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

Race to dump the 4870 ROM, Who's first?

Hi Guys i know this is a old Thread.

But ive just managed to get my ATI 4870 working in the my Mac pro 1.1 but something strange is happening. I used the instructions on page 14 on how to create a mac rom from the pc firmware.

Now heres the odd bit.

It will only boot in slot 2 with with the pcie system config set at x1 if you change it to 8 it refuses to be seen. If you stick it in slot 1 at it runs at x16 it cant be seen.

I know slots 1 and 2 work as i still have the old nv7300 and been testing.

Ive also tested other mac roms, again it wont work in slot 1 or at full speed.

Any thought people?
 
Could anybody (or Cindori) please help modifying my Sapphire Radeon HD4890 Vapor-X 1G GDDR5

PN 288-1E-115-020SA
SKU#11150-05
MACPro 3.1 Lion 10.7.3

I tried several ROMs, Zeus and XYZ to get the ROM file, but it doesn't work. I always get the information: Flash aborted! Possible cause: Rom already identical to card firmware or card simply not compatible with Zeus.

My original ROM
 

Attachments

  • RV790.bin.zip
    47.1 KB · Views: 140
juos said:
Could anybody (or Cindori) please help modifying my Sapphire Radeon HD4890 Vapor-X 1G GDDR5

PN 288-1E-115-020SA
SKU#11150-05
MACPro 3.1 Lion 10.7.3

I tried several ROMs, Zeus and XYZ to get the ROM file, but it doesn't work. I always get the information: Flash aborted! Possible cause: Rom already identical to card firmware or card simply not compatible with Zeus.

My original ROM
Click to expand...

Try this.
4890 need patch to run openGL on 10.7.3.
patch for 10.7.3
 

Attachments

  • 4890mac.bin.zip
    95.1 KB · Views: 117
I've just got a XFX Radeon 4870 512 MB (Part # HD-487A-YDFC) and I'd like to flash it and use it in my Mac Pro 1,1

tried making my own EFI ROM, but I got the following:
OSX-Leopard:~ admin$ cd desktop
OSX-Leopard:desktop admin$ dd if=4870.ROM of=efi.part bs=1 skip=63488 count=49152
49152+0 records in
49152+0 records out
49152 bytes transferred in 0.342599 secs (143468 bytes/sec)
OSX-Leopard:desktop admin$ blocknum=`printf %d "'\`dd if=pc4870.rom bs=1 skip=2 count=1 2>/dev/null\`"`
OSX-Leopard:desktop admin$ size=$(($blocknum * 512))
OSX-Leopard:desktop admin$ dd if=efi.part of=pc4870.rom bs=$size seek=1 conv=notrunc
dd: bs must be between 1 and 2147483647
OSX-Leopard:desktop admin$ python fixrom.py pc4870.rom pc4870.rom
Traceback (most recent call last):
File "fixrom.py", line 103, in <module>
f=file(sys.argv[1])
IOError: [Errno 2] No such file or directory: 'pc4870.rom'

any ideas what I'm missing ?
Thanks !
 
Last edited:
^^^  (cmd) + I on pc4870.rom file and see if it doesn't have .bin extension (or else). If so, delete this what is after .rom.
And last command should look like this:

Code: 
python fixrom.py pc4870.rom Mac4870.rom

where "Mac4870.rom" will be your hybrid rom.

...or just try to use Zeus ;)
 
Help!

I got my 4870 card's rom, attached, and zeus says it has to be patched manually.

It has a beginning hex of 55 AA 80 E9

I have been trying to figure it out, but I need help. Can anyone give me a rom with efi that I can flash my card with?

My card is an ASUS EAH4870 Darknight 1GB

device id is 0x9440

Thanks
 

Attachments

  • RV770.bin.zip
    46.4 KB · Views: 115
melchior said:
I got my 4870 card's rom, attached, and zeus says it has to be patched manually.

It has a beginning hex of 55 AA 80 E9

I have been trying to figure it out, but I need help. Can anyone give me a rom with efi that I can flash my card with?

My card is an ASUS EAH4870 Darknight 1GB

device id is 0x9440

Thanks
Click to expand...

Yeah, I tried to help Cindori with the "80" length cards but we had a communication breakdown and I wasn't able to help him.

Try this one, should work fine.
 

Attachments

  • MRV770.rom.zip
    93.9 KB · Views: 144
melchior said:
Thanks! That worked great!
Click to expand...

Asus ROMs are tricky...for some unknown reason they leave a tiny floating piece of dreck at the end of 1st BIOS portion.

Artificially inflates size and makes them a nuisance for EFI addition.

Still glad to do "Pro Bono" stuff for the community.
 
