Wow! I am impressed. I came to the realization awhile ago that the G4 line of PowerMacs were incredibly rich with upgrade potential, but where I erred was in thinking that I had saturated my QuickSilver’s potential when I upgraded it to 1.4GHz with 1.1GB RAM and a GF4Ti. Boy, was I wrong.

Check this out: Giga ships 2GHz processor upgrades.

Back in the day, I concluded that processor upgrades would never hit more than the 1.4GHz that Apple raised the G4 line to. I suspected that the bar would never raise any higher. Thus, a 1.4GHz upgrade, a nearly maxed-out RAM capacity of 1.1GB, and a GF4Ti–which is about all a 133MHz FSB can handle–left my machine pretty saturated. And it did indeed stay that way for quite some time. I am very pleased with my upgrade decisions, and my processor upgrade card specifically has served me very well since I bought it in August 2003.

And yet here we are, with a 4-year old machine originally set at 733MHz now capable of pushing 2GHz. After four years–nearly two years since being upgraded–I thought my machine was finally losing the vitality it once had, and I finally saw a G5 purchase looming in my future. But with a 2GHz upgrade looking back at me, it looks like the G5 will have to wait a bit longer before it can get a piece of me.

Don’t get me wrong. I’m not a sucker nor nieve. I appreciate that a G4 is still just a G4 and that it doesn’t hold a candle to a G5 per megahertz. I also appreciate that a G5 purchase would likely consist of a dual-processor system, which is even more powerful, especially for the apps that need it the most. And finally, I also appreciate that I’ll still have a suffocatingly narrow 133MHz FSB, compared to the G5 architectures that all straddle the 1GHz mark. Nevertheless, I know how pleased I am with my G4 running at 1.4GHz, and I know that an upgrade to 2GHz would be a huge shot in the arm. Considering the significant speed boost the upgrade would give my machine, and considering the cash back I would be able to garner by selling the 1.4GHz upgrade, a G5 just doesn’t look like a very wise choice. My Mac still has too much life left in it.