I am about to purchase a Mac Pro, and I saw the rumor about the new ATI Radeon 3870 coming for the Mac Pro in late May.
I had a few questions about it and Mac Pro graphics cards in general. First, will this card be available as an optional upgrade when configuring a Mac Pro from the Apple Store? Is that usually how it goes?
Secondly, I'm a video editor planning to use this Mac Pro primarily for Final Cut Studio and After Effects. It seems to have been indicated that ATI cards are better for this sort of work, versus the 8800GT they off right now.
Do these programs gain significant benefit from using ATI or is it more unsubstantial?
The other question I have is whether or not these cards would be recommended for use with the Avid product line (namely Avid Xpress Pro or Media Composer). It seems that Avid only will certify NVidia graphics cards, as it has with the 8800GT. I also am aware that Avid is not compatible with Leopard just yet, but will be in the near future.
So does anyone know if Avid performs well (or at all) with the ATI cards? Would the overall performance increase of ATI over NVidia be enough to take a chance with compatability issues?
Well I got rid of the quicksilvers since they died. Power supplys gave out and took the motherboards, So I sold what was left on EBAY.
My G4 Ethernet was sold to a co-worked and he is quite happy.
And I got this off ebay today:
Dual 1.8GHz PowerPC G5Procs 2GB RAM (2 x 1GB PC3200U DDR SDRAM) Pioneer DVD-RW DVR-117D Samsung HD160JJ/P 160GB SATA HDD (not apple labeled, not original to this system) (1) Power Cord pci106b,9 PCI Ethernet Controller
Well I didnt' read the fine print and BAZINGA! I noticed that it comes without a video card.
So For video editing, watching hulu and youtube and netflix What do you guys recommend.
I do have a PCI GEforce at home with 512 megs for PC and I was wondering if I could flash it and if so, does anyone know of a good walkthrough?
I'm not exactly hardware savvy, so please bear with me.I've been looking into some cool video games for my MacBook (white, couple of years old, Leopard), and it appears I need a new video card/graphics/whatever. I think it's GeForce or something.I've heard in the past that the video card/graphics could not be upgraded in the Macs. Not sure if this is true or if it has changed.Is there any possible way on Earth that I could send the MacBook into a shop and get the video card/graphics updated? It doesn't have to be Apple; a genuine third party would do.
My 3 yr old IMac G5 (no isight) seems to be real sluggish in graphics dept. I never used to have problems watching hulu videos, now they stutter. When I play warcraft, the game struggles to keep up if I'm in an area where there is lots of players. Would a new graphics card help? Is it replaceable on my IMac model?
I have an 06/07 model 24" iMac - I believe it was the only one of that make that had an internal PCI express slot...currently with an nvidia 7600GT in it.
If I were to get dirty with some screwdrivers, would it be possible to upgrade my graphics card to something compatible with MacSteam? (Nvidia 8 series+)
If I bought the cheapest iMac at base model right now, in a month or two could I buy more RAM for it? Then could I later buy a better video/graphics card and get that put in And could I have these things done by official Apple peoples. Not that I care much - I'd just like to know if official people do this.
Recently my 20" iMac has been showing some strange graphic problems when starting up, it doesn't happen all the time. Its hard to explain, what it looks like so I was able to capture a video of it on my iPhone, it happens near the end of the boot cycle; Here's a link to the video; [URL:...] I've tried clearing the PRAM etc and no luck. The iMac will be two years old this August, I don't have AppleCare. Do you think the video card is dying?
I just purchased my first Mac... a used Mac Pro...2 x2.66 dual core with 8 gb of ram and a 7300GT video card. (built Aug 2007) I want to upgrade the video card. I have tried to follow earlier postings, but need a bit more clarification... It appears that the 8800GT mac version is the only recommended card, but Apple no longer sells them. I can still find these 1st gen cards on eBay for approx $250-280. I have also read where others of you have installed new cards, such as the 4870, in your 1st gen mac, but using these newer cards seems to require some "flashing" of the card or other such tweaks--which, unfortunately, I am not that familiar with. With the 8800GT, it seems you can just swap out the cards, update the drivers and you are good to go... am I wrong in thinking that the newer cards are more difficult to get up and running?
