[rescue] AppleMacanix GFX cards

[Mark Benson]

On 31 Aug 2011, at 19:15, Jonathan Patschke wrote:

> I've not bought from that seller particularly, but my Mac Pro has an
> Nvidia 8800GT that was flashed with Mac firmware by an eBay seller.  So
> far, it's given me no problems.

No issues in 10.7? One thing applemacanix are not 100% about is testing in
10.7 - apparently they haven't got to that yet. I don't imagine there *are*
any issues as it's hardware, it's gonna look the same to whatever OS, but
again it's a lot of wedge for a card that may not work as expected.

> Double-check that the card has the correct firmware for your Mac.
> MacPro1,1 and MacPro2,1 need 32-bit firmware;

I am well aware of this. I have a 1,1 and used to have a 8800GT that we all
had to wait 4 months for when Apple refused to do a 32-bit version until
everyone jumped up and down.

<rant>It lasted 3 years then (I suspect) blew a RAM chip (I got massive screen
corruption to the point that the screen just stops working after 2-3mins).
It'd be the second time I've laid down big bucks for an NVIDIA card only to
have it do that. I whipped off the (poorly designed IMHO) heat-sink to find
the RAM chips used that crappy white stick-on thermal pad stuff as a cooling
interface and it had all but dried out over the 3 years. As well as that 2 RAM
chips were under the centre of the fan (where there's no airflow) and there
wasn't a lot of metal above them to dump the heat. The whole system also use
to fur up with dust very easily because it was low-profile and all enclosed.
Even *with* regular cleaning it still died. It didn't even have  a back-panel
outlet vent. Rubbish design... </rant>

Apparently Apple's current Radeon 5770 *still* works on a 1,1 and a 2,1 with
32-bit firmware... but not officially. They cost over 200 GBP though. Bit of a
wallet breaker when you consider the Sapphire 5770 in my PC cost me 104 GBP a
year and a half ago!

> There are, however, problems with some cards that have multiple DVI
> outputs that cause the secondary DVI port to not work.  Check on the
> forums for reports on the card you're looking to buy if this would be a
> dealbreaker for you.  Most work just fine, though.

The dual-DVI Radeon 4870 1GB I was looking at has that issue but only in 10.5.
10.6 and up see both DVI ports just fine.

> One final thing: make sure the power cable is included.