What have you done with an early Intel recently?

[Amethyst1]

Bertha never ceases to utterly amaze me. That's from the GTX 660 Ti via single-link DVI. Mavericks of course.

The GPU (or the old lady) is beginning to struggle (anomalies in the center) - the framebuffer (screenshot) doesn't exhibit any glitches. A width of 5760 is OK but 5765 is not.

8000 seems to be the "hard" horizontal limit - 8001×1000 is rejected as "invalid" by SwitchResX.

 

[joevt]

Bertha never ceases to utterly amaze me. That's from the GTX 660 Ti via single-link DVI. Mavericks of course.

Bertha/the old lady is that IBM thing that has four DVI inputs?

The first image is single single link. The other two are dual single link? Or dual link?

I haven't forgotten about the idea of overriding EDID input with EDIDs that include tiled info. This isn't possible with current macOS EDID overrides because those are per display model or date while tiled info needs to be per display input. Actually, on Windows, EDID overrides are per display model and GPU port so maybe tiled info could be added there (it depends if the Windows drivers uses non-override info anywhere - ignoring the override in some key decision making steps).

The GPU (or the old lady) is beginning to struggle (anomalies in the center) - the framebuffer (screenshot) doesn't exhibit any glitches. A width of 5760 is OK but 5765 is not.
8000 seems to be the "hard" horizontal limit - 8001×1000 is rejected as "invalid" by SwitchResX.

I use multiple of 32 pixels for width. Check the result with an even number of pixels at least.
For a 16:9 display, the vertical is then a multiple of 18. For 16:10, it's 20. For 4:3, it's 24.

 

[joevt]

This is a single cable display. 16384x16384 is the equivalent of 32 3840*2160 displays.... I'll try a dual cable display later.

Dual cable display is also limited to 16384x16384.
So I tried two 16384x16384 scaled displays which works.
There are some issues with Arrangement (Displays) and Zooming (Accessibility) and Screen Sharing and moving around. It helps to set the cursor to the max size in the Accessibility settings before starting.
Then I tried three 16384x16384 scaled displays which also works. Things get slow when you have the equivalent of 97 4K displays.
Taking a screenshot creates 3 files each ≈260 MB in size (16384x16384 png files)

Kepler has a hard limit at 4K? :/

Edit: Oh, *vertical* so effectively 8K. That’s okay I guess.

But you can't simulate an 8K 7680x4320 display with only 4096 pixels. You would be limited to something like 7264x4086.

 

[TheShortTimer]

It's weird that PPC Macs have capabilities that don't exist on current Macs.

Not weird, par the course with tech.

I can think of no end of products that I've purchased where the successor was inferior or the predecessor was superior in some form. On the Mac front, I remember being quite bemused that the stock optical drive in my 2006 MacBook Pro was unable to write dual-layer DVDs but the some of the PowerBooks could. It was supposed to be Apple's flagship laptop but had less functionality in that regard than its PPC forerunner.

 

[Amethyst1]

Bertha/the old lady is that IBM thing that has four DVI inputs?

The IBM T221 (DGP), yes. Sorry if that was unclear.

The first image is single single link. The other two are dual single link? Or dual link?

Single single-link for all three. I'll try dual single-link next. I don't have the converter(s) necessary for feeding dual-link signals to the DG5/DGM/DGP.

I use multiple of 32 pixels for width. Check the result with an even number of pixels at least.

Will do - iirc I tried 8192×1000 first and it was also rejected.

 

[Amethyst1]

Check the result with an even number of pixels at least.

I did. The actual single single-link max seems to be a width of 8032 pixels, 'cause 8032×1000 works but 8033 is rejected as invalid - same goes for 8036, 8040, 8044, 8048, 8056, 8064, 8096, 8128, 8160 and 8192.

I'll try dual single-link next.

Width > Height

2× 5760×2400 (automatically put on top of each other): slight glitches and flickering.

