5870 or 5770? Decision for ordering new MP

[glassbathroom]

Looks like I'll be giving the 5770 a test drive. As I got to thinking about whether to upgrade to the 5870, I noticed on my order status page there was no option to modify the order. Chatted with a rep who confirmed I could NOT change my order. I guess that could mean the MPs will start shipping sooner rather than later...

In my experience you can only ever cancel an order and reorder. Have they stopped you cancelling as well? If this is true then they must be near to shipping time.

 

[seek3r]

As I told another member, a good bet might be to go for a 5870 driving your important displays, and a GT 120 or two for driving secondary displays. The GT 120's are about as powerful as the 8800 GT's, but they require no power connector so you can load them in alongside the 5870. This is what I do in my Mac Pro.

The 5870 does use a lot of power, but you should be able to scoot in a few GT 120s alongside it.

aha, someone running ati and nvidia alongside, how's the performance?

(I ask because of my question here: https://forums.macrumors.com/threads/994839/ )

 

[goMac]

aha, someone running ati and nvidia alongside, how's the performance?

(I ask because of my question here: https://forums.macrumors.com/threads/994839/ )

I'm not running ATI yet (but I plan to after the OS X NVidia driver debacle.)

I'm in the same situation you are, as I do CUDA programming, here is what I've heard.

OS X you should be fine, you can still target the second card with CUDA just fine (or any NVidia card in the machine.)

Windows - You need to be running Windows 7. Vista freaks out if you have mixed GPUs. Also, NVidia may intentionally gimp stuff like running hardware Physx on a mixed system, although from what I've heard CUDA should work.

 

[seek3r]

I'm not running ATI yet (but I plan to after the OS X NVidia driver debacle.)

I'm in the same situation you are, as I do CUDA programming, here is what I've heard.

OS X you should be fine, you can still target the second card with CUDA just fine (or any NVidia card in the machine.)

Windows - You need to be running Windows 7. Vista freaks out if you have mixed GPUs. Also, NVidia may intentionally gimp stuff like running hardware Physx on a mixed system, although from what I've heard CUDA should work.

That's what I've been hoping, good luck on your end! Wish there were some official docs on Apple's site about this kind of mix n match that were, you know, actually helpful ::rolls eyes::

 

[johnnymg]

Looks like I'll be giving the 5770 a test drive. As I got to thinking about whether to upgrade to the 5870, I noticed on my order status page there was no option to modify the order. Chatted with a rep who confirmed I could NOT change my order. I guess that could mean the MPs will start shipping sooner rather than later...

Curious to know how the 5770 has worked for you. I'm particularly interested in the noise this bad boy makes.

thanks
JohnG

 

[xyzzy-xyzzy]

Curious to know how the 5770 has worked for you. I'm particularly interested in the noise this bad boy makes.

I'd like to bump this thread since I too am curious about the noise level, power consumption, and heating of both the 5770 and 5780, particularly the latter, since I'm "on the fence" trying to decide between these two cards. While I generally don't need the more powerful 5780, for only a $200 price difference for the more powerful card, which I may need some future time, for me, I'm mainly concerned about the noise level relative to the 5770. Power consumption and heating is a secondary concern in that if the 5780 runs hotter, the other fans might rev up somewhat and again contribute to even more noise.

Also, over the long term, should I be concerned about the larger load on the power supply? Or is the power supply more than adequate to handle the 5780 plus up to 3 more ePCI cards (e.g., like a eSata card)?

And finally, am I correct in my assumption that the 2010 mac pro's (I've got my eye on the 3.33 hex by the way) have a double-wide slot 1 to accommodate a 5780 which would still permit some other ePCI card in slot 2?

 

[johnnymg]

I'd like to bump this thread since I too am curious about the noise level, power consumption, and heating of both the 5770 and 5780, particularly the latter, since I'm "on the fence" trying to decide between these two cards. While I generally don't need the more powerful 5780, for only a $200 price difference for the more powerful card, which I may need some future time, for me, I'm mainly concerned about the noise level relative to the 5770. Power consumption and heating is a secondary concern in that if the 5780 runs hotter, the other fans might rev up somewhat and again contribute to even more noise.

Also, over the long term, should I be concerned about the larger load on the power supply? Or is the power supply more than adequate to handle the 5780 plus up to 3 more ePCI cards (e.g., like a eSata card)?

And finally, am I correct in my assumption that the 2010 mac pro's (I've got my eye on the 3.33 hex by the way) have a double-wide slot 1 to accommodate a 5780 which would still permit some other ePCI card in slot 2?

I've had the 5770 for a while now. It's virtually silent.

 

[DesmoPilot]

\The GT 120's are about as powerful as the 8800 GT's,

Uhhh, what?

 

[xyzzy-xyzzy]

I've had the 5770 for a while now. It's virtually silent.

Thanks, that's good to know. But it doesn't help me eliminate the 5780 on the basis of the concerns I mentioned.

Anyone care to comment on the 5880 with respect to my concerns?