Disk Speed Upgrades (aka The Bootable PCI SATA & SSD thread)

[geforceg4]

Is this still something we are working on?

I'm having a heck of a time finding any SATA cards that are native. I see these si(i|L)3112 cards for $8 on ebay. I don't see any confirmation that the $8 cards work. One post was the first went well, the next two failed.

Do we know what the firmware instruction set is for REing it? Or any more real info?

the SIL cards themselves dont work untill they are modified by a professional whos familiar with the process in making them mac bootable..

[madalynmcworm]

Is this still something we are working on?

I'm having a heck of a time finding any SATA cards that are native. I see these si(i|L)3112 cards for $8 on ebay. I don't see any confirmation that the $8 cards work. One post was the first went well, the next two failed.

Do we know what the firmware instruction set is for REing it? Or any more real info?

the SIL cards themselves dont work untill they are modified by a professional whos familiar with the process in making them mac bootable..

Is there a defined process for modifying those cards that is public?

[MacTron]

Is there a defined process for modifying those cards that is public?

Yes, it's public but complex: You have to change the EPROM of the card and flash it with the Mac Firmware.

[Knezzen]

Just wanted to share the QuickBench results from my KingSpec 120gb SATA SSD connected to the Sil3114 based card I bought from max1zzz.

QuickBench™ 1.5 Test Results File
©2000 Intech Software Corp.
Test file created on fredag 25 november 2016 at 19.37.39
Test Volume name: Copland

Xfer Size     Sequential Read   Sequential Write    Random Read      Random Write

1 KByte         3.772 MB/sec    565.163 KB/sec      2.134 MB/sec    577.968 KB/sec
2 KBytes        7.202 MB/sec      1.110 MB/sec      7.250 MB/sec      1.127 MB/sec
4 KBytes       12.749 MB/sec      2.228 MB/sec     12.346 MB/sec      2.186 MB/sec
8 KBytes       23.196 MB/sec      4.101 MB/sec     19.734 MB/sec      4.214 MB/sec
16 KBytes      20.864 MB/sec      8.297 MB/sec     28.591 MB/sec      8.505 MB/sec
32 KBytes      62.751 MB/sec     16.107 MB/sec     36.350 MB/sec     15.476 MB/sec
64 KBytes      78.340 MB/sec     28.115 MB/sec     47.863 MB/sec     27.315 MB/sec
128 KBytes     89.580 MB/sec     43.093 MB/sec     39.700 MB/sec     42.769 MB/sec
256 KBytes     96.779 MB/sec     59.297 MB/sec     59.275 MB/sec     61.216 MB/sec
512 KBytes    100.766 MB/sec     77.188 MB/sec     76.233 MB/sec     76.578 MB/sec
1 MByte       102.913 MB/sec     89.473 MB/sec     95.815 MB/sec     78.484 MB/sec

[Protools5LEGuy]

Just wanted to share the QuickBench results from my KingSpec 120gb SATA SSD connected to the Sil3114 based card I bought from max1zzz.

I would swear max1zzz does magic on 3112

[Knezzen]

So the SeriTek/1v4 arrived today from Italy. I took out the Sil3112 based card I bought from Max and put the SeriTek in it's place. The first thing I did was take some new benchmarks with QuickBench.

So this is the exact same SSD with the same 9.2.2 installation I used with the Sil3112 card.

QuickBench™ 1.5 Test Results File
©2000 Intech Software Corp.
Test file created on torsdag 1 december 2016 at 18.19.38
Test Volume name: Copland

Xfer Size     Sequential Read   Sequential Write    Random Read      Random Write

1 KByte         4.498 MB/sec    688.468 KB/sec      3.342 MB/sec    723.170 KB/sec
2 KBytes        8.677 MB/sec      1.377 MB/sec      9.825 MB/sec      1.411 MB/sec
4 KBytes       15.241 MB/sec      2.712 MB/sec     16.758 MB/sec      2.782 MB/sec
8 KBytes       27.832 MB/sec      5.247 MB/sec     28.123 MB/sec      5.420 MB/sec
16 KBytes      25.469 MB/sec      2.950 MB/sec     40.406 MB/sec     10.234 MB/sec
32 KBytes      76.238 MB/sec     19.184 MB/sec     51.610 MB/sec     18.941 MB/sec
64 KBytes      94.812 MB/sec     33.307 MB/sec     67.067 MB/sec     33.499 MB/sec
128 KBytes    112.289 MB/sec     51.318 MB/sec     82.476 MB/sec     52.636 MB/sec
256 KBytes    120.314 MB/sec     72.897 MB/sec    109.185 MB/sec     73.063 MB/sec
512 KBytes    125.294 MB/sec     90.588 MB/sec    118.810 MB/sec     91.037 MB/sec
1 MByte       127.379 MB/sec    105.403 MB/sec    122.983 MB/sec    104.777 MB/sec

You can really see that the 64bit SeriTek gives an overall speed improved.
I'm very satisfied with the results 

[madalynmcworm]

Hmm. Been a bit busy, maybe I missed something. Has anything new been learned or has a wiki been made with a flashing process and proper chips, etc for making this work?

