The 6400 Zone - Sonnet Clocker Info

7/4/2001: This new version should not timeout anymore and a carbon version has been added! Though no 6400 can run OSX, you might feel like clocking the extension on another system running OSX and then move it back to your 6400 :)

Here is the news I bet your all waiting for, well at least the Sonnet G3 owners :) I just recieved a Realbasic app that a reader of my site sent that can modify your Crescendo extension to fool it into running the G3 faster! This is not the hack or app that Bill had mentioned in a previous posting I had about clocking the PDS versions. This should work on ANY Sonnet G3 upgrade that uses the Crescendo extension! Basically you enter your current mother board bus speed and then pick the CPU speed you want. NOTE, this can cause crashes and has only been tested on a 6360 with Sonnets L2 G3 300 to clock it to 320Mhz. Any faster and it froze but the current 8X G3's cannot go faster then 320Mhz on a 40Mhz bus anyway so it may have confused it and this locked it up. 6500 owners may get faster results if the CPU can handle it? You must pick your true mother board speed and not another one as the program was writen to use this data to configure the Crescendo extension. There are other bus speeds listed that the 6400 and 6500 do not run at because the author is hoping that this will work for all Sonnet G3 upgrades using the Crescendo extension.

Try this at your own risk as The 6400 Zone will not take any responsibility for any damages caused by it. Click the above links to download it. Instructions are included.

The author also added the Realbasic data used to make the app because he only had a trial version which means this app may timeout in 30days? If anyone who has a registered copy of Realbasic wishes to recompile it for me I would certianly appreciate it! Please let me know how it works if you try it.

11/12/1999 Sonnet clocker update: I have gotten several replies from Sonnet users on how well this utility works. It seems that the Sonnet 240Mhz users are not getting it to work but the 300Mhz users are? I emailed the author and hopefully he can find the problem? Here are a few letters I got. Thanks all.

Note as of this posting all 300Mhz cards seem to work and 240Mhz cards don't? Also the backside cache on the G3 will speed up as it is a direct ratio of the G3 CPU's speed so its probably a good idea to turn off any G3 cache utilities that might speed it up even more! I know the author of this utility is keeping himself secret AS he is the one that broke the code so to speak. There is no way Sonnet can track any user of this utility and all you have to do is replace the modified Crescendo extension with an original version and the mod is gone. No way to tell it was ever used.

Please keep the info coming in, specially the 240Mhz card owners. we need to find out why they aren't working?

12/10/1999 New Sonnet Clocker app a hit, Maybe?: I have received some initial reports stating the new clocker app is working for 240/250 card users! But I also got some users that still report no luck :( Here are some letters I got. Thanks for the info.

12/17/1999 Sonnet Clocker and Sonnet Clocker II!: The author of the Sonnet Clocker utility has updated it again to fix the issue of 240Mhz users not being able to clock their G3's. It turns out he correctly modified the 240 registers but the problem is that Sonnet was not using those? They were using the 250 registers for both 240/250 speeds. With this update it should work fine. Please let me know how it goes.

Also another person took the source code and made the same changes but also added bus settings for Nubus G3 upgrades! This one is named Sonnet Clocker II. The whole 33-36.7 Mhz range was not in the original version but now it is. He did leave out the 66 and 100Mhz settings for the beige and B&W G3 upgrades but its not certain if it would work on those anyway? This second Author says it won't work on any PCI G3 upgrade, only the Nubus and L2 upgrades. So now you have a choice of either one (both do the exact same thing but each has different bus choices and both have the 6400/6500 settings) which should cover the entire spectrum of Sonnets G3 upgrade offerings :)

2/26/2000 Sonnet Clocker II recompiled: One of my readers took the source code for the Clocker II app and recompiled it for us with a full version of RealBasic so now it will no longer time out. Thank you very much!

Also since a link to my site had been posted on Accelerate Your Macs site I have gotten many non L2 G3 Mac owners like 7500 owners trying out this great app. Unfortunately it doesn't seem to work for them? reports I have recieved say the system bus on the 7500 is showing at 43.3 or 46.6 with the unhacked Crescendo Sonnet G3 installed. Neither of the Sonnet Clocker apps have settings for these bus speeds at this time :( I am trying to contact the authors to see if they can make the needed changes. In the mean time I have posted a text file with instructions from another reader of mine on what these apps are really doing to the extension. If you know how to use ResEdit then maybe you can hack it your self? Please let me know if you find the combination for these bus speeds. Thanks.

Now for the good news, the Clocker apps seems to be working fine for 7100 and 8100 owners! Here are some letters I got. Thanks!

