Accelerate Your Macintosh! Newer Tech. 225mhz Review

SUMMARY:
Pros: Reliable, good performance and sofware bundle (Speed Dblr2/Ram Dblr2)
Cons: Limited bus/cpu speeds can result in running the CPU below rated speed.
Faster and better designs available now, expensive. Beware connector defects.
This review was originally written in March of 97. Always check the Main Site and Buyer's Guide for reviews of newer cards (faster speeds, etc.). Speeds, features, etc. change rapidly in this market - so stay up to date!

Introduction
Newer Technologies is a name most Mac users will recognize, and with good reason. They have produced many of the best accelerator, memory and video accessories ever made for the Mac. With that said I must say that I got off to a bit of a rocky start. I had a rare, but serious problem with the card, although one that was fatal to my motherboard. However, Newer came to the rescue (after some heated mail by yours truly) and sent a replacement motherboard in advance of my returning mine. The 2nd card was AOK and rock stable in operation. They bent over backwards to immediately get me back up and running. Good times and bad, Newer does stand behind their product (well, except for my problematicMP card ).

Back up and running we discovered some interesting differences in design, execution and philosophy between the Newer and other CPU cards. These differences may sway your purchasing decision, and you should be aware of them. Newer takes the conservative stance as far as speed settings, allowing a small number of settings, some that actually run the CPU below its rated speed. Other manufacturers allow you more choices - including the option to run the accelerator faster than the CPU's rated speed. More importantly in overall performance, many other manufacturers give you more bus speed choices. Personally I'll take more choices and speed for the same or less money as long as it is reliable.

Overall we found the Newer card to be as reliable as the best accelerator we've tested to date, the PowerLogix Pro. It was extremely tolerant of cache variations, running fine with every manufacturer we tested (Apple, XLR8, and MacCPU supplied OEM caches ranging from 256k to 1 meg in size). It consistently ran at a faster bus speed than the XLR8-180 card, in some cases as much as 7.5mhz faster in the identical system. It is important to note that Bus speed w/cache, not just CPU speed alone, is a key to high performance. The Newer Tech and especially the PowerLogix Pro demonstrate this very well.

While on the subject of bus speeds, it is important to note that the Newer card limits you to only three or four bus/cpu speeds ( usually only two are usable ), which pales in comparison to more advanced designs like the PowerLogix Pro, which has a much more flexible, easy to use and wide ranging series of speed selections - allowing full optimization of any Mac. As a result of the limited bus speed settings, we ended up running the card at 210mhz cpu speeds, below the rated speed of the processor, as the only other speed setting that ran reliably in our 8500 was the 45mhz bus/225mhz cpu produced lower overall scores than the 52.5mhz bus/210 mhz cpu speeds. Excellent performance boost over the stock 8500, but you'll never know what your Mac can really do with this limited a selection of choices. In contrast, the PowerLogix Pro allows bus speeds of 40mhz to 70mhz, in 0.3mhz increments - to allow you to fully optimize the performace of the card in your particular Mac. More choices usually means more performance, which we have verified repeatedly with the PowerLogix Pro types of cards.

UPDATE:
If you haven't already done so, make sure you read the CPU Card Buyer's Guide before making any card purchase. It has all the latest reviews on shipping models of CPU card upgrades (pros/cons/prices). Be sure to check be buyers guide before making a final decision - a lot has changed in speed, features and performance since this card was reviewd.

Benchmarks
All tests were run using MacBench 4.0 . Other system scores shown for comparison were from previously tested products on this platform. (Stock 120mhz 604, XLR8 card at various speeds, etc.). All graphics tests were run at 1024x768, thousands of colors..

If you find this review useful, or have comments or suggestions, we'd love to hear from you. Use the form on the Feedback page to submit your comments.

Table of Contents - Newer Tech Review:

System Spec's Test system hardware specifics

Software Installed Details on installed system software

Observations Observations from the Newer test

Scores What you're really after - the Scores!

Support Warranty and Support information

Final Analysis Results Overall Summary and Comments

CPU Card Buyer's Guide! Compare before you buy!

Software Installed Details on installed system software

Feedback Send us your questions or feedback

About Us About Computer Resources

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= Back to WWW.XLR8YOURMAC.COM =

Copyright © , 1997.
No part of this sites content is to be reproduced in any form without written permission. All brand or product names mentioned here are properties of their respective companies.
Users of this web site must read and are bound by the terms and conditions of use.


