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Level 1

10 points

Ati 4870 Monitor/Mouse problem

Hi!

I have one Mac Pro Quad Core Nehalem 2.66Ghz with one ATI 4870 connected to two Acer Al2423 (1920x1200 at 60 Hz). One is connected using DVI cable and the other with the adapter Mini display port/DVI.

The problem here is the mouse movement, if you try to follow a straight line with the mouse (mighty mouse) the pointer jumps forward some times more rapidly than your hand movement. Imagine you want to select one button in some software and when you stop the mouse to click that button the pointer stops some inches after or behind... i'm getting nut with this thing.

Apple on the phone can't fix this thing... tried lot's of thing's: change ports, connect/disconnect, new OSX install (10.5.6) the 10.5.8 don't change nothing at all... with one monitor connected on the the DVI port or using only the Mini Display Port...

I have BootCamp installed with Vista Ultimate 32 Bit. and the mouse works very nice there but in OSX just jumps and moves erratically.

I visited a technical Apple center this morning and they didn't find any problem, i tested the machine with them and the mouse was very fine, not a single jump, using my keyboard and mouse and others in the center... they have the monitor there connected with VGA adapter.

After this journey changed the cables from DVI to VGA, with the adapters from DVI to VGA and MinDisplay Porte to VGA (on the two monitors) and the problem goes away... bad drivers from Apple/ATI?????

What can i do to solve this thing?

Regards

p.s. - Snow Leopard didn't solve this thing either

Mac Pro 2.66GHz, Mac OS X (10.5.8)

Posted on Aug 27, 2009 1:57 PM

166 replies

Pierre Cross Author

Level 1

10 points

Sep 4, 2009 1:48 PM in response to The hatter

Hi!

Chris is totally right, i share the same opinion with him.
Is totally unacceptable for a machine in this price range with this kind of problem... mine was 2850€ =4077$.

The true intentions of Apple are more $, only that; it's important to have cash in the pocket but when quality is getting worst and worst... think about that. They cut on everything for profit but they don't care anymore with reliability, that's the problem here.

Like Samsara, if another company starts to make computers with a good OS, i bet Apple would be out of business pretty soon(computer business of course).
I take a state here for myself: If i lived in USA (live in Europe, by the way) i would by Psystar in the future because that's the only thing they deserve.

The OSX is a reflection os Apple last years, more and more buggy... and changing thing from one system to other... like, 10.2 to 10.3 and 10.4... Snow Leopard in my opinion, apart from the core optimizationthat is extreme important for the processors type, is like a new theme for OSX.

The 10.5.8 take a nice problem with permissions changes, without solutions at this time... my machine has that stuff, some preferences are a tame to change, when i start the machine and if i want the machine like it was left.

Apple really abuse their most loyal customers. Period.

To put a end on this, when my monitors enter in sleep mode, the second one (connected with mini-vga adapter) need to be unplugged and connected again to have again the native resolution because he change to 800x600 with 256 colors... very nice this one to.

Regards

p.s. - i don't have faith in new drivers to... that's the information that i recollect after some e-mails exchanged with ATI, thing is more then drivers...

Samsara

Level 4

1,321 points

Sep 4, 2009 5:50 PM in response to Pierre Cross

when quality is getting worst and worst

Apples computers have gotten better and better, no question about it in my mind. The 09 line up is a drastic step up from my 3-4 year old G5 Quad. 4-5 times better performance. What Mac users continually pay for though is Apples decision to continually push forward, not thinking everything through, and abandoning it's older tech at the drop of it's hat.
It does get awfully suspicious sometimes I admit, but it may be that a company like Apple, so extremely creative and innovative, is focused on the next "insanely great" thing and assumes it's customers are going to grab it and come along. And guess what? We do, over and over.
For me it's a love-hate thing really. I love the brilliance, but I hate the attitude. Actually, I'll admit I'm an Apple Zombie. Even if a brand new company created a good machine and a good OS, it would take a lot to get me to change.

Pierre, I have a lot of grudges against Apple but problems with mice never led me to condemn the whole company. There is a bug somewhere, only that. And it will straighten out in time. So too will the issue of monitors. I think in another 6 months all the problems with third party monitors will be gone. Apple is awfully smart, even though perhaps ethically challenged. They will address and head off problems the best they can. New Machines, a new OS, ... we can cut them a break for a bit and see how things settle down.
🙂

Pierre Cross Author

Level 1

10 points

Sep 4, 2009 6:11 PM in response to Samsara

Hi!

I concord with you in some thing's because i'm a little over me with this problem but, but, it's totally unacceptable form a machine like this in this days a problem like this. Period.

