8800gt EFI64 ROM

[tugger]

Success!

eVGA e-GeForce 8800 GT Superclocked Edition from Amazon
512-P3-N802-AR

Best deal I found on this card with identical model number is at Buy.com for $204.99 with free shipping after $30 eVGA rebate (good thru 31 March).

Edit: I ordered this on 11 March at 1:00 AM, and it arrived today (12 March) at 6:00 PM with standard shipping. Unbelievable. Still waiting for the power cable from ATI.

 

[MacNoobie]

So what IS the exact success rate of the EVGA cards? I'm going down to the city in a few days and noticed that Circuit City's there sell EVGA's there.. none of em carry the 512-P3-N802-AR designation so I might just buy it on amazon.

I noticed they have one carrying a DX designation (instead of the AR) and I think I recall someone mentioning you need the MX designation for it to work.

I'd love to see a list of what specs or what I'm suppose to look at for a chance at success I'd rather buy the card in the city.

 

[tugger]

Hey Thanks! That was the solution or close. It actually had to be:
nvflash --index=1 -4 -5 -6 somerom.rom

Does the index designator refer to the slot the card is in? If so, what slot was your card in when you flashed it?

 

[mcnearcj]

@MacNoobie

I've read the whole thread and I don't recall any EVGA failing. Worst case is you return it for a full refund if you buy it at Circuit City.

 

[jhuss]

Hi,

I also managed to flash known EVGA card (e-GeForce8800GT, 512MB Superclocked, P/N 512-P3-E802-AR, green board, from amazon.de) successfully.

But: In OS X, after some more or less minutes I get quite weird graphical errors, then a black screen and complete OS freeze. Everything works fine in Windows Vista, though. Had a 2600XT installed previously.

Looks like some software issues, maybe there's something left from Ati that causes that? Any suggestions?

 

[diamond.g]

Hi,

I also managed to flash known EVGA card (e-GeForce8800GT, 512MB Superclocked, P/N 512-P3-E802-AR, green board, from amazon.de) successfully.

But: In OS X, after some more or less minutes I get quite weird graphical errors, then a black screen and complete OS freeze. Everything works fine in Windows Vista, though. Had a 2600XT installed previously.

Looks like some software issues, maybe there's something left from Ati that causes that? Any suggestions?

Sounds like errors from clocking. Usually driver problems wouldn't take time to appear. What clock is your card set at?

 

[nizzerbean]

Count another EVGA 8800GT flashed and functioning on the 2008 Mac Pro. I made a bootable USB key and flashed with a PC. I didn't try it with the Mac. I bought the stock one (not superclocked) from Newegg.

 

[jhuss]

Sounds like errors from clocking. Usually driver problems wouldn't take time to appear. What clock is your card set at?

Clock speeds are stored in the ROM, right? Since I flashed it today and did no changes, I assume that my card is running with standard clock. Correct me if I'm wrong.

Crysis demo and other GPU-intensive games worked without problems for several hours - but on Windows..

 

[diamond.g]

Clock speeds are stored in the ROM, right? Since I flashed it today and did no changes, I assume that my card is running with standard clock. Correct me if I'm wrong.

Crysis demo and other GPU-intensive games worked without problems for several hours - but on Windows..

Hmm, that is odd. Yes the stock clocks should be easeily handled by a card that came overclocked. I am not sure why OS X is hosing up. Does anyone think an Archive+Reinstall would help? Maybe boot from the Install DVD and see if the corruption happens there as well. If it doesn't then maybe the reinstall would be useful. I am just not sure how a ktext that isn't being used (the ati one) is causing issues.

 

[jhuss]

Hmm, that is odd. Yes the stock clocks should be easeily handled by a card that came overclocked. I am not sure why OS X is hosing up. Does anyone think an Archive+Reinstall would help? Maybe boot from the Install DVD and see if the corruption happens there as well. If it doesn't then maybe the reinstall would be useful. I am just not sure how a ktext that isn't being used (the ati one) is causing issues.

Ok, I will try to reinstall. Thanks for now..

 

[ringworm]

Hi,

I also managed to flash known EVGA card (e-GeForce8800GT, 512MB Superclocked, P/N 512-P3-E802-AR, green board, from amazon.de) successfully.

But: In OS X, after some more or less minutes I get quite weird graphical errors, then a black screen and complete OS freeze. Everything works fine in Windows Vista, though. Had a 2600XT installed previously.

Looks like some software issues, maybe there's something left from Ati that causes that? Any suggestions?

Hmm, haven't had any issues on the Mac side of things, but I did re-apply the 10.5.2 combo update after I booted back up. Maybe give that a shot before attempting more drastic measures. Hope this helps, let us know!

ringworm

 

[jhuss]

Hmm, haven't had any issues on the Mac side of things, but I did re-apply the 10.5.2 combo update after I booted back up. Maybe give that a shot before attempting more drastic measures. Hope this helps, let us know!

Too late... But it looks like a clean OS installation solved that issue.

 

[JollyRogers]

Coming from the Hackintosh world, I would think that removing the /System/Library/Extensions.mkext may have helped. It will force an update of cached kext's that are used with the system.

