Cards and sell them modified for Mac on eBay. Of course I would let people know that in the description. That’s was a $50 profit for each one. It was a nice little side hustle. After a little while, it became less profitable to do that and had been burned by a few bricked ones that I could not recover.

[@ActionRetro]

That's awesome! At least while it lasted!

[@markdjdeenix6846]

you could maybe trim and grind down the width and length of the original gpu bracket

[@willm5032]

Flashing GPUs is a lot easier when you have a spare windows machine. I had to flash an nVidea card for my mac pro and I ended up having to create a Linux USB then use the wifi network to do it remotely from my laptop and load NVFlash on THAT... was some matrix shit

[@AtomicGoober]

Hey, I reworked someone else's G4 Cube GPU bracket to hopefully work with your card configuration. I posted the design on Thingiverse /thing:4659096. The original design is by Dietervdf, at /thing:1665153. Also, if you don't have access to a 3D printer, or can't print locally. I can totally print the part out of high-temp resin and send it out to you at the cost of shipping.

[@ActionRetro]

Holy crap thank you! I'd be happy to pay for shipping! Could you email me? [e-mail]

[@AtomicGoober]

@@ActionRetro Email sent. 👍

[@littledudejoey]

loved the Druaga reference!

[@supercrazymario404]

Could you put a 7800 GS in one of these? It’s the best AGP card that can be flashed for Macs and it’s pretty good

[@andrewbaluk1663]

use kapton heat tape like they use in 3d printing beds and print heads. Its more resilient.

[@SteelSkin667]

That's weird, all of these ROMs seem to be expecting a GeForce 6660 card. Does that mean that someone somewhere managed to cram an underclocked 6600 in a cube? These were scorching fast compared to the 6200.

[@goclunker]

No. It was a hacked 5200fx rom

[@InMediasRes_vo]

bend, drill, and dremel the slot cover you pulled off that one PC. that's how a former co-worker did it when he upgraded his own cube.

[@ruicaridade2798]

Respect :) One of my favourite games ever on one of my favourite computers ever :)

[@bnard6299]

I might be able to throw you together a 3D printable design (or even print it for you) if you send some dimensions

[@racer4200]

Specific AF. Awesome work man. Subbed

[@EweToobUsername]

Btw, did you get the ROM images from The Mac Elite or somewhere else?

[@ActionRetro]

Yep Mac Elite

[@MartinPaoloni]

As for the bracket, can you try modding the original metal one? Alternatively, sketch something up in Thinkercad and have it 3D printed!

[@JessicaFEREM]

5:09 tfw the whole pc costs as much as the GPU

[@leong108]

Don't you just fold the end of bracket up or cut it off ??? can't you cable tie the parts internally so as to hold the card firmly inplace ?

[@extrameatsammich]

didn't these nv44 cards have issues with the die delaminating?

[@vlad_sab]

Does anybody know, where can I download that fancy cyber mountain screen picture? Thank you!

[@CoolDudeClem]

I still remember when 256 MB of graphics RAM was a big deal, now in my computer I've got a card with 6GB!

[@EvilTurkeySlices]

My main PC has 11GB.

[@STAR-fn1pi]

that was extremely complicated, like trying to kill a dragon with a needle :/ i love it good job :p

[@EdgyShooter]

Liked simply for that expression 😅

[@mightydeku]

I remember flashing a voodoo 3 3000 PCI for my umax back when 3dfx released a Mac firmware for their cards.

[@TheDrunkenPL]

Why didn’t you use RtCW to benchmark both cards on this setup?

[@richardhammer187]

I'm glad it''s not just me who has to go through this crap every time they want to try something a bit different!

[@tractorman7733]

I hate it when I try to do something that may not work and I keep running into issues before I can even get to the task I set out to accomplish