Installing NEXXTECH USB/Firewire on PowerMac 7500

McCann

Hello,

Just bought a NEXXTECH USB 2.0 and 1394 3+2 combo PCI card and want to install it on my powermac 7500. Any things I should look out for.

Thanks

Eric McCann

CanadaRAM

What OS are you using?

Rob

Cross your fingers.

I'm assuming you're using OS8 or 9. Neither one supports USB2. They only support USB1.

USB2 cards should still be backwards compatible to USB1, but on these older machines they often don't work at all. The only way to know for sure is to try it.

Most firewire cards work without problems, as do most USB1 cards. USB2 cards are hit or miss.

If your combo card doesn't work, then you might be better off looking for separate firewire and USB cards. A USB1 card is more likely to work, but they're very hard to find now.

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McCann

I'm using OS 9.0 and just tried it now with nothing installed... and nothing. I heard I gotta reinstall 9.0 and make sure I have the USB and firewire stuff installed. Will try that ...

McCann

No go. Re-installed OS 9 and tried the apple USB support of the web (the install you can download). Still no go.

Anybody has any ideas or I should really try to get a used USB 1.1 only card.

Eric McCann

CanadaRAM

My guess is that the card would need third party drivers to work under OS 8 / 9
Not a prayer of getting driver support from Nexxtech.
You may have a slim chance of finding drivers if you found out the chipset the card was built around, and then searched for existing card drivers for cards made with the same chipset.

Sonnet makes a card that is compatible with System 9.2 at USB 1.1 speed
Sonnet - Tango 2.0: FireWire/USB 2.0 PCI Card

Rob

Forget about the combo card. It's not going to work. Been there, done that.

Save the card for a PC or a newer Mac.

OS 9 supports USB and firewire without adding any new extensions. The problem is that it never supported USB2, and some USB2 cards just don't work.

OS 8.1 needed the extension add ons from Apple since they didn't come built in.

The best bet, as stated previously, is to find a USB1 card. Look for a used one if you can't find a new one.

Look for a card that only has two ports, since some of the ones with more than two ports could overload the power available to the PCI slot. That also makes combo cards a bit riskier.

I've had very good success with that generation of older Macs using almost any two port USB1 card.

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rampancy_fatalin.

It won't work. Plain and simple, and if it did, it wouldn't support deep sleep. To my knowledge, every PCI FW400/USB2 combo card I've seen, with the exception of cards built for the Mac, use two VIA chipsets to supply FireWire and USB I/O (and I think I've seen some which use a single VIA ASIC for both); for reasons I can't fathom, VIAs chipsets don't work well with Mac OS X at all, let alone OS 9.

A surefire bet would be to find a FireWire 400 card which had either an Agere or an NEC chipset; for USB 2 cards, ALi/Nvidia (yes, Nvidia) or NEC is best (though NEC is preferred).

However, since you have a very, very old machine, you may be limited to a PCI card which has two ports and has USB 1.1; I discovered when upgrading an old 6400 that its motherboard PCI controller had an errata which meant that any card that had more than two USB ports wouldn't work; this may hold true for the 7500 too.

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bsenka

I was never able to get a combo card to work in my G4 tower either, but separate USB2 and FW cards worked right out of the box with no drivers.

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McCann

Hello to all,

Well followed your advice and found a used STARTECH PCI 2 port USB 1.1 card that worked straight out of the box. It cost me only 5 CAD too and was right next to my house. So was very happy about that.

Will go again tomorrow to try to find a firewire card with recommended chipset. Are aware if a 3 port firewire 400 card would work on a 7500. Would like to connect internally a firewire drive.

The old beast is getting a bit better and better. Now has a 500 MHz G3, a USB 1.1, probably this week a ATI RADEON 7000 32 meg PCI card, firewire, and boom, all set. A pitty that only three PCI slots are available 'cause would have liked to put in a ATA card in.

Thanks

Eric McCann