Is the Mac Pro Sound Card Upgradable?

[Cromulent]

ASUS has one in the works but its a PCI-E 1x slot card. Or perhaps theres a few models which I think the other is PCI... but I'll bet its PC only.

http://www.theinquirer.net/default.aspx?article=38230


This is a normal thing though, they hype PCI-E to no end, and not much gets made for it. Heck its been on the go since 2005 and the only things thats been PCI-E were graphic cards, and here we are 2007 where a PCI-E sound card is about to be revealed. And now PCI-E 2.0 is on the horizon.

That is mainly due to the fact that until relatively recently there was only one PCI-E slot in a computer, and seeing as the graphics card is the one that requires most bandwidth it makes sense that it would be the first one to take advantage of the newer high speed interfaces. The same is likely to be true of PCI-E 2.0 or whatever new standard they come up with.

 

[amtctt]

Wow, quite abit of mis-information regarding the TOSLINK output. The TOSLINK will only provide surround with DVDs, and pretty much nothing else. Forgo the toslink and get a nice external soundcard, here is a guide for configuring pretty much any windows only soundcard to work on all output of the card in OS X:

http://guides.macrumors.com/5.1_Surround_output_in_OS_X

Sweet Justice that worked nicely. 5.1 one now. Awesome, although a lot of trailers out there aren't 5.1.

 

[sycho]

Sweet Justice that worked nicely. 5.1 one now. Awesome, although a lot of trailers out there aren't 5.1.

No problem. I tired to word it as best as I could. Actually, funny thing, I actually haven't used 5.1 output in OS X as I don't have enough 1/4" to RCA adapters for audio interface.

 

[Tangerine]

So the Mac Pro will never get an updated Sound Card? This is sad.

 

[Kosh66]

Also you say that its different than a pc... nope mac's are pc's. Boot into windows with an audio card and it'll work as it should.

Hardly, same hardware maybe (although even the hardware has different firmware), but a totally different OS. As you yourself just said boot into windows with an audio card and it'll work as it should. Uhhh... we're running Macs with Macs OS here not windows, at least I am.

You can gather from various snippets from around the net that the sound is a load for the CPU on a Mac. For instance, it was noted that when UT2004 came out that the sound can run on the other CPU in a dual CPU Mac giving better FPS. Adding a soundcard isn't going to change how the MacOS handles sound. It just provides the MacOS with another option to route the sound out.

Here is another snippet from the net: http://www.insidemacgames.com/forum/index.php?act=Print&client=printer&f=3&t=14279

 

[scottlinux]

The Creative/BestBuy sort of stuff are consumer brand stuff.

The pro audio folks use firewire interfaces, which are themselves a sound card. These can handle most any sample rates up to 192k and are 24bit, etc.

Check out

http://www.m-audio.com
http://www.presonus.com
http://www.edirol.com
http://www.alesis.com
http://www.sweetwater.com

etc, etc.

or search the digital audio subforum on this forum for lots of recommendations.

There are more high end pci-x solutions which cost several thousands of dollars from:
http://www.apogeedigital.com/
and
http://www.digidesign.com

depends on your needs.

Lots of options out there. I suggest avoiding anything from BestBuy, etc. and going right to a reputable pro-audio company.

 

[amtctt]

Lots of options out there. I suggest avoiding anything from BestBuy, etc. and going right to a reputable pro-audio company.

I wouldn't really recomend that for the OP, he was wanting something for gaming, not for pro-audio stuff. just my opinion though.

 

[Sesshi]

There's no equivalent to the likes of CMSS (3D headphone surround) and EAX (and please don't mention the EAX capability of the inbuilt soundcard on the Mac Pro in the same breath as the Audigy/X-Fi because I'll just laugh at you) implementations of Creative cards - which are PCI only right now. External soundcards have no such capabilities, period.

There's a very good reason why I use both a pro soundcard and a Creative X-Fi on the same PC and it's for the reasons above. Alas, that's just one of the reasons Mac Pro owners are crippled as far as a true general-purpose high-end computer is concerned.

The 'best' solution for gaming is actually the inbuilt soundcard. It offers a very basic version of EAX, which is frankly the best you're going to get on a Mac-compatible platform.

I'm not sure the posted reasons are the actual reasons but Creative says that PCI-E soundcards come up against certain major problems which don't impact the soundcard itself but the other things in the PCI-E bus - and therefore makes a PCI-E soundcard a crippling factor for a gaming PC.

 

[amtctt]

There's no equivalent to the likes of CMSS (3D headphone surround) and EAX (and please don't mention the EAX capability of the inbuilt soundcard on the Mac Pro in the same breath as the Audigy/X-Fi because I'll just laugh at you) implementations of Creative cards - which are PCI only right now. External soundcards have no such capabilities, period.

