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The Golden Guide to Flashing Graphic Cards

panjandrum said:
Thanks, I'll give it a shot when I can find the time!

Is there a disk image available for download everywhere with all of this already setup? It seems crazy for everyone to rebuild this from scratch each time...
Click to expand...

Here is a link to a copy of Ultimate Boot CD 4.1.1, including ATIFlash and a collection of 4870 and 4890 ROMs (taken from this thread).
http://www.mediafire.com/?nv7tqn98azaj6na.

Follow the screenshot examples from http://web.me.com/jacobcroft/4870Flash/4870Flash.html (uses the same version of UBCD).

Remember that to navigate in DOS:
cd .. (changes directory to go backward)
cd xyz (changes directory to xyz going forward)
dir/w (displays contents of directory)
 
apple_iBoy said:
Here is a link to a copy of Ultimate Boot CD 4.1.1, including ATIFlash and a collection of 4870 and 4890 ROMs (taken from this thread).)
Click to expand...

Thank you! I can't believe it but I finally have a 4890 card which is now nominally functional in OSX. I get the power warning and I don't have any screen acceleration at all yet, but as of 30 minutes ago I actually have a picture! Yeah.

Thanks too for the iso file, it helped a lot. But, take a look at your image. The ATIFlash executable and support file are 0 bytes. I didn't notice this at first so my first burn didn't work. I downloaded the latest version and replaced them on the iso file and then burned and everything worked properly.
 
Cindori said:
The Golden Guide to Flashing Graphic Cards

However, since no OSX stuff will run with the PC card, the Bootloader (the list of OS you get when holding alt / option button at boot) will not be accessable when using a PC card. You must select windows in Startup Disk in system preferences
Click to expand...


I would like to buy the new 6870 and I have the HD 2600. If I have them both connected, am I able to boot into OS X with the 6870 connected? Will it use the 2600 in OS and the 6870 in Windows?
 
Bosma said:
I would like to buy the new 6870 and I have the HD 2600. If I have them both connected, am I able to boot into OS X with the 6870 connected? Will it use the 2600 in OS and the 6870 in Windows?
Click to expand...

well it depends. if you are unlucky, the 6870 will try to attach to OSX ati drivers, which won't work, so you get kernel panic. But if you are lucky, it wont try to attatch, and will be left alone.
 
Cindori said:
your problems can be fixed with zeus
Click to expand...

It is now working fully (only 1 DVI display though. My HDMI port does not work at all under Mac OS X. I've ordered a Display Port to DVI adapter and will see if that port works once I get it.)

Zeus worked great for me in that it was able to modify my ROM file and also turn off the power message. However, the downloaded drivers from Zeus did not do anything for me, nor was it able to flash my card. I eventually had to go the DOS route.

After several hours of playing I was finally able to get QE to function properly. I used Zeus to download and install the drivers (and then repaired permissions). But that didn't work. Then I found a thing called "ATI10.6.4Patch.pkg" and installed that (and repaired permissions), but that didn't work either. Then I found a distribution of "mapp" with Kext Helper b7. I used that to install all the extensions that came along with it (and repaired permissions). That gave me QE acceleration but along with it came serious screen glitches. Finally I found the "Ny mapp" distribution and installed those extensions (and repaired permissions). And THEN IT WORKED. This is great.

BTW, I think this is a great marketing opportunity for someone here (with time). If you could just get the driver process streamlined and working properly, you could sell pre-flashed cards with a nice driver set on CD. Or alternately you could flash cards that were sent to you for a fee and send them back with the drivers (well, the kexts anyway).

In the end it took me many hours to finally get this working. I would have been very happy to just buy a good pre-flashed card (I know there are some supposedly on eBay, but I wanted a 4890 specifically because I also game in windows, so within reason my card really needs to be as fast as possible at the time of purchase.) I don't know what a fair markup would be since you would have to maintain something like Zeus to update drivers after most major or minor OS update. Maybe $50 or $75?

Thanks again for all the hard work. I'll finally be donating!

