Upgrading a 4,1 2009 quadcore 2.93 Mac Pro

[Nessdufrat]

Oh, and I wanted to say sorry about the FireWire thing and me being so sure it was the 400 version and not the 800. It is indeed the 800 version, and whoever said so was perfectly right about that. I discovered that the hard way when I tried to plug in my WD My Book FireWire ^^ Luckily, I had a FireWire 400 to 800 cable.

Apple Cinema Display is normally arriving on Monday. Switched the cintiq to DisplayPort to free the Dvi port on the graphic card for it Can't wait.

The guys at the magic trash bin place told me they will keep an eye out for other mac pros and put them aside for me if they see any, so maybe I can grab a dual processor tray, but I'm not holding my breath. Also, the chief knows to get the trash can Mac Pro for me if he sees it. He knows what it looks like and told me he would do it (he likes me ^^). I don't know, it does look like a trash can, in case someone dies and the family is getting rid of things, they might be like "wtf is that thing, is that some weird gadget or modern art or a drone or a kind of automated trash can? Let's throw that away". I might get lucky ^^

 

[DEMinSoCAL]

My dual CPU cMP project has come to a tragic halt. If you remember, I thought I might have ruined one of the X5670's by delidding it. So I bought another and after getting back from vacation this week, I carefully delidded it (razor and heat). Everything went well, and it should be good, but after putting it in CPU B socket, nothing, AGAIN. When I took it out, I could power on and boot with one X5670 CPU (in CPU A) just fine.

After careful examination, I saw one pin of the CPU B socket was smooshed against another pin. I don't recall touching the pins, so I think it might have happened when laying one of the CPU's into the socket. Using a magnifying glass and a pin, I tried putting it back into position, but the tip of the pin looks to be damaged and I can't get CPU B to work. To verify if my 2nd X5670 was really good, I tried putting it in CPU A by itself. Nothing.

I thought I would just try both of the original CPU's (2.26Ghz) back in their sockets to see if both sockets are good and if that 2nd X5670 might, too, be bad. But now, neither CPU works and I can't get the Mac Pro to work at all.

I wish I found mine in a trash can, but alas, I might as well had thrown money out the window!

Ugh. Are we having fun yet?

 

[Nessdufrat]

Waooo,so it's possible to damage the pins just by putting the CPUs in? Are you sure nothing can be done? And if one doesn't work, the other doesn't work either? It really sucks wasn't there somebody on the forum who managed to recover from a damaged pin or maybe I misread that?
I'll be super mega careful when I change my CPU... I'm already freaking out over applying the thermal paste, so...

 

[carpsafari]

but the tip of the pin looks to be damaged and I can't get CPU B to work. To verify if my 2nd X5670 was really good, I tried putting it in CPU A by itself. Nothing.

I would check the pins again, it sounds like you overlooked another bent pin, because 1 or 2 bent pins, should be easily fixed.
Also possible it shorted out.

The 4.1 8-core doesn't have the usual cpu clamp, to hold it into place, so you have to be carefull placing the cpu and/or moving the tray around too much.
I learned from somebody who had to fix a broken NB rivet and when he put it upside down, he must have bent pins.
For that reason I always tape the cpu's into place, before I lift the board from the frame.

So much for safe delidding, like I said not neccesary at all and even than you can bent pins.

 

[DEMinSoCAL]

Waooo,so it's possible to damage the pins just by putting the CPUs in? Are you sure nothing can be done? And if one doesn't work, the other doesn't work either? It really sucks wasn't there somebody on the forum who managed to recover from a damaged pin or maybe I misread that?
I'll be super mega careful when I change my CPU... I'm already freaking out over applying the thermal paste, so...

Not usually. I've changed many a CPU in my years and never had a problem, so not sure when/how the pin was damaged. Depending on the amount of movement/damage, you can reposition a pin that has been bent/moved. If you look at the pins in the socket, there is a small "ball" at the top of each pin that contacts the CPU. We're talking MICRO size. That seems to be damaged. So even putting the tip of the pin back in place (as good as I can), I don't think it is making good contact with the CPU.

And now, for some reason, CPU A isn't working either. At this point I might have three good, delidded X5670's (I have at least one tested good...the other two I'm unsure about since they were tried in a socket B with a bent pin).

Thermal paste--don't freak out. Just wear old clothes, because no matter how careful you are, you wind up with it everywhere. Just evenly spread a thin layer with a razor blade and you'll be fine.

 

[Nessdufrat]

I would check the pins again, it sounds like you overlooked another bent pin, because 1 or 2 bent pins, should be easily fixed.

