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

[MacUser2525]

whats mouse jump thing, explain plz, is it smth like screen shaking ?

The first thing that popped into my head when reading that was the mouse lag you get when running a Nvidia card like the 8800gt on a Hackintosh from the AppleUpstreamUserClient.kext for DRM that was added in 10.5.6 perhaps it rears its ugly head yet again here...

 

[medsource]

whats mouse jump thing, explain plz, is it smth like screen shaking ?

What I'm seeing is that the pointer jumps an unspecified distance every 1-2 seconds when dragging across the screen in the direction of motion.

Example: I put the pointer at the far left middle of the screen and begin to move it to the right at a constant pace. As the pointer moves, every so often it will jump further to the right by a seemingly random distance inline with my direction of motion (eg if I'm moving to the right then the jumps will also be to the right, left if moving left, up if moving up etc). This will happen about every 1-2 seconds while moving in any direction. It's kinda like a hiccup of sorts, sometimes its only a few pixels that it jumps, other times it's a good 20% of the screen distance. It does seem to jump larger distances when moving the pointer faster.

Again, this doesn't happen in XP Pro. I dunno if it's in the apple rom timings or clock speeds? Driver issue (I've tried both the #irc original version and the newer one posed on page 22)? I'm at a loss.

Again any input is appreciated.

 

[PatrikL]

I'm using 2x 4870 Sapphire's in my Mac Pro 8-core 2,8ghz right now.
But, the lower card gets warm and sounds pretty much.
Have anybody bought a aftermarket cooler for the 4870 to their mac pro?
Please tell me if you could recommend any.
I've been looking at Thermalright t-rad2 and Schyte mouseor (or something like that) but dont know wich one to choose.

//BR
Patrik

 

[zoppa]

whats mouse jump thing, explain plz, is it smth like screen shaking ?

My 10.5.6 MacPro (early 2008 +10.5.7beta driver) GUI (mouse movement) freezes every 2-4 seconds for some 1/10 s. On bootcamp Vista64 no probs like this.

@medsource: no fix or workaround yet

 

[jaberwocky]

What I'm seeing is that the pointer jumps an unspecified distance every 1-2 seconds when dragging across the screen in the direction of motion.

FYI, on my Sapphire 512 MB / custom ROM i can't see this Sorry for you.

Bye, jaberwocky

 

[skyhand]

ASUS Dark Knight 1GB 4870

I'm just awaiting the power cables from ATI for this card that I ordered from Newegg:

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814121291

I've never flashed a card before (nor have I ever flashed anyone in public, for that matter...) so hopefully I will avoid screw-ups and land upon a successful ROM to post here. Unless anyone's already beat me to the punch on this ASUS? Regardless, if someone wants the dumped, pre-tweaked ROM, let me know and I'll upload it when the cables arrive this week. FWIW, it's a pretty swanky looking card with piping that rivals tricked out Civics...

 

[gmontag]

xfx zddc 4870 card install

I am working on getting one these cards to work as posted by others. However, I am having issues with this card flickering under windows vista. I have been to XFX website and they have a new bios to flash the card with.

If I install the new bios and then flash the bios posted here that would put the flicker back in would it not? I was hoping to not have to do all the rom customizations.

I did find it neat that I can boot the system using the 2600 for OSX and have the 4870 work fine in windows.

I wanted to point the flicker issue since I have seen other posts about issues with the OEM ATI 4870 cards.

I am not sure about the power draw on this card but when I put it in my regular PC instead of a 8800 GTS the system will not boot.

 

[MacVidCards]

My original DIamond did originally flicker in Windows.

By merely changing the clockspeed by a few Hz, it would go away.

Weird...but it worked.

But yes, if you use a posted ROM here, it will replace the "flicker fixed" one you now have.

You should just build your own follwoing Pipolomo42's superb instructions out of your NEW rom.

 

[netkas]

What I'm seeing is that the pointer jumps an unspecified distance every 1-2 seconds when dragging across the screen in the direction of motion.

Example: I put the pointer at the far left middle of the screen and begin to move it to the right at a constant pace. As the pointer moves, every so often it will jump further to the right by a seemingly random distance inline with my direction of motion (eg if I'm moving to the right then the jumps will also be to the right, left if moving left, up if moving up etc). This will happen about every 1-2 seconds while moving in any direction. It's kinda like a hiccup of sorts, sometimes its only a few pixels that it jumps, other times it's a good 20% of the screen distance. It does seem to jump larger distances when moving the pointer faster.

Again, this doesn't happen in XP Pro. I dunno if it's in the apple rom timings or clock speeds? Driver issue (I've tried both the #irc original version and the newer one posed on page 22)? I'm at a loss.

Again any input is appreciated.

try to use another one dvi port

 

[gmontag]

When I flashed my XFX card they had an ati flash program that worked in windows. Having a windows version to flash the cards would make it easier to flash the cards. Not that booting a cd rom and typing one command is that hard but....

