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Mac 5770 + OS 10.5.8, any way to make it work?

P

Pavezer

macrumors newbie
Original poster
Oct 21, 2010
11
0
Hi!

I'm a new member with a dilemma.

My 8800GT died on early 2008 (3,1) 8 core MacPro. I needed a new craphics card very fast and I was told that Mac edition 5770 works (in early 2008 machines, too) and was a good choice. I ordered one from Apple, installed it and it seems to work, but is veeery slow and doesn't recognize color profiles or display. I have 30" HP through dual-link DVI. Apparently a driver issue.

After a bit of reading, I found out that 5770 requires also 10.6.4 for the drivers (should have been told that too..). I'm running Leopard 10.5.8 and not willing to upgrade because I have Adobe Master collection CS3 for my work. My system has been very satisfying and updating to Snow Leopard would mean also upgrading the whole master collection, for the stability, which is expensive and not very reasonable to do just because of the 5770.

Is there any way to make Mac 5770 work in 10.5.8? I have read flashed 5770 cards running in 10.5.8, is that true? If so, how, and is it possible to do with Mac edition card?

If it's impossible, any recommendations for some equivalent graphics card that is known to work (choices seem to be veeeeeeeeeeeery limited)? Should I just get another 8800 and forget the whole mess?

Thanks a lot in advance!
 
Thanks, mjsmke.

I'm not really confident with that fact, Internet is full of stories CS3 not working with 10.6.4. Seems that some are lucky while some are not.
 
If you have a spare HDD try installing 10.6.4 on that first with CS3. That way you can always switch back without reinstalling.

There is a Mac Mini at my work with 10.6.4 with CS3 working fine.
 
Thanks again, will do that.
Still interested in resolving the original dilemma, too :)
 
Back to topic.

Running 5770 with SnowLeoprad now, installed graphics update etc. The most important softwares seem to work ok, so no problems with that, but 5770 isn't still working as expected. Performance is low and I have lost color depth, card recognizes color profiles, but I have veeeery heavy banding going on, blacks are deep black from 0 to around 50, and the whole color spectrum does have similiar problems. Almost like I've downgraded the bit depth, but without dithering. Anyway, system profiler still says that I do have 32 bit color depth... I have resetted pram etc, no help there. I also upgraded to 10.6.5 but no help. Apple Hardware Test didn't find any problems

I've used a lot of time reading through forums already to find a solution but I have no idea what's going on. Could it be that changing from nVidia to Ati messes something up with the drivers? Dunno. :confused:

I'm really close to give up. I might try to do a clean install of OSX, if it doesn't help, thats it.
 
Atomic101 said:
Hi
could it be the gamma ?
Click to expand...
No. I know how to deal with gamma. I have professional calibration system and did recalibrate, but it didn't help. I also uninstalled calibration system and tried Apples own calibration procedure. No help.

New info:

Colors in 10.5.8. are ok (EDIT: no banding problem (low-bit depht??) but it doesn't recognize color profiles) but in 10.6.5. messed up! :confused:

BTW, Xbench gives me results of:

In 10.5.8.
Quartz Graphics test: 221
Open GL test: 100

In 10.6.5.
Quartz Graphics test: 258
Open GL test 228

10.5.8. tells that Quartz Extreme is "Not Supported", it shouldn't even work, right? But 10.6.5 isn't much better. How to determine Quartz status Snow Leopard? I couldn't find it from the System Profiler.
 
Last edited:
Good news for me!

I did a clean install of OSX up to Snow Leopard and updated to 10.6.4. I got my colors back and profiles working! But still had some performance problems, slow interface etc. I tested Quartz Extreme by launcing iMovie, which didn't want to launch and indicated that Quartz Extreme is not supported. I installed Snow Leopard Graphics Update and voilá! Got Quartz Extreme working and everything works smooth! Sleep and fan is ok too.

In the end, straight change from nVidia 8800 to Ati 5770 obviously wasn't a success and caused problems. Clean install repaired something (drivers, maybe) and got me back to business.

xBench results are now:
Quartz Graphics Test: 255.36
OpenGL Graphics Test: 259.31

Are these numbers in the right ballpark?
 
Pavezer said:
xBench results are now:
Quartz Graphics Test: 255.36
OpenGL Graphics Test: 259.31
Click to expand...

A bit lower than I have seen on my 5770. Also, I did just pull out a 8800GT from my Mac Pro, so if you would rather save the money and replace the card just send me a PM.
 
izibo said:
A bit lower than I have seen on my 5770. Also, I did just pull out a 8800GT from my Mac Pro, so if you would rather save the money and replace the card just send me a PM.
Click to expand...

Izibo, I think I'll keep the card, It's anyway better than 8800GT and I'm just happy to get the thing working properly again.
What ballpark are your results and what's your configuration?
 
Pavezer said:
xBench results are now:
Quartz Graphics Test: 255.36
OpenGL Graphics Test: 259.31

Are these numbers in the right ballpark?
Click to expand...

On my MacPro 4,1 (Quad 2,66-2009), with my Geforce NVidia GT120 (which is a much slower card) I get
Quartz Graphics Test 257.66
OpenGL Graphics Test 220.17

I think Cinebench is a more reliable test.
There OpenGL score is only 15,10 frames/second. Your Radeon should do much better.
 
Last edited:
Mac Hammer Fan said:
On my MacPro 4,1 (Quad 2,66-2009), with my Geforce NVidia GT120 (which is a much slower card) I get
Quartz Graphics Test 257.66
OpenGL Graphics Test 220.17

I think Cinebench is a more reliable test.
Click to expand...
Ok.. Cinebench:
OpenGL: 26.68 fps
CPU 6.50 pts
 
Pavezer, can you boot under 10.5.8 without proper graphics acceleration or do you get a blank screen?
 
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