New GFX card but which one?

[spacescraper2]

hi all

i run a 12 core 5.1 (2 x 2.93 GHz 6-Core Intel Xeon with mountain lion and a gtx570 (3gb twin fan MSI). 64gb ram 1333 MHz DDR3. Mountain Lion 10.8.5

recently in the last week the card has twice turned off the machine and restarted im guessing the gfx card is on the way out, i had the machine serviced recently and i saw that one of the fans is not working correctly but i doubt this is the reason for the bigger issue. I have not been handling massive render in AE and C4D which i use all the time with other adobe software.

So thats the issue i have.


for the past year ive been really trying to get my head around this whole business of which OSX and which gfx card are best for my 2010 mac pro 5.1. I have gone there and back again trying to see if the gtx570 card will work with newer OSXs. So i installed maverick / yosemite and el capitan and didn't see anything near the performance i have now or once had when the gtx570 was new (it was fast as). Premiere and other software beachballing all over the place (hell!)

recently i have been really trying to find the right setup, adobe and newer gfx cards running on later (past mountain lion) have had major performance issue, or is it me? why am i finding mountain lion the best OSX to get max cuda from the gtx570 (though its not running smoothly.

so my questions are:


1. Is their a newer or recent than the gtx570 (high performance card) that works to the level of the gtx570
and higher, i personally think i can go up to no higher than 2gb / 3gb as the GPU processor will not know what to do with it.

2. With the newer card to get max cuda performance do i have to stay with mountain lion. ive been searching
online and everyone is saying everything and i cant find concise data or info on this big subject that convinces me to shell out the money and try something.

budget not so much an issue for this.

3. are the Titan / 1070 / 1080 card worth a try. are they better than the gtx570 (in its prime), again
as before more so the titan, can a mac pro 5.1 run a titan to its full or a very good percentage of its potential? do any of these require a second power supply or can the mac pro handle this?

4. should i buy another gtx570? their are so many. if i do should i go for MSI again or go for Nvidia brand, any suggestions would be great? and 2 or 3 fans?


i look forward to hearing your views on this subject, id like to think what ive written is me understanding
the next steps but i'm sure and hoping someone can advise on what i should do to keep the 5.1 mac pro alive for at least another 2 to 4 years. I used to run AE and C4D at the same time rendering with about 10 apps open inc photoshop / chrome and office apps and it just didn't flake at all, this is my dream to get back or close to the glory days where i just had epic performance on a very stable and smooth running machine.

thank you for reading
Graham


just to add: is this the answer? the quadros M6000 (will it go in the mac pro) ?

http://www.anandtech.com/show/9096/nvidia-announces-quadro-m6000-quadro-vca-2015

 

[prvt.donut]

Buy my GTX 970!

 

[spacescraper2]

Buy my GTX 970!

what have you upgrade to? im toying with a 980 4 or 6gb, i had a breakthrough in the wee hours this morning.
how much is it and how old is it. secondhand gfx cards are very hit and miss

whats your pitch?

 

[Draeconis]

You'll need to update your OS if you want a newer GPU; 10.8.5 is too old for 9xx series GTX cards.

Check here for info.

1. Is their a newer or recent than the gtx570 (high performance card) that works to the level of the gtx570
and higher, i personally think i can go up to no higher than 2gb / 3gb as the GPU processor will not know what to do with it.

Yes, but it's not all that simple. If you're after CUDA performance, an Nvidia card would be a safe bet, but you'll need to run OS X 10.10 or higher, and install the web driver before you install the new card. You can then install the CUDA package too for better support.

2. With the newer card to get max cuda performance do i have to stay with mountain lion. ive been searching
online and everyone is saying everything and i cant find concise data or info on this big subject that convinces me to shell out the money and try something.

Not sure where you got that from, though my experience with CUDA is limited.

budget not so much an issue for this.

3. are the Titan / 1070 / 1080 card worth a try. are they better than the gtx570 (in its prime), again
as before more so the titan, can a mac pro 5.1 run a titan to its full or a very good percentage of its potential? do any of these require a second power supply or can the mac pro handle this?

As is mentioned rather extensively in this thread; the 10xx series / Titan X (Pascal) are not supported by the Nvidia web drivers at this time. There have been a few rumours that this will change in the future, but there's no solid evidence (that I'm aware of) that these will be made publicly available or when.

The 1070/1080 are great cards because they only have a single 8-pin connector. The Mac Pro has 2x 6-pins, which can be adapter to a single 8-pin without issue. The Titan X (Pascal) however has 1x 8-pin and 1x 6-pin, with a TDP of 250w, making it draw more than the 225w the Mac Pro can provide on its own. Some people around here will tell you it's fine to just convert one 6-pin to an 8-pin and they've been running like this for years, but personally I'd advise against this. Alternatively some people use 2 of the SATA power connectors to power the 6-pin 75w connector, while adapting the 2x 6-pins for the 8-pin. That stands a more realistic chance of working, but I can't comment on that, as it's not something I've tested.

Frankly, I'd stick to a 1070/1080, but YMMV.

As for how well they'll run, that's hard to say. It depends on your workload I guess, but on a basic level, you're using a new GPU with a 6-year old system; it's not going to run at 100%. Single-threaded performance, slower memory speed and PCIe connection speed are all factors that will slow things down. Not by much, but they all stack up.

4. should i buy another gtx570? their are so many. if i do should i go for MSI again or go for Nvidia brand, any suggestions would be great? and 2 or 3 fans?

I'd suggest this if you have to stick with 10.8.5, but I'd advise against this. 10.8.5 isn't being supported by Apple any more as it's too old.

 

[jeff7117]

Upgrade the OS to 10.10 or 10.11, and run a better card than the 570. The 980ti is the best bang for the buck card right now if you want to run only one card. I'm running a 980ti in my 5,1 right now (2x2.66, OS X 10.11) and it works great.

Since there aren't any web drivers out yet for the 1080, unless you want to run windows, those cards are not worth looking at. Everyone assumes that a web driver will be out for Pascal cards when 10.12 is released, but if you need a card now, look at a Maxwell card. Prices are still really high for the 1080 and most Pascal cards as well.

As for the external power supply, MacVidcards has a pretty good breakdown on his website of what cards require extra power should you want to go that route. The 980ti does not require an external power supply.

And yeah, most of the Adobe stuff really struggles with the newer Apple operating systems. Compared to the current OS you are running, the interface will seem slower because it is. UI lag is a major problem in After Effects for me in 10.10 and 10.11. I just run the 980ti for Octane.