No video signal from 2006 Mac Pro

[LarryD68]

Hello, I have a 2006 Mac Pro I use for a video ministry. I tried to install Sierra, which I now know my Mac does not support. I clicked on Sierra install icon, system restarted with no video signal on monitor. I know all works because put in a hard drive with Windows XP (all I had to test) to see what would happen. It worked. I wiped the Mac Pro hard drive using security option zero. Took 7 hours. I hooked hard drive to my Mac Book Pro via usb and drive is 1 TB which is why it took so long. Plus it was a thorough wipe. With drive still plugged into MacBook, I installed Snow Leopard onto Mac Pro drive. Worked fine in Mac Book. I ejected from MB and installed in Mac Pro. Still no signal. Mac Pro has 9 GB RAM, I TB Dell hard drive for OS and apps. And one 80 GB storage drive. It did have Mountain Lion, I believe 10.7.1. And GE Force 9500 GT video card. And GPU present led diagnostic light is not on when pressing button to check. Any help at all will be greatly appreciated. Like I stated earlier, I use this Mac to produce positive, uplifting videos. I am new to MAC word so please be patient. Thank you and God bless.

 

[ActionableMango]

It sounds like you have a PC card in there instead of a Mac card. I don't think it is getting initialized because of the older operating system. The fix is probably to install Mountain Lion, not Snow Leopard.

I can't remember exactly where the cutoff is, but at some point MacOS started to init PC cards. I'm guessing Snow Leopard is before that time and Mountain Lion is after. So with Snow Leopard it is not initializing the card.

 

[orph]

10.7.1 is fairly old may be worth updating it on your laptop then re installing it in the macpro to see if it works then, with luck 10.7.5 may have better GPU support but as @ActionableMango mentioned osx10.8 may give you better luck.

 

[LarryD68]

It sounds like you have a PC card in there instead of a Mac card. I don't think it is getting initialized because of the older operating system. The fix is probably to install Mountain Lion, not Snow Leopard.

I can't remember exactly where the cutoff is, but at some point MacOS started to init PC cards. I'm guessing Snow Leopard is before that time and Mountain Lion is after. So with Snow Leopard it is not initializing the card.

Thank you.
Did trying to install sierra on Mac Pro have caused no video signal in first place?
I'm thinking of buying an Apple version of 9500 card.
[doublepost=1525368399][/doublepost]

10.7.1 is fairly old may be worth updating it on your laptop then re installing it in the macpro to see if it works then, with luck 10.7.5 may have better GPU support but as @ActionableMango mentioned osx10.8 may give you better luck.

Thank you.
Can Mac Pro 1,1 run OS X 10.8?

 

[ActionableMango]

Thank you.
Did trying to install sierra on Mac Pro have caused no video signal in first place?

No, Sierra did not break anything. I think you misunderstand my post. It is hard to explain, but here's my best effort:

You have, I assume, a PC card.

Video cards stay inactive until the point that they are "initialized" (started up). The Mac Pro has EFI that knows to init Mac video cards when the Mac Pro is powered up, long before the OS even loads. It doesn't do this for PC video cards, which is why your card always stays black--it never gets initialized.

At one point, Apple decided to have their MacOS GPU drivers also initialize graphics cards. This meant any graphics card supported by MacOS drivers, including PC cards, would initialize after the OS loaded the driver.

Snow Leopard was prior to that change, so your card is never initialized on Snow Leopard, and so your screen always stays back. Mountain Lion was after that change, so it does know to initialize your PC card, and that's why your card works there. Your card also works with Windows XP for the same reason it works with Mountain Lion...because Windows drivers initialize the card.

Your card, because it is a PC card (I assume), will only ever work with MacOS versions after that change.

So there are several possible ways around this problem:

• Run a more recent version of MacOS that inits the video card (like Mountain Lion did for you).
• Get a Mac Pro 1,1 compatible card.
• Install ATY_INIT (This is a third party KEXT that people used to init video cards prior to MacOS doing it... not sure it works with your model though. ATY_INIT was before my time and I don't know much about it.)

 

[LarryD68]

No, Sierra did not break anything. I think you misunderstand my post. It is hard to explain, but here's my best effort:

You have, I assume, a PC card.

Video cards stay inactive until the point that they are "initialized" (started up). The Mac Pro has EFI that knows to init Mac video cards when the Mac Pro is powered up, long before the OS even loads. It doesn't do this for PC video cards, which is why your card always stays black--it never gets initialized.

At one point, Apple decided to have their MacOS GPU drivers also initialize graphics cards. This meant any graphics card supported by MacOS drivers, including PC cards, would initialize after the OS loaded the driver.

Snow Leopard was prior to that change, so your card is never initialized on Snow Leopard, and so your screen always stays back. Mountain Lion was after that change, so it does know to initialize your PC card, and that's why your card works there. Your card also works with Windows XP for the same reason it works with Mountain Lion...because Windows drivers initialize the card.

Your card, because it is a PC card (I assume), will only ever work with MacOS versions after that change.

So there are several possible ways around this problem:

• Run a more recent version of MacOS that inits the video card (like Mountain Lion did for you).
• Get a Mac Pro 1,1 compatible card.
• Install ATY_INIT (This is a third party KEXT that people used to init video cards prior to MacOS doing it... not sure it works with your model though. ATY_INIT was before my time and I don't know much about it.)

Thank you all. You guys are the only ones to tell me what is wrong. I will use Final Cut Pro X 10 and Motion running Lion 10.7.5 on Mac Pro 1. Can you recommend a Mac graphic card that is compatible with all? Thank you. The PC GeForce 9500 was installed on Mac Pro so I was looking at Mac edition 9500.

 

[desisn.com]

install nvidia gpu drivers. this will most likely fix the problem. did you have no boot screen when the computer worked before? then the only problem is that you do not have the driver installed.

i think this driver should be it for 10.7.5
http://www.nvidia.com/object/macosx-295.00.05f03-driver.html

 

[LarryD68]

I have that driver downloaded. How do I install? I can only access the Mac Pro drive on my MacBook
[doublepost=1525646625][/doublepost]

install nvidia gpu drivers. this will most likely fix the problem. did you have no boot screen when the computer worked before? then the only problem is that you do not have the driver installed.

i think this driver should be it for 10.7.5
http://www.nvidia.com/object/macosx-295.00.05f03-driver.html

It worked! Youse guys are epic! Thanks soooo much!

 

[orph]

i think a GTX680 is a simple option, buy the pc one and flash it.
there cheep on ebay now, do a search for flash gtx680 or look at the nvida sticky
lots of info here too http://forum.netkas.org/