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5,1 dead video card, running 10.6

K

Kuzbad

macrumors member
Original poster
Jun 11, 2009
62
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I have a 5,1 that just developed a bad case of dead video card today (froze up while running, infinite chime loop when rebooting). Currently running 10.6 for legacy software reasons and has to KEEP running 10.6.

What are my replacement options given the OS version limitation?

Thanks!
 
A "proper" replacement would be an Apple 5770 or 5870, which are the cards that came with a 5,1. If you don't need a powerful GPU, the Apple GT120 is popular because it is small and doesn't require any extra power cables.

I don't think I would go older than those. Yes there are more cards going back, but they are quite old and a couple of the common ones are prone to failure.

You can save a little money by getting a flashed card instead of a genuine Apple one.
 
Seconding this. The 4870, offered as an upgrade on the 4,1, is also an option if you can find one at less cost than the above. However, the 5000 series cards were superior in almost every manner. The 4870 is also a bit of a power hog. I don't believe you'll be able to go newer than the HD 5000s.
 
( You didn't say which brand card is failing. AMD ? Nvidia ? Perhaps it can be flashed or re-flashed)

My flashed HIS 7950 3Gb @ 5.0 GT/s runs Snow Leopard 10.6.8 with boot screens but .. some old games report "GameSprockets cannot ,, bla bla bla but if I boot with a flashed HD 5770 or ( better ) HD 5870 the games work in most screen resolutions.

As a spare backup - if you often use 10.6.8 - I would get a HD 5870 . . they are dirt cheap now - Get a Sapphire 5870 as they can be upped to 5.0 GT/s.

PM me if you need help with a HD 5870.

Good luck.
 
Speaking of power hogs, my Radeon 7950 just arrived today to replace the 5770 in my flashed Pro 1,1. I think thats a TDP of 200W vs 108W (peak.)
 
Sure the 5000 series is a better choice. The 4870's idle consumption (normal 2D desktop environment) is 3x the 5870's.

MIKX said:
( You didn't say which brand card is failing. AMD ? Nvidia ? Perhaps it can be flashed or re-flashed)

My flashed HIS 7950 3Gb @ 5.0 GT/s runs Snow Leopard 10.6.8 with boot screens but .. some old games report "GameSprockets cannot ,, bla bla bla but if I boot with a flashed HD 5770 or ( better ) HD 5870 the games work in most screen resolutions.

As a spare backup - if you often use 10.6.8 - I would get a HD 5870 . . they are dirt cheap now - Get a Sapphire 5870 as they can be upped to 5.0 GT/s.

PM me if you need help with a HD 5870.

Good luck.
Click to expand...

I really don't know that 7950 is supported in 10.6.8. I know a flashed card will display something because of the EFI. But I don't know it has proper driver support. I never try it myself. It's something good to know.

Michael MP2 said:
Speaking of power hogs, my Radeon 7950 just arrived today to replace the 5770 in my flashed Pro 1,1. I think thats a TDP of 200W vs 108W (peak.)
Click to expand...

The 7950's official TDP value is very strange, despite it's a 225W TDP card, the actual power draw under normal high demand is just about 140W in general, and may go up to 170W with something like Furmark. Not really >200W.
 
Last edited:
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h9826790 said:
Sure the 5000 series is a better choice. The 4870's idle consumption (normal 2D desktop environment) is 3x the,


I really don't know that 7950 is supported in 10.6.8. I know a flashed card will display something because of the EFI. But I don't know it has proper driver support. I never try it myself. It's something good to know.



The 7950's official TDP value is very strange, despite it's a 225W TDP card, the actual power draw under normal high demand is just about 140W in general, and may go up to 170W with something like Furmark. Not really >200W.
Click to expand...
True words, and no, I don't think 10.6 has drivers; I think it was 10.8 or so that introduced them, maybe later
 
owbp said:
HD6870/50 are also working, but the drivers are introduced in 10.6.3 or 10.6.4 IIRC, so it's a no go if you have 10.6 GM DVD.
Click to expand...

Oh that's right, I forgot about those.

I think 5770 and 5870 have same problem, you cannot use them with 10.6 unless you update it first.
 
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( kusbad I replied to your PM. )

The 5770, 5870 & 7950 all run in 10.6.8.
I have often done clean re-installs of Snow Leopard from a 10.6.0 GM DVD using the above flashed cards successfully.
I just have to set the date in Terminal just after the install starts ( " date 0719140011 " )

The only real codecil is that 10.6.8 with the HD 7950 means that my favourite game : Civ II DYP ( = Double Your Pleasure ) will not work with any of it's available screen resolutions. Every other non-game Snow Leopard 10.6.8 app works OK.

I firmly believe that Snow Leopard remains a viable and well developed OS X for it's time and still useful today for running favourite abandonware or no longer developed apps.

El Capitan remains unfinished - shame on Apple for that.
 
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MIKX said:
The 5770, 5870 & 7950 all run in 10.6.8.
I have often done clean re-installs of Snow Leopard from a 10.6.0 GM DVD using the above flashed cards successfully.
Click to expand...
Just one thing that i want to emphasize - It only applies to the flashed cards!

HD57xx drivers are not in OS X until 10.6.4 and HD7950 drivers have their first appearance in 10.8.3 (although you can download them from AMD website for 10.7.5-10.8.3, but they are 64bit only).

Yes, you can use flashed HD7950 in Snow Leopard, but you can also use flashed GTX 1080 TI in it, or GT 7300 Apple OEM in 10.13.1 on the opposite side of things. It doesn't mean that card works, it means that EFI part of the ROM is giving you screen to look at.

The thing is, flashed HD7950 will behave better in 10.6.8 (or even better in 10.4.11 - i've tried ti with MacPro 1,1) than GT 7300 OEM will in High Sierra, just because QE, Core Image, Core Animation etc was in it's infancy in those operating systems (Core Animation was introduced in Leopard, and QE was by default off in Tiger) so there is not much left for GPU to do. GT 7300 OEM will behave awful in new, unsupported, OS because it is heavy dependent on GPU to do almost all animations.

Just to make it clear for members that have tendency to read one topic and, based on it, buy HD7950 for their 10.6.8 machine. :D
 
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