There's a very good reason why I use both a pro soundcard and a Creative X-Fi on the same PC and it's for the reasons above. Alas, that's just one of the reasons Mac Pro owners are crippled as far as a true general-purpose high-end computer is concerned.

The 'best' solution for gaming is actually the inbuilt soundcard. It offers a very basic version of EAX, which is frankly the best you're going to get on a Mac-compatible platform.

I'm not sure the posted reasons are the actual reasons but Creative says that PCI-E soundcards come up against certain major problems which don't impact the soundcard itself but the other things in the PCI-E bus - and therefore makes a PCI-E soundcard a crippling factor for a gaming PC.

Are you saying you can do 5.1 with the built in soundcard on the mac pro? if so, can you please explain how?

 

[trainguy77]

Are you saying you can do 5.1 with the built in soundcard on the mac pro? if so, can you please explain how?

Connect it to a DTS or dolby digital amp via optical. Then you change a setting in DVD player and DVDs are 5.1 However this doesn't work for games as games are not pre-encoded data streams.

 

[vohdoun]

Connect it to a DTS or dolby digital amp via optical. Then you change a setting in DVD player and DVDs are 5.1 However this doesn't work for games as games are not pre-encoded data streams.

Yeah. Thats how I have my Power Mac hooked upto the Logitech Z5500 5.1 speaker set. BOOM BADDA BING!

Even iTunes plays 5.1 through it, its lurvy!

 

[amtctt]

Connect it to a DTS or dolby digital amp via optical. Then you change a setting in DVD player and DVDs are 5.1 However this doesn't work for games as games are not pre-encoded data streams.

Well, i know that, but it sounded like Sesshi was saying that you do 5.1 like you would with an x-fi card or something. maybe that's not what he was saying, but that's what i thought he was getting at.

 

[Sesshi]

Well, i know that, but it sounded like Sesshi was saying that you do 5.1 like you would with an x-fi card or something. maybe that's not what he was saying, but that's what i thought he was getting at.

Sorry if I gave you the impression. No, it's not possible to get non-preencoded 5.1 out of the optical digital output, which just has passthrough. EAX simulates environmental effects for gaming on 2.0 (i.e. stereo) systems and upwards. You'll get the most basic EAX on the built-in soundcard under Boot Camp, which is better than nothing I guess.

 

[Magnus Reftel]

I want to get an upgrade my Sound Card in my Mac Pro because I want better 3D surround sound for online game. Will any of the Creative SoundBlaster Card work?

There's a plethora of USB and firewire sound cards available that will work with Macs. Internal ones may or may not work, but I can't really see any reason why anyone would want them anyway =)

 

[amtctt]

Sorry if I gave you the impression. No, it's not possible to get non-preencoded 5.1 out of the optical digital output, which just has passthrough. EAX simulates environmental effects for gaming on 2.0 (i.e. stereo) systems and upwards. You'll get the most basic EAX on the built-in soundcard under Boot Camp, which is better than nothing I guess.

Gotcha, that's good though cause otherwise i would have been pissed i spent 40 bucks on my external card. It does seem though that since there are 3 ports, 2 outs and 1 in, that they could have designed it so that they were either ins or outs and assignable so that you could do 5.1.

 

[JeffDM]

That is mainly due to the fact that until relatively recently there was only one PCI-E slot in a computer, and seeing as the graphics card is the one that requires most bandwidth it makes sense that it would be the first one to take advantage of the newer high speed interfaces. The same is likely to be true of PCI-E 2.0 or whatever new standard they come up with.

A lot of boards had one or two x1 PCIe slots along side the graphics slot. But given that many computers had PCI slots too, anyone upgrading would likely take along a PCI card from their old computer, or just use the integrated sound chip on the new sound card. Mac Pro's chip is integrated, there is no removing it, you just add a new device.

There is a bit of a point in wanting an external sound box, because shielding the audio from the computer's noise is tough.

I don't know if there are any Mac-compatible non-pro sound boxes.

 

[trainguy77]

I don't know if there are any Mac-compatible non-pro sound boxes.

Something like the firewave?

 

[JeffDM]

Something like the firewave?

I suppose that would fit my description, but it's still not a solution to the question that the original poster asked. That merely decodes pre-encoded audio, the Firewave won't let you generate play surround sound in real time unless it's already been encoded.

 

[madog]

Griffin Firewave

 

[trainguy77]

Griffin Firewave

That has been mentioned a couple times just read the thread..

 

[madog]

That has been mentioned a couple times just read the thread..

lol, like the ones right above my post? Looks like I didn't see the second page..