I have an early 2006 Mac Pro 1,1 and am thinking about getting one of these cards. How much louder are they than say the stock NVIDIA GeForce 7300 GT. All three other slots are in use so I can only have one graphics card. Does the 5770 actually support 3 displays? I have the 30 in cinema and a 21 in Samsung 213T. Thanks.
My 5870 is totally silent, even when I'm pushing Lightroom and Apple Color. Too bad it keeps giving me static like I've got 1970's rabbit ears attached. Still waiting for a fix from Apple. Maybe sometime in 2011.
RE three monitors, from Apple's site on the 5770: The 5770 does indeed work, with all three ports fully functioning for video use. As noted in Apple's kbase docs, you MiniDisplayPort -> (dual link) DVI adapters if you intend to drive three displays.
Which is correct if you want to drive 3 30" or high res 27" displays that only a DVI input, for smaller DVI displays simply use active single link DVI adapters, or, if supported by your monitors, use (mini) display port.
Ditto here - for all the hand wringing I saw from folks on the noise, I was shocked at how quiet mine was. Complete non-issue as far as my experience.
So if I am using a 30 in cinema connected to the dvi, would I need a simple mini display to DVI adapter to run my Samsung 23 in. And then I guess I could get another adapter to run a third DVI display. The 30 in cinema is/would be the largest display for me, unless somebody gets really generous and wants to get me three new 27 in displays.