The 7100/80AV must have a 40Mhz bus to attain 280Mhz CPU speed? Also 320Mhz is the max for any L2 G3 system unless Sonnet used the 10X bus ratio G3's in them. They did make a 400 card for the 6400/6500 and a 500 card for the 6500 but 300Mhz is the fastest listed for the StarMax systems on their web site. Its possible that they chose a 7.5X bus multiplier for the StarMax system as the highest they could run for some reason? Or maybe the correct registers in the Crescendo extension aren't being changed for StarMax systems? I'll have to look into it.

Below are some info from 7500 owners who are unable to get either Clocker app to work. But from the info I have received from them it seems that Sonnet may have hardwired the bus ratio into the card so clocking will not be possible for PCI mac owners. I have not heard from any other PCI Mac owners such as 8500, 9500, and so on so this is only theory right now. The original bus speeds with Apples CPu cards installed was set at 50Mhz but one 250Mhz G3 Sonnet owner says his now reads 46.6Mhz and a 300Mhz G3 reader says his bus speed is set to 43Mhz? I'm assuming Sonnet did this to assure better compatibility since I don't see any other reason to lower the bus speeds? Below is a letter from the 250Mhz Sonnet owner with some interesting info on using XLR8's G3 utility instead of Sonnets Crescendo driver. This info pretty much reasures this issue of the bus speed being hardwired. Notice if he removes the Crescendo extension he gets reports of the G3 speed so it would seem the CPU is activated but the L2 cache is not running. Now rememebr these are PCI G3 upgrades which means the original CPU is removed to place the new G3 card in. Unlike L2 G3's and Nubus G3 upgrades where the stock CPU is left in the system. This means that the G3 will always be activated and the Crescendo driver is only needed for the activation of the L2 cache so Sonnet may have to hardwire the CPU speed in without the need for any software? What would happen if you booted with Extensions Disabled? Well on our systems you get an old slow system but on a PCI G3 upgrade you can't let your CPU not activate! It has too! I hope I didn't drag this on to long :) I don't think that PCI G3 upgrades will be clockable :(

Now you L2 G3 and Nubus owners don't go run out and get the XLR8 utility! Since your CPU is dependant on software to activate the G3 CPU I bet this utility won't work by itself (meaning you need your extension no matter what!)

3/11/2000 Apple 4400 and the Sonnet Clocker?: Pedro wrote to let me know he tried both Sonnet Clocker apps and neither would change the speed of his 300Mhz Sonnet G3 to 320Mhz which is the max an 8x G3 could go on a 4400 due to its 40Mhz bus. I think Sonnet may have programmed into the driver or in hardware that if its on a 40Mhz bus then 300 is the fastest it will go? Anyone with a 4400 get the 300 car to run at 320Mhz? Thanks.

3/18/2000 Info on why the Sonnet Clocker won't work on a 4400: J.R. writes that the 4400 version of the Sonnet G3 is designed in a way inwhich the Crescendo extension is not needed to activate the G3. Its only needed to turn on the L2 cache. I knew that there were different designs for the 6400 and 4400 but did not know this was what was different? Thanks J.R. Also note that this is how Newer says their L2 G3 for the 6400/6500 works.

5/13/2000 Sonnet Clocker updated!: The author of the original Sonnet Clocker has upgraded it with Nubus mother board settings plus the ability to clock the G3 on a 6500 up to 500Mhz! Now this feature will only work with the Sonnet 400Mhz L2 G3 as it has a 10x G3 CPU to get to 400Mhz on a 6400 but is only set to 8x when on the 6500 to stay at 400Mhz. But Since it has head room, you can try to max it at 500Mhz if used on a 6500 (or 6400 with clocked mother board crystal). The app will time out in a month since he does not have a serialized version of RealBasic so if the person that recompiled the others could do this one, I would greatly appreciate it :) Please email me your results with this clocker. Thanks.

5/18/2000 Update on Sonnet Clocker update: Michael sends word that he tried the new clocker and it did not change his G3 speed over 400Mhz? I have already relayed this info to the author and we'll see if a fix can be found?

[Hey Tom.
I tried out the Sonnet clocker (thanks for asking them to put this together by the way) but unfortunately, it doesn't work.

When I select the 6500's bus speed (50MHz), the over-400MHz speeds become available. When selecting them however, nothing will actually increase the CPU speed upon restart. I have a small theory about this. Since the 400MHz G3 runs at 400MHz in both 6400 and 6500 systems, it has both the 8x and 10x bus multiplier. I am thinking there must be some kind of switch mechanism which tells it which multiplier to go with. It would seem that since it isn't getting the faster CPU speeds, this new Sonnet clocker is somehow not addressing the switch, that it's not just enough to tell the CPU to go faster, but that it has to somehow work with that 10x bus multiplier when using a 50MHz system bus. The modified Crescendo extension doesn't cause any glitches, it just isn't running over 400MHz.