SUMMARY: Pros: Reliable, good performance and sofware bundle (Speed Dblr2/Ram Dblr2) Cons: Limited bus/cpu speeds can result in running the CPU below rated speed. Faster and better designs available now, expensive. Beware connector defects. This review was originally written in March of 97. Always check the Main Site and Buyer's Guide for reviews of newer cards (faster speeds, etc.). Speeds, features, etc. change rapidly in this market - so stay up to date!
Introduction Newer Technologies is a name most Mac users will recognize, and with good reason. They have produced many of the best accelerator, memory and video accessories ever made for the Mac. With that said I must say that I got off to a bit of a rocky start. I had a rare, but serious problem with the card, although one that was fatal to my motherboard. However, Newer came to the rescue (after some heated mail by yours truly) and sent a replacement motherboard in advance of my returning mine. The 2nd card was AOK and rock stable in operation. They bent over backwards to immediately get me back up and running. Good times and bad, Newer does stand behind their product (well, except for my problematicMP card ). Back up and running we discovered some interesting differences in design, execution and philosophy between the Newer and other CPU cards. These differences may sway your purchasing decision, and you should be aware of them. Newer takes the conservative stance as far as speed settings, allowing a small number of settings, some that actually run the CPU below its rated speed. Other manufacturers allow you more choices - including the option to run the accelerator faster than the CPU's rated speed. More importantly in overall performance, many other manufacturers give you more bus speed choices. Personally I'll take more choices and speed for the same or less money as long as it is reliable. Overall we found the Newer card to be as reliable as the best accelerator we've tested to date, the PowerLogix Pro. It was extremely tolerant of cache variations, running fine with every manufacturer we tested (Apple, XLR8, and MacCPU supplied OEM caches ranging from 256k to 1 meg in size). It consistently ran at a faster bus speed than the XLR8-180 card, in some cases as much as 7.5mhz faster in the identical system. It is important to note that Bus speed w/cache, not just CPU speed alone, is a key to high performance. The Newer Tech and especially the PowerLogix Pro demonstrate this very well. While on the subject of bus speeds, it is important to note that the Newer card limits you to only three or four bus/cpu speeds ( usually only two are usable ), which pales in comparison to more advanced designs like the PowerLogix Pro, which has a much more flexible, easy to use and wide ranging series of speed selections - allowing full optimization of any Mac. As a result of the limited bus speed settings, we ended up running the card at 210mhz cpu speeds, below the rated speed of the processor, as the only other speed setting that ran reliably in our 8500 was the 45mhz bus/225mhz cpu produced lower overall scores than the 52.5mhz bus/210 mhz cpu speeds. Excellent performance boost over the stock 8500, but you'll never know what your Mac can really do with this limited a selection of choices. In contrast, the PowerLogix Pro allows bus speeds of 40mhz to 70mhz, in 0.3mhz increments - to allow you to fully optimize the performace of the card in your particular Mac. More choices usually means more performance, which we have verified repeatedly with the PowerLogix Pro types of cards. UPDATE: If you haven't already done so, make sure you read the CPU Card Buyer's Guide before making any card purchase. It has all the latest reviews on shipping models of CPU card upgrades (pros/cons/prices). Be sure to check be buyers guide before making a final decision - a lot has changed in speed, features and performance since this card was reviewd. Benchmarks All tests were run using MacBench 4.0 . Other system scores shown for comparison were from previously tested products on this platform. (Stock 120mhz 604, XLR8 card at various speeds, etc.). All graphics tests were run at 1024x768, thousands of colors.. If you find this review useful, or have comments or suggestions, we'd love to hear from you. Use the form on the Feedback page to submit your comments.
Table of Contents - Newer Tech Review:
System Spec's	Test system hardware specifics
Software Installed	Details on installed system software
Observations	Observations from the Newer test
Scores	What you're really after - the Scores!
Support	Warranty and Support information
Final Analysis	Results Overall Summary and Comments
CPU Card Buyer's Guide!	Compare before you buy!
Software Installed	Details on installed system software
Feedback	Send us your questions or feedback
About Us	About Computer Resources
= Top of Page = = Back to WWW.XLR8YOURMAC.COM =

Copyright © , 1997. No part of this sites content is to be reproduced in any form without written permission. All brand or product names mentioned here are properties of their respective companies. Users of this web site must read and are bound by the terms and conditions of use.