 

[medsource]

try to use another one dvi port

Hmmm, hadn't thought of that. I'll give it a whirl in a few (currently at work). However, isn't the DVI closest to the connector the dual link and the other is a single? Technically this shouldn't affect my monitor (24inch 1900x1200) right? Granted, I won't know until I test, but it's worth checking it out. Also, I'll try other screen resolutions on the primary port to see if that makes any difference.

Results to follow...

 

[medsource]

When I flashed my XFX card they had an ati flash program that worked in windows. Having a windows version to flash the cards would make it easier to flash the cards. Not that booting a cd rom and typing one command is that hard but....

I used this http://www.techpowerup.com/downloads/1364/Winflash_2.0.1.7.html (atiwinflash) to flash my card for the second time (did freedos method the first time) and it worked just fine. I did it via command line interface and the flash command was the same syntax as the regular atiflash just substituting atiwinflash for the app. Took longer to flash (2 min vs 2 sec) but it did work (for me at least).

 

[medsource]

try to use another one dvi port

No change in the mysterious mouse jumping issue. Changing resolutions also has no effect.

Is there a way to change the clock speeds for the os x side if that is the culprit? I know it's relatively easy to do on the PC side either with software or with modifying the rom file.

Thoughts?

 

[MacVidCards]

First find out if it fixes it in WIndows...easy enough to change for OS X if so. No sense bothering if it doesn't.

 

[zoppa]

First find out if it fixes it in WIndows...easy enough to change for OS X if so. No sense bothering if it doesn't.

I don't see the issue, I call it mouse freeze, when I boot to Vista64.
With the original ATI 2600 everythings fine in Leopard, too.
So it is definitely 4870 related.

 

[jjhny]

What cards work without problems

My Question;

What cards work without the mouse "jumping" problem and with both DVI ports operating and not freezing the machine when a second monitor is plugged in? Can those who have made it work just post the name and model of a working card (s)?

Does anyone have a card that works without problems? I would be happy with a standard 512 MB card - I don't care about crossfire or having 1 GB or 2GB or 50 GB of card memory - I would just like a card I know I can flash and that will work without endless problems.

Thanks in advance!

 

[medsource]

First find out if it fixes it in WIndows...easy enough to change for OS X if so. No sense bothering if it doesn't.

Like above, this mouse jump problem doesn't happen in XP Pro, nor does it happen with my 8800GT. Just the 4870 in OS X.

So are the clock speeds different in XP than in OS X? I'm guessing yes as they use different portions of the rom at boot time right?

I can see the speeds in XP Pro using the catalyst control center; but how do I find them in OS X? Is there a tool I should be using that I haven't stumbled upon yet?

If the clocks are different, then the card I have might hate the ones apple has chosen and this hatred is displayed as the mouse jump/hiccup (as I am using a 1gb variety and apples is a 512mb as just one of the diffs).

 

[BEIGE]

success - this card works:

https://www.bestdirect.ca/products/190316/21133-04-20R/SAPPHIRE/

1 GB Sapphire 21133-04-20R. Tested with some complex scenes in Maya/Mudbox for Mac and Cinebench. No errors. Only getting 2.5 link speed but I don't need dual link. Haven't tried a second monitor but I don't need that either.

Used winflash in Vista 64-bit since I already had it installed on this machine's boot camp drive.

No mouse jumping. QE and CoreImage supported. The only problem is that the heatsink screws on the bottom of the board are too big for the Nehalem Mac Pro. I had to use the ones from the Apple card so I'll have to get a replacement set of short screws.

 

[zoppa]

This one has mouse hiccups on both DVI ports. Second monitor and VGA not tested yet.

Sapphire HD4870 512 M GDDR5 PCI-E DUAL DVI-I/TVO
PN 288-10E85-030SA
SKU# 11133-03-20R

 

[jaberwocky]

This one has mouse hiccups on both DVI ports. Second monitor and VGA not tested yet.

Sapphire HD4870 512 M GDDR5 PCI-E DUAL DVI-I/TVO
PN 288-10E85-030SA
SKU# 11133-03-20R

I have exactly the same card and no mouse problems - so there must be some other differences!

Bye

 

[BConvery]

Beige, which ROM did you use? I just flashed the exact same card and can't wait to get home and try it. I used elvisizer's from page 19 of this thread.

 

[BEIGE]

I used the one from page 1 here. Should I have used the elvisizer? Will that enable dual-link?

Just curious - does lack of 5.0 GT/s affect gaming/realtime 3D performance?

 

[panzer06]

Will this work on early Mac Pro?

We have a 2.66 with 2x dual core Xeon 2.66 and the x1900. Can we buy a 3870 or 4870 for this system? Do these mods work on the older Mac Pro?

Cheers,

 

[BEIGE]

hmm - so any ideas how to get the link speed up to 5.0 GT/s for a 1 GB Sapphire and Nehalem Mac Pro?

 

[MacVidCards]

We have a 2.66 with 2x dual core Xeon 2.66 and the x1900. Can we buy a 3870 or 4870 for this system? Do these mods work on the older Mac Pro?

Cheers,

The beauty of the ATI cards is that they work on ALL Mac Pros ever made.

Easy to figure out.