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Knew it was too good to be true... 4 weeks and problems already

I

Imperil

macrumors member
Original poster
Apr 15, 2008
68
0
I came out of sleep on my new Mac Pro today and it wouldn't get any video (it has dual 8800GTs connected to three 30" monitors). I thought maybe it was a sleep glitch so I rebooted thinking nothing of it.

Upon reboot same problem except now the fans are going full speed and not stopping. So I reboot again and this time the fans calm down but I get a screen that says I must shut down or reboot the Mac Pro. I tried this a few times and eventually I stopped getting this screen and only get the black screen.

If I take out the second 8800GT everything works perfectly fine like it did before, but I tried putting it back in and it is exactly the same.... so much for quality parts hehe.. haven't had this happen with one of my built PCs so far in over 10 years... so I'm really not sure what to do.

Do I just call Apple and tell them the video card is dead and they ship me a new one? Or am I going to have to go through some big run around? Are they going to try to scam me and not warranty it since it is a part and not a system?

Thanks!
 
Could be a problem with the power supply. I am guessing the 8800GT's need their own 12V feeds from the PS in addition to what they get off the PCI-X bus, so the PS might be having problems providing sufficient juice off the 12V rail which is starving the systemboard. When you pull one of the cards, the PS is able to provide enough 12V to boot and operate the system.
 
Hopefully that is not the problem as I was told by the Apple sales person when I purchased everything that having two 8800GTs was perfectly fine. It worked without a single problem for 4 weeks now and just happened all of a sudden.

I'm not sure I'm ready to blame the PSU because the card comes on and you hear the fan at full and it never actually comes back down to normal RPM.
 
Also I was wondering if it possible to test the card on a PCI-E 4x slot? Or does the card need the x16 in order to work?
 
Well I think the card itself is dead since it actually doesn't work in the other slots. Oh well I'll have to call tomorrow and see if I can get a new one shipped out.

Is this how it works? (I call them and they send me a new one) or is there some other process I'll have to go through?

Thanks!
 
Imperil said:
Well I think the card itself is dead since it actually doesn't work in the other slots. Oh well I'll have to call tomorrow and see if I can get a new one shipped out.

Is this how it works? (I call them and they send me a new one) or is there some other process I'll have to go through?

Thanks!
Click to expand...

Imperil, you are the first on this board that I've heard using 2 8800. Did you order this setup BTO from Apple directly, or did you just purchase the mp with 1 8800, and a 8800 upgrade kit that you installed yourself? I'm just curious as the Apple tech over at my country told me I could order a mp with 2 8800 installed for me.

Have you tried inserting the second 8800 into the first slot to test if it's faulty? That would tell you if it is indeed faulty or so. Conversely you can install the first 8800 into just the second slot alone and see if the system is stable. That would tell you if the second slot is faulty.


EDIT: Ah, I just realised you just tested the second 8800 in the other slots.
 
Imperil said:
Well I think the card itself is dead since it actually doesn't work in the other slots. Oh well I'll have to call tomorrow and see if I can get a new one shipped out.

Is this how it works? (I call them and they send me a new one) or is there some other process I'll have to go through?

Thanks!
Click to expand...

For parts I believe the process is: 1) send you a new one with a return label 2) you send the old one back. The alternative would be: 1) they send you a label (maybe a box too) and you put the old one in. 2) Once they see that fedex (usually fedex) has it they send out a new one.

One of those will be the way it works. I think. Good luck to you.
 
orpheus they wouldn't let me order the Mac Pro with the dual 8800GTs but they told me I could order the separate part and use it with no problems at all.

Thanks for the posts guys, I'll be calling them tomorrow to get a new one shipped out.
 
Well I phoned and was on the phone for about 40 minutes (on and off hold) but they told me they are sending shipping labels out to me tomorrow, and that once they receive the card they will ship me a new one. Not really that happy with the service as I couldn't get it cross shipped.. and it took forever and a day on the phone to get it sorted out.. but hey at least my system works with one of them for now.
 
Multiple uses actually... as a game developer it is ideal as I can have my development environment set up on one, run the game/editor on the other, and use the third for either Maya, Safari/Email/Skype, etc. I ordered this Mac Pro to actually see if it would be viable for our company to move towards Mac/iPhone games.

I also trade in the market a lot which requires at least 2 nice sized screens, and the more you have the better.
 
CWallace said:
Could be a problem with the power supply. I am guessing the 8800GT's need their own 12V feeds from the PS in addition to what they get off the PCI-X bus, so the PS might be having problems providing sufficient juice off the 12V rail which is starving the systemboard. When you pull one of the cards, the PS is able to provide enough 12V to boot and operate the system.
Click to expand...

How would you explain the system having worked up to this point if that were the case? Power elves?
 
Imperil said:
Multiple uses actually... as a game developer it is ideal as I can have my development environment set up on one, run the game/editor on the other, and use the third for either Maya, Safari/Email/Skype, etc. I ordered this Mac Pro to actually see if it would be viable for our company to move towards Mac/iPhone games.

I also trade in the market a lot which requires at least 2 nice sized screens, and the more you have the better.
Click to expand...

Post pics of your setup! Sorry to hear about your card!
 
Sure I have a couple pics from before I cleaned up the wires, etc right after I set up :)

http://img100.imageshack.us/img100/2627/dsc0104hq0.jpg

http://img66.imageshack.us/img66/3931/dsc0106wr4.jpg

I know people on these forums will likely be disappointed as the monitors are not ACDs, but we actually had to go with the 3007WFP-HCs. We waited and waited for Apple to upgrade their panels from Rev.1 and meanwhile Dell is on Rev.3 and we needed the color gamut and display quality for what we work in, so we had to sacrifice the look/style :(

EDIT: oh I missed the question about system specs, it is an early 2008 Mac Pro with 2 x 3.0Ghz, 10GB RAM, dual 8800GTs, dual superdrives... and right now the default 320GB drive until I decide on if I want RAID0 150GB Raptors or WD640s :)
 
OMFG. :eek: You have FIVE 30" panels in that second picture (2nd PC for the uninitiated). Pure display pRon.

Also, I'd go for 2 640's in RAID vice the Raptors. The 640's have done really well in speed tests.
 
I am actually really leaning that way towards the RAID 640s... I've been hearing really good things about them and they would most definitely be quieter than raptors :)
 
Not really sure about SLI on the PC with multiple monitors... haven't tried it. The reason it has the two video cards is because it supports 4 monitors and has two 30" and two 20" connected via DVI.
 
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