Of course computers tend to be more faster one model from another(in any manufacture in the world, technology is all about the same this days, a little edge here an there but it drive us to the same place)... when i'm talking about quality is about durability, the time that takes the machine to start with some kind of malfunction... this is a malfunction, machines have malfunctions because the people that made them make mistakes... just that. Is 0 and 1, ensemble instructions...

You have a lot of faith in the solution but from my past with Apple i'm learning that can be extremely painful.

I understand the innovation and the design of the all package (machine and OS), because of that i'm a user for almost 22 years but this cause me a sensation, a stupid sensation that is: buy another if you didn't like.

Regards

p.s. - will se when they update the Snow Leopard if the fix come, i don't think so... lot's of people in the waiting line from 10.5.6; six months from March, isn't?

Regards

Samsara

Level 4

1,321 points

Sep 4, 2009 7:05 PM in response to Pierre Cross

You have a lot of faith

I do, Pierre. I really do. There's a turn about now in the business world, the consumer world. People don't spend money on junk anymore. And an Apple computer has never been junk. Each succeeding generation of models has been a push forward, and in a way unusual, with imagination. There's not another company I can think of like Apple. Apple is the only company I know of where the customers have a relationship with it. A relationship. That's too weird. And great at the same time. They disappoint us as like feeling it from a friend.
I had, 3 G5's, still have one. Each cost a pretty penny. One by one they died, until the Quad which was and still is a great machine. Those first two machines put me in agony, they were so problematic, for several years. Later I find out that Apple knew pretty early that things were going wrong with the G5s and weren't saying anything about it. Indeed kept selling them.
That would have been a good time to say goodbye to Apple for me, but the Quad worked great and I held on. The early Mac Pros weren't worth much, just minor gains. But all of a sudden, there was a machine that made my Quad pale in comparison. Moving to this machine has been one big lift in performance. It's remarkable to me.
So Apple redeemed itself in my eyes. It learned from it's mistakes and with no apologies moved forward.
I feel for the G5 users abandoned from Snow Leopard. I don't know what to say about that.

Pierre Cross Author

Level 1

10 points

Sep 8, 2009 5:26 AM in response to Samsara

Hi!

The market changed a lot from the last decade... People still buy junk when they don’t know better than that; i think the problem here is consumer education and a lot’s of bad attitude from the “strange” thing/new habit; the new learning curve, pointing out the problem.

The G5 Power Mac had problems like others machines but that’s not a excuse to produce “bad” machines with a “proprietary” software in it, Apple have a privileged market here, don’t you think?

The new Pro is a new type of thing; the multithread core distribution is a remarkable thing that needs to be completed in all kind of programming accepts but we are just in the beginning of… I remember when my father gave me the Quadra and some applications crashed all the time… I thought what sh…??? But after sometime Apple released a update system that stops all that kind of thing’s… but didn’t take all the instructions on the Motorola processor… but that was fine, it was working stable… I hope it occurs the same here with this drivers but I don’t think this problem will be fixed in the 10.6.1.

Regards

Samsara

Level 4

1,321 points

Sep 8, 2009 6:53 AM in response to Pierre Cross

Yes. 10.6.1 might still be lacking a bit but I think they'll make quite a few changes right away at least. Too many things, even native Apple apps still crash with some regularity, on my machine anyway. I found out I had to do a clean install to get the best performance from it. I didn't expect to have to do that. It still balks at starting from that system sometimes too. My ultra expensive Video card runs slower on it. But I'm willing to give Apple a break for a time. If the number of crash logs I'm sending to them are any indication of of what a lot of us are doing, Apple is getting a lot of feedback right now

If by "privileged" you mean "captive", there's some truth to that. Mac customers will ride their "tech" train, Apple, even when they treat us poorly. On the other hand we do have options, like abandoning the platform all together. I'm way a way from that option myself. No, for the time being I'll stick to Apple, it's great stuff, and it's generally poor attitude. Especially now, when Apples reputation for the highest quality computers on the market is on the line. It can't afford another line of G5 like machines, innovative but with a short time stamp.

So hang in there. I have "faith" that Apple will do ok this time. Already their customer service is much better than it was a short time ago. And with all the other items they sell now, one bad reputation in one line might carry over to their others. They can't afford that at all.

One thing I noticed the other day are these discussion pages for 09 Macs themselves. Maybe I can't remember the launch of something similar, but there are very few questions and complaints here at all. On the other hand a quick perusal of the G5 discussions will have one depressed in no time. 😟

Sep 24, 2009 9:01 PM in response to Pierre Cross

Hey guys,

I just put a 4870 in my Mac Pro and I'm getting the same problem with a Samsung SyncMaster 215TW. Hopefully this gets fixed soon. I need to dig up my VGA adapter/cable. In the meantime I'm stuck with just my Apple Display...

