nvidia quadro fx 4500 driver

You appear to have purchased the PC version of the FX4500.

The PC version of this card will not work in your Mac Pro. It needs to have specific Apple firmware on the card- which the PC version does not have.

To my knowledge, the only way to make it work is to flash the card with the Mac ROM, which may or may not be possible, and is a complex procedure which could damage the FX4500.

Since Apple (afaik) doesn't offer the FX4500 as an aftermarket upgrade, I think the only place you can order the proper FX4500 is from:

http://welovemacs.com/6613928.html

Other then that, the card just won't work.

-SC

Was the Quadro FX 4500 an original Apple part for the Mac Pro? All graphics cards for the Mac Pro need firmware which supports EFI (and not BIOS which 3rd party graphics cards are designed for).

If you are feeling particularly brave, it may be possible to flash your standard FX 4500 with the EFI firmware from a Apple Mac Pro compatible version of the card. This requires extensive technical knowledge however, as well as access to the correct firmware file - if you make a mistake, you could easily turn your FX 4500 into a glorified paperweight!

EDIT: Sorry ScottishCaptain - we posted at exactly the same time!

Yup.

I believe I posted a link to the card you'll want to get- it's the FX4500, for an Intel Mac Pro.

-SC

I have a 4500 from a Power Mac (dual-dual). It does not seem to work with my new Mac Pro. Does this seem right?

Yes it does.

There are technically three versions of the FX4500:

PC, Mac PowerPC, and Mac Intel.

All have different firmware written on the card, and are not interchangeable. You may be able to update the firmware on that PowerPC FX4500 to somehow make it work on a Mac Pro, but that might kill the card, and I have no clue how it would be done.

-SC

It's a shame you're not in the U.K, as I have an unused Quadro FX 4500 (Apple sent me) for the Mac Pro going spare.

Do you still have that card necronym?

I'm about to get a upgrade from my GF7300, so either I get a FX4500 or a FX4600, but the FX4600 will not let me start OS X with the card inside I guess.

I was about to get a FX4500 from a Sun-workstation, but then I have to flash the bios on the card with a Mac Pro FX4500-bios, and I cant find any copies of this on the net.

I'm afraid not, I sold it on eBay, the new owner has it installed on their Mac Pro and it's working like a charm.

Sorry

Ok, I will keep my eyes on ebay to see if I can find another 🙂