Two question for 2009 Mac Pro

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Level 10

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Two question for 2009 Mac Pro

I purchased 2009 Mac Pro with the stock GT 120 graphics card.

1. When I was connecting the video cable I noticed that the card retaining place and screws were missing and the sell did not have them. Could someone tell me the screw thread form of the screws used to retain the plate. They are not the same form used on PCs and my old G4 Macs. Also what are the dimensions of the retaining plate? If I have that info I cam fabricate a retaining plate.

2. I have Sapphire ATI Radeon 5770 graphics card from the PC that the 2009 Mac replaced. From what I have read that will work fine in the 2009 Mac Pro with Yosemite without problems and without the need to install additional drivers with the caveat that nothing will be displayed during bootup. I just what to confirm that.

Posted on Mar 23, 2015 4:43 AM

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Answer 1

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The hatter

Level 9

60,990 points

Mar 31, 2015 10:46 AM in response to lllaass

This http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/USED-Mac-Pro-PCI-Card-Retaining-Bar-Bracket-922-7771-/ 200863791531

And this place:

http://store.apple4less.com/922-7771-PCI-Card-Retaining-Bar-Bracket-p/922-7771-3 .htm

One of the two places it screws down broke on mine so I just use standard PC screws to hold each PCIe card in place.

I will leave it to others but Bing(o) has these:

http://www.bing.com/search?q=PC+5770+flashing+Mac&qs=n&form=QBLH&pq=pc+5770+flas hing+mac

If you want to flash it which is quite easy. Once you load drivers and login it will be fine.

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Answer 2

Mar 31, 2015 10:46 AM in response to lllaass

I had my 2009 apart for some changes, and pulled out the PCIe retaining plate. It is about 4+7/16-in overall, by about 3/4 in wide, stopping just short of the back grille. The screws are placed in a line about 1/4-in from the inboard edge, and spaced about 1+1/16 and 2+11/16 inches up from the bottom edge.

The screws measure about 0.136 thousandths in, equal to 3.5mm, and very close to SAE #6 (Hard drive mounting screws). But the thread matches a fine 0.6mm thread pitch, which would be similar to 42 thread/in SAE (the SAE standard s 32 threads/inch in that size).

Based on where they are, I would expect them to match PCI retaining screws in size and thread pitch. But the sheet metal they screw into is not very thick, and I expect you could coerce a different thread on them if you needed to, just by forcing a different screw in the same hole.

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Answer 3

lllaass Author

Level 10

210,411 points

Mar 31, 2015 10:45 AM in response to Grant Bennet-Alder

HD screws do not work but are close.

The card retaining screws from my PowerMac G5 do work. The thread length is too short for me to measure the pitch with my screw gauges. I have both metric and USA gauges.

The retainer plate that the hatter pointed out is for an earlier MacPro. The earlier ones have one thumbscrew for PCle slot one while the 2009 starts with slot 2.

Google did not find any plate for a 2009. I just used the screws from my PowerMac but have to be very careful getting them in slot one and the last slot since there is no straight-line access with a screw driver. I thin that is one reason why a plate with to thumbscrews are used vie screws for all slots.

I am also just going to use my unflashed PC 5770 card as is. It looks too hard to flash.

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