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Sca1pel

macrumors regular
Original poster
Apr 9, 2005
127
0
Alright, So Im planning on switching the "family computer" (DELL 8200 2.2ghz P4) for a 20in Imac.... Then selling three dell 2405fpw's and getting two 30in cinema's. Im wondering tho, is it a good time to sell my powermac? Specs are in sig... If I sell I'll get a quad with at least 4gb of ram... but my question is can I get two nvidia 6800le's and have each one run one 30? or do I have to get the 4400 quarda
 
Unless I'm wrong Apple's G5s only have one PCIe 16x slot, so you can only have one graphics card. You could have a look into which ATI cards when flashed would work in the Powermac (or nVidia for that matter, I just think ATI cards are easier to flash) and then flash it.
 
The G5 page says:

"Support for two 30-inch Apple Cinema HD Displays requires a PCI Express-based Power Mac G5 configuration with the NVIDIA Quadro FX 4500 or installation of an additional NVIDIA GeForce 6600 graphics card; support for more than two displays requires installation of one or more additional NVIDIA GeForce 6600 graphics cards."

So I guess you can just put in two graphics cards for the two displays.
 
Spanky Deluxe said:
Where do the extra 6600s go though?? Do they go into a single lane PCI Express slot?

They go into one of the available slots - one 8X and two 4X slots available - PLENTY of bandwidth on even the 4X slots - not sure there is a 1X slot.
 
Apple site again:

"In addition to the 16-lane graphics slot, the Power Mac G5 features three PCI Express expansion slots: two four-lane slots and one eight-lane slot.(1) Each slot uses a standard connector that can accommodate a card of any size. This means you can install a PCI Express graphics card in any PCI Express slot — enabling a single Power Mac G5 to support four, six, or even eight displays.(2)"

And a footnote:
"The NVIDIA Quadro FX 4500 graphics card occupies the 16-lane PCI Express slot and adjacent PCI Express slot. Maximum of one NVIDIA Quadro FX 4500 or GeForce 7800 GT card per system. To support up to eight 20-inch or 23-inch Apple Cinema Displays, install up to three additional NVIDIA GeForce 6600 graphics cards."
 
livingfortoday said:
Apple site again:

"In addition to the 16-lane graphics slot, the Power Mac G5 features three PCI Express expansion slots: two four-lane slots and one eight-lane slot.(1) Each slot uses a standard connector that can accommodate a card of any size. This means you can install a PCI Express graphics card in any PCI Express slot — enabling a single Power Mac G5 to support four, six, or even eight displays.(2)"

And a footnote:
"The NVIDIA Quadro FX 4500 graphics card occupies the 16-lane PCI Express slot and adjacent PCI Express slot. Maximum of one NVIDIA Quadro FX 4500 or GeForce 7800 GT card per system. To support up to eight 20-inch or 23-inch Apple Cinema Displays, install up to three additional NVIDIA GeForce 6600 graphics cards."

Wow. That really is cool. Most PC based SLI solutions only offer 1x16 OR 2x8. If the PowerPCs have longer bays so that you can put a PCIe graphics card in *any* of them then that is seriously ground breaking. Truly awesome stuff!! Now if only they would allow SLI over those bays. Maybe as more games get ported to OSX x86 a demand will grow for it.
 
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