MacPro 1,1 video card upgrade...

Lesser Evets · Apr 10, 2011

I'm curious about what-effects-what in my computer. Over the past couple years I noticed some of the video like YouTube or will stutter and hold during times of "high computation". If I open a web page while YouTube is playing, YouTube stops for a second.

Can this be remedied with a new video card? My system still has the original 1900xt which is said to be pretty crappy for a variety of reasons.

What kind of newer card can I get for this Mac? Does the 5770 work well and what kind of improvement would it provide?

Thanks.

interslicer · Apr 10, 2011

i dont think a new graphics card will much improve youtube loading. thats almost always throttled by your connection speed and even the worst mac pro should do the processing part just fine.

as for upgrading the 1900xt, i upgraded to a 5770 myself and its wonderful. its much faster, much quieter, and i can now use bootcamp and run windows. totally worth the money

Lesser Evets · Apr 10, 2011

The problem is odd. It doesn't seem to be about connection or loading. My DSL is speedy. If a video is even already loaded, while playing it will halt while another program (DVD player for instance) starts up. Same with DVD player while something else loads. A quick second-long pause.

Wasn't sure if it was video card problems or a processor problem.

interslicer said:
... upgrading the 1900xt, i upgraded to a 5770 myself and its wonderful. its much faster, much quieter, and i can now use bootcamp and run windows. totally worth the money

That's good enough for me.
I've been struggling with the 1900xt on a couple games and bootcamp windows.

handheldgames · Apr 10, 2011

Lesser Evets said:
The problem is odd. It doesn't seem to be about connection or loading. My DSL is speedy. If a video is even already loaded, while playing it will halt while another program (DVD player for instance) starts up. Same with DVD player while something else loads. A quick second-long pause.

Wasn't sure if it was video card problems or a processor problem.

That's good enough for me.
I've been struggling with the 1900xt on a couple games and bootcamp windows.

If you haven't cleaned the copper cooler inside the x1900, I highly recommend you take a couple moments to remove the layer of dust buildup inside the cooling unit. A can of compressed air should do the trick. I'd also recommend a good cleaning of the CPU coolers as well, they get a good amount of build up.

Regarding the x1900, a 5770 would be a nice bump in performance and shouldn't make your system louder. If you go to a 4780, 5780 or 6780, you'll need an additional power cable.

Best luck!

aliot · Apr 10, 2011

I suggest you can give 5870 a try. I recently buy a xfx 5870 and flash it with a mac rom. Everything works fine except no efi screen, but I have a original 7300GT so problem solved. If you are a single system user you can just buy two power cable and a 5870, and you probably will have enough video power for the rest of this year..

lloyd709 · Apr 12, 2011

aliot said:
I suggest you can give 5870 a try. I recently buy a xfx 5870 and flash it with a mac rom. Everything works fine except no efi screen, but I have a original 7300GT so problem solved. If you are a single system user you can just buy two power cable and a 5870, and you probably will have enough video power for the rest of this year..

I did quite a bit of testing side by side of the 5870 and the 5770 on a 1,1 mac pro and there is no significant difference - the 1,1 mac pro just can't make use of the extra power. The only difference is the 5870 is louder!!

Lesser Evets · Apr 13, 2011

Thanks guys. I ordered a 5770 from Apple. It'll be here Monday.

I took the 1900xt out and sprayed. Yes--there was a sheet of dust on the fine, copper heat sinks. Awful. It hasn't solved all my niggling problems, but it solved the shutting down I used to experience when I ran Steam on this system.

It's about time to upgrade what I can so this system is worth another 4 or 5 years. It's plenty fast for 99% of what I do.

stiwi · Apr 17, 2011

I might disappoint but 5770 might not resolve your problems. There is no GPU acceleration support in flash for ATI so the stutter issue is not related to GPU performance.

I have 5770 and I got stutter on youtube too. When Safari takes too much resources, e.g. 1.5GB memory, it starts to behave a bit odd and stutter the video. If I open the same video in Firefox, it works perfect.

Soniko · Apr 17, 2011

Hi, I've HD 3870 with MacPro 2008, and it makes a lot of noise.
Does the HD 5770 is better than the 3870 and is it more silent?

ActionableMango · Apr 19, 2011

Soniko said:
Hi, I've HD 3870 with MacPro 2008, and it makes a lot of noise.
Does the HD 5770 is better than the 3870 and is it more silent?

Yes

Lesser Evets · Apr 21, 2011

INSTALLED... excellent.

Oddly, it did improve around 2/3 of the "YouTube stutter" generally there is one stutter now as the video hits the final-load moment. Only a fraction of a second. Used to stutter around three times each video. Not sure how the hardware-software works, but it has helped some.

Easy install! It has helped gaming, too. I'd say it is 3x as fast from what I'm seeing with tricky game maps and mods.

Soniko said:
Does the HD 5770 is better than the 3870 and is it more silent?

I have no idea about the 3870's noise, but the noise of the 5770 is absolutely nothing next to my old 1900xt. There was considerable fan-noise in the 1900. And even worse, I remember this tower made no noise compared to my old quicksilver tower... those old QS Macs must have sounded like turbine engines!

geonjay · Jun 10, 2011

interslicer said:
as for upgrading the 1900xt, i upgraded to a 5770 myself and its wonderful. its much faster, much quieter, and i can now use bootcamp and run windows. totally worth the money

I have a 1.1 and I've been fine with the 1900xt so far. Actually, I used to be a bleeding edge hardware junkie and I've been VERY surprised by the staying power of this little 1900 card. I just picked up a few games that require more horsepower and I'm looking at the 5770. I see that there's a XFX knockoff of the card available for $99 at some stores. How difficult was the mac rom flashing process? Did you do it through a Bootcamp'd version of Windows? I found a few places that will sell the Apple model for $220..but I'm cheap.

Thanks

shawk1 · Aug 7, 2012

Graphics Card Upgrade

I had this problem and had a difficult time locating the right graphics card that would work with my 2006 mac pro. Everyone referenced older graphics cards, or ones that were discontinued. After trial and error, I found the XFX Radeon graphics cards sold at Best Buy work perfect. They are the same Radeon type, although older, that was previously in my mac when I purchased it new. All I did was pop out the old graphics card, put in the new one, and fired up the computer. After the system uploads it recognized the new card, the screen appeared and it prompted me to select the proper power configuration for the new graphics card. Then the system resets and I are off and running with the new graphics card.

I think any of the XFX Radeon graphics cards will work.

This is the first one I tried. IT worked well but seemed to lack the power.
http://www.bestbuy.com/site/XFX+-+On...&skuId=4676591

The second one I tried seems to work much better.
http://www.bestbuy.com/site/XFX+-+AM...&skuId=4677014

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MacPro 1,1 video card upgrade...

Lesser Evets

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interslicer

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Lesser Evets

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handheldgames

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aliot

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lloyd709

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Lesser Evets

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stiwi

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Soniko

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ActionableMango

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Lesser Evets

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