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User profile for user: Gene Cutler
Gene Cutler Author
User level: Level 1
24 points

Is the NVIDIA GeForce 7300 GT video card compatible with 2009 Mac Pro?

I just got a new (early 2009) Mac Pro and tried to add in an NVIDIA GeForce 7300 GT 256MB video card from an older Mac Pro. I could not get my displays to work through this older card. The System Profiler saw the installed card, but only recognized the manufacturer (NVIDIA) and not any model info on the card. The specs say that PCI express 2.0 slots should be backwords compatible with PCI express 1.0.

Does anyone have any experience with this?

Mac Pro (early 2009), Mac OS X (10.6.1)

Posted on Oct 30, 2009 10:49 AM

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User profile for user: The hatter
The hatter
User level: Level 9
61,001 points

Posted on Oct 30, 2009 1:39 PM

Wrong firmware.

The card is also on a short fuse with the way some of them are failing and needing to be replaced.

Mac Pro 2008 requires an EFI64 (Unified EFI 2.x) compatible firmware which really should be spelled out. ATI uses a universal firmware on most all of their cards and not as big an issue - now - and are backward compatible.

Your GT120 is comparable. The ATI 4870 is ideal. The GTX 285 has yet to live up to its potential cores and bandwidth (needs a lot of work on drivers).
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User profile for user: The hatter
The hatter
User level: Level 9
61,001 points

Oct 30, 2009 1:39 PM in response to Gene Cutler

Wrong firmware.

The card is also on a short fuse with the way some of them are failing and needing to be replaced.

Mac Pro 2008 requires an EFI64 (Unified EFI 2.x) compatible firmware which really should be spelled out. ATI uses a universal firmware on most all of their cards and not as big an issue - now - and are backward compatible.

Your GT120 is comparable. The ATI 4870 is ideal. The GTX 285 has yet to live up to its potential cores and bandwidth (needs a lot of work on drivers).
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Is the NVIDIA GeForce 7300 GT video card compatible with 2009 Mac Pro?

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