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lloyd709

macrumors 6502
Original poster
Jan 10, 2008
312
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On another thread, someone just said that the Nvidia 580 can work on the Mac Pro with a bit of tinkering.

I'm not that technical so can anyone explain the steps.
 
The steps are "technical". They gave you everything you'd need. I don't know if anyone will go through all the steps. The "pretty easy" comment was meant for people who are used to using things like pacifist and Xcode to rebuild or re-package kernel extensions and device id's. If you did not understand the post you may not want to go down this route. If it was totally newbie easy everyone would have a flashed GTX580. The only newbie easy card I know is the AMD 6870. If you have a 5870 you don't want a 6870.
 
There is no EFI flash for the GTX580.

It is likely that there never will be.

I can say this with certainty as I am the one who has written the EFI for Quadro 5000, GTX460 and GTX470 and GTX480. Those all work great but require some soldering.

Any Fermi card can be used from 4xx series in 10.6.8 or 10.7 using ATY_Init.

With 10.6.8 you don't even need a "helper" card.

The GTX5xx cards can be made to work in 10.7 and later but require ATY_Init, a "helper" card and adding the device id to the NVDANF100HAL kext.

If you want OpenCl that is a separate hack.

The GTX580 is not a good choice due to it's need of an 8 pin power supply while Macs have only 6 pin.

The GTX570 is a good choice for this reason but you still need to do the hacks.

None of the hacks are very difficult, but people seem to enjoy making them that way.

The thing to keep in mind is thatthere is one set of procedures for Mac Pro and another set for Hacks. They are similar but should NOT be mixed.

There is a thread here that Netkas started about "Using GTX285 or any Nvidia card in Mac Pro". It lays out the basics. The rest of the info is on his site but do research before asking questions.

You are far better off to just get a 6870 as suggested. Any orangutan can get decent results with a 6870 so they are a far better choice for 99.9% of the people reading this.
 
Hey MacVidCards,

My brother has an extra GTX470 that I would like to use in my Mac Pro and I searched high and low for upwards of an hour to see if I could find how I would be able to use it in OS X and windows.

It seems as though youre the go to guy since you've written the EFI for it. But you said it requires soldering? Is there a tutorial for this anywhere that makes down the process?

Im very interested. I have Mac Pro 1 1.
 
Which thread?

On another thread, someone just said that the Nvidia 580 can work on the Mac Pro with a bit of tinkering.

I'm not that technical so can anyone explain the steps.

Which thread is being referred to? I'm searching for more information on this myself so it would be good to follow all leads --- could the original poster include a link to the thread being referred to?

The most relevant information I could find was as netkas' forum:

http://forum.netkas.org/index.php/topic,1120.0.html
 
I have actually a GTX 570 DirectCU II in my 2010 Mac Pro under 10.7.2.
No helper card needed, just ATY_init and add device ID to kext.

It's working just fine.
This card has a 6-pins and a 8-pins connectors.
For the 8-pins connector, I used a 8-pins -> 2x6-pins.
I then had 3x6-pins, 2 are connected to the available connectors on the motherboard, the third connected to 2 satas power connectors using 6-pins -> 2xmolex.

Tested the card under Win7, almost every games maxed out at 2560x1440.
The card is OC'd to about 20%.
I'm playing like this since 3 months and everything is working great.

Just wanted to share my experience ;)
 
I have actually a GTX 570 DirectCU II in my 2010 Mac Pro under 10.7.2.
No helper card needed, just ATY_init and add device ID to kext.

It's working just fine.
This card has a 6-pins and a 8-pins connectors.
For the 8-pins connector, I used a 8-pins -> 2x6-pins.
I then had 3x6-pins, 2 are connected to the available connectors on the motherboard, the third connected to 2 satas power connectors using 6-pins -> 2xmolex.

Tested the card under Win7, almost every games maxed out at 2560x1440.
The card is OC'd to about 20%.
I'm playing like this since 3 months and everything is working great.

Just wanted to share my experience ;)

Thanks for your post Toumak! It's good to hear people having success with nVidia GTX 570/580 in late MacPro. Under Lion it seems surprisingly easy --- even no helper card! --- however I haven't found much consolidated information (other than the link I posted above) about how to go about it.