So much for safe delidding, like I said not neccesary at all and even than you can bent pins.

I dont see the connection between delidding and bending pins? Are delidded CPUs more likely to bend pins on the tray? (We're talking about the pins on the tray here, right?)

 

[carpsafari]

The boys who are promoting delidding, say

dmylrea said: ↑

Pick your poison--break a CPU trying to delid it, or over-tighten the heatsinks using non-delidded CPU's and crack your CPU tray. Hmmmm....


And now he proves himself, what I have stated before, that even with delidded cpus, you can bent pins!
He must have bent the pins another way, not neccesary by overtightening.

The pins he talks about, you will see under the cpu, not the underside of the cpu, but the board!

 

[DEMinSoCAL]

I dont see the connection between delidding and bending pins? Are delidded CPUs more likely to bend pins on the tray? (We're talking about the pins on the tray here, right?)

Sorry...didn't mean to sound confusing. No connection between the two. CHANGING the CPU's though is where the risk is (small risk, but there if you're not careful). Obviously, at some point something happened to mine.

And, yes, the pins in the CPU socket of the tray.

 

[Nessdufrat]

Cinema Display is here, and it is GORGEOUS. I only switched it on for like two minutes yesterday night because my friend arrived really late (one day later than expected) and still had to drive 2 hours to get home, and still hadn't had dinner, and when he left it was past midnight, and I unplugged all the cables from the mac pro because he wanted to see the "insides" (he had to admit it was really tidier than a PC. No kidding. The PC I mounted on the same day I put the graphic card in the mac is a MESS. I need to get a bigger tower, all the cables are pushed inside wherever I could find space. Jeremy was amazed at the fact that there were actually NO cables inside the mac, except my two PCIe cables for the GTX980). I'm getting my USB3 card this afternoon so I thought it would be a bit stupid to plug everything back, and then unplug everything again in a few hours to put the card in. I'll also put the GT120 back inside.
We had a scare for a minute because it wouldn't switch on... And then, I was like "ok, maybe I need to turn on the mac for it to work" and yes, that was it.

Also, surprise! The cinema display is actually firewire 400... LOL. I bought an adapter on aliexpress, but looks like I'll be able to plug in my WD my Book firewire behind it.
It's funny, I kind of expected it to be even bigger. It's big, but I think I've gotten so used to my two 27" displays (thunderbolt 27" and a Fujitsu 27" that's actually pretty awesome and that you can even flip and put in portrait mode) and my 24" cintiq (which is actually bigger than a 27" display is you count the sides) than it's not that impressive. But I'm really happy with the fact that the screen is not glossy, that was my biggest disappointment with the thunderbolt.


Oh, and something totally unrelated but weird: my WD my book was plugged in the computer with a firewire 400 to 800 cable, but not plugged into the wall (I'm actually missing the power adapter, I need to buy one. Yeah, I found that one in the magic trash too. I know it works because I tested it with the power adapter for a WD my book USB (also from the trash). The computer wasn't running. The WD was HOT. Like the disk inside had been turning or something. How come? It didn't have any power, since the power adapter was missing, the computer was not turned on (or maybe it was in sleep mode, I don't remember, but anyway, I thought, maybe it's getting heat from the computer case, but it wasn't even that close and the computer was cold). Does firewire has some kind of evil power I don't know, like the power to invoke electricity when it's not even plugged in?
That was super weird. But firewire has always been kind of a mystery to me.

 

[Squuiid]

I think a Firewire 400 device deserves to remain in the trash! Performance will be awful and the age of the drive would be a concern IMO.

 

[Nessdufrat]

I thought it might be good to store a few things I don't use very often.

 

[Nessdufrat]

ok, weird thing: I couldn't get the Cintiq to display its proper resolution. My only choices were 720p and 480p. The proper resolution is 1920x1200px. After clicking everywhere, I tested changing the port where it was plugged in. Suddenly, I was able to choose the usual resolution. Seems like at least one of the DPs on the GTX980 isn't carrying all the resolutions, for whatever reason. I didn't test the third one, nor the HDMI one (I might, since I have a HDMI device that I could use for the test later).
Also, seems like since I put the GT120 back in, computer in windows mode doesn't want to use the GTX980 on boot. (at least it wasn't showing anything, and I ended up unplugging the screen, plugging it to the GT120 and restarting the computer, and suddenly, we're back in business). It also crashed the Nvidia driver. So, with the GT120 inside, no more GTX980 in Windows. Which means, exit GT120.
I disabled the SIP, I shut down the computer, I'm waiting for it to cool a bit and I'll remove the card. I'll miss seeing that Apple on a gray screen, though ^^
But OMG is that Cinema Display beautiful... The colors are amazing. For less than $160, I sure grabbed a bargain, I think.