(When you gonna get those new 6000 series cards working? )
 
Cindori said:
well it depends. if you are unlucky, the 6870 will try to attach to OSX ati drivers, which won't work, so you get kernel panic. But if you are lucky, it wont try to attatch, and will be left alone.
Click to expand...

Could I disable that PCI-E slot so it doesn't even work in OS?
 
panjandrum said:
It is now working fully (only 1 DVI display though. My HDMI port does not work at all under Mac OS X. I've ordered a Display Port to DVI adapter and will see if that port works once I get it.)

Zeus worked great for me in that it was able to modify my ROM file and also turn off the power message. However, the downloaded drivers from Zeus did not do anything for me, nor was it able to flash my card. I eventually had to go the DOS route.

After several hours of playing I was finally able to get QE to function properly. I used Zeus to download and install the drivers (and then repaired permissions). But that didn't work. Then I found a thing called "ATI10.6.4Patch.pkg" and installed that (and repaired permissions), but that didn't work either. Then I found a distribution of "mapp" with Kext Helper b7. I used that to install all the extensions that came along with it (and repaired permissions). That gave me QE acceleration but along with it came serious screen glitches. Finally I found the "Ny mapp" distribution and installed those extensions (and repaired permissions). And THEN IT WORKED. This is great.

BTW, I think this is a great marketing opportunity for someone here (with time). If you could just get the driver process streamlined and working properly, you could sell pre-flashed cards with a nice driver set on CD. Or alternately you could flash cards that were sent to you for a fee and send them back with the drivers (well, the kexts anyway).

In the end it took me many hours to finally get this working. I would have been very happy to just buy a good pre-flashed card (I know there are some supposedly on eBay, but I wanted a 4890 specifically because I also game in windows, so within reason my card really needs to be as fast as possible at the time of purchase.) I don't know what a fair markup would be since you would have to maintain something like Zeus to update drivers after most major or minor OS update. Maybe $50 or $75?

Thanks again for all the hard work. I'll finally be donating!

(When you gonna get those new 6000 series cards working? )
Click to expand...

congratz. yes I know my driver folders are very spread.i've been waiting for 10.6.5 to fix it.
with dvi+hdmi+dp cards, the dvi and dp are the outputs working.

I've been having alot of thoughts on selling flashed cards internationally. basically there are two problems:
1. I live in sweden, we have 25% tax on everything we buy. So I would have to include that extra 25% on the price if I sold anything.
2. There are alot of other people selling flashed cards on ebay, for much cheaper. However they are often not part in any form of developing this.
3. 5800 cards came out with flashing troubles. People would just rather buy the Apple ones.


Bosma said:
Could I disable that PCI-E slot so it doesn't even work in OS?
Click to expand...

no.
 
n00bs with needs. ;-)

Cindori said:
3. 5800 cards came out with flashing troubles. People would just rather buy the Apple ones.
Click to expand...

Guys, at first: thanks a LOT for all the great work and science effort. I really have read hours in this forum ,the Golden Rules, Forum help etc but I still wonder about simple things. Sorry if I might have overseen it somewhere.

1. I have a MacPro 4,1 which I quite never saw here on the forum. Dunno if this makes any difference to the 1,1 – but I guess so.

2. I'd like to buy a Sapphire HD 5670 card. It needs no extra power and is fast enough for all I want to do. But since I never saw any information in here or in Zeus about using 5xxx cards I ask to make it clear: is there any chance to use cards newer than 4xxx series?
:confused:
 
I realise the graphics guys have left macrumors, but I'm looking for some assistance with the boot disk.

I've got a boot USB that I used in my old mac pro to do the 4870 flashing back with leopard. However that very same boot drive will not work. My 08 machine does not recognise it.

I've tried creating half a dozen different methods of boot cd and usb but none of them are regognised by my Mac. They work fine in PC machines just not the mac. Unfortunately the mac is the only one I have enough slots to have two video cards to flash with. (trying to flash a gtx285)

Anyone have any thoughts on my I might be having an issue with the boot disk. Did apple change something in a firmware update? or just with SL?
 