Hi all,

Just flashed my XFX 1GB 4870 - and it works perfectly, other than a LOT of tearing on dock magnification, and a few other places. Scrolling works fine, moving most windows is fine - but the dock is really noticable.

NB - I installed the "patch" for the OpenGL, but made no difference.
 
plasmarox said:
Hi all,

Just flashed my XFX 1GB 4870 - and it works perfectly, other than a LOT of tearing on dock magnification, and a few other places. Scrolling works fine, moving most windows is fine - but the dock is really noticable.

NB - I installed the "patch" for the OpenGL, but made no difference.
Click to expand...

First thing with the XFX is you don't want the ZWFC model, those are really troublesome, and should be avoided (egg shaped cooler). You shouldn't need to install any patch for flashed 4870's, so something sounds odd.
 
I installed the patch because someone above said their 4890 needed the patch to run opengl properly, and I thought my issue may be due to opengl, due to poor scoring on Xbench (i know xbench is rubbish, just had it installed.
 
plasmarox said:
I installed the patch because someone above said their 4890 needed the patch to run opengl properly, and I thought my issue may be due to opengl, due to poor scoring on Xbench (i know xbench is rubbish, just had it installed.
Click to expand...

4870 and 4890 have different device id's.

So by fixing a problem that didn't exist, you create a new one.

The "shotgun" approach rarely works with computers.
 
MacVidCards said:
4870 and 4890 have different device id's.

So by fixing a problem that didn't exist, you create a new one.

The "shotgun" approach rarely works with computers.
Click to expand...


Point taken. However, is there anything I can do which will resolve my problem? I have the ZWFL 1GB card. I did not purchase this card specifically for this purpose, I purchased it a couple of years ago for my gaming PC. I upgraded to a 6850 today and wanted to repurpose my 4870 - seems a shame to let a good card go to waste.
 
plasmarox said:
Point taken. However, is there anything I can do which will resolve my problem? I have the ZWFL 1GB card. I did not purchase this card specifically for this purpose, I purchased it a couple of years ago for my gaming PC. I upgraded to a 6850 today and wanted to repurpose my 4870 - seems a shame to let a good card go to waste.
Click to expand...

Your 4870 ZWFL probably won't find a usage in your mac pro - it appears to be pretty close to the ZWFC, which has always been troublesome in os x. Your best bet is probably to try and sell it and get back some of what you paid, or trade it to someone for another card - i'd imagine you could find ways for it to work if you devoted enough time, but with how many other choices there are, it's probably just not worth it.
 
A pity. Could you recommend the XFX card that would be ideal for flashing? There is a ridiculous number of cards available!
 
The XFX 1 GB 4870 that uses the reference fan assembly were ironically the BEST 4870s to flash.

They were the only ones to have working Dual Display in 10.5.7 and 10.5.8. All of the other 4870s would hard crash the system with a 2nd display connected in those OS's.

This is why it was such a switcheroo for the WORST flash able 4870s to also come from XFX.

They had model numbers like ZDDC or ZDFC.
 
MacVidCards said:
The XFX 1 GB 4870 that uses the reference fan assembly were ironically the BEST 4870s to flash.

They were the only ones to have working Dual Display in 10.5.7 and 10.5.8. All of the other 4870s would hard crash the system with a 2nd display connected in those OS's.

This is why it was such a switcheroo for the WORST flash able 4870s to also come from XFX.

They had model numbers like ZDDC or ZDFC.
Click to expand...

That's interesting. I'm running 10.7.4 on a Mac Pro 1,1, with upgraded processors and firmware (so software and EFI-wise a Mac Pro2,1), so which XFX card gives the best results?
 
Code: 
The XFX 1 GB 4870 that uses the reference fan assembly were ironically the BEST 4870s to flash.

Do you have the ZDxx code for this model?
 
Any ZD** model should work just fine. Just make sure you use the 1GB ROM. I believe they all use the reference fan.

ZW's are the troubled ones.

I think Y-models are 512MB's.
 
Hi there,
this is a very old thread, but I need to flash a 4870. its a ZHDC (XFX). I searched for a long time now, but there was no bios for this card. I found out, that its gonna work (an user wrote that), but there is no modded BIOS available.

So could anyone be so kind and add this EFI part to my BIOS? :) would be a great help for me!


Michi
 

Attachments

  • RV770.zip
    44.7 KB · Views: 122
I just saw, that there is this zeus tool for mac, and its just a matter of seconds to update the bios, unfortunately, ive got a pc only.
so maybe someone with a mac...? :)
thx
 
I was wondering if one flashes the reference cards with OEM apple 4870.rom will the card run at 5.0 GT/s? Also has there been any progress to getting the flashed cards running at full PCI speed?
 
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