Does Building Your Own CoreCrib G4 Make Economic Sense?
Daniel Knight - 2003.05.14
If Apple offered a "bare bones" Power Mac G4 - one with no hard
drive, no media drive, no video card, no memory, no mouse, no keyboard,
no cables, no CPU, and no OS - would you buy it?
If your answer is yes or maybe, you may be a candidate for the
CoreCrib
computer from CoreComputer. Except for not using Apple's Power Mac G4
enclosure, it's the bare bones Power Mac described above.
The CoreCrib includes a 340 W Apple power supply and a G4 motherboard in a boxy white case. It's not as
swoopy as Apple's case, but it's nicer looking than most PC cases. The
computer sells for US$379.99.
There is one place where the CoreCrib improves upon any current
Apple desktop machine - in addition to the usual USB and
FireWire ports on the back of the box, the CoreCrib has two USB ports
and one FireWire port on the front of the computer where they are
readily accessible. Apple should have done this years ago.
As you can see in the photo, the CoreCrib has a lot more accessible
drive bays than any Power Mac ever: two 3.5" external bays and four
external 5.25" bays - and room for still more drives inside the
box.
The system accepts all the same expansion options as the Power Mac
G4: RAM to 2 GB, AGP 2x video, three PCI slots, and an AirPort card.
Core recommends the use of PC133 memory instead of PC100 memory.
Upgrade Your Old Power Mac
If you've already got a Sawtooth or
"two brains are better than one" Gigabit
Ethernet G4, you can easily move everything you have to the
CoreCrib with no need to buy additional components.
If you have a Yosemite (blue & white)
G3 or Yikes! G4, you're most of the way
there. Your PC100 memory should work. The same goes for most of the
components inside the computer, except if you have an internal modem
(Apple changed that from time to time). And, of course, the CPU. Pulled
G4s from AGP Power Mac G4s go for as little as US$40 on eBay
these days - depending on speed, of course.
If you have a beige G3, you can move
over your hard drive, CD-ROM, connection cables, and any PCI cards you
may have added. Any "personality card" will have to stay with the old
machine, as will the CPU and 66 MHz SDRAM memory. We suggest you check
ramseeker for memory prices.
Build a New Power Mac
Although you can move a lot of components from an older Power Mac G3
or G4 to the CoreCrib, I suspect most people will buy this bare bones
machine so they can build a new Power Mac G4 that's configured exactly
as they want it - and probably at a lower cost than Apple would
charge.
The place to start is with a CPU. If you're willing to settle for
something 500 MHz or slower, you may find some excellent deals on
eBay or our own swap list.
If you'd prefer to buy new, check out the many options in our Guide to Power Mac G4 Upgrades. You can find
G4 modules ranging from 350 MHz to dual 1.2 GHz.
One of the better values is the PowerForce G4
Series 100, which offers an 800 MHz G4 for US$299. Although there
are plenty of other options, this gives us a reasonable price point and
brings the cost of the CoreCrib to $680.
If we go with PC133 memory as Core suggests, the sweet spot for
price and capacity is 256 MB modules, which can be found for as little
as $30 each. Unless you need lots of memory, figure three of these for
$100 shipped for a total of 768 MB. This brings your CoreCrib to
$780.
The IDE bus handles drives as large as 128 GB (or 137 GB if you
follow the convention of 1 GB = 1,000,000,000 bytes). If you buy
anything larger, you either won't be able to use the whole drive, will
have to buy a new controller card that supports this capacity, or put
the drive in a FireWire enclosure. On the premise that we're building a
budget system, you should be able to find a nice fast 80-120 GB drive
for under $100 after rebates, bringing the cost of this project to
$880.
And we're not even close to done yet. At this point, you can't
connect a display, so we need to look at video cards. $100 is a
midpoint for AGP Radeon cards for the Mac on eBay.
Some sell for as little as $75, others for $150, but a lot sell for
about $100, bringing our CoreCrib to $980.
Normally I'd suggest a Combo drive here, but looking at the amazing
deals on CD-RW drives available through national computer and office
supply chains (sometimes less than $20 after rebates), it probably
makes more sense to buy both a CD burner and a DVD-ROM drive if you
want the ability to burn CDs and watch DVDs. It's a cheaper way to go,
and the great number of external drive bays in the CoreCrib makes this
practical.
Before spending a penny on either type of drive, I strongly
recommend you visit the Drive
Compatibility Database at Accelerate Your Mac! to make sure the
drive(s) you're looking at are compatible with the Mac. I'm guessing
you can pick up a CD-RW drive and a DVD-ROM drive for under $100,
keeping the cost so far to under $1,080.
Add a mouse and keyboard for anywhere from $50 to $100, and then buy
all the cables you'll need to connect your drives to the motherboard.
At this point, you have all the hardware you need to create a working
computer. Your net hardware cost is about $1,200.
The only thing missing is the Mac OS, and you have your choice of
the classic Mac OS or OS X with the CoreCrib. Figure $100 for
whatever you choose, and you've created an 800 MHz G4 system with 768
MB RAM, an 80 GB drive, both CD-RW and DVD-ROM drives, and up-to-date
video for about US$1,300.
The Value Equation
Has it been worth it? I think so. Picking up a used G4/733 or G4/867
from a dealer would set you back about US$1,500 with less memory, a
smaller hard drive, no ability to watch DVDs, and less drive bays. If
you go with the 800 MHz configuration we've put together, you save
about $200.
But that's a ballpark figure. Since you get to choose how much RAM
you buy, what size hard drive you want, whether you need CD-RW and/or
DVD, etc., you can easily trim the price if you have lesser needs - or
boost it if your needs are more demanding.
If you're not moving your OS license and several components over
from an older Mac, the CoreCrib lets you customize your own Mac for
less than a comparable used Power Mac G4 would cost. If you don't mind
working inside the box (and it's something most computer users can do),
the CoreCrib could be a way to build your own G4 while saving money.
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We believe in the long term value of Apple hardware. You should be able to use your Apple gear as long as it helps you remain productive and meets your needs, upgrading only as necessary. We want to help maximize the life of your Apple gear.
usual USB and
FireWire ports on the back of the box, the CoreCrib has two USB ports
and one FireWire port on the front of the computer where they are
readily accessible. Apple should have done this years ago.