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

[Moop]

Well my card arrived today and within 30 minutes i had it flashed and working!!

Its a sapphire 4870 512mb card. Had better luck looking on ebay because i was able to actually see photos of the card. The card is the reference design with 'AMD' written on the board.

SKU# 21133-00-20R

I created my own rom using the instructions here and flashed it quite quickly using this method.

The card works like a charm. The fan is controlled by the system, bootcamp works, QE and CI are supported and the system sleeps and wakes up properly (using 10.6.1). I cant try dual displays as i only have one at the moment.

Oddly enough system profiler doesnt report any displays connected.

Anyhow, thanks to the people who made this all possible

 

[MacVidCards]

Can you please post and attach the working ROM for future readers?

Great to hear of your success !!

 

[frontsidebus]

can anyone post a link to purchase a flashable card in the US?

 

[Moop]

Can you please post and attach the working ROM for future readers?

Great to hear of your success !!

Sure can.

Ive attached the rom to this post.

Exact details of card (as printed on a green sticker on the side of the box)

HD4870 512M GDDR5 PCI-E DUAL DVI-I/TVO
PN 102-B50701-10-AT
SKU# 21133-00-20R

 

[FireArse]

Hi

can anyone tell me if i need both power cables as i have a 8800gt in and want to put 4870 in but dont have second cable. or could i loop the cable to both plugs

as a note
here are zdfc in uk

http://www.videocardshop.co.uk/prod...03-0UTCQS@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@&prodid=HD-487A-ZDFC

I want to thank gsxrq a great deal for the above - I purchased what was linked (a ZDFC card) and it works 100%. The fan is far better than the ZWFL and better still, the ROM posted works 100%.

A big thanks to all who've made this possible - you've saved me over £180!

FireArse

 

[gsxrq]

No problem

nice when we get a break and it all works !!!

as a note : hdmi audio works a treat on this card in windows 7 plugged into
sony 2400es full 7.1
if only os x had that capability!! but out of 8gb ram windows will only use 1.99gb good old ms
still don't need anymore for WAW

 

[bobpensik]

Thanks for all the great info everyone! I have been looking for a new graphics card and thought I was stuck paying over $400 CAD for the Apple version of the ATI 4870.

Just a few questions...

Should I buy this ATI 4870 (XFX 1GB ZHFC) for $180

or is this a better buy ATI 4890 (XFX 1GB ZDFC) for $200

If I purchase either of those cards I would use the above mentioned method to flash the card link and I assume I will also need 2 ofthese power cables??

or am I just better (or the same off) buying this card eBay ATI 4870 1GB flashed for use in Mac Pro


Once the card is flashed and working on my Mac Pro is it business as normal?? What I mean is do I have to worry about future OS X updates (10.6.2, 10.6.3, etc..) messing up the card?? or is it a non-issue

Thanks

 

[MacVidCards]

Don't buy it from those Circus Clowns at Applemecanix.

Buy the ZHFC and flash it yourself.

Order the cables from ATI.

Now that there is a way to flash in OSX, there really is NO REASON not to do it yourself.

 

[MacVidCards]

Hi,

For your info, I just managed to flash a PC 4870 card with a Mac/EFI bios using Mac OS X only. No Bootcamp, no Windows or FreeDOS, no FAT partition.

I detailed my steps here : http://boeglin.org/blog/index.php?entry=entry090918-031702

So, any chance that this same method could be used with the Nvidia 7300GT updater to make an Nvidia OSX flasher?

 

[bobpensik]

Don't buy it from those Circus Clowns at Applemecanix.

Buy the ZHFC and flash it yourself.

Order the cables from ATI.

Now that there is a way to flash in OSX, there really is NO REASON not to do it yourself.

Can't get the cables from ATI, whenever I click on their Canadian Store it doesn't work

Leaning toward the 4890 as the flash is supposed to work on it as well, and I figure I might as well get the best card I can

 

[matthew.russo]

Can't get the cables from ATI, whenever I click on their Canadian Store it doesn't work

Leaning toward the 4890 as the flash works on it, and I figure I might as well get the best card I can

Hmm wait till someone gets their hands on a 5870

 

[bobpensik]

I've located two 4870 1gb cards and I'm trying to decide which one to buy. One is a ZHFC and one is a ZHDC. From reading this thread I can see that both are flashable and work well. Are there any benefits or drawbacks to either type? Which one should I get?

