ATI R600 - Next Graphics in Mac Pro?

[Fearless Leader]

But the hardware the cards work with is different.

http://www.architosh.com/features/2007/chatside/ati/070128_ati-1.html

Your Statement makes no sense. And that article you linked to doesn't do anything for your statement. The only thing I could pull from it was The hardware in PowerPc macs are different from x86 PC's. Wow amazing.

Edit: To the OP get some geniuses at http://strangedogs.proboards40.com/ real happy. Say buy them a card a Mac Pro, they'll figure out how to get it to work.

Robert Goulet is great, just not at 3pm when messes he with your stuff.

 

[Lord Blackadder]

Video cards in Intel Macs and PCs are hardware identical.

The R600 will show up at some point in the Mac Pro - just when is the question. Hopefully, the R600XTX model will show up in the next Mac Pro rev.

 

[pseudobrit]

Your Statement makes no sense. And that article you linked to doesn't do anything for your statement.

CB: It's not an arm's length relationship. We are close. We don't just
throw Apple a little package of binaries at the end of each day. Rather, we see 50% of their source code and they see 80% of ours. We sync up with each other's source depot every day or two. Sometimes it gets to several times a day. There are probably about 50 conversations a week with Apple engineers. Working with Apple is different than working with any other computer manufacturer. Basically we function as an extended part of their team. The only way to write drivers for the Mac is to work this way with Apple.

...
AFR: So what is specific today on the hardware side for the cards in the Mac Pros? They have industry standard connectors now.

CB: Not a lot on the hardware side. But EFI is a big difference on the
ROM side. Apple's early adoption of this Intel standard has also caused hardware vendors to create special boards just for that.

AFR: So there's not much unique on the hardware side today? EFI is also an Intel standard, should that mean that when Microsoft adopts EFI with Windows Vista and post-Vista, there will be even less of a difference remaining on hardware uniqueness?

CB: It is not clear when or if other PC vendors will adopt EFI, which I
think stands for "extensible firmware infrastructure". Virtually all
other PC graphics cards require a video BIOS, a different kind of
firmware than EFI and different again from OpenFirmware, the type
required by the Power Mac G5 and other PowerPC based Macs. This
distinction between the firmware, the control code typically programmed into a ROM on what otherwise might be identical hardware, determines the system compatibility and operating characteristics of each individual graphics card. It makes them unique from one another and unfortunately prevents the individual cards from being interoperable between one type of system and another--for example from a Power Mac G5 to a Mac Pro or from a Mac Pro to a typical Windows based PC.

I don't see how it can be made any more obvious that this is a ROM issue, a firmware issue; it's not a software/driver issue on Apple's part.

 

[Fearless Leader]

I don't see how it can be made any more obvious that this is a ROM issue, a firmware issue; it's not a software/driver issue on Apple's part.

i dont feel like arguing with you any more. Its totally a ROM issue and i'm a big dummy. you win, Happy?

 

[pseudobrit]

i dont feel like arguing with you any more. Its totally a ROM issue and i'm a big dummy. you win, Happy?

Which PC card works out of the box with just a driver?

 

[Fearless Leader]

From what I understand any of the nvidia 7 series. ie 7300 7600 7800

 

[bearbo]

i obviously dont know anything... but if flashing the card is what require all PC based graphics card to work, provided the correct driver/firmware... is that for the benefit of the OS X or the hardware.. in another word, if flashing the card enables the OS X to recognize the card, doesn't the jeopridize the functionality on the Windows side?

 

[Fearless Leader]

yep my 7800 wont work in a PC anymore unless i reflash it back. A fun and enjoyable process where I get to listen to funny sounds when to eject the floppy and type dos commands without a monitor, becuase the 7800 doesn't work with non macs until you do that.