^ I never was able to boot my 1.1 from USB stick. When I need to flash cards in MP, I use DOS formatted HDD connected internally (with ATIFlash and ROMs on it). It works with 1.1 that I have and worked also with 3.1 single that I had (and sold).

I use Win ME disc image: http://www.bootdisks.us/windows-millennium/17/windows-me-bootable-cd-images.html - burned with Disk Utility. It works with option pressed at boot and also when it's selected as Startup disk in Sys Prefs. 1.1 and 3.1 booted from it perfectly. Give it a try.
 
666sheep said:
^ I never was able to boot my 1.1 from USB stick. When I need to flash cards in MP, I use DOS formatted HDD connected internally (with ATIFlash and ROMs on it). It works with 1.1 that I have and worked also with 3.1 single that I had (and sold).

I use Win ME disc image: http://www.bootdisks.us/windows-millennium/17/windows-me-bootable-cd-images.html - burned with Disk Utility. It works with option pressed at boot and also when it's selected as Startup disk in Sys Prefs. 1.1 and 3.1 booted from it perfectly. Give it a try.
Click to expand...

So I'm a little confused here. What you are saying is that you boot from the WinME CD and then you will have access to the DOS Formatted HDD?

How do you dos format a HDD?
 
Hi,

after reading a million of webpages including this thread, I am still desperately trying to flash an old HD2600 XT card off a PC to work in Mac Pro 1,1 of my wife (running GT7300 now and buying Civ V for Xmas ended up in no play at all). The only ROM I was able to find is 61 kb of size and the original ROM I've dumped out of this card is 60 kb.
The tools I have show this card as an ATI Radeon HD 2600 XT and the PC BIOS is P/N 113-AA, image size 0xF000, CRC 0x4300.

Any help? Please. I can not buy another video card right now...
 
1kb is usally because of rounding errors, should not be a prob (ive flashed roms saying 131kb on 128kb chips)
 
Hi, I'm really glad it's you who noticed and took time to answer. OK, so the situation is like this:

The PC BIOS I've dumped from this card is exactly 61,440 bytes big.
The Mac ROM I've found is 62,464 bytes big, so 1024 bytes bigger than the PC BIOS.
The Ati WinFlash tool does not allow for flashing, saying "hardware id mismatch" (however, the Mac ROM is said to be for a RV360, so it should be the proper one).
ZEUS 2.2 says: the ROM is the same as on the card or card simply not compatible.

The card is somehow recognized by the Mac Pro as:

Display:

Type: GPU
Bus: PCIe
Slot: Slot-2
PCIe Lane Width: x1
Vendor: ATI (0x1002)
Device ID: 0x9588
Revision ID: 0x0000

(I've put it into the second PCI-E slot available).

More help? ;)
 
Last edited:
OK. Flashed in DOS using the rv630.rom mentioned above. Though the flashing itself went OK, no success. Both ports give no signal, neither in DVI nor using the DVI-VGA converter. Are there any other 64k ROMs for the HD 2600 XT?
 
Where did you get from 2600XT 64KB ROM? Proper ROMs should be 128KB. There are 2 revs: 219 and 252. Both available on TME, second one could be extracted from 2600XT firmware update (attached it).
64KB seems to be incomplete dump. I've never heard about reducing EFI ROMs. For best results you should use reference design 2600XT: http://img08.allegroimg.pl/photos/oryginal/13/88/82/97/1388829731

If you'd need assistance in our native language, drop me PM :)
 

Attachments

  • RV630Lamna_027_252.rom.zip
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Last edited:
Thanks blacksheep. Just bought a 4870 off Allegro and looking to flash it once it arrives to my shed in the woods. Meanwhile will try your ROM.
 
Sapphire ati radeon hd4870 pci-e 1gb dvi gddr5

Hello, will this card works on a first gen macpro (2006)?

thanks
 
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