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

[Ferrari904]

In regards to the Link Speed showing 2.5 GT/s. What do the official Apple 4870s report?

I'm getting 5.0 GT/s. I'm pretty close to ordering a 4870 X2.

 

[swissmann]

BEIGE and Ferrari904 - Are either one of you planning on selling your Apple 4870 then?

 

[BEIGE]

BEIGE and Ferrari904 - Are either one of you planning on selling your Apple 4870 then?

well if I can get the 1 GB working okay, I will. I don't need dual-link, just one DVI and no bugs.

 

[MacVidCards]

Good point.

If anyone is in the SoCal / Hollywood area and would like to TRADE a 1Gig card for an OEM Apple one, let me know.

I think there may still be things to learn from the OEM.

(A nice hi-res scan of back of card would also be nice)

 

[BConvery]

I have a 1 gig Sapphire card I've been trying to flash for a week. None of my friends have a PC that can even have this card installed. If anyone in the Bay Area (Norcal) can help I'd appreciate a PM.

TIA

Bob

 

[MacVidCards]

Bob,

You don't need a PC.

That 8 Meg FreeDOS download, a CD to burn it ont, and aBootcamp FAT32 partition are what you need.

 

[BConvery]

I'm positive its my fault....but I've tried a bunch of different DOS start up disks and I can't get them to boot up. I guess I need to get a windows (XP or Vista(ugh...)) system on the partition first.....

 

[jaberwocky]

Link Speed: 5.0 GT/s

that's on my Nehalem with 512 MB Radeon 4870 (I want a 1GB card - that's why I'm here). So am I right in seeing that everyone here is running their flashed cards at half the speed of my official one?

It depends on your Mac - my old MacPro 1,1 uses only PCI 1.1 - so max link speed is 2.5 GT/s. Newer ones have PCI 2 which doubles the possible link speed.

Bye, jaberwocky

 

[Ferrari904]

BEIGE and Ferrari904 - Are either one of you planning on selling your Apple 4870 then?

Sorry, I plan on doing Crossfire in Windows with my cards.

 

[netkas]

I just checked that PCI line with both of the 4870's I have here.

My original Diamond running the OEM ROM and the newer Diamond running a custom patched ROM.

Sure enough, the one that can run both screens doesn't have that incidence of the "no driver loaded" but the one that crashes on second DVI connect DOES have it.

I know that in the device tree each card exists as a parent and then as an "A" and a "B" where they two "children" are the two display channels. So for some reason, only one is lining up with the driver and the second is NOT.

Would be great if one or both of our geniuses could come by and have a look. I am sure it has something to do with that MDP nonsense.

I have developer tools on this, so if anyone wants an output from IO tree, or whatever, just say the word.

I have a feeling we may be on to the Dual Port solution !

I am a little concerned about the 2.5Gts thing. I have noticed that the 4870 doesn't bench any faster in OSX than a 9800GT/8800GTS while it screams past them in WIndows. I assumed it was immature OSX drivers.

We have to also remember that we are running these cards in an OS not specifically designed for them.

I am still hopeful that 10.5.7 will bring some changes.

EDIT: Tallest Skil just pointed out in another thread that 2.5GTs is throughput spec of PCIE 1.1 and 5.0 is 2.0.

So we may have yet ANOTHER clue.

If a 2.0 capable machine is running this card at 1.1 then obviously there are still things that driver can improve.

!IOreg )

 

[MacVidCards]

!IOreg )

I have saved three reports.

The one called "4870_Dual" is a Diamond 512 Meg 4870 running OEM Apple ROM that is running 2 @ DVI's

"4870Dual_Single" is the Dual capable board with just one display connected.

"4870single_only" is from a later Diamond board that needed a custom ROM and which crashes the Mac if a second display is plugged in.

These are the same exact cards which created the "PCI Cards" outputs some spaces up.

 

[rapids41]

I followed rhildinger's lead and purchased an XFX HD4870 1GB XXX Edition and used the ROM provided by him. Sleep works fine. Core Image is hardware accelerated and Quartz Extreme is supported. The full 1GB is being recognized. Link speed is at 2.5 GT/s (like everyone else's).

