Snow Leopard and ATI cards

Question

Snow Leopard and ATI cards

I have a 800 MHz RAM bus mac pro (a 2008 model). It shipped with an ATI Radeon 2600XT graphics card (and OSX Leopard 10.5). I then upgraded to a SECOND graphics card which is the NVIDIA 8800GT. With Leopard OS the two cards played nicely together.
However, after upgrading to 10.6 the ATI card no longer works properly.
booting 10.6 in 64 bit kernel (the default) with the ATI card installed is un-successful (with the ATI card in the machine, it WILL NOT BOOT.)

My suspicion is that the ATI firmware does not support the 64bit kernel because when I boot the mac pro in 32 bit kernel mode the machine boots and the ATI card is recognized (displayed in system profiler: BUT DOES NOT OUTPUT VIDEO!) When reverting and booting from 10.5 (anyway a 32bit kernel system) the machine boots EXTREMELY SLOW and the ATI card is visible BUT NOT USABLE. When shutting down the computer (in verbose mode) I get about 12 screens of ATI debugging codes before the machine powers off (this all flies by very very quickly).

I see on the apple support downloads an updater called:
ATI Radeon HD 2600 XT Firmware Update
HOWEVER, the installer will not let me install this update even when I do get my machine booted in Leopard with the card installed, because it tells me I need the Leopard Graphics Update (it's a 10.5.8 system...) ***?

when i completely remove the NVIDIA card from the computer and attempt to ONLY use the ATI card, nothing works. NADA.
Is my only chance to get 4 video outputs from this machine to buy a second 8800GT?
I know that the ATI card is not fried, but that there is a driver or firmware problem. how can I fix this issue? thanks in advance,

|K<

mac pro, Mac OS X (10.6.4), ATI Radeon 2600 XT

Posted on Jul 26, 2010 5:40 AM

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Answer 1

The hatter

Level 9

60,990 points

Jul 26, 2010 6:21 AM in response to kent_ipod_touch

ATI 2600XT is an iffy card.

Early shipped models of that card had a firmware update, newer cards were 'fixed' and didn't need the firmware update. Firmware only seemed to make its fans run more and be louder and was annoying.

A lot of things happened with 10.6.4 and graphics. Even video out issue. Some have downgraded to 10.6.3.

There are 4 other options also:

GT120 is cheap and fine
8800GT is EOL and ebay only, and look for "2nd generation Apple Mac Pro"
ATI 4870 or wait to see if Apple comes out with 5800s
Nvidia GTX 285 ($450)
Some cards require 2 power connectors, the GT120 does not need any.
Wait for 10.6.5+ or downgrade to 10.6.3 and see how that works

Mac Pro 2008 required an EFI on graphics cards to work with the UEFI/EFI64 so I am unsure that the card or its BIOS is an issue... but haven't seen much of that.

10.5.2 era there was a Leopard Graphics 1.0 update that was rolled into 10.5.3.

I'd ditch and get the GT120 or wait and see if GT3xx.

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Answer 2

Jul 26, 2010 8:06 AM in response to The hatter

Hi, "The hatter" and thanks for your opinions on this matter.
If I am to assume that the 2600XT is dead or simply not at all supported (which ruffles my feathers in a real big way for a default config card...)
I think the only option is a second 8800GT (eBay)

1) the GT 120 is only supported in the 1066 MHz bus machines (mine is an 800MHz)
2) the GTX 285 requires BOTH supplemental power connections (and I am using one for the 8800GT already).
3) same problem with the 4870 (two aux power connections).

so very frustrating...

|K<

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Answer 3

The hatter

Level 9

60,990 points

Jul 26, 2010 9:29 AM in response to kent_ipod_touch

Not true about the GT120. Take Apple requirements with a grain of salt, sorry to say, written by marketing dept? Check the comments again:

http://store.apple.com/us/product/MC002ZM/A

There is ebay, yes.

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Answer 4

Jul 26, 2010 2:03 PM in response to The hatter

hey thanks again "The hatter" !
that's a good tip with the GT120.
do you know if the GT120 also works in the 4x lanes of the 3,1?

|K<

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Answer 5

The hatter

Level 9

60,990 points

Jul 26, 2010 2:46 PM in response to kent_ipod_touch

Apple allows configuring BTO with 4 x GT120s.

And you probably don't need more than an 8x slot anyway.

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Answer 6

Jul 26, 2010 8:29 PM in response to The hatter

I have installed 2 different gt120s inn 2008 mac pros at work. They work great. I have one in a Pro with a 8800 and one in a box by itself. that would be how I would go. I would also try putting your 8800 in the bottom slot and the 2600 in each of the others.

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Answer 7

Jul 27, 2010 4:20 AM in response to Brian Butt

Hi Brian! thanks a lot for sharing your experience with the GT120's in 3,1 mac pros. That sounds like a real (and practical) alternative. I am very happy with my 8800GT I have to admit, and excited to try further NVDA products.

I would also try putting your 8800 in the bottom slot and the 2600 in each of the others.

I have tried with the 8800 in slot 1 and 2600XT in slot 2, and the opposite (2600 in slot 1 with 8800 in slot 2) but have not yet experimented with trying the 2600XT in one of the 4x lane slots. it is just all so time consuming: every time the mac fails to boot is like 15 minutes lost and every time the mac DOES boot with the ATI card installed, the boot time is never less than 5 minutes.

thanks again for sharing your experience.

|K<

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Answer 8

Aug 23, 2010 4:39 AM in response to kent_ipod_touch

Just as an update to this thread... I did try (again) the radeon card after installing the snow leopard graphics update. to no avail. my guess is that the card is dead or just a piece of crap (or both).

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Answer 9

Aug 26, 2010 5:20 PM in response to kent_ipod_touch

Its official the ATI 5770 will work in the Mac Pro 1.1!!!!!!!!!

http://blog.macsales.com/6856-owc-reveals-which-radeon-video-cards-work-with-200 6-2009-mac-pros

Its all there, Enjoy!!!!

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