2× 6016×2000: more glitches and flickering.

2× 8000×1000: lower left part is black, other glitches; height misreported by OSD.

Height > Width

2× 3959×3960 (automatically put next to each other): Width (slightly) misreported by OSD (perhaps due to not being divisible by 8 or 16?). No glitches.

Once I have the proper adapters to feed three or four inputs from the GTX 660 Ti, I hope to exceed a combined width of 10,000 pixels on Bertha.

 

[eyoungren]

So, since yesterday I've had a few issues with the trustd process on my 2008 MBP. Keeps using up a lot of CPU. No idea what the problem was, but for most it's a corrupt keychain. I got rid of all that stuff and still had issues.

So, the next thing was a reinstall. I decided to take the opportunity to move up to Catalina instead of reinstalling Mojave. trustd gave me a few fits after all was said and done but then settled down. I still have some stuff to work out, but mostly I'm just back to normal.

Kind of cool that Quicksilver still works! I was expecting to lose my app launcher.

 

[joevt]

I did. The actual single single-link max seems to be a width of 8032 pixels, 'cause 8032×1000 works but 8033 is rejected as invalid - same goes for 8036, 8040, 8044, 8048, 8056, 8064, 8096, 8128, 8160 and 8192.

Width > Height

2× 5760×2400 (automatically put on top of each other): slight glitches and flickering.
2× 6016×2000: more glitches and flickering.
2× 8000×1000: lower left part is black, other glitches; height misreported by OSD.

Height > Width

2× 3959×3960 (automatically put next to each other): Width (slightly) misreported by OSD (perhaps due to not being divisible by 8 or 16?). No glitches.

Double click the timing in SwitchResX. Does it show Active Width is 3959? Is that a custom timing or does it come from the EDID? I wouldn't expect an odd value for the width, except if it was a HiDPI mode, for example 7918x7920 for a "Looks like 3959x3960" mode. You can also try taking a screenshot and checking the dimensions of the created png files.

 

[Amethyst1]

Double click the timing in SwitchResX. Does it show Active Width is 3959? Is that a custom timing or does it come from the EDID?

Yes. Custom.

Pushing things just a little more:

(2× single-link DVI; individual screenshots are 3964×3965 as expected)

 

[Sparkledog]

I own 2 Macbook 5,2 and 1 iMac i dont remember the model of
I keep trying out different MacOS versions. I decided to stick with 10.13 for my Macbooks
10.7 has got to be my favorite in UI though

 

[Amethyst1]

So I recently picked up an Asus MG24UQ. Three guesses as to what I did with it today...

Widths greater than 4096 (4097, 4100, 4128, 4480, 4608, 5120) either result in coloured vertical lines or a totally black screen. Heights greater than 4039 (4040, 4045, 4050, 4060, 4070, 4080) are rejected by SwitchResX...

...which is interesting since I can go up to 4075 on Bertha via DVI. 4076, 4077, 4078, 4079, 4080 and 4090 are rejected.

 

[TheShortTimer]

Using Avidemux on my 2010 C2D MacBook Air running High Sierra, I carried out some trimming on a TV recording that I'd made of a film which was presented in the open matte format and so I thought that it was worth having as an alternate version. I copied it over from my PVR and got to work.

This means that I can watch it without having to periodically Fast Fwd through the promotional spots, bumpers and adverts that I have no desire to sit through during every viewing. I created two different files: one which has been muxed as an AVI for G3's (and some G4's) and another as an MKV for everything else.

Annoyingly, many UK broadcasters insist on splitting films into two halves with an infotainment break in the middle, which means that two files are created by your PVR but no matter, Avidemux will happily append them for you so that both halves can be (very easily) merged into a single video file.

Time to test out my handiwork in VLC.

Plays perfectly and I don't miss the extraneous segments one bit

 

[joevt]

So I recently picked up an Asus MG24UQ. Three guesses as to what I did with it today...