I have no idea if it's even possible to make it do this, but it was worth a shot. Maybe they can figure it out.
~Michael]

5/27/2000 Update on revised Sonnet Clocker: The author just sent me a copy of a Crescendo extension clocked to 500Mhz. If anyone with a 400Mhz card could try this and see if it either works or crashes the computer then at least we know the changes are affecting somthing. It should not hurt your computer and just replace it with your original extension to get thinks working correct again. But The 6400 Zone cannot be held responsible for anything that happens.

Another thing pointed out to me was the fact that Sonnet had sold 400Mhz upgrades before the 10X CPUs were out. If you have one of these then it will not be clockable over 400Mhz because it is at its max speed already.

This will only work if you have a 400Mhz card that is capable of running at 10x the mother board speed and you have a 50Mhz mother board.

6/4/2000 Utility to tell you what kind of 400Mhz G3 you have: Tiong writes that Newer's Gauge Pro utility can tell you if you have an 8x or 10x G3 CPU. Thanks Tiong. Only 10x CPU's can possibly be clocked over 400Mhz on a 6500 with the Sonnet Clocker, that is if we can get it working :)

[Hi Tom,
I've been reading about the problems Sonnet L2 users have been facing when trying to get their 400MHz G3 to run faster. Sorry I don't have a 400 to test, but I'd like to advise your readers to do a simple test before they overclock their 400MHz G3s.

As you have already stated, some of the 400MHz upgrades do not come with 10x multiplier chips, so users must determine if their chips are 10x capable before trying to clock it over the 8x limit of the older versions of G3. One good software for checking if their G3 is 10x capable is Newer's Gauge Pro (http://www.newertech.com/software/index.html)

If Gauge Pro reports the CPU version as 3.0, users can overclock it and make run at or below 10x. However, if the CPU version is below 3.0 (most likely 2.2), the G3 will run at 8x max.

Hope this info helps.
Regards,
Tiong]

6/17/2000 Moving a clocked Sonnet 300MHz card from a 6400 to a 6500 with problems: Nikos had written me a few days ago with a problem he had after moving a 300MHz Sonnet G3 from his 6400 to his 6500. he had it clocked to 320 in the 6400 which in turn clocked it to 325 in the 6500. This may have caused his initiall problems as 5MHz might not seem like much but it is already 20MHz over the stock setting. With the addition of just about every G3 utility on the market, he seems to have gotten it stable again :) Thanks for the info Nikons.

[Thank you Tom for your quick reply.
I think I got it to run at 325. I ve been online 3-4 hours now with no freezes and it boots OK too! Temperature goes as high as 47 is this OK? We gonna have a hot and muggy weekend up here in NH so it might go higher?????
I got Newers, Power logix, and sonnets extensions all running at once and I ve installed the PCI timing extension too. I turned VM off too (memory 128) maybe that helped I don't know but its running good and fast. Thanks again for all the tips and a great web site
Nikos]

Later he sent this info. Thanks Nikos

[OK
After a couple weeks of constant crashes even doing the simplest things like modifying a picture with KAi's photo soap it runs at 325 for hours and it will do anything and fast (880 on processor score and 1007 on floating point)
PCI timing is the utility that finally did it. I believe now that one of the cards was falling out of synch.
This is what I have:
Sonnet's 300/512 version 2.2
Two 64's (VM off). It's faster with VM off
Macallys PCI to USB adapter card
Epson Printer USB
Logitech Usb cam
Supra express 56K serial modem
Momentum port expander
Quick cam- HP 680c
ATI Xclaim 3D pro 8 MB
17 inch Apple 1705 multiscan
Software OS 8.6
Among others the important ones are
PCI timing extension
G3/G4 cache profiler (to turn speculative access off)
Gauge pro ( to check everything out)
Sonnets processor upgrade (made to scri and running at 325 2:1)
I have removed the "Max power extension" (no need for it)

This what it looks like
Sonnet's extension loads right away and in a blink of an eye the G3/G4 profiler over writes it , a very short wait (a lot shorter than before) and all the rest of the extensions come on. G3/G4 profiler reports Back side Cache disabled but Gauge pro reports a 512 enabled. I noticed there is no more poping sound from my speakers when sonnets extension loads up. The PCI timing extension doesn't show up at the bottom of my screen at boot up but its on