I have an 8 Core Mac Pro with the NVIDIA GeoForce 7300GT video card and I was wondering if I should update the driver? I am running Vista Business 64bit through bootcamp. When you go to nvidia site there is no driver update for mac os but there is for vista 64bit. But I am afraid that if I update the driver for vista it might mess it up when I am in Leoapard?
Back in my PC days, I used to have to manually update my video card drivers ALOT due to the many games I played on it. I know that Apple has the update software feature, but I never seem to see any video card drivers for the 9400/9600 chip. Can I update this manually from the Nvidia site? Or trust that Apple will update drivers when they feel the need. BTW, I'm not having video issues on the OS X, but just wondering.
I think my video card died about a month ago and I've been trying out some cards with no success. Here is a previous thread I made about it:
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I just got the second card I'm trying today: ATI X800 XT AGP, and my computer will just sit at the grey apple screen with no wheel spinning. I'm assuming this is a driver issue (or something much worse)! Since my computer will not boot, I have no idea how to update the drivers for this card.
I just updated boot camp and when restarting teh entire windows went 8 bit. In the monitor conrol panel the computer recognizes I have an nvidia 8600N video card but when changing the resolution it won't take it. I press apply and nothing, it goes back to 640 x 480 and 256 colors.
I started the computer switching to the previous working system and I get the same result.
I've recently come into the need to do some basic graphics editing (mostly with computer generated images like logos and text......not photos) and was wondering if GIMP is sufficient to do this kind of stuff? If not, what software (CS5 is out of the acceptable price range) would you guys recommend?
I have an '06 Mac Pro and my Nvidia 7300 just sucks, so I'm looking to buy a new card. I saw this, which uses ATI Radeon 4870. How safe is this, and where can I use any Radeon card for this?
Ok so I have a old Mac Performa 640CD/Dos that I am trying to to get up and running again. I had a monitor for it but it fell off the couch and broke. So I thought maybe I can use an adapter with it in order to use PC VGA monitor. Well after getting the first adapter and trying it, no luck, then I tried one that had dip switches on it. Tried 640 x 480, 800 x 600, almost all the dip switch combination with no luck on getting anything on the screen. Could it be that I might have a bad video card and it needs replaced? Or is this particular model not compatible with PC VGA monitors?
Using a MacBook Pro (early 2008) 2.4Ghz 4Gb Ram running Snow Leopard 10.6.5. When I got this I never had the foresight that I would be editing videos. So its pretty easy to eat up lots of disk space. I was looking at a SATA Express 34, my question is - how do these Cards / drives perform I would want to use it for Videos, and Virtual Machines.
I replaced my macbook pro last week with a MacPro 8 core.
For the last few days the GT120 graphics card was connected to two 24" dell monitors (2407 and 2408).
The 2407 is my main display and was connected via the display port to a display port to DVI-D adaptor and then to the DVI-D port on the screen. The 2408 was connected using the DVI-D on the graphics card straight to the monitor. This setup was great as I couldn't even tell if my mac was on or off because I couldn't hear any off the fans.
The only problem was that when running full screen video (EyeTV/Quicktime), the picture would sometimes stutter. After looking at the apple store website, a new GT120 was �99 for students so I picked one up yesterday.
The original GT120 is in slot 1 and is connected to my 2407 (main display) via DVI-D, the second GT120 is in slot 2 and connect to my 2408 via DVI -D. Now the problem is noise! I can now hear my mac whirring away all night (MacPro in my bedroom).
Any idea what the problem could be? When i run iTunes visualizer, both displays average at about 63fps and there is no stuttering of the picture. One thing I have noticed (using hardware monitor) is that when play itunes visualizer on full screen the GT120 in slot one uses 22% and the GT120 in slot two uses 99%.
