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Will any graphics card work in a Mac Pro early 2009?

Ben1l

Ben1l

macrumors regular
Original poster
Nov 30, 2006
249
0
Hi

I want to run a second display on my mac pro, that currently only has one NVIDIA GeForce GT 120. (it only has one DVI port).

Can I buy any graphics card that has a PCI Express 2.0 interface and install it in the mac pro without any issues? Is there anything else in the tech specs I need to make sure it does/doesn't have in order for it to work in the mac pro?

Appreciate any advice!
 
Ben1l said:
Hi

I want to run a second display on my mac pro, that currently only has one NVIDIA GeForce GT 120. (it only has one DVI port).

Can I buy any graphics card that has a PCI Express 2.0 interface and install it in the mac pro without any issues? Is there anything else in the tech specs I need to make sure it does/doesn't have in order for it to work in the mac pro?

Appreciate any advice!
Click to expand...

Any old graphics card will work under Windows in Bootcamp. Otherwise to utilize a fully functional graphics card in OSX you'll either have to opt for apple's offerings like the 4870, 5770 or 5870 which they have listed on their website or you can flash certain PC graphics cards to work under mac osx. You see the problem or the issue with graphics cards is that PC ones have a BIOS firmware on them whereas Mac variants have EFI firmware on them.
 
ildondeigiocchi said:
Any old graphics card will work under Windows in Bootcamp. Otherwise to utilize a fully functional graphics card in OSX you'll either have to opt for apple's offerings like the 4870, 5770 or 5870 which they have listed on their website or you can flash certain PC graphics cards to work under mac osx. You see the problem or the issue with graphics cards is that PC ones have a BIOS firmware on them whereas Mac variants have EFI firmware on them.
Click to expand...

Thank you for the reply. I'm not so hot on the tech stuff. But am I right in saying that if it's not sold on the Apple site. I'm going to have issues with it in one way or another?
 
I'm running 2 monitors from the GT120. Just use the Mini Display Port with an adaptor. Works 100% for me.
 
unless you're doing graphics-intensive stuff, just get a miniDP to DVI adapter. otherwise, you will have to purchase a Mac-specific card or a normal card that's been flashed...or buy a compatible card and flash it yourself.
 
Msi r6570

I installed the MSI R6570 video card in my mac pro (early 2009, replacing the nVidia GT120). It runs fine with most applications. However, when I try to load Left4Dead, (the main reason fro upgrading the 4 year old video card) it crashes. When I run the game from command line I get the following error:

AppFramework : Unable to load module vguimatsurface.dylib!
Unable to load interface VGUI_Surface030 from vguimatsurface.dylib
Click to expand...

I uninstalled steam and the game then reinstalled them both but still get the same error. I'm running 10.7.4 and it identifies the card as "Graphics ATI Radeon HD 6xxx 2048 MB". Any ideas how to get around this (without having to purchase an archaic Radeon 5770)?
 
mr12 said:
I installed the MSI R6570 video card in my mac pro (early 2009, replacing the nVidia GT120). It runs fine with most applications. However, when I try to load Left4Dead, (the main reason fro upgrading the 4 year old video card) it crashes. When I run the game from command line I get the following error:



I uninstalled steam and the game then reinstalled them both but still get the same error. I'm running 10.7.4 and it identifies the card as "Graphics ATI Radeon HD 6xxx 2048 MB". Any ideas how to get around this (without having to purchase an archaic Radeon 5770)?
Click to expand...

This issue is WELL documented. Read up on using 6870 in a Mac Pro
 
I would send this in a private message if I knew how to. Could you help me with specific terms to search for? I tried searching for parts of the error I had and for the R6570 card but didn't find any results. I found the Zeus patcher but my card isn't supported so I'm not really sure where to go from here. Thanks.
 
Frustrated request for help

After spending an entire Sunday afternoon researching and trying to find something that works, I'm requesting help. I installed ATY_init from groths.org I couldn't find any firmware for MSI R6570 that would work with Zeus or any firmware for that matter that would flash with the card. I also installed 2 other radeon packages that were supposed to work but didn't. Steam is still broken (like threads said it would unless I can flash the card). That being said, I have 3 questions:

1. Is there any way to get steam to work with a MacPro 4,1 and a Radeon R6570 card?

2. Is there a simple and recent card (2011 Q4 - 2012 Q1) that will work with the MacPro that isn't too expensive?

3. I saw a thread about the GTX570 working well but am not too excited about dropping $300 for the card. Does it matter who manufactures the card for compatibility with mac (MSI, XFX, Asus, etc.)?
 
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