Oct 27, 2009 2:26 PM in response to Pierre Cross

I have a late model 2.66GHz Quad-Core Intel Xeon Nehalem. I purchased my Mac Pro back in March with the 4870 card. I did so in anticipation of true 10 bit per color plane monitors coming out at some point---which happened, and now includes the HP DreamColor and Eizo CG 243w.

I bought an Eizo CG 243w when it came out in September after my reference monitor got killed in a shipping accident. The only means of providing true 10 bits per color plane data to the monitor is in the use of DisplayPort. Connecting the Eizo CG 243w to the 4870 via DisplayPort (using a mini displayport to displayport cable) resulted in the now famous "mouse jump."

Under warranty repair, Apple replaced the mother board (logic board) and front USB board---a $500 effort. It failed. Then they replaced my entire Mac Pro. This also failed.

Eizo replaced my monitor. That test failed. I replaced all the interconnect cables three times, which also failed.

Apple support ran the problem up to engineering. Engineering confirmed that this is a "known problem", but appreciated the data capture program tests we did with the Eizo CG 243w, which were forwarded to them by support. As of late October, there is no solution to the driver issue---which makes me wonder if there is a known hardware issue that is preventing the mouse jump problem from being resolved AT ALL with current models. I think if it were an easy issue, the problem would have already been solved at 10.5.7.

At the moment, I have found stability with the CG 243w only in 8 bits per color plane mode, using the DVI connector. As with every one else that has entered comments, I await a solution. I have been a Mac user since the Mac II.

Pete

Oct 28, 2009 12:20 PM in response to Peter Myers

Thanks for posting Pete! It's always good to hear one is not alone and that the problem at least has some attention at Apple. I'm also waiting for a solution. Even though i am lucky enough to have a tft in front of me that doesn't have this problem.

All the Best,
Chris

DPArt

Level 3

604 points

Nov 1, 2009 11:43 PM in response to Peter Myers

Apple has a simple fix....buy one of their monitors.

Oddly, the issue only shows up on OTHER monitors.

TO anyone reading this, I can confirm that my 30" Apple Display works A-OK with a 4870.

In addition, I have a Dell 2407 which hasn't the least trouble with the 4870.

What is sad is that they don't issue a tech bulletin...there are forum posts all over the internet, people driving to stores and buying new mice, etc. It's their driver...they need to fix it.

Samsara

Level 4

1,321 points

Nov 2, 2009 6:56 AM in response to DPArt

Are you using the 30" off the DVI port? I couldn't, with adapters, get the proper resolutions, using the mini-display port, just the DVI. The mini-display port worked fine for my 20" though.
It still strikes me as absurd, if my situation was not the norm, that Apple would not market a card that worked perfectly with their own displays. To me I would think a card like the 4870 should have enough juice to power two 30" displays perfectly, but the way they made it, it doesn't.

Nov 2, 2009 10:21 AM in response to Samsara

A list of monitors that DO and DON'T work should be started, somewhere.

I had this 'jumpy mouse' issue between my flashed 4870 and an el-cheapo HannsG 28" monitor from Costco. I seriously upgraded to a very nice 26" VIZIO that has great refresh, colour, and contrast. NO MOUSE PROBLEMS ANYMORE...

VIZIO 26" AOK

HannsG CRAP

Samsara

Level 4

1,321 points

Nov 2, 2009 10:33 AM in response to justmetoo1

flashed 4870

Flashed adds another element to the equation. I just came from a post where the gentleman couldn't get his stock 4870 to play nice with his new 24" LED display. That's the display the mini-display ports were designed for. Apple, whither thou goest?

Nov 8, 2009 2:15 PM in response to justmetoo1

Same issue with Jump mouse using ATI 4870 trying to drive two Gateway 2100 (FPD2185W). Using one display from the full sized DVI port of the ATI card works but not two monitors - i.e. one using the mini display DVI.

mcbarny

Level 1

0 points

Nov 9, 2009 4:50 PM in response to Pierre Cross

I got the same problem when I connect my FUJITSU SIEMENS SCALEOVIEW W19-1 via DVI. Both DVI and MDP->DVI bring up the problem with hanging mouse and keyboard. I've already talked to the customer support, but no further answer (as they promised) since 2 months.
I'm extremly disappointed of Apple and their will to fix the problem for their best customers... and it shouldn't be the biggest problem if everything works fine on bootcampXP!!!
What else can we do beside posting here?

Regards, mcbarny

Message was edited by: mcbarny

Ati 4870 Monitor/Mouse problem