I so wanna try this. Circuit City is right up the road, but I also noticed the difference in the part # for the eVGA 8800GT they sold is 512-P3-N802-DX vice 512-P3-N802-AR and have no idea what the difference is. I looked at eVGA's website also and the p/n that is sold at newegg, amazon etc is listed, but not the one CC carries... will have to check on CC's REFUND policy.

 

[jhuss]

Too late... But it looks like a clean OS installation solved that issue.

Oh no! As I said, I did a fresh OS X installation, installation itself worked very well. But after half an hour playing around and reconfiguring the system, the same error occured again. I did nothing or installed anything which could possibly cause this error. Weird.

For now, I'm using an old ATX PC power supply to fire up that 8800 until my local Apple source delivers the power adapter for connecting the card to the Mac Pros mobo. Maybe that's the problem? But why is it working with Windows then? To calm down, I played Crysis for some hours, which worked without any problems.

Delivery of that cable could take some days, to avoid that problem is caused by my external power supply, I will grab some Molex Y-Adapters today and connect the card to DVD power supply. Let's hope the best.

 

[jhuss]

Got my power adapter earlier than expected, it's on original apple spare part.

But still no luck. Crashes just some minutes after system start up.
Rechecked rom file and nvflash version (5.57).

Any help is appreciated.

 

[waha]

Got my power adapter earlier than expected, it's on original apple spare part.

But still no luck. Crashes just some minutes after system start up.
Rechecked rom file and nvflash version (5.57).

Any help is appreciated.

It definitely sounds like a typical 'Ooops, overclocked too much' error. But since it's the stock bios/EFI from Apple that can't really be it.

Your EVGA card has the right 128kb flash chip too I take it?

 

[jhuss]

Your EVGA card has the right 128kb flash chip too I take it?

Yep. It said 1024something. There were some errors while flashing, but I read in other posts that they were normal.

 

[waha]

I so wanna try this. Circuit City is right up the road, but I also noticed the difference in the part # for the eVGA 8800GT they sold is 512-P3-N802-DX vice 512-P3-N802-AR and have no idea what the difference is. I looked at eVGA's website also and the p/n that is sold at newegg, amazon etc is listed, but not the one CC carries... will have to check on CC's REFUND policy.

My EVGA card is 512-P3-E806-AR, and it has the correct flash chip. I've yet to flash it though as I'm still waiting on the actual Mac Pro to arrive.

 

[jhuss]

It definitely sounds like a typical 'Ooops, overclocked too much' error. But since it's the stock bios/EFI from Apple that can't really be it.

I checked clock speeds with nTune in Windows, they are the stock ones. Since my card is eVGAs overclock edition, it should be easily capable of even more speed.

 

[waha]

I checked clock speeds with nTune in Windows, they are the stock ones. Since my card is eVGAs overclock edition, it should be easily capable of even more speed.

Mmm, thing is, when it's booted in OS X it uses whatever's in the EFI part of the firmware. But I doubt Apple's own EFI firmware would be overclocked. :/

You should probably do another check with nvflash to see what exact chip it is, since there are 128kb chips that don't work.

This all is making me a bit worried since I got an eVGA superclock edition too.

 

[thagomizer]

Got my power adapter earlier than expected, it's on original apple spare part.

But still no luck. Crashes just some minutes after system start up.
Rechecked rom file and nvflash version (5.57).

Any help is appreciated.

Do you have another PC that you can test the card in? Your crash could be a Windows or driver problem in your bootcamp install. But if it happens on another PC, you know there's something wrong with the card. Some cards are just bad from the factory, even with eVGA.

By the way, your card is slightly different from mine. I have a 512-P3-N802-AR, which is also listed as e-Geforce 8800GT Superclocked Edition. I also got mine from amazon.

 

[diamond.g]

Mmm, thing is, when it's booted in OS X it uses whatever's in the EFI part of the firmware. But I doubt Apple's own EFI firmware would be overclocked. :/

You should probably do another check with nvflash to see what exact chip it is, since there are 128kb chips that don't work.

This all is making me a bit worried since I got an eVGA superclock edition too.

OS X honors the PC overclock.

Do you have another PC that you can test the card in? Your crash could be a Windows or driver problem in your bootcamp install. But if it happens on another PC, you know there's something wrong with the card. Some cards are just bad from the factory, even with eVGA.

By the way, your card is slightly different from mine. I have a 512-P3-N802-AR, which is also listed as e-Geforce 8800GT Superclocked Edition. I also got mine from amazon.

OP is having the problem with OS X not Windows. So there is something wrong with the EFI code, but I am unsure what it is.

 

[jhuss]

OP is having the problem with OS X not Windows. So there is something wrong with the EFI code, but I am unsure what it is.

Argh, first freeze in Windows, same weird graphic errors. I think there is something wrong with the card's hardware. I will send it back and try to get a new one. Hope that the cracked one was not the last 128K they had.

Thanks for your help (for now...)!

 

[jhuss]

Damn, I forgot do make a backup of the original ROM of my eVGA card (superclocked, 512-P3-E802-AR). Argh, what should I do now? I don't think amazon is amused when they get a flashed card back.

Can someone provide me a original ROM of that card? That would be very nice.

 

[diamond.g]

Argh, first freeze in Windows, same weird graphic errors. I think there is something wrong with the card's hardware. I will send it back and try to get a new one. Hope that the cracked one was not the last 128K they had.

Thanks for your help (for now...)!

Ah, stand corrected!