Widths greater than 4096 (4097, 4100, 4128, 4480, 4608, 5120) either result in coloured vertical lines or a totally black screen. Heights greater than 4039 (4040, 4045, 4050, 4060, 4070, 4080) are rejected by SwitchResX...

...which is interesting since I can go up to 4075 on Bertha via DVI. 4076, 4077, 4078, 4079, 4080 and 4090 are rejected.

In both cases, the limit appears to be a vertical total (active + sync total) of 4096. If that is the max, then you need to reduce the number of lines used by the sync to get more active vertical lines.

All your tests are on Kepler? What version of SwitchResX and macOS? You could try creating the override on a newer Mac/GPU then copy it to the old Mac. Disconnect the display, wait 5 seconds, and reconnect to use the new override. Actually, I don't think we know if Kepler can do > 4096 width/height. We do know that it can do 8Kx4K scaled, but that's different. I'll try some tests in Mojave tomorrow (since Catalina doesn't support the DisplayPort port of my Mac GTX 680?).

 

[Amethyst1]

All your tests are on Kepler?

Yes, a GTX 660 Ti.

What version of SwitchResX and macOS?

SwitchResX 4.8.1. macOS 10.9.5 "Mavericks".

In both cases, the limit appears to be a vertical total (active + sync total) of 4096.

I hadn't seen that - you're absolutely right. That also explains the width of 8032 (active) + 160 (blanking) = 8192.

Actually, I don't think we know if Kepler can do > 4096 width

I'm able to do e.g. 5120×2880 via DVI and screenshots look fine but since "Bertha" only displays the first 3840×2400 pixels in this case (which is one way of handling things I guess), I cannot verify if the actual output is 100% flawless.

The only display I have that's surely capable of properly showing widths larger than 4096 is the Dell UP2715K - not from a single connection though...

 

[Amethyst1]

Update #1... 3× 3840×4075:

Somehow I had a feeling that something like that would happen.

Update #2... Since 8032 is the horizontal limit, I set out to determine how far she could be pushed vertically at 8032.

8032×1969 and she admits defeat. Now I'm done torturing the old lady.

Edit: Update #3...

7680x4320 works on Intel Iris Pro 5200 (Haswell) on Mavericks but I haven't checked the actual limit yet.

Now I have. The actual scaled resolution limit is 8191×8190 == 67,084,290 pixels. A screenshot weighs in at about 50 MB

 

[joevt]

SwitchResX 4.8.1. macOS 10.9.5 "Mavericks".

Latest SwitchResX 4.11.1 is compatible with Mavericks. I don't think it adds anything new (except all the tweaks since 4.8.1)

I'm able to do e.g. 5120×2880 via DVI and screenshots look fine but since "Bertha" only displays the first 3840×2400 pixels in this case (which is one way of handling things I guess), I cannot verify if the actual output is 100% flawless.

I did some test in Catalina, Mojave, Mavericks (EVGA Nvidia GTX 680 Mac Edition)
Catalina and Mojave uses macOS driver.
Mavericks uses Nvidia web driver.
Catalina doesn't support DisplayPort but the earlier OSs do.
DisplayPort is limited to 540 MHz (less than what DisplayPort 1.2 is supposed to be able to do).
HDMI is limited to 340 MHz.
DVI is limited to 330 MHz (dual link)