Like is having a higher end GPU only good if you play games? Will it still boost the computers performance even if I do stuff that doesn't involve videogames?
I have two issues with my present X1900: it's not going to be OpenGL compliant come September, and more pressingly on a day to day basis, for some reason Eve Online, the game I'm rather addicted to, doesn't like me using two video cards - a stock GeForce 7300 and the Radeon.
I haven't been able to troubleshoot my way to confirming why I have the issue (and I've posted on Eve online forums - no one else seems to have the issue) but I get really odd graphics glitches when I have more than 2 screens 'detected'. Rather, when I have screens on more than 1 video card. I think it has to do with an ATI/nVidia conflict while running a Mac port of the Linux Port of Eve.
So I was hoping to get the 8800 perhaps, but they're getting pretty hard to find. Any other suggestions? Performance-wise I've been happy with the X1900, don't really *need* to upgrade, but I'd like to maximize OpenGL and solve this confilct issue so I'm not constantly climbing in behind my desk to unplug and replug DVI cables - I now run 3x monitors and a projector.
Price counts for me, I'd like to keep this upgrade as cheap as possible - don't use 'Pro' apps. I'm not afraid to flash a PC card if there's decent instructions around somewhere. This is actually a PC X1900 with a custom fan/heatsink fitted (Xcellero X2 or something? It's been a while).
I have a 7300 gt in my Mac Pro 1,1 and I am looking to upgrade. I am planning on getting a pc card and flashing it but am wondering what is the best card the Mac Pro 1,1 can handle. Should I just stick with the Ati 4870 or can I go bigger.
So basically, I bought a Mac Pro in mid 2007 with the following specs:
Two 2.66GHz Dual-Core Intel Xeon 1GB (2 x 512MB) NVIDIA GeForce 7300 GT 256MB SDRAM
Anyways, I have just started using it again and would like to use it to play WoW (probably via BootCamp) but the current graphics card is really insufficient.
So what I'm basically looking for is a graphics card that would run in a mid-07 Mac Pro with the 2x2.66GHZ Dual-Core Intel Xeon's (ram is not an issue, I can upgrade this as well) - that will allow me to play WoW on even good settings.
I have a mac pro mid 2007. I read the ati radeon 5870 upgrade kit will work. My video card is fried will it automatically recognize the new card and boot up fine?
I posted this on the buyers guide forum but got no response. Maybe you guys can help.
I have a G5 dual 2.0 with 5.5 GB ram and an ATI Radeon 9600 pro graphics card.
I have been running Final Cut Studio with no problems. Once I upgraded to FCS 2, it seems to drag with some of the new fetures. Motion 3 seems really slow! So I added 2 more gigs of ram to bring it up to the 5.5.
I am waiting for the new MP like so many of you, but I will keep this computer for off line editing and compressor and for a part time assistant editor to use.
Would it be worth it for me to upgrade the graphics card?
If so what would be a good choice of card for this type of work.
FYI the last computer game I played was Zork, so I don't care about gaming.
Can you fit pretty much any graphics card into a mac pro? (Im new to mac so sorry if thats basic) Also say the card only worked with windows, if I plugged in a card and booted to windows would the card run that way? Reason I ask is that some of the work I do requires running high end games but I hate vista and have always wanted a mac. Im fine with dual booting if I have to but I was hoping that high end graphics cards would work on the mac pro so I dont have to buy two machines.
Now on my second 2008 MP 2.8 octo and this keeps happening to my screen. I assume its a problem with the standard ATI 2600 graphics card. Anybody experience the same problem, happens with many different apps. Have done all updates, all Apple said was reset the PRAMMy first MP died after a couple of weeks, logic board and both processors failed. Couldn't get replacements as Apple were still waiting for Intel to increase production so I ended up with a new MP.