Video Card upgrade for early 2008 MacPro

It does! Thanks.

One more question (at least for now), this is a stock card and not flashed or altered? Would you think that variants of this card (ie an Asus variant) would behave the same? No issues with power cables or anything like that?

I have the same specs for my base machine.

-- Scotte

Hi Scotte,

yes, the card is completely stock, and was purchased as a refurbished PC card from a branch of Microcenter for $110.00.

I don't know whether other card manufacturers' versions of the GTX660Ti chipset would work or not. If you bought a refurbished card from a Microcenter or other retail store then you could always return it and get your money back if it doesn't work. You might pay a little extra buying a card from a retail store, however you'll get some peace of mind if it doesn't work, and won't have the return-policy hassle of some online stores or purchases.

James

This is the "no early video" black/blank screen meaning using the EFI boot manager or single user mode are "blanked out" and is how a stock PC card without EFI functions, at least Nvidia.

X-Plane is one of those apps that can stress or stretch a gpu and desire for 3-6GB VRAM

http://barefeats.com/tube13.html

New GPU, includes X-Plane

http://barefeats.com/tube06.html

Your short wait is thanks to how short the wait, how quick to boot, thanks to SSD.

Mine is on SATA II and 10 seconds, moved it to PCIe device and cut even that down (because it uses the slot but is not a controller as such) but a blade SSD adapter.

Thanks guys.

X-Plane 10 is exactly the trigger for upgrading the card. Just ordered X-Plane 10. I have a 30" Mac monitor so expect it to be stressed. X-plane 9 wasn't too bad as far as I recall. I'll be trying out 10 before picking up a new video card.

-- Scotte

I like to re-read this one every couple months! 🙂

I have read that the 2008's do not show the same graphic performance with higher end graphic cards (GTX 680 and above, AMD 7xxx and R9's) and even the 5,1 has an edge over the 4,1.

So they are held back. PCIe 2.0, the fact there are 1.1 slots, fewer lanes and less bandwidth, 2009 saw more functions moved closer to and into the processor to handle... like memory controller. No PCIe 3.0 to alleviate the problem.

Ordered the Radeon R9 280X 3GB card. X-Plane 10 and a new video card should make for second Christmas!

Hello. I have a mac pro early 2008 (3,1; 2x2,8 quad core), running Mac OS 10.8.5;

I have purchased (waiting for delivery) a Nvidia Quadro FX 5600 (1.5gb) for pc (i presume), and two power cables (they are needed, i guess).

Do you think it'll work on my mac pro, or flashing is needed (no care for boot logo..)?

My mac has two ATI RADEON HD 2600 (256gb), should i remove all of them, one of them, none of them?

Thanks in advance for help (and sorry for my poor english). 🙂

See:

NVIDIA Quadro FX 5600 in a 2008 Mac Pro?

Thanks, i have read that weeks ago. It says it is possible, but no details (flash, non flash, etc.). 🙂

Your spec is pretty much the same as mine.

I had the two same 2600 graphics cards too

I'd leave one of the 2600's in there, even if you don't need it now, as it will give you the boot screen if you need it for any reason, without haven got unplug and open the machine up.

My second card is a home flashed 4870, begin dual width has to go tin eh primary slot.

It Does show the boot screen so all is good.

Unless you really have to ,, avoid re flashing the card unless you are 100 % sure you need to.

It is just a risk that could potential brick the card and give you hours of agro to unblock.

Mine 4870 was a freebie PC card so i was happy to flash it.

Thanks 🙂 i will leave one ATI RADEON; hopefully the two cards will not consume more of the maximum watts from the pci bus.

Maybe i'd have tried a more modern and performant graphic card, instead of nVidia Quadro FX 5600 .. 😟

You should be just fine.

I have been running two cards since new,

Ok so my 4870 is a double width card with two 6 pin extra plugs, from the main board headers,

You can alway said a second PSU. there are some available that fit in the spare CD tray, though beware, some 450W ones I have seen recommended on here have had some dreadful write ups

Hello.

Today the nVidia Quadro FX 5600 was delivered, i mounted it on my Mac Pro early 2008 (3,1) and all seems to be ok.

It was a PC card, i am sure of this, but no problems at all.

I bough two 6pins (to 6pins) power cables because of the cables in package was not usable in mac pro, i connected them to motherboard and card.

It was necessary to remove a strange metal handle from the ending of card (two screws) to make it fit in Mac Pro.

I had two ATI Radeon HD 2600 XT (256mb), i removed the lower one (slot 1 pci-e) and left the other in his place.

I attached one side monitor to ATI Radeon and one monitor to nVidia; when i boot i have the nVidia monitor black, but Apple logo appears on side monitor.

No need to zap pram, all is just ok from first launch.

Tested with cinebench, opengl performance is 3x compared to Ati Radeon, as for fps.

Thanks to you all.

I spent, for card, shipping, taxes, a little less of 200$.

Ciao!

Francesco V.

Great news.

you can to a degree select which card Cinebench uses to do its test.

I found this out the other day.

If you go to sys prefs and Displays / Arrangement tab. You can drage the menu bar to either screen.

If you have the menu bar on a screen fed from the slower card, Cine Bench will test that card.

What sort of Frame rate does cinebencz give with your new card?

my 2600 give about 9 to 10 fps, and the 4870 was giving up to about 48fps.

Good to hear what you get