ATI Radeon HD 5870 Won't Work with Mac Pro 5,1

Question

ATI Radeon HD 5870 Won't Work with Mac Pro 5,1

I've just upgraded my brothers Mac Pro 5,1 8-core with several items to speed up Final Cut Pro. Mainly SSDs and RAM. The part I thought was going to be the easiest doesn't seem to work at all. I installed a ATI Radeon HD 5870 Mac graphics card upgrade but I don't get any love at all with either Apple screen. The specs say it should be compatible with a mid 2010 or early 2009 MP 5,1. I don't believe there were any discs with this item. I read online that OS 10.6.4 and later should have the drivers already installed. This MP is at 10.6.8.

When I tried to boot up, I could see the fan running on the card. I had the two power connectors providing power. The two Apple displays are connected via the mini port. They don't even try to come up. When I put the older ATI 5770 back in, all is well.

Another question that comes up... is this 5870 even worth it? The 5770 has the same amount of VRAM. I'm sure there is a speed difference, but is it really enough to justify the hassle for working with Final Cut Studio 3 and Photoshop mainly?

Thanks for any advice.

Posted on May 22, 2012 1:02 PM

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Answer 1

X423424X

Level 6

14,271 points

May 22, 2012 1:41 PM in response to Alex Campuzano1

Given that you can order a mac pro with a 5870 you can be sure it is compatible with it. I am one who did order a macpro 5,1 with a 5870. And aside from the fact that the 5000 series cards (not just 5870) probably have the lousiest fans on the planet I have not had any problems with the 5870. But as I sort of alluded to I've gone through two of them and am on my third due to the fans no always working and the cards overheating.

As for perfomance, google "5770 vs. 5870" and you will see various reports on the comparison. For example, look at Bearfeats.

Why doesn't it work? Not sure, unless it is because the 5870 you got was not the apple version of the 5870. That one is properly flashed for macs and has two mini-displayports and an dual link dvi port.

Note those mini-displayports can be tricky little devils. Make sure the mini-displayport plug is pushed firmly in so that essentially all the metal part disappears inside the socket.

Finally, if you try to connect three moniotrs to the 5x70's there's certain rules you need to follow to do that. You cannot just plug in three monitors into the three ports and have it work (specifically you need at least two active adapters with three monitors).

Note, since you are changing configurations by changing video cards I suggest you also do a smc and pram reset.

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Answer 2

May 22, 2012 1:40 PM in response to X423424X

Thanks for the reply. One tip I'll give you is to check the air vents for your card once a month or so. I had an old X1900 XT and didn't notice the dust had collected to form a perfectly smooth coating over the fins of the intake. It looked like metal, so I left it alone. Big mistake. A $1,000 mistake after replacing the logic board and power supply. The fans still sounded loud. I searched online and found someone else with the same issue and showed him with a brush removing the "metal" to reveal the intakes. After that, fans quieted down and that Mac Pro lasted for another five years before the CPUs gave out.

Is there any funky was to install, maybe to "flush" the system to forget the old card and reset the slot?

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Answer 3

X423424X

Level 6

14,271 points

May 22, 2012 1:51 PM in response to Alex Campuzano1

In my case it wasn't a air vent or dust problem. I keep the machine pretty clean. In the first case the machine was only about a month old before I discovered the fan wouldn't always start up (I assume couldn't overcome the starting friction). That card was replaced and in less than a year that second card's fan either wouldn't start up or would stop if it had started up (randomly, not always). The results of this is the card overheats and the machine does a thermal shutdown -- looks like it's sleeping except one fan on the rear is running to purge the heat. If you can detect the fan has stopped before the overheat you can tweak it with your finger to get it going again. So far so good on card number three (at least I am getting my money's worth with applecare). Keeping my fingers crossed, but one ready to tweak the fan, and I use iStat Menus to watch the temp on slot 1.

The smc and pram reset are what I recommend when changing the card or any other hardware configuration change.

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