 

[bearbo]

yep my 7800 wont work in a PC anymore unless i reflash it back. A fun and enjoyable process where I get to listen to funny sounds when to eject the floppy and type dos commands without a monitor, becuase the 7800 doesn't work with non macs until you do that.

but will it work with windows on mac?... or do you have an intel mac to test this?

i just wanted to know whether it's OS X that needs to recognize the card and be able to do blah with it, or is it the Mac hardware portion that needs to recognize it... because if it's the latter, that means Windows on Mac can recognize it and such... dose it make sense?

 

[Macinposh]

But the hardware the cards work with is different.

http://www.architosh.com/features/2007/chatside/ati/070128_ati-1.html

Umm,now tell me,where in that text it mentioned that a "Pc R600" and "OS X R600" are different physically?

I couldnt find any.

All i found was This
distinction between the firmware, the control code typically programmed into a ROM on what otherwise might be identical hardware, determines the system compatibility and operating characteristics of each individual graphics card.



The physcial side is the same (we are talking about macpro,not G5 here) including the ROM, so all comes down back to drivers again,wich we talked about in the first place...



So,Pseudobrit, could you care to elaborate what you mean with your "hardware that your cards work with is different"?


Edit: Ach, slow to post,things clearer now...

 

[thebeephaha]

All a rom/firmware is, is software, a driver in basic form, just its stored on the graphics card's chip.

Besides, how else do you think the hackintosh users (gasp! ) are using all that non EFI/flashed rom'd hardware with OS X? custom drivers... Of course the OS X installs for hackintosh comps has been illegally modified but the point is, the hardware at is identical, just different software, be it the EFI, or BIOS, or the rom/firmware.

But lets get back to the original topic.

R600! Amazing card which I hope eventually comes the MacPro's way.

 

[Erasmus]

Hmmm...

Awesome card, have been following its progress for some time. Hopefully Apple's holding off releasing the 8 core Mac Pro for Seaburg/Stoakley and ATI's beast of a card.

I believe the Mac Pro has 300W to provide to the PCI cards. I remember reading it.

We can ignore gamers here entirely. I know people tend to say "New super high performance graphics cards are only for people who waste their lives away playing the newest of games", but although true in the minority of cases, people miss a nice chunk of the professional market. That chunk is engineers. The Inquirer mentioned that ATI are trying to release a 4GB card (That's right, 4... Insane, huh?) How many pople who make money designing aircraft, cars, trains, etc. in SolidWorks or Catia would like this card? And I'm sure, if it can take a 4 GB (or even the fallback 2 GB) supercard, it can take the teensy-in-comparison-otherwise-behemoth "R600"XTX.

So, X1600 as bottom, Mid R600, "R600"XTX (water cooled?), with FireGL R600 as top, replacing the Quadro. That lineup would be awesome.

 

[Fearless Leader]

but will it work with windows on mac?... or do you have an intel mac to test this?

i just wanted to know whether it's OS X that needs to recognize the card and be able to do blah with it, or is it the Mac hardware portion that needs to recognize it... because if it's the latter, that means Windows on Mac can recognize it and such... dose it make sense?

The only Intel mac I have is the lovely MBP. If any one wants to send me a Mac Pro I'd Be happy to test.

Well the cards are actually a bit different. The "official" cards have both Distinct ROMs for EFI's and BIOS's and to store them both they have double the size of what is called a eeprom (where the roms are stored).

Certian cards will load up with the hackintosh drivers but not until osx takes hold of the card. You boot as a black screen until you get to that progress bar.

 

[psingh01]

What it comes down it is Apple probably just doesn't want the added support issues of having these advanced cards on the OSX when it doesn't really use the new features. A DX10 card makes no difference to OS X since it doesn't have DX10 to begin with. I don't know if there are any new features of OpenGL that a card like the 8800GTX can provide that the X1900XT can't provide.

This is basically Apple's way of saying, you only really need it for Windows but why would you want to run Windows?

Apple eventually announced Bootcamp when it saw that this is what people wanted. I think they should release at the very least release an solution in an unsupported manner to give those that want it the option. Eventually they will have to offer better cards anyway, so they maybe in no rush to do it now.