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Lion and Third-Party Gfx Cards?????

UltraNEO*

UltraNEO*

macrumors 601
Original poster
Jun 16, 2007
4,057
16
近畿日本
Hey folks...

Since the release of Lion (yesterday) what's the low-down on using, utilizing after market video cards made for the generic PC market? Do we still need to patch the OS or does it support any card with or without an EFI Bios?

I'm pretty sure this will be asked over and over and over again... Eventually.
 
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My 6870 works fine in both an upgrade from 10.6.8 and a clean install of Lion.

In fact, my 6870 works fine in the Lion installer - which wasn't the case with Snow Leopard installation media.
 
bamf said:
My 6870 works fine in both an upgrade from 10.6.8 and a clean install of Lion.

In fact, my 6870 works fine in the Lion installer - which wasn't the case with Snow Leopard installation media.
Click to expand...

I hope it stays this way. There could be a bright future approaching for Apple towers, as flexible gaming rigs.

But they could release some update, that shoots everything down. :eek:
 
Dnix said:
I hope it stays this way. There could be a bright future approaching for Apple towers, as flexible gaming rigs.

But they could release some update, that shoots everything down. :eek:
Click to expand...

Yeah, 'could be'.. nice choice of words there!!

But do you really think a gamer would shell out extra for a MacPro when they could build a fairly decent gaming rig for less? cause I don't think so.
 
Dnix said:
I hope it stays this way. There could be a bright future approaching for Apple towers, as flexible gaming rigs.

But they could release some update, that shoots everything down. :eek:
Click to expand...

Well more flexible than they currently are. I doubt they'll shift away from Xeons.
 
How does this work with bootcamp? If I need to boot into Windows how do I? Is the screen black?
 
UltraNEO* said:
Yeah, 'could be'.. nice choice of words there!!

But do you really think a gamer would shell out extra for a MacPro when they could build a fairly decent gaming rig for less? cause I don't think so.
Click to expand...

I hate building a cheaper box just to house it's own GPU. I like to get my hands on the newest stuff, and Apple is always a generation (or two) behind.

If you already own a Mac Pro, it would make an awesome rig. If you aren't into hardcore overclocking and water-cooling (which I'm not). These got i7 equivalents, typically loads of RAM, and a killer 1000W+.

The whole reason I got a Mac Pro, is for flexibility and easy upgrades. But the graphics are of course, the weakest link in the equation. :(
 
XFX RadeonHD 4870 in Lion?

I have an XFX RadeonHD 4870 card that was previously flashed and working thanks to Cindori and the Zeus app.

I've upgraded to Lion and replaced the Radeon card with my original Mac Pro video card for the time being because I needed Lion (I'm a developer).

I'm just looking around now to see if there is a way I could get this card fully working (my main concern is dual monitors, critical to my workflow) under Lion.
 
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I am not really getting how this will work? I've tried to stick a normal pc bid card into my Mac pro and nothing appears on the screen. So is there a efi update that you have to do before installing lion?

With no Mac efi rom in the card, won't the screen just be black? At least until it boots to the desktop?

And if not, anyone know what cards are supported at the moment?

I have a 4870x2 I'd love to use in my Mac pro, will it /just/ work?

Confused as hell...
 
VanneDC said:
I am not really getting how this will work? I've tried to stick a normal pc bid card into my Mac pro and nothing appears on the screen. So is there a efi update that you have to do before installing lion?

With no Mac efi rom in the card, won't the screen just be black? At least until it boots to the desktop?

And if not, anyone know what cards are supported at the moment?

I have a 4870x2 I'd love to use in my Mac pro, will it /just/ work?

Confused as hell...
Click to expand...

https://forums.macrumors.com/threads/877441/

https://forums.macrumors.com/threads/877437/

http://www.groths.org/?p=431

welcome to /f1 :)
 
Thanks for the links Cin, I am well aware of the golden guide of flashing and used it myself to flash a 4890 a long while back. But I don't get why you posted the links....

Isn't lion supposed to support normal pc video cards without flashing or modding at all? And without modifying kexts or anything at all. It's supposed to work right out of the box? A least that was my understanding...

At any rate, cheers for the links.
V.
 
bamf said:
My 6870 works fine in both an upgrade from 10.6.8 and a clean install of Lion.

In fact, my 6870 works fine in the Lion installer - which wasn't the case with Snow Leopard installation media.
Click to expand...

I am amazed - does this mean that if I toss in a standard 6870, say a Sapphire one, it should just work in my 2008/ 3.1 Mac Pro, no messing around needed?
I can tolerate DVD player not working and a black boot screen.
 
Lion does NOT support all generic PC video cards. It does not work with my 4870. No quartz, no dual monitor support. The old patches no longer work in Lion either.
 
OracleRedux said:
I am amazed - does this mean that if I toss in a standard 6870, say a Sapphire one, it should just work in my 2008/ 3.1 Mac Pro, no messing around needed?
I can tolerate DVD player not working and a black boot screen.
Click to expand...

I installed a 6870 in my Mac Pro and it was functional with no tweaks. A few games refused to launch, a few were quirky, and a few worked perfectly. Upon installing the ATY_init kext from groths.org, all of those issues went away and it is now seemingly working perfectly (until an issue turns up at least). I'd hate to extrapolate my experience to other video card/computer combinations since I have only my experience to draw from, but it certainly seems promising.

Boot screen seems to work fine, btw. DVD Player launches fine, but I haven't tested playback.
 
Mike Biggen said:
I installed a 6870 in my Mac Pro and it was functional with no tweaks. A few games refused to launch, a few were quirky, and a few worked perfectly. Upon installing the ATY_init kext from groths.org, all of those issues went away and it is now seemingly working perfectly (until an issue turns up at least). I'd hate to extrapolate my experience to other video card/computer combinations since I have only my experience to draw from, but it certainly seems promising.

Boot screen seems to work fine, btw. DVD Player launches fine, but I haven't tested playback.
Click to expand...

I am assuming this is under Lion. Which Mac Pro do you have?
 
pfjellman said:
Lion does NOT support all generic PC video cards. It does not work with my 4870. No quartz, no dual monitor support. The old patches no longer work in Lion either.
Click to expand...

I see, it's a whole new ball game with Lion then. I think I read and inferred what so many people wish could be true!
 
pfjellman said:
Lion does NOT support all generic PC video cards. It does not work with my 4870. No quartz, no dual monitor support. The old patches no longer work in Lion either.
Click to expand...

Any more beta what your machine is?

Have one 1.1 with 4870 (apple) and intrested if the chain is finally broken.


And oh, thanks to Cindori and all (cant remember the names!) the peeps from the past that did an awesome job on the previous patches.
 
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