Updating a G3 Wallstreet, Part 2 - the final stretch - July 8, 2002 You've come back for more? Well in this final stretch of the Keeping a PowerBook WallStreet current series, I have a pocket full of miracles for you to blow all the rest of your money on. But, It'll be worth every penny because there's a big grin fest ahead! Left out in the cold, the legacy WallStreet and Lombard G3 PowerBook had no access to WiFi 802.11b WLAN technology from Apple. The Pismo G3 was the first to offer an internal slot for an Apple Airport Card, but there have been answers for your favorite. Two prominent companies have had those answers, Lucent/Agere ORiNOCO and Farallon (now Proxim) have made PCMCIA 802.11b cards for years that make WLAN possible for the early G3 PowerBook's. You may not have known but the inside the first version Airport Base Stations, commonly known as the "Graphite", is a Lucent/Agere WaveLAN Silver (64-bit) PCMCIA card. For that reason the ORiNOCO series of Silver and Gold cards are totally compatible with Apple Airport software under OS 9.x. There is no reason to use any additional software or extensions, as the Airport software will see the ORiNOCO card as if it were an internal Airport Card. There's a "but" to this good thing though and it's that OS X does not recognize this card as an Airport card. In my last conversation with the PR folks at ORiNOCO I got the bad news that there were no plans for OS X drivers either. To the rescue comes the Open Source group at Sourceforge.net . They have mercifully developed an elegantly sweet OS X / Darwin OS free software package (in Beta still) that any OEM would be proud of. To top that, it works perfectly with a slew of WiFi cards you can use with any Airport-less PowerBook or iBook running OS X. It supports all the "WaveLAN", ORiNOCO Silver and Gold, Farallon Skyline, D-Link and Cabletron 802.11b cards. We installed it on the G3 WallStreet with the ORiNOCO Gold card and in a matter of a few minutes the software was running and configured under DHCP. The only hitch in the software is that each time you boot up, the software will require you to re-enter your WEP Encryption key, and you MUST install whichever WiFi Card you're using before you boot your PowerBook. Both are a bit of a nuisance, but with this being your only OS X solution for now, you can live with it. Everyone, say thanks to the fellows at Sourceforge.net! The Proxim (Farallon) Skyline 11Mb Wireless PC Card is the other great choice for your WiFi solution. While the Skyline card is not seen by the Apple Airport software, the accompanying software is a breeze to install and set up to connect to your Airport or any other 802.11b network. As of this writing, Proxim has not released proprietary OS X software for it's previous Farallon cards or the				current Proxim branded cards. But, as I stated above the free Sourceforge OS X software does support the Skyline cards as well. So far so good, but you still look longingly at those shinny new Titanium G4 PowerBook's with fat G4 high megahertz numbers and wonder, can this milestone sleek black beauty compete? Buckle up your seat belts, you bet it can. ìFor our project WallStreets we selected processor kits from two veteran and respected companies . . . î Fortunately, you've got some great choices for processor upgrades to your G3 WallStreet PowerBook or Lombard (PowerLogix's BlueChip LS). And not to leave out Pismo PowerBook owners like me, upgrades have recently been made for you too like the PowerLogix G4 500 Pismo. in this market niche; PowerLogix and Sonnet Technologies. Original Apple 233MHz and the PowerLogix G4 500 with the Viking 256L MB SODIMM module in the lower memory slot. To make things interesting for this article and provide you with more choices, we acquired two very different kits. From Sonnet we got a new Crescendo/WS G3 500MHz kit and from PowerLogix a BlueChip G4 500MHz kit. Both kits use Motorola processors and have 1 Megabyte L2 backside cache, but that is where the similarities end. The Crescendo/WS uses a standard "Arthur" series G3 PPC750 chip at 500MHz, while the PowerLogix BlueChip uses the AltiVec G4 7410 chip also at 500MHz. Both processor daughter boards are beautifully made, both allowing you to install a total of 512 MB of SODIMM RAM and both fully support OS X and OS 9.2 Classic Mode. Keep in mind that you are still dealing with a 66 MHz system bus on your WallStreet and a video card (ATI RageLT Pro) that Apple still has chosen not to fully support even in the latest version of OS X, 10.1.5. The list price of the Sonnet Crescendo/WS G3-500 is $399.95 and the list price for the PowerLogix BlueChip G4-500 is $499.00, check the net for the best street prices. Both processor kits will accept a total of 512 MB of RAM. We used Viking Components 256 MB Low Profile 1" SODIMM in the lower slot and the standard 1.5" SODIMM in the top slot. Both processors recognized a total of 512 MB RAM in the system profiler without a hitch. These are PC-100 modules with CL2 (2-2-2) timing specifications. Don't buy anything but premium CL2 RAM. Removing the original Apple processor card is easy with the kit supplied tool. Physically installing both cards is a breeze, it won't take a brain surgeon or an IT whiz to do the operation. Both cards come with very good documentation that is well-illustrated and easy next
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