 

[Nessdufrat]

About that USB 3 card... Carpsafari, I got the one you suggested, and... Yeah... Right now, I don't know if I'm doing something wrong (like what could I be doing wrong, but why not), I doesn't work. I mean, if I plug in a USB drive, the drive will act like its plugged in : it will turn. For a quick second, I'll have a window appear telling me the drive wasn't ejected properly (like wth I just plugged it in) and nothing else. I'm talking WD my passport drives here, the ones that are self powered.
So far, the one ones it recognized were :
- a Samsung USB 2 640go self powered drive
- a 2go iPod shuffle
...
I'm pretty sure it would also recognize a bunch of other thumb drives, but I didn't want to go through the hassle of testing other stuff, once it recognized the iPod shuffle.
The point is, none of my 1To my passport WD and similar format drives are recognized, and I bought the USB 3 card for that purpose, since my data is in there.

Windows via bootcamp is another matter. The driver which was sent with the card on a tiny CD was a piece of crap, and luckily I found another one on the internet. The card seems to work fine in Windows 7. But it appears I'll have to buy another card if I want something I can use on Sierra.

So can anybody confirm I'll be able to use the Inatek to read my self powered drives in Sierra with that one? Buying two $30 drives, I could have gotten the Sonnet card... And of course, I'm pretty sure the seller in HKG will offer to take it back if I send it back to him, like I'm gonna send back a card which will cost me $20 in shipping fees...

Or is there maybe something I'm doing wrong? Maybe my card is defective?


And for those who are interested in the fate of my Cinema Display and the GTX980 and cintiq, turns out the driver kept crashing in Windows, and I had to reinstall it for some obscure reason. After that, my Cintiq wasn't recognized anymore (why?!!!!). Once again, I had to change the port on the graphic card. Last one did the trick. This time, I was able to get the CD on its 2560x1600 resolution and the Cintiq in 1920x1200 in both Windows AND mac. FINALLY. Now I'm not touching anything anymore with that graphic card ^^

 

[DanSilov]

So can anybody confirm I'll be able to use the Inatek to read my self powered drives in Sierra with that one? Buying two $30 drives, I could have gotten the Sonnet card... And of course, I'm pretty sure the seller in HKG will offer to take it back if I send it back to him, like I'm gonna send back a card which will cost me $20 in shipping fees...

I use Inatek card with self-powered drives, and it works just fine, never had any issues with it, and if you need to copy just from one drive at a time, the speed is very decent.

 

[h9826790]

980 and GT120 not working well together under Windows is a known issue. But there is a work around, you can search in this forum.

I suspect your USB card do not provide enough power to drive the WD external HDD. If you have any USB 3.0 POWERED hub (with external power supply), try to connect the WD HDD via that hub, it may work.

 

[Nessdufrat]

The seller told me to reset PRAM. I ended up in a world of nightmares having to put the GT120 back in, but it did the trick.
I took the opportunity to try the driver trick with the GT120 and the GTX980, I never could make it work. In the end, I had the GT120 displaying a maximum resolution of 1600x1200 and no GTX980 at all and the driver wouldn't even install anymore.
Once the problem with the USB3 card was solved, the GT120 went back in its box.

But, I'm wondering.
I know the double CPU Mac Pro shipped with another card, a Radeon something, a bit more powerful (not that I care about that). Maybe this one wouldn't cause driver conflict in Windows?
Anybody tried this one as well as another GPU together in Windows? Any trouble?

Still hoping for a double CPU Mac Pro in the magic trash one of these days
yesterday I found two airport base stations from 2000 and 2001, took them out of nostalgia, they do look cool (they are missing the power adapters, so they do nothing else than looking cool right now) ^^ also, a funny little iPod shuffle 3rd gen 2go, and greatest find was a USB microphone which will be perfect for Skype on the Mac Pro. Turns out it's actually a great microphone that sells for $60. Magic trash was generous also filled up the car boot with books and household items for goodwill.

 

[flowrider]

^^^^The Radeon HD 4870 was an option with both configurations.



Lou

 

[Nessdufrat]

Oh, I see it actually needs to be connected to the PCIe to work. So, not an option since my PCIe ports on the MB are already occupied by the GTX980. Too bad, seemed like a good idea for a minute :/

 

[ActionableMango]

Magic trash was generous

Dangit, I want a magic trash can that spews Apple products!