I have a 4K display (Acer XV273K) which can take inputs up to 8K. macOS accepts resolutions up to 8Kx4K with any refresh rate (total width and total height cannot exceed 8192x4096 - active pixels is less than that to allow for sync). Other GPUs have different limits.
My display shows no signal when the refresh rate is less than 20 Hz.
My display shows garbage if the active width is greater than 5120.
In Mavericks, DVI switches to Dual Link when pixel clock is greater than 165 Hz. My display only has DisplayPort and HDMI. If I connect HDMI to GPU DVI, it shows only ever second pixel. For example, if the timing is 5120x2880 21Hz, the display shows 2560x2880 21Hz because Dual Link (pixels are alternated between each link) is being used but the display only receives Single Link. The 2560x2880 received by the display is scaled by the display to 3840x2160 so everything looks normal, but you can see by dragging a window around and looking at the vertical lines, that only every second pixel is drawn.
In Catalina, DVI appears to be outputting Single Link up to 340 MHz. I wonder if it's doing chroma sub sampling? I switch to 4K 30Hz 297MHz, and look at a chroma sub sampling test. I think it looks as good as a proper DisplayPort 1.2 connection using RGB. Unfortunately, my display doesn't show pixel format, and AGDCDiagnose doesn't give the info for Nvidia GPUs.

The only display I have that's surely capable of properly showing widths larger than 4096 is the Dell UP2715K - not from a single connection though...

I couldn't get 5K single cable to work even at 30 Hz for the Dell UP2715K (I didn't try Windows or Ubuntu). At least one person was successful getting 5K single cable (DisplayPort 1.2) with the LG UltraFine 5K, but I don't remember seeing screenshots of that.

 

[Amethyst1]

Latest SwitchResX 4.11.1 is compatible with Mavericks.

I'll give that a shot, thanks.

Mavericks uses Nvidia web driver.

The GTX 680 shouldn't need that - my 660 Ti and NVS 510 work fine using the built-in driver.

I have a 4K display (Acer XV273K) which can take inputs up to 8K.

Does that mean 7680, 8000, or...?

In Catalina, DVI appears to be outputting Single Link up to 340 MHz.

Wait - does that mean dual-link isn't kicking in, so if you were to hook up e.g. a 30" Cinema Display it wouldn't work? No DP and no DL-DVI on Kepler pretty much ruins the show in Catalina.

DVI is limited to 330 MHz (dual link)

On macOS at least; until a patch is come up with - I've seen reports of it going higher on Windows.

Other GPUs have different limits.

Just out of interest - can you do some testing with Maxwell and Pascal on macOS? I'd be interested in max scaled resolutions.

At least one person was successful getting 5K single cable (DisplayPort 1.2) with the LG UltraFine 5K,

The display I'd use for these tests is the Iiyama XB2779QQS (single-cable 5K 60Hz via DP 1.4). Or the Dell UP3218K.

------

I did some testing with an Atlona AT-DP400 (DL-DVI to mDP) hooked up to the GTX 660 Ti and Dell P2415Q today.
Looks like it hits a wall at 267 MHz pixel clock, since 266.81 is fine (as far as I can see) but 267.06 is not. I'm seeing one or more flashing green pixels. The frequency of the flashing and the number of flashing pixels increases as the pixel clock increases, and at 325 MHz I'm seeing dozens.
It's only specced for 2560×1440 at 60 Hz (241.5 MHz) so does what it's meant to do, and 3840×2160 at 30 Hz (262.75 MHz) also works - however, my tests suggest it won't do 2560×1600 at 60 Hz (268.5 MHz).
(Are there many 30" 2560×1600 displays that do not have dual-link DVI though? I can only find the Dell UP3017.)

 

[B S Magnet]

What I’ve done lately is take a broken A1181 late ’06 C2D laptop I received in a trade a couple of years ago, locate why it wasn’t working, and bring it back to life. I took it apart back in 2019 and then set it aside until I could focus on it.

There was probably a badly-seated DC/magsafe connection with the logic board, because before cleaning it out, the magsafe light wasn’t lighting up. After cleaning (which housed the carcasses of dead insects), re-pasting and re-assembly, I managed to get the magsafe light to detect the board, but when I tried to power on, there was no backlight. The HDD’s sleeve was also missing (though not necessarily needed to get it booted). The original HDD, which I think had failed, didn’t have a working build of OS X on it, so I put in another HDD.