Thanks rhildinger, The Rominator, and netkas for your help! I look forward to OS X 10.5.7.

Great to know! I am reading here for some time and thinking to buy this card too.
Only thing which hold me back is the noise level. Can u tell me how noisy this card is?
Do you here them in 2D? Or should i get a 8800GT when I dont really need the extra performance?
Bye the way did you testet 2 Screens on it? (1920x1200 and 1620x1000 for example)
Greetz Michael

 

[jeanlain]

It depends on your Mac - my old MacPro 1,1 uses only PCI 1.1 - so max link speed is 2.5 GT/s. Newer ones have PCI 2 which doubles the possible link speed.

Bye, jaberwocky

Good point. It may be that flashed 4870s run in PCIe 1.1 mode, enven in PCI-E 2.0 Mac Pros, which would not make a difference in older Mac Pros.

 

[netkas]

Rominator, the idea is to insert binimage from dual-dvi capable card to a dual-dvi not capable card, using natit. See, your diamond512 has rom from apple - binimage in ioreg matches apple's too - dual dvi works.
another example from osx86, if 4870 has own binimage in ioreg - it's not capable for dual dvi, once we insert apple's binimage for it - dual dvi works(without reflashing).

p.s. binimage - is a dump of pc bios part in ioreg, for specific card.

 

[BEIGE]

It's merged and ready to go, but 512Mb versions only. It should actually work for the guy in quote below.

I thought the 1GB cards work as well. Do they need a different modified EFI than the 512? I don't care about dual-link or multiple monitors.

 

[johnjobs]

10a286

Has someone testet a flashed 4870 with the latest SL Build? My 2600xt works fine(and fast ) but with the 4870 I can´t boot into SL that I have installed with my 2600xt I cant´t also boot the SL-DVD with a installed 4870, only what I get is the grey Startup Screen.

Bye

 

[v0n]

I thought the 1GB cards work as well. Do they need a different modified EFI than the 512? I don't care about dual-link or multiple monitors.

I meant more of a - I'm not sure if 1Gb cards with same SKU as 512Mb cards in Europe are actually identical boards. Tell you what - dump your rom first, save it somewhere, then try my rom. If it doesn't work, we'll make one with Toxic clock values from scratch in a jiffy.

 

[Spikelite]

I made the wonderful choice to leap head first without looking. I did however call Apple tech support (NEVER AGAIN) and they told me any ATI 4870 would work (lies...).

I have never flashed a card and am terrified at the prospect of doing so but I am going to give it a try.

I got the Sapphire 4870 1GB TOXIC card.
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...Tpk=14-102-815
PN: 288-20E85-T305A
SKU: 11133-14

It has the dual 6 pin power connectors so should be fine there. I am just wondering if anyone has already tried this card and found it to work or not.

If I don't hear anything an EE friend and I are going to muck around with it and see what we can do. I will let you know how it goes.

*crosses fingers*


If it works I may also write a step by step for noobs write up on how to do this for this card and possibly others that use the same steps.


Also would someone mind re-hosting the drivers somewhere not on IRC? Unfortunately I can not get to any IRC channels from where I am at due to network policies and I would like to be able to test the card once I flash it.

Update: I think I am missing something and I have yet to get hands on about this. But would anyone be interested in holding my hand for the backup of the ROM currently on the card? I downloaded GPU-Z But it looks like a GUI app and I more expected it to be a CLI app. How does one use this to pull the ROM? If this is a stupid question feel free to note so and I will poke at it more.

 

[v0n]

Update: I think I am missing something and I have yet to get hands on about this. But would anyone be interested in holding my hand for the backup of the ROM currently on the card? I downloaded GPU-Z But it looks like a GUI app and I more expected it to be a CLI app. How does one use this to pull the ROM? If this is a stupid question feel free to note so and I will poke at it more.

 

[Spikelite]

OK I feel wonderfully stupid right about now.

Anyhow I did that and I found some giant ass block letters saying that the power supplies were not hooked up correctly. I will have to figure out why it isn't getting enough power.

I dumped the ROM using the button notated above and it dumped it to a .bin file I assume this is correct but being a complete novice I figured it doesn't hurt to ask.

