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USB C Cards for Mac Pro 5,1/4,1

J

Jigga Beef

macrumors 6502
Original poster
Jan 11, 2009
253
23
Philadelphia, Pa
Hello I am hoping to add some USB C ports to my early 2009 4,1 / firmware updated 5,1 mac pro.

I have a USB 3.0 card added to my last PCI slot current looking to swap that out.

Ideally the new card will have 2 USB C ports and 2 USB 3.1 (Type A) ports as i use 2 of the ports in the back right now for the added speed.

I could live with 1 USB-C Port though.

Any ideas?
 
Jigga Beef said:
Hello I am hoping to add some USB C ports to my early 2009 4,1 / firmware updated 5,1 mac pro.

I have a USB 3.0 card added to my last PCI slot current looking to swap that out.

Ideally the new card will have 2 USB C ports and 2 USB 3.1 (Type A) ports as i use 2 of the ports in the back right now for the added speed.

I could live with 1 USB-C Port though.

Any ideas?
Click to expand...

Which OS you are running (or going to run) with the USB-C card?
 
I will be using High Seirra.

I am not necessarily concerned with display alternate mode I have 2 decent video cards powering my 3 displays.
 
Interested in this as well. I would need at least 1x A, 1x C ports.
 
CalDigit makes great stuff. I don't know why they removed the internal Sata on this card (previous version had it). I guess one could run an eSata cable back into the case to plug to an internal SSD with SATA III speed.
 
macuser453787 said:
The CalDigit FASTA 6GU3 Plus meets this requirement, and also includes 2 ESATA ports.

I have this card in my 4,1 --> 5,1 and it works well.
Click to expand...

I have seen that card come up in conversations before, I've noticed that it looks like it has a SATA power port on the end of it. Do you need to run power from the optical disk drive to get it to run or does it pull all the power it needs from the PCI bus?
 
TheIguana said:
I have seen that card come up in conversations before, I've noticed that it looks like it has a SATA power port on the end of it. Do you need to run power from the optical disk drive to get it to run or does it pull all the power it needs from the PCI bus?
Click to expand...

The card is powered through the PCIe bus, however some USB devices with greater electrical demands require their own external powering.
 
I'm curious what you people are hooking up to the USB-C port.

I've made mine useful only by buying a USB-C to Lightning cable, but obviously that was going out of my way.
 
ActionableMango said:
I'm curious what you people are hooking up to the USB-C port.

I've made mine useful only by buying a USB-C to Lightning cable, but obviously that was going out of my way.
Click to expand...

I'm hooked to an external 2.5 enclosure with a SATA v.3 drive for ad hoc 1:1 imaging/backup...
 
Jigga Beef said:
Bought this card, but can't figure how what kind of cable / adapter I need to power it.

Anybody have any ideas?

https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B076WK3LH6/ref=oh_aui_detailpage_o05_s00?ie=UTF8&psc=1
Click to expand...

That is a bus-powered card so it should work fine with anything that isn't super power hungry like charging an iPad or something like that. But if you want to hook up the optional supplemental power, it's a SATA connector.

Unfortunately it uses the NEC chipset, which is not a great choice for Macs since the drivers are not built into MacOS. Personally I would have bought a card with an Apple-supported chip like Fresco Logic or Asmedia.
 
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pierre1610 said:
Can a thunderbolt 2 drive be used with this on a cmp 5,1
Click to expand...

From Sonnet's tech specs page for this product, under the Thunderbolt Compatibility section:

"Supports USB 3 peripherals on a Mac or Windows PC when installed in a Thunderbolt 2 or Thunderbolt 3 PCIe expansion system"

So it can be installed into a Thunderbolt expansion chassis, which would then connect to a Thunderbolt-compatible Mac (none of the cMP's are compatible -- 5,1 or lower), at which point a USB3 peripheral (such as an external hard drive) could be connected to the Allegro card.
 
Has anyone tried an eGPU with this card? I have a Mantiz case with a Vega 56 on my 17” MBP now, but have picked up a 2009 (flashed to 5,1) to replace it.
 
iGobbleoff said:
Has anyone tried an eGPU with this card? I have a Mantiz case with a Vega 56 on my 17” MBP now, but have picked up a 2009 (flashed to 5,1) to replace it.
Click to expand...

eGPU through USB3? If that's even possible, it's probably not a good idea for fast I/O between GPU and computer.

Speaking of possibility, is there even such a thing as a PCIe expander chassis that has a USB interface?
 
macuser453787 said:
eGPU through USB3? If that's even possible, it's probably not a good idea for fast I/O between GPU and computer.

Speaking of possibility, is there even such a thing as a PCIe expander chassis that has a USB interface?
Click to expand...

No, with usb-c/tb3 port on these cards?
 
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