In taking it apart again (by this point, the plastics inside are so aged that at least three brass grommets have been pulled out of their sleeves with no coaxing at all), I found the inverter cable (the one with four ultra-thin, black-coated wires which route through the hinge) with one wire completely severed. I gently soldered it back together, covered it with kapton tape, and put it all back together.

This time, the display lit up! I installed Snow Leopard on it from USB. The MacBook only had 1GB (OEM) in it. I switched a DIMM to a 1GB SO-DIMM to give it 1.5GB. This wasn’t enough to install Lion, so I borrowed the 2 2GB DIMMs from my early ’08 MacBook (the one running the patched Sierra), installed Lion on a second partition, and now the late ’06, a total beater by its original owner (who clearly loved it to near-pieces), is running again!

It’s an ugly duckling, and it needs a battery, but it works. It even comes with the original box (which is in better shape than the janky top case). I plan to give this one to a friend’s kid who’s showing an interest in software development.

 

[joevt]

The GTX 680 shouldn't need that - my 660 Ti and NVS 510 work fine using the built-in driver.

Correct.

Does that mean 7680, 8000, or...?

I didn't try more than 7680 until now. Doing tests with my W5700 and XV273K:
8192x4096 21Hz works. I can screen share it.
8192x4608 20Hz works. I can screen share it.

5120x5120 20Hz works. I can screen share it.
5120x8110 21Hz works. I can screen share it.
5120x8112 21Hz no signal (8192 total vertical pixels)

6016x6016 21Hz works. I can screen share it.
6016x7680 20Hz works. I can screen share it.
6016x8000 21Hz works. I can screen share it. blinking garbage in the top tenth of the display every second.

1000x8192 30Hz no signal. I can screen share it.
1000x8224 30Hz no signal. I can screen share it.
4096x8192 21Hz no signal. I can screen share it.
4096x8224 21Hz no signal. I can screen share it.
8192x8192 15Hz no signal. I can screen share it.

8224x4096 21Hz is detected by the display but the display is black. I can screen share it.
8224x4626 20Hz is detected by the display but the display is black. I can screen share it.
8224x1000 30Hz is detected by the display but the display is black. I can screen share it. The display shows masked text 32x1000
10000x1000 30Hz is detected by the display but the display is black. I can screen share it. The display shows truncated text 0000x1000
16000x1000 30Hz is detected by the display but the display is black. I can screen share it. The display shows truncated text 6000x1000

Wait - does that mean dual-link isn't kicking in, so if you were to hook up e.g. a 30" Cinema Display it wouldn't work? No DP and no DL-DVI on Kepler pretty much ruins the show in Catalina.

Maybe Dual Link doesn't kick in because the display doesn't have Dual Link specified in the EDID.
Dual Link works fine with my 30" Cinema Display in any macOS.
I guess Mavericks or the Nvidia web driver doesn't look for the Dual Link info in the EDID - and assumes anything > 165 MHz is Dual Link.

On macOS at least; until a patch is come up with - I've seen reports of it going higher on Windows.

I suppose if it can Single Link up to 300+ MHz then it could Dual Link up to 600+ MHz?

Just out of interest - can you do some testing with Maxwell and Pascal on macOS? I'd be interested in max scaled resolutions.

I do have Maxwell and Pascal in hackintoshes (High Sierra with Nvidia web drivers). I'll try testing them later.

The display I'd use for these tests is the Iiyama XB2779QQS (single-cable 5K 60Hz via DP 1.4). Or the Dell UP3218K.

I like the Acer XV273K - it seems to be able to do all the single cable stuff that those 5K and 8K displays can do. The downscaling ability is nice for emulating larger displays - I don't know if any Dell can do that. It would be nicer if I could get lower than 20Hz though.