Thanks!

I'm curious about the answer to this as well.


I think I'll go with the 4870 because reading the other 4890 thread people are having issues with the XFX 4890 ZDFC card

 

[macz1]

I have a flashed Gainward 4870 Golden Sample which worked fine so far in Leopard, but after the upgrade to Snow Leopard I can't get any VGA signal out of it anymore...
I see the boot menu and the grey apple at startup, but when the system finishes loading the monitor switches to energy save mode. Does anybody know a solution to this problem?

UPDATE: Using VNC I can see that the card is perfectly recognized in the system profiler but it says that no monitors are connected...

 

[Kaimuki]

X8 Only ???? Please Help

I wanted to know if anybody could help me out here,
I have a first generation Mac Pro and the XFX card that I flashed is running
@ X8 speed I would like the card to run at the full X16 speed.

Rominator I checked out the card and nothing is broken or missing,
I was thinking that maybe my I have to many items installed on my computer.
I the VGA XFX|HD-487A-ZHDC HD4870 1G DDR5 card and the 7300GT card
installed, 12gigs of ram, 2=250gig Western Digital hard drives in raid 0 configuration for OS, and 2= 1TB hard drives for media. I also have the adapter from OWC for 2 extra esata ports connected to 2 external hardrives.

I was thinking that maybe the power supply cannot provide enough power ??? or is there anything else that I am missing. When I select the X16 in the expansion slot utility then the XFX card is not recognized by Snow Leopard and the card will not display anything at all ???

I would prefer to use this card but if not I guess I will be forced to purchase the APPLE 4870

Mahalo,

 

[kushari]

help

Can somone help me i have a XFX ATI 4870 ZWFC. i tried pipos method but when it restarted i get a weird colored pink and green stripped screen and the apple sound keeps repeating half way though. I am thinking of reflashing it back to pc and then reflashing it if anyone can help make a rom file to use this method.
http://boeglin.org/blog/index.php?entry=entry090918-031702

Attached is my pc rom

 

[dmd.]

hi,

my sapphire is on its way and i was wondering if any of you guys already did a custom driver for the

Sapphire Radeon HD4870, 1GB GDDR5, 2x DVI, HDCP, PCI-E 2.0, CrossfireX
(21133-04-40R)

?

if you could provide me the driver that would be greatly appreciated. also, i am running two displays (30" and 19"). has anyone tested that?

cheers and thanks in advance

 

[symbspid]

baffled

Hi, was wondering if anyone could help me out here. For some reason this has been giving me a whole lot of trouble.

I have a 2006 mac pro, with snow leopard installed. I bought an XFX card to use, but they were sold out of the one I needed, and it ended up not working, so I returned it and purchased a Sapphire card. I bought the exact card listed on this page and followed the instructions that were given. I bought the same card and used the same rom and it didn't work. I then tried to make my own bios using pipomolo's method and it still wouldn't work. I have tried multiple ways of flashing with multiple bios with varying results.

Currently I can boot the computer using the bios I made, but the 4870 card only displays a black screen. I have to plug the display into the nvidia 7300 to get a picture. I am no longer getting an error that says the power cables are unplugged, but I still have no picture out of the 4870 card. I can upload the bios I have tried if necessary, but right now I have no idea where I went wrong.

Thanks in advance for any help.

 

[symbspid]

hi,

my sapphire is on its way and i was wondering if any of you guys already did a custom driver for the

Sapphire Radeon HD4870, 1GB GDDR5, 2x DVI, HDCP, PCI-E 2.0, CrossfireX
(21133-04-40R)

?

if you could provide me the driver that would be greatly appreciated. also, i am running two displays (30" and 19"). has anyone tested that?

cheers and thanks in advance

I bought the same card, with the intention of using this tutorial, but it hasn't worked for me. The bios download is linked there so if you have better luck let me know.

 

[dmd.]