I'm fine with soldering / flashing it myself; It just appears to be a bit scattered as far as info goes for me. I'd like a confirmed process that seems to be the agreed upon way to do this and not "Oh this guy said this and then did this and then vanished. Some other guy used this and it worked maybe...".

[stephenvalente]

I'm watching the item below. Anyone use this?

https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/142222150212

[MacTron]

I'm watching the item below. Anyone use this?

https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/142222150212

It does not support Mac OS 9.

[stephenvalente]

I'm watching the item below. Anyone use this?

https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/142222150212

It does not support Mac OS 9.

Apologies; was too focussed on looking at it working with the Power Mac G4 and not the OS!

[stephenvalente]

Managed to get a 2-port Sonnet SATA card here in the U.K. Will install in one of my mirror door G4's when time allows. Amazed to find one!

[tiousable]

Well, I finally got around to replacing the flash on the card I mentioned earlier. Have the Seritek 1S2 (v5.1.3, I seem to recall there being others, which I have yet to try) firmware on it right now. The card shows up, as well as the attached SSD, and I can start initializing the disk, but then it just... sits there, being busy... updating the screen every second or two so it's not totally stuck. Is that a known failure mode? Do I have to install to an IDE drive and clone that to a SATA one, maybe?

[IIO]

my sonnet recently started to do weird things in both OS9 and OSX. there is also a chance that the problems are caused by a dying quicksilver PSU, but otherwise i tracked it down to the sonnet card by a long list of tests.

[wnlewis]

I recently bought a Firmtek/Seritek 1V4 and several Firmtek/Seritek 1SC1 adapters. I put the jumper on a Seagate Barracuda 750 Gb drive to set it for master, put the 1SC1 adapter on it, and plugged the cable into the 1V4 card. Then I selected OS 9.2.2 as the boot drive (on the Seagate) and restarted the G4 (AGP with a 1 GHZ upgrade). The G4 booted into 9.2.2 just like it was supposed to. So that was step one in a project I am working on. Neal Lewis

[macStuff]

the combination of a pci sata card and a healthy modern hard drive = disk performance that i would have loved to have had
back in 1999, 2000, 2001 time period, for g3s + lower end g4's i think its a must have upgrade for any serious hobbyist or vintage mac enthusiast!

[MacTron]

All the SATA PCI cards for Mac os 9 are 32 bits.

I was wrong here... the Seritek 1eVE2+2 and the Seritek 1V4 are both 64 bits.

It would be interesting to see some test results with those SATA cards against this adaptors.

http://macos9lives.com/smforum/index.php/topic,2023.msg27432.html#msg27432

[macStuff]

it would be an amazing accomplishment to be able to find an easy modification to allow the generic SIL3112 cards to be able to be mac os9 bootable..

looking at the graph above just posted by mactron, yes the 64bit is far + away the leader .+ "BEST" but for me, the performance of the sil3112 is not far behind but the biggest difference is the PRICE! these sil3112 cards are only 10$ a pop or can be found in large quanitities + availability; wheras the 64bit ones are hard to find and about 3-4 times as costly,
small price to pay to have the BEST for those who are obsessed with achieving the best performance..

but for me, im more than happy with the performance jump simply using a sil3112 pci card over the built in disk which can be ATA33 or ATA66 or ATA100 depending on which PCI MAC you are using..
because of the PRICE! is so cheap..  the main problem is the stupid tricky firmware.. performing all these unneccessary checks..with the sole purpose of ensuring their own profit margin,

whats funny to me is that the creators of the seritek firmware + other bootable sata firmwares, this is not something that they "OWN COPYRIGHT OF" because noone can "OWN" the ability to boot the mac.... except for maybe apple.

these developers who developed this firmware must have done so with the help of apples developer support, somewhere, there must be information on how to achieve this, if only we could find someone who is a firmware programmer; i think if it were possible to remove these unneccessary steps from the firmware, or to create a new, bootable firmware, that this might shave some seconds off the startup time and also remove some other "hardware incompatibility" that has been observed as a result of the firmware "messing up" its configuration at boot time;

if only we could find someone who is a firmware programmer

[macStuff]

@ widter: How is this work going?

ive ordered a card on which to test with ; and ill be attempting to get this 'done' myself

[macStuff]

I'm watching the item below. Anyone use this?

https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/142222150212

It does not support Mac OS 9.

the sil3114 has been confirmed to work on a powermac g4 under osx after being flashed with the sil3112 wiebetech firmware; i plan on attempting to do the same with the seritek 1s2 firmware;

[macStuff]

time to kick this up a notch + get this done - for the benefit of all ppc macos users worldwide
we need a new source of bootable pci cards
im not gonna sit back and watch losers sell tempo sata cards on ebay for 400$