x86 macs and graphics cards

[Anarchy99]

do you think they will use pc versions of graphics cards?

[admanimal]

do you think they will use pc versions of graphics cards?

They will use whatever is compatible with the motherboards they use. But in any case, don't expect them to support all available PC graphics cards, because then OS X just turns into a big device driver swamp like Windows.

[Mechcozmo]

No, due to the whole PC BIOS, Open Firmware, etc. thing. And yes, Intel Macs don't use OF but they don't use a BIOS either.

[admanimal]

No, due to the whole PC BIOS, Open Firmware, etc. thing. And yes, Intel Macs don't use OF but they don't use a BIOS either.

Has someone actually confirmed that they won't use a BIOS? If so, I'd like to see a link.

[panphage]

Has someone actually confirmed that they won't use a BIOS? If so, I'd like to see a link.
The rumor is that they'll use Intel's BIOS replacement. So that won't affect graphics cards because most of the world will also be using Intel's BIOS replacement. Sorry I don't have a source for this, it's just what I keep reading in articles and at the ars technica fora.

[ExoticFish]

i thought i read that they were still going to use open firmware?? i forget where i read that though.

[robbieduncan]

i thought i read that they were still going to use open firmware?? i forget where i read that though.

It states in Apple's porting guide that Intel Macs do not use Open Firmware.

Personally I think that pretty much any ATI or NVidia based card will be usable on Intel Macs which will be pretty cool. Of course this only applies to Macs with upgradable graphics cards so assuming that the Intel Mac lineup ends up looking like the PPC one than that's PowerMacs only.

[Platform]

Gigabytes 6600GT card with TWO GPU's on one card.......SLi :eek: :eek: :rolleyes: :D :D

[Redneck1089]

Will the current Mac graphic cards work on future Macs with Intel processors in them?

[ravenvii]

Will the current Mac graphic cards work on future Macs with Intel processors in them?

No. Unless you are daring and try to flash the card to the new BIOS or whatever it is they're going to use in Intel Macs.

[rdrr]

Apple OpenFirmware Statement (http://developer.apple.com/documentation/MacOSX/Conceptual/universal_binary/universal_binary_tips/chapter_5_section_18.html#//apple_ref/doc/uid/TP40002217-CH239-283936)

[Eric5h5]

Personally I think that pretty much any ATI or NVidia based card will be usable on Intel Macs which will be pretty cool.

Yeah, and the drivers to run "pretty much any" card are just going to fall out of the sky. ;) In reality, the selection will remain similar to what we have now, unless Macs get a truly massive increase in marketshare so that it's worth ATI/nVidia's time to write those extra OS X drivers.

--Eric

[MrCommunistGen]

Gigabytes 6600GT card with TWO GPU's on one card.......SLi :eek: :eek: :rolleyes: :D :D

This card is a proprietary Gigabyte implementation of SLI on a single card. Currently it only works with a matching Gigabyte mobo (unless something has changed...) Even if this is no longer true the mobo must have at least PCI-E (duh) and would probably still have to support SLI.

-mcg

[benpatient]

Yeah, and the drivers to run "pretty much any" card are just going to fall out of the sky.

you do realize that PC graphics cards from the "big 2" manufacturers have had universal drivers for several years now, right?

The same driver that controls the latest 6800 Ultra SLI setup controls a GeForce2mx.

No matter what graphics card you have, you only need to download the nVidia or the ATI graphics driver to get updated graphics drivers for every chipset they've made since the late 90s.

With Mac moving to x86, there's no reason for ATI or nVidia to not work with Apple to support their entire mess of graphics cards. If it can run on integrated Intel graphics, it can run on any modern card. If that turns out to not be true, it won't be a technical limitation, but rather because Apple wishes to keep that part of the hardware closed.

You don't have to worry about "tons" of drivers for the thousands of different cards out there. At present, 90% of stand-alone PC graphics cards use one of 2 different drivers, each coming in a 20-30mb download.