I bought the same card, with the intention of using this tutorial, but it hasn't worked for me. The bios download is linked there so if you have better luck let me know.

will do. i was hoping to not need to create my own rom, but i guess i'll have to use windows for the backup dump anyway.
my power cables should arrive this week, i'll let you know how it all went. here's to hoping i will be able to drive both of my monitors

 

[WaTTz]

Interesting discovery

Hey Guys,

After reading the thread, I was able to repeat the mouse jumping problem and make it go away. Currently, I'm using 2 Radeon 4870's (XFX HD-487A-ZDFC + ATI oem 1GB) that are split with 2 PCI-E splitters from the motherboard of my 2008 Mac Pro. I flashed them using the instructions and rhildinger’s ROM from http://web.me.com/jacobcroft/4870Flash/4870Flash.html

The main is the XFX 4870 using 2 Samsung T240 and 2 Acer X243w on the 2nd oem 4870. All 4 are at 1920x1200.

Now get this, when all 4 monitors are running the mouse moves ok. However, when 1 or 2 Acer's are off (undetected or power off) then the mouse skips around like mad. The same problem occurs in 10.5.8 and 10.6.1. On Bootcamp, no skipping at all.

I read earlier it had something to do with the brand of monitor. The problem is that I don't need to use ALL 4 monitors most of the time and turning any of them off will make the mouse jump. I also use a HDMI splitter on the 2nd monitor and that also causes more mouse jumping even when all 4 are on.

Is there something wrong with the ROM I'm using? I couldn't figure out how to create my own rom so I'm stuck. If anyone has some other ROM's I can try out then it would be really appreciated.

 

[matthew.russo]

Whether it provides any clarification or not.. I run two Apple OEM 4870s with 3 monitors and get exactly the same issue described. I think it is more of an OS problem rather then a flashed card problem.

 

[WaTTz]

That's strange. I used Vista SP2 Ultimate on Bootcamp and the mouse was smooth. Rather it seemed even smoother than ever!

Everything worked fine until Windoze bluescreened (didn't catch the error code) What I'm stumped on is why different monitors skip the mouse. If it's a Mac OS issue then does modifying the ROM even relevant at all...

 

[welcher]

Calibrating XFX 4870?

Has anyone tried calibrating one of these non-Apple 4870s? I've got a super old original Spyder and Colorvision Optical software which has run fine with my old X1900.

I ran it with the 4870 yesterday, and the profile was a disaster. Not just a little off, but psychadelic colors off. Looking at the profile in colorsync, the color space is like 1/20th the size of a profile I made with my x1900. Clearly wrong.

Anyone tried calibrating and had success? I'm hoping it's just my ancient calibration hardware and software.

 

[folp02]

hi all -

i'm a complete noob at this flashing business, couldn't find my way around terminal to save my life. that said, i'm itchin to try this on the 4890 for macPro 3.1. so i'm asking for help. what i'd like to do is use this method, http://boeglin.org/blog/index.php?en...y090918-031702 , it seems the easiest. i tried the initial step to see if i could load the kext in terminal, but i got a command not found for kextutil. and i'm lost after that...if anyone could provide clearer, more elaborate steps, i would be most grateful!

on the other hand, swissman's method (http://web.me.com/jacobcroft/4870Flash/4870Flash.html) sounds promising and more in line with what i feel comfortable doing, but has anyone tried it for the 4890?



thanks!

mike

 

[Cindori]

hi all -

i'm a complete noob at this flashing business, couldn't find my way around terminal to save my life. that said, i'm itchin to try this on the 4890 for macPro 3.1. so i'm asking for help. what i'd like to do is use this method, http://boeglin.org/blog/index.php?en...y090918-031702 , it seems the easiest. i tried the initial step to see if i could load the kext in terminal, but i got a command not found for kextutil. and i'm lost after that...if anyone could provide clearer, more elaborate steps, i would be most grateful!

on the other hand, swissman's method (http://web.me.com/jacobcroft/4870Flash/4870Flash.html) sounds promising and more in line with what i feel comfortable doing, but has anyone tried it for the 4890?
mike

Actually Im working on a way to avoid all the newb-unfriendly stuff.

https://forums.macrumors.com/threads/713428/

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