Also I remove the geoport because that stooped working with the G3 and I didn't have time or pations to play with it. I don't need it anyway

Another thing that got my attention is that when MAxPower extension is in the system Apple Profiler reports a 6500 machine with a G3 processor and a 512 L2cache!!!!!!! WOW
If my ordeals help anybody that will be great. I thank you cause it seems that the only reason I got this sucker running stable is your Web site which is rich with tips and troubleshooting letters.
Something else I like to bring to your attention is: I sold both the 512 L2 cache from the 6400 and the 256 L2 that came with my 6500 on ebay and when the auction was complete and before I shipped I wrote a letter to the recepient(s) and I included a link to your "take apart manual" for help in installation and precautions so they don't ZAP it. Both the bidders were aware of your web site and spoke highly of it.
Thank you Tom
Nikos]

7/16/2000 Update on the 6500 with Sonnets 400Mhz G3 and using the Sonnet Clocker: I am getting feedback that even the 2 hacked extensions I had posted are still not having the desired affect on the G3. The 425 does nothing and the 500 freezes the 6500. It may be possible that Sonnet did away with software speed selection for this particular version and the Clocker app may never work on it :(

1/26/2001 Sonnet Clocker on a 6100 with Sonnets G3: I have heard of people getting the Sonnet Clocker to work on 6100's in the past but a reader of my site was having some trouble with it? The Clocker app kept crashing his 6100 whenever he tried to run the it? His fix was to disable the Crescendo extension and then alter it with the Clocker app. This may be do to the fact that the extension is in use while it's in the extensions folder. Its always better to work on a copy of the extension and then swap it with the original.

2/9/2002 Sonnet clocker on a UMAX Apus 3000/200: Bleck writes that he was able to get his Sonnet 240Mhz card up to 300 using the Sonnet clocker on a UMAX Apus 3000/200 system. Thanks Bleck. I posted this just so other UMAX owners know it works.

[Hello,
Thx for your site. I just want to report that I could set the clock of my L2/G3 240 up to 300 MHz, running Sonnet Clocker on my Umax Apus 3000/200 (also known as C600). The cache speed could be set up to 200 MHz with G3/G4 Cache Profiler.
Bleck]

Sonnet clocker has been updated to v1.3.2: Click here to download it. This version adds-

-Duplicate Window Fixed.
-Added Current Processor Display (Hardware Running Now).
-Creates a New User Named Extension.
-You can choose to Delete the Old one: If your working out of the Extensions folder you can Restart after, without having two Extensions Load.
-Auto recognizes speeds in modified Extension. You only have to enter the target speed if you use a Clocker copy for the source.

I would like to thank another anonymous author for this update :) It doesn't add compatibility with more systems but cleans up the user experience using it. If you use this, please let me know how it goes.

3/2/2002 Sonnet clocker 1.3.2 user report and fix for issues with Asante Ethernet cards: Justin writes that he used the new Sonnet clocker and it works as advertised on his system. He also notes some comments from Asante on issues and a fix for their ethernet cards and electrical interference causing them to fail. Thanks Justin.

[I recently downloaded the updated Sonnet clocker from your site and just wanted to let you know it's been running very smooth so far(2 days). I have a PMac 6500 with the Sonnet 400MHz/512kb card running @ 500MHz. It's run very stable so far with temps getting up to about 39C when I tried to overwork the CPU, otherwise it sits around 35C(it was @ 30C before the Overclock). I also have a 3dfx Voodoo 3 3000 video card and an Asante 10/100 Ethernet card in the PCI slots. No crashes yet, although I had my ethernet card in the A1 slot and the machine would crash when copying files with a crossover cable connected to my QS 733. Asante tech support told me the crashing was caused by the processor card/motherboard giving signal interference to the ethernet card. And sure enough, when I switched it to the B1 slot, I got smooth transfer speeds and no crashing. Just an FYI. Thanks for the great site. Keep up the good work! Justin]

7/6/04 - Another happy Sonnet Clocker user!: Reinhard sent me some info on his experience with the Sonnet Clocker on his 6500. This little utility is still coming in handy :-)

[Hello Tom,
although it is possibly not interesting to anyone anymore. I thought I'd let you know that my 300MHz G3 (in a 6500) now seems to be running like a charm at a whopping ;) 400MHz. The CPU is a 2.1 Version, hence no speeds over 400MHz accessible, but nevertheless I think this is enormous already and it actually made me stop thinking about the purchase of a 500Mhz module.... Cool utility :)
Thanks again!
Regards Reinhard]

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