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Scored a Mac Pro for $50

A

applereviewguy

macrumors regular
Original poster
Aug 22, 2011
117
0
Pretty great deal, even though it is a 1,1. Currently doesn't boot, they aren't sure if it is the logic board or the video card. If it is the video card, I will be doing:

-16GB RAM
-2xX5365's (3.0GHz 8 Core)
-7950 (PC Card, flashed)

If not, I'll be gutting it and putting my Hackintosh inside of it. I'll hopefully do it cut free if I do a case mod.

Picking it up tomorrow from a crime investigation lab, lets hope it's just a fried GPU!
 
Congratulations, man. A lot of people will tell you "The 1,1 isn't worth it!" but anything that can output that much power for $50 is an incredible find. I grabbed my 1,1 for $70 a few months ago, dead video card. If you need a quick fix, try the video card in another machine (it will work in PCs totally fine) and see if it's shot. I used the oven trick on mine just yesterday and it's fully functional again. If you don't have another PC, just yank the video card and see if it boots up headless.

I wouldn't go with the X5365s, they're way too expensive for the very slight performance boost they give over X5355s (3GHz vs 2.66GHz). You can pick up a pair of the X5355s on Ebay for around $50.

Good luck with your troubleshooting, I hope it's a heck of a find for you.
-N
 
You can also throw in any off the shelf Geforce card without flashing and it will work (minus boot screen), which is quite handy.
 
NOTNlCE said:
Congratulations, man. A lot of people will tell you "The 1,1 isn't worth it!" but anything that can output that much power for $50 is an incredible find. I grabbed my 1,1 for $70 a few months ago, dead video card. If you need a quick fix, try the video card in another machine (it will work in PCs totally fine) and see if it's shot. I used the oven trick on mine just yesterday and it's fully functional again. If you don't have another PC, just yank the video card and see if it boots up headless.

I wouldn't go with the X5365s, they're way too expensive for the very slight performance boost they give over X5355s (3GHz vs 2.66GHz). You can pick up a pair of the X5355s on Ebay for around $50.

Good luck with your troubleshooting, I hope it's a heck of a find for you.
-N
Click to expand...
Yeah, I'll test the GPU in my Hackintosh, to see if that is the problem. I have a few spare video cards, and the 6870 works in Mac Pro's, just no boot screen. I'll most likely give this to my dad for fathers day. He is currently using a 20" iMac G5 with 512MB of RAM, and it is ridiculously slow. He does (tries to do) AutoCAD work, and hopefully the Mac Pro will be great for him if I can get it working.

I'll be picking it up in about 2 hours, wish me luck!
 
A 6870 can even be flashed with a boot screen, especially if you have a Hackintosh with Windoze to do it. I think there is even an OS X utility to do it now. For sure a 1,1 - especially with those upgrades - is going to destroy any PowerPC in high-intensity work like AutoCAD. Again good luck! Can't wait to hear the results!
 
NOTNlCE said:
A 6870 can even be flashed with a boot screen, especially if you have a Hackintosh with Windoze to do it. I think there is even an OS X utility to do it now. For sure a 1,1 - especially with those upgrades - is going to destroy any PowerPC in high-intensity work like AutoCAD. Again good luck! Can't wait to hear the results!
Click to expand...

Just got home about an hour ago. Computer is really nice. No RAM yet, but I put a 6870 in the computer, and when I pressed the power button the white light showed up on the front. Does that mean that it will work once I throw some RAM into it?
 
applereviewguy said:
Just got home about an hour ago. Computer is really nice. No RAM yet, but I put a 6870 in the computer, and when I pressed the power button the white light showed up on the front. Does that mean that it will work once I throw some RAM into it?
Click to expand...

If you get the white light it means your power supply is working ok.
Did the machine post ? did you hear a chime ?
Also you may want to check the diagnostics leds on the backplane board to see if everything is ok with it.

Good luck !
 
shindom said:
If you get the white light it means your power supply is working ok.
Did the machine post ? did you hear a chime ?
Also you may want to check the diagnostics leds on the backplane board to see if everything is ok with it.

Good luck !
Click to expand...

Didn't hear a chime, didn't have a video card in it, and it had no RAM. I'll check for the lights
 
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