I will post the ROM I get off of it once I have one that doesn't include you are a noob power me better in the first 10 lines.

 

[aconu]

I try to flash this card :
Gainward HD 4870 1024MB Golden Sample - 1 Go DVI/HDMI/DisplayPort - PCI Express (ATI Radeon HD 4870).

One big advantage of this model is the double BIOS, you can switch from normal bios to overclocked bios with a button on the back. If you failed a flash, you can switch to "backup" BIOS and save the card.

I flash it with standard Apple ROM : failure (endless reboot).

Then, i use pipomolo42 method to build a custom BIOS, and i got mixed results. When the mac boot with a display attached to DVI, the screen goes grey, then i can see the black apple (but i don't see the moving progress circle, and i see only grey when i use the alt key at boot). As soon as the window server start, the display goes to sleep mode. The window server is not crashed, i have access to remote desktop.

With a saphire custom ROM, the DVI-D work if i plug the HDMI-DVI adapter on HDMI port. And no image on display port.

I continue my tests.

 

[MacVidCards]

OK I feel wonderfully stupid right about now.

Anyhow I did that and I found some giant ass block letters saying that the power supplies were not hooked up correctly. I will have to figure out why it isn't getting enough power.

I dumped the ROM using the button notated above and it dumped it to a .bin file I assume this is correct but being a complete novice I figured it doesn't hurt to ask.

I will post the ROM I get off of it once I have one that doesn't include you are a noob power me better in the first 10 lines.

All the ROMs have that warning inside.

It is what will flash onscreen if you don't have power connected.

 

[Spikelite]

OK,

Well I got the ROM out (I hope). Here it is. This is the standard ROM on the Sapphire 4870 TOXIC 1GB

PN: 288-20E85-T305A
SKU: 11133-14

RV770.bin


Using the fixrom.py script here is the mashed up ROM. I still have not tested this and can not do so until I get the drivers. Note that I cant get them via IRC due to some network policies where I currently am.

mac-toxic-4870GB.rom


I will let you all know how it goes.

Update: I am thinking this did not go as planned. The GFX card is still working in the PC tower I was using to flash it, I was under the impression that this would no longer work. Here is the output of atiflash.

atiflash.exe -p -fs -fp 0 C:\mac4870.rom
Old SSID: 0051
New SSID: 0051
Old P/N: 113-AX89100-100
New P/N: 113-AX89100-100
Old DeviceID: 9440
New DeviceID: 9440
Old Product Name: TXOFF2 WEKIVA RV770 B50701 BOARD
New Product Name: TXOFF2 WEKIVA RV770 B50701 BOARD
Old BIOS Version: 011.012.000.002.000000
New BIOS Version: 011.012.000.002.000000
Flash type: PM25LV010
20000/20000h bytes programmed
20000/20000h bytes verified

 

[pastrychef]

I still have not tested this and can not do so until I get the drivers. Note that I cant get them via IRC due to some network policies where I currently am.

Here you go: http://www.sendspace.com/file/gvsi12

 

[Spikelite]

I do not know if this is running properly but it is running. I am going to hold off on posting all my steps until I get home and can test it in my '09 MacPro but it is working in this older MacPro.

Sadly it is not making a 5.0 link but that could be the nature of the motherboard on this machine rather then the card. I will take another screen shot when I get home.

Here is what the card is:

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814102815
SAPPHIRE 100243-1GTXSR Radeon HD 4870 1GB 256-bit GDDR5 PCI Express 2.0 x16 HDCP Ready CrossFire Supported Video Card - Retail
Toxic Edition

PN: 288-20E85-T305A
SKU: 11133-14


Working/Installed ROM: mac-toxic-4870GB.rom
Drivers: http://www.sendspace.com/file/gvsi12


Update: Problem detected in this older MacPro. When I connect a screen to the second DVI port I no longer get anything from either port. Also I do not know if it is running dual-link DVI or not as these screens at work suck. This wont be an issue for me as I plan on using this card as the master card for my 25.5" screen and using the GT120 that came with my MacPro as a slave for my 22" screen. However this could be an issue for others.

Update: I got the second port working thru voodoo magic. However now if you connect a second DVI cable you get a nice happy kernel panic.