Is it because it is so simple --- "just ATY_init and add device ID to kext" as you said above?

If you have links to more info on this topic please post them :)

Cheers, and thanks again for posting your experience.
 
Thanks for your post Toumak! It's good to hear people having success with nVidia GTX 570/580 in late MacPro. Under Lion it seems surprisingly easy --- even no helper card! --- however I haven't found much consolidated information (other than the link I posted above) about how to go about it.

Is it because it is so simple --- "just ATY_init and add device ID to kext" as you said above?

If you have links to more info on this topic please post them :)

Cheers, and thanks again for posting your experience.


The reason that no more consolidated info isn't posted is that it is as consolidated as it gets.

You install ATY_Init and add your device id to the kext. (You need to fix permissions after this)

ATY_Init is from Netkas.

So it is pretty easy to understand that if the info isn't on his site, it doesn't exist. Look there.

I have posted here many times about how simple this is, but nobody wants to believe it could be that easy.

On Mac Pros 4,1 and 5,1 you also need to worry about AGPM kext.
 
That's it.
All has been said : with 10.7.2 you just need to install correctly (with Kext Wizard or Kext Helper) ATY_Init (some versions might give troubles, I use the 22th july one : http://rghost.net/15474371).

Then add the card's device ID to /System/Library/Extensions/NVDAGF100Hal.kext/Contents/Info.plist :
0x108610de&0xffe0ffff
Replace 1086 with the ID of your card :
1200 is GTX560Ti
1081 is GTX570
1080 is GTX580
1088 is GTX590
Mine is 1086 because it's a modified design 570 card (Asus 570 DirectCu II).

When done, simply fix permissions on kext (with Kext Wizard or Kext Utility), reboot, and voilà !
You have a working 560/570/580 in your Mac Pro !

Also, the card is working but it's power management is really poor.
The easiest thing to do to use the card at the maximum of its power, is simply delete (make a backup) AppleGraphicsPowerManagement.kext.
As said by MacVidCards, you can also tweak this kext but it is more complicated.

For more informations about using a Fermi-based card (GTX 4xx and 5xx) under OSX, visit those :
http://www.insanelymac.com/forum/index.php?showtopic=260074
http://www.tonymacx86.com/viewtopic.php?f=15&t=25858
http://forum.netkas.org/index.php/board,6.0.html

Keep in mind that those sites are talking about OS X in PCs, not in Macs, and so lot of informations found there can't be applied to our beloved apple'd computers ;)
 
You can find it easily under Windows via the device manager,
or if you make a good search on google with the good reference of your card ;)
 
@macvidcards... Interesting... does everything work? ie boot screens, dvd player etc, or are those issues only for ati cards..

also, i know you have done the efi soldering job, are there any issues with the 4Xx cards after they have the efi rom installed? by issues, i mean does everything work? or are the hacks still required?

cheers
 
No boot screen as the cards can't be efi-flashed.

Didn't tried games or DVD player, but so far everything is working great for me.
 
Can that 570 got to work in 10.6? As I don't have lion and am quite happy with snowy at this stage..

Can't answer you on this, as I bought this card because of its "compatibility" with lion.
But I'm sure you can find that infos on the sites I previously provided ;)
 
I have actually a GTX 570 DirectCU II in my 2010 Mac Pro under 10.7.2.
No helper card needed, just ATY_init and add device ID to kext.

It's working just fine.
This card has a 6-pins and a 8-pins connectors.
For the 8-pins connector, I used a 8-pins -> 2x6-pins.
I then had 3x6-pins, 2 are connected to the available connectors on the motherboard, the third connected to 2 satas power connectors using 6-pins -> 2xmolex.

Tested the card under Win7, almost every games maxed out at 2560x1440.
The card is OC'd to about 20%.
I'm playing like this since 3 months and everything is working great.

Just wanted to share my experience ;)

Hi,
@Toumak
I see in your signature 2 Grafic Cards: "GTX 570 DirectCu II + GT120"
Does this mean, that you use both cards under Lion (with all DVI Ports working), or that you use the GTX 570 under windows and the GT120 under Lion? Are there some conflicts by switching between the 2 systems?

