Sidebar Sidebar
Become a MacRumors Supporter for $50/year with no ads, ability to filter front page stories, and private forums.

Need the best Nvidia GPU I can get.

C

CountlovE

macrumors regular
Original poster
Aug 17, 2007
144
0
Hello!

I currently have a 2011 MacPro 6 core machine. Right now it has one of the ATI cards which is great, but not so great for OpenCL.

Knowing I will have to pull out the ATI and use a card that will only work in Windows 7. What are my options from Nvidia. I need the most GPU cores I can get on one card. I realize I can't use a 590, but would a 580 work? A Mac Quadro 4000 will not have enough cores.

Thanks for any help in advance.
 
I don't care about running the card in OSX. I just need a card that works under windows. If you know of any that will work in Windows, that would be great.
 
Well, that depends on what requirements the card has. The Mac Pro provides two 6 pin connectors. If your card needs more than that, you could use the power from the additional SATA connectors, or use a splitter for the 6 pin cables.

Either option isn't really recommended as no one knows exactly how much power the SATA connectors of the ODD bay provide and splitting the 6pin cables might not be the best choice either since a single 6 pin provides only 75W. Apple decided to include the lines for these connectors into their PCB and you might damage the logic board if you overload these lines.

Best option is to get a $30 5.25" power supply. They provide enough power for one or two additional graphics cards.
 
Best option is to get a $30 5.25" power supply. They provide enough power for one or two additional graphics cards.
Click to expand...

Thanks for that.. I didn't know this was possible. So in theory, I could place an extra power supply in one of the spare bays, and have two GTX590's running in a 2011 Mac Pro 6 core?

Thanks again.
 
I just checked, the 590 requires two 8 pin connectors, which should be fine. A single card consumes about 340W (which is insane btw :rolleyes:).

The PSU I had in mind provides 450W (this one) and offers two 8pin connectors and two 6pin.

So you'd end up with 2 8pin and 4 6pin. I'm pretty sure there are adapters for the 4 6pins to give you another 2 8pin connectors.
Power wise, you should be fine.

The additional PSU provides 450W, the two PCIe slots 150W combined, the two PCIe 6pins from the Pro give you another 150W, so 750W in total for 680W of graphics cards.
 
Transporteur said:
I just checked, the 590 requires two 8 pin connectors, which should be fine. A single card consumes about 340W (which is insane btw :rolleyes:).

The additional PSU provides 450W, the two PCIe slots 150W combined, the two PCIe 6pins from the Pro give you another 150W, so 750W in total for 680W of graphics cards.
Click to expand...


Ok, so I will need to get two of those power supplies to handle two 590's. In a 2011 Mac Pro 6 core machine. Don't they have external power supplies that can just connect through a slot on the back?
 
Why 2? A single one suffices (450W + the 300W the Pro provides).

You can also use a standard ATX PSU and route the PCIe cables through an open slot bracket. Switching on the computer and PSU would be possible with a Master/Slave plug board.

Still, I find the only internal option to be nicer.
 
Ok, I will give that a shot with one 5.25 power supply. But I should have no problems with two 590's under windows though right?
 
CountlovE said:
Ok, I will give that a shot with one 5.25 power supply. But I should have no problems with two 590's under windows though right?
Click to expand...

Extreme heat, buggy drivers, and firmware updates that downclock the cards below factory speeds for them to work properly.

Except that, no.
 
Cindori: How would Apple control the 590 drivers in Windows 7 when it will be using drivers directly from Nvidia?
 
What do you mean? Apple has nothing to do with windows, or graphic drivers for it.


It's the nvidia drivers that are buggy and faulty, if that's what you meant.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sRo-1VFMcbc&feature=player_embedded


There is even demands of a recall because the card uses low grade VRM's, which is the reason that Nvidia has to downclock the card in drivers for it to function properly.

http://www.overclock.net/nvidia/974902-nvidia-gtx-590-owners-club-35.html


Put this through google translate to read more about the VRM problems
http://lab501.ro/placi-video/nvidia-geforce-gtx-590-studiu-de-overclocking/12
 
Last edited:
Yeah, but 2048 cores total is better than the 256 you would get with a QuadroFX 4000, along with 3 GIGS of ram. Even if it's underclocked, it's still better than anything else on the market.

Plus for what I am doing, ATI is not an option when running Mari, or V-Ray RT.
 
I just realized that the 590 splits the Ram in half to 1.5 gigs per GPU.. That's no good, so I guess using two 580's with 3 gig's will definitely be the way to go. Thanks again for all the help.
 
The 590 is the "fastest". 580 is pretty darn fast too. Generally, I like ATI card better. The fastest ATI is the 6990, and it's a beast.
Whichever of those you decide will be a bomb! :apple:
 
CountlovE said:
I just realized that the 590 splits the Ram in half to 1.5 gigs per GPU.. That's no good, so I guess using two 580's with 3 gig's will definitely be the way to go. Thanks again for all the help.
Click to expand...

It depends. There will be a performance penalty for using CUDA over two different graphics cards.

There's actually a performance penalty for even talking to a discreet card in CUDA, which means for simple operations an integrated card like the 9400m is sometimes a lot faster. But regardless, depending on what you're doing, the penalty of talking to two cards instead of one may not be faster than two GPU's on one card.

(Note: I did a lot of work on multi GPU CUDA at my university.)
 
about 6970

Hey guy's sorry to intrude but just opened a new account and am tryin to get some info on a 6970 i just bought i would like to run this in boot camp in windows 7 64 bit tryin to see how to power it up? had this for a week and am not able to get anywhere yet. any help would be appreciated.
 
Well I got the two 580's and this power supply:

http://www.epowertec.com/power_cd.html

I hooked up the 6 pin connector from motherboard to 580, then the 450 watt supply went 6 pin from power supply to 8 pin card. Am I forgetting something?

At first the cards spun up booted I to windows but no video. So I put only one in and I can't get that 580 to spin up or load video. Does the power supply I bought have to connect to the Mac power supply? If so, how? Really bummed out that I can't get this working. :(

Thanks for any help
 
CountlovE said:
Does the power supply I bought have to connect to the Mac power supply? If so, how? Really bummed out that I can't get this working. :(
Click to expand...

Yes it has to be connected, otherwise how would it know when to power on? ;)

From what I can tell from the pictures, the PSU requires a Molex input, so all you need is a SATA power to Molex adapter.
Something like this:
71oWrPntucL._SL500_AA300_.gif
 
Thanks Transporteur.

So I then have to hook up a SATA cable from one of the HD slots to the Internal PSU?

Great! Thanks.
 
CountlovE said:
Thanks Transporteur.

So I then have to hook up a SATA cable from one of the HD slots to the Internal PSU?

Great! Thanks.
Click to expand...

Your 2010 already has two SATA backplane connectors in the ODD bay. Considering that you've got the PSU in the lower bay, the connector is already in place, not reason to tinker with the hard drive bays. Just connect the SATA power to Molex adapter and you're done.

Edit: If you can't get a grip on a Molex adapter with only one - lets say "nose", just saw the right one off. The image of the adapter above shows two noses, which won't work out of the box.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Register on MacRumors! This sidebar will go away, and you'll see fewer ads.
Top Bottom
Back