 

[Nessdufrat]

Guys, ****'s about to get real, processor has arrived at the post office, I'm getting it on Wednesday. Can't say I'm too comfortable about the whole changing it thing after what happened with the pin bending...
Wednesday will be another trip to the magic bin (it's next to the post office), maybe I get lucky again. I'm meeting somebody about a Magic Mouse right before, let's hope I don't find one in the trash after, I would be a bit frustrated ^^ I'm wishing for a pair of earphones to go with the little iPod shuffle 3rd gen because right now the only ones that work are my beoplay H6 (the remote that goes with them, I mean). The more recent earphones that I found from Apple that had a remote with them aren't compatible. I do love that iPod shuffle, I've been using it almost everyday since last week ^^

 

[Nessdufrat]

Ok, it's done. I'm never doing that again. Like, ever. I was all frightened about the thermal paste thing, silly me. The ventirad was the worst part. A nightmare. I unscrewed each screw using the cross method, I even wrote down the number of turns for each screw. So far so good. CPU replacement went like a charm, I had a lot of doubts when I had to put the lever down because of the bent pin story and I was afraid it would apply too much pressure and break my CPU but I went ahead with it anyway because what choice did I have. Thermal paste was okay, after seeing a few videos I chose the pea method.
And here comes the real nightmare. This stupid grey thing just wouldn't click in place. Like everything was aligned, the screws were perfectly aligned, and they still wouldn't start screwing the damn ventirad in place. So after messing with the thing a little bit, I finally managed to get it in screws were turning, by that time I had messed up my count, I was sure the whole thing was crushed anyway. I still found out that for all the other screws, I had to do less turns than was I had to do to unscrew it. I mean, once I couldn't screw any further, I certainly wasn't going to push any harder just to get the screw rotation number right.
So, everything back inside the mac, I push the power button, not even breathing, and oh crap, it starts in Windows mode, of course, which means waiting forever after the first bios screen with just a black cursor in the top left corner. But I mean, I got the bios screen, so far, so good.
Windows finally starts, and good news, I now have 6 cores
Just to be sure, I start it in mac mode, and it's confirmed. Now I'll have to wait and see if it explodes or something in the next few days...

Oh, and last trip to the magic trash bin "only" gave me a WD my book USB3 2To full of data (I didn't look at the data, but it was a time machine, so I did grab the really cool albums that were on it before deleting everything. New music for free ^^)

 

[zephonic]

I upgraded my 4,1 quad to a 5,1 hex and frankly, for most things I don't really notice the difference. Render times have improved, but it's not like night and day.

I did the upgrade in January, when I thought the MacPro would be discontinued and it seemed sensible to max out my computer as it would likely be the last Mac workstation I'd ever own.
If I had known a new MacPro was coming, I don't think I would have bothered.

 

[Nessdufrat]

It cost me a little over $60 so I guess I didn't lose too much money anyway. The graphic card and USB 3 card I can use in another computer if I need, and I didn't pay for the Mac Pro. All in all, I'd say it was a very positive operation. Now I can finally go ahead and install my programs (I didn't want to do that before in case I messed everything up, like why take hours to transfer all my files and install everything on the new mac if I kill it when I upgrade the CPU). So I won't be able to say anything about render speed, but I was planning to use the GPU for that anyway. Processor upgrade was more for everyday tasks and also photoshop and such.

 

[Nessdufrat]

Hey, guys, I'm back
I *might* have the opportunity to grab a dual processor tray for cheap (with the rest of the computer). Not sure about it, since the guy is selling the computer for parts since he had a red light on the motherboard and the computer wouldn't start anymore, and it's a two hours drive with the car and then back.
It's $100, I might be able to get it for a bit less.
I asked him about the processors in place. Not sure I'll bother if they are quad cores, but I might make the trip for hexa cores.
I have an Hexacore right now in the Mac Pro, but it's the lidded version (that goes with the single processor tray) and I don't really feel confident delidding two processors including the one I have now to put them in the dual tray processor. I did however come across that : https://www.caseking.de/en/der8auer-delid-die-mate-2-fsd8-019.html which seems a good solution.

What do you think? The red light on the MB could mean a lot of things...

 

[ActionableMango]

I did however come across that : https://www.caseking.de/en/der8auer-delid-die-mate-2-fsd8-019.html which seems a good solution.

A Nehalem/Westmere CPU will not fit in that tool.

I've used a normal bench vice with success.