I did some testing with an Atlona AT-DP400 (DL-DVI to mDP) hooked up to the GTX 660 Ti and Dell P2415Q today.
Looks like it hits a wall at 267 MHz pixel clock, since 266.81 is fine (as far as I can see) but 267.06 is not. I'm seeing one or more flashing green pixels. The frequency of the flashing and the number of flashing pixels increases as the pixel clock increases, and at 325 MHz I'm seeing dozens.
It's only specced for 2560×1440 at 60 Hz (241.5 MHz) so does what it's meant to do, and 3840×2160 at 30 Hz (262.75 MHz) also works - however, my tests suggest it won't do 2560×1600 at 60 Hz (268.5 MHz).
(Are there many 30" 2560×1600 displays that do not have dual-link DVI though? I can only find the Dell UP3017.)

I have the Gefen GTV-DVIDL-2-MDP https://www.amazon.ca/Gefen-GTV-DVI...01LZT2Z15/ref=cm_cr_srp_d_product_top?ie=UTF8
I think it works well. I can try doing higher clocks if you like.

The Gefen GTV-DVIDL-2-MDP converts to DisplayPort various single link and dual link DVI resolutions, refresh rates, and aspect ratios, from 640x480 60Hz to 1792x1008 144Hz to 3840x2160 30Hz. This allows connecting modern displays to older GPUs. It also converts analog stereo audio to DisplayPort. It has a couple minor errors in the EDIDs for Mode 1 (2560x1600) and Mode 2 (2560x1440). For example, Mode 1 is missing the 1280x800 mode. Mode 3 (pass-through EDID) doesn't work with some GPU/display combinations. You'll probably want to override the EDID with additional modes anyway using whatever methods are supported by your OS. The USB connection not only provides power for the adapter, it also connects a built-in "USB-Serial Controller D" (from Prolific Technology, Inc.). You can connect to it with serial terminal software using settings 19200.8.N.1 to see messages about the DVI to DisplayPort connection and conversion. The serial controller also accepts commands but I don't know what they are ("READ 10" reads 16 things).

 

[LordeOurMother]

Well, I used my 5,1 for my master's coursework: watching lectures, coding, solving problem sets, etc.

I use my Air (admittedly not "early" intel) for much of the same purpose when I'm out and about. It's superseded the 2009 MBP that came before it, as I realised I value the portability/power of what's effectively a netbook with an i7 over the expandability of an MBP.

 

[wicknix]

Made my 2006 iMac running Linux look like Windows XP.

 

[joevt]

I do have Maxwell and Pascal in hackintoshes (High Sierra with Nvidia web drivers). I'll try testing them later.

So I did some tests. In both cases, the max scaled resolution is 8192x4096, just like the Kepler.
The Pascal is a Nvidia GTX 1070 in a Hackintosh.
The Maxwell is a Nvidia Titan X in my MacPro3,1. It would not perform properly until I removed the Kepler (GTX 680 Mac Edition) - just disconnecting the display from the Kepler is not enough.

The scaled resolution limit is either in the GPU or the macOS driver. I haven't tried scaled modes in Windows or Linux. I wonder if RTX is different (but RTX doesn't work in macOS).

 

[mortlocli]

Made my 2006 iMac running Linux look like Windows XP.

View attachment 1775806

Ratz - feels like some sort of flash back!!!

 

[mortlocli]

Discovered my Imac running un-supported 10.15 wouldn't run 32 bit software...so tried getting back to 10.13.
Wot a nightmare!! 10.15 formats the hd into a new format that my older software wouldn't look at..so had to use linux.
Got there in the end...the long way it seems..as I later discovered if Id had a network connection theres a key combination that installs the latest functioning OS for your PC.

 

[B S Magnet]

Discovered my Imac running un-supported 10.15 wouldn't run 32 bit software...so tried getting back to 10.13.
Wot a nightmare!! 10.15 formats the hd into a new format that my older software wouldn't look at..so had to use linux.

Yah, 32-bit software support ended with Mojave, while APFS began to replace HFS+ with High Sierra. There is a way to convert APFS back to HFS+ (scroll down to “Resources”), which is advisable if your iMac still uses a HDD and not a SSD (or Fusion).