For the connectors, does anyone know where i can find some pictures supporting a "how to" guide?
Thanks all!
 
Hi,
@Toumak
I see in your signature 2 Grafic Cards: "GTX 570 DirectCu II + GT120"
Does this mean, that you use both cards under Lion (with all DVI Ports working), or that you use the GTX 570 under windows and the GT120 under Lion? Are there some conflicts by switching between the 2 systems?

For the connectors, does anyone know where i can find some pictures supporting a "how to" guide?
Thanks all!

I have both, but only the 570 is in the Mac Pro.
The GT120 is in its box, just in case Id need to see EFI screen, for some reason.
;)
 
@macvidcards... Interesting... does everything work? ie boot screens, dvd player etc, or are those issues only for ati cards..

also, i know you have done the efi soldering job, are there any issues with the 4Xx cards after they have the efi rom installed? by issues, i mean does everything work? or are the hacks still required?

cheers
My GTX470 and GTX480 are solid cards that offer boot screen and no need for ATY_Init.

They also run at 5.0 GT/s while most "injected" cards will report 2.5 GT/s.

They run in 10.6.8 which the GTX5xx cards will not.

The GTX5xx cards are faster, but I have still not gotten EFI to work for them.

The cards work great, but Apple has set it up so that you have to mod a couple files if you want OpenCl.
 
Thank-you Toumak and MacVidCards!

Toumak & MacVidCards thanks very much for reiterating the simplicity of running GTX5xx cards under Lion! The information and links provided is just what I was hoping for!

I think the clarifications are very helpful; on some forums related to Hacks (PCs running OS X), where good info is still found, some posts can be very confusing for the inexperienced as to what is relevant for MacPro's.

@Toumak: You mentioned that your GT120 is not in your MacPro and as such there is no boot screen. BUT, if you did install the GT120 (say in slot 3), would you then have boot screen off that card? And would OS X continue using the GTX570 for monitors attached to it once the OS is booted? I guess the answers are all "Yes" but it would be reassuring to hear from you.

Cheers, and thanks again!
 
@MacVidCards,

mate, appreciate the work your doing on EFI, and i for one will buy one of the gtx570 of you if you get the EFI rom dump and solder to work in 10.6 (i dont have the option of going to Lion as my Wacom drivers have bugs in Lion.)

:)
 
@Toumak: You mentioned that your GT120 is not in your MacPro and as such there is no boot screen. BUT, if you did install the GT120 (say in slot 3), would you then have boot screen off that card? And would OS X continue using the GTX570 for monitors attached to it once the OS is booted? I guess the answers are all "Yes" but it would be reassuring to hear from you.

Cheers, and thanks again!

You get EFI boot screen on the monitors attached to the GT120.
To get EFI boot screen on GTX 570, it needs to be flashed (even if the GT120 is in too), which we can't actually do.
And of course, all displays connected to the 570 keep working if the GT120 is present.
BTW, both DVI works simultaneously on the 570, but no DP or HDMI.
That gives me the possibility to run 4 displays at the same time : 2 on GT120 and 2 on 570.
;)
 
You get EFI boot screen on the monitors attached to the GT120.
To get EFI boot screen on GTX 570, it needs to be flashed (even if the GT120 is in too), which we can't actually do.
And of course, all displays connected to the 570 keep working if the GT120 is present.
BTW, both DVI works simultaneously on the 570, but no DP or HDMI.
That gives me the possibility to run 4 displays at the same time : 2 on GT120 and 2 on 570.
;)

Thanks for the input! Your setup sounds great, especially ability to run 4 monitors if you need. It's good news to read! I have an Apple GTX285 connected by DVI to two Dell U2410's at the moment. I'd like to replace the GTX285 by a GTX580 (with extra power from an external power supply), and put the original GT120 in slot 3 (connected to one of the U2410's via DisplayPort).

I run both OS X and Windows using Bootcamp, so having the boot screen is beneficial. I know there are other ways to reboot from one OS into the other, but having the option to select either OS at boot time can be a plus.

Presumably I could toggle one monitor to its DisplayPort input during boot to select OSX or Windows, and then toggle back to DVI input. Should be okay, right?
 
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