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NVIDIA GeForce GTX 285 confirmed for June release
- Thread starter Jamnabot
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Yes but even with 3.2 octo Mac Pro + 8800GT, wow runs at 10 fps in certain scenes. So surely 285 will be a big upgrade to it. Wow does not have poor graphics anymore. 5 year old game but has seen two expansions, which did play with the graphics engine a lot over the years.
Wow in windows will run similar to OS X since it's not ported but developed separately for OS X from the start. It uses all the technologies OS X can offer, not to mention wow for OS X does have an ingame capture technology, which the windows part does not even offer.
About the quality of picture, it can be OpenGL vs DX. You should run it on windows using OpenGL and see if then the quality of picture is any different.
Flight Simulator X will happily do it as well. Anything with large environments nad lots of textures probably will.
What about the cooling for the GTX 285 under gaming situations where the GPU is used more? Will it run hot as hell like the iMac's 4850 card and face issues? Isn't GTX285 the type of card you want liquid cooling for on PC's, are the Mac fans strong enough to keep that sucker chilled playing WoW all night?
A couple of things to keep in mind here. Generally the PC crowd (of which I used to be a member of) runs liquid cooling for purposes of overclocking. You can push hardware farther under liquid cooling, which is exactly what Apple had to do in the old G5's if you look back a little ways to get the clock speed up.
The second thing is that the Mac Pro is a really well designed computer. There aren't any cables or other obstructions in the case to block airflow, and it has some enormous fans. It also has a nicely integrated thermistor and fan control. I wouldn't expect any cooling issues with the GTX285.
cooling seems OK with good card
Happily running Mac Pro 08 right now with both 8800GT and a PC GTX 285 up at same time. Up for hours at a time running CUDA under Windows and busy hacking CoreVidia kexts to get it up in OS X. I am using the Palit 2G card which has two fans and some extra cooling pipes sticking out the side, which is probably one of the cooler-running cards. Here it is - this also shows my power setup, where the 8800 is powered from the optical bay and the 285 from the two motherboard connectors. I'd like a cleaner route from the optical bay but otherwise this is running fine.
Happily running Mac Pro 08 right now with both 8800GT and a PC GTX 285 up at same time. Up for hours at a time running CUDA under Windows and busy hacking CoreVidia kexts to get it up in OS X. I am using the Palit 2G card which has two fans and some extra cooling pipes sticking out the side, which is probably one of the cooler-running cards. Here it is - this also shows my power setup, where the 8800 is powered from the optical bay and the 285 from the two motherboard connectors. I'd like a cleaner route from the optical bay but otherwise this is running fine.
Attachments
Cindori's method is absolutely the best way - my photo was taken after rushing into shop to grab decent long molex extender to try other options and only finding a short one and having to do this. I will reorganize as per your photos - thanks! My point was really to show 3 6-pin connectors in play and explain no overheating. But what your post ALSO makes clear is that we can get four 6-pin supplies in place purely internally: Two from your scheme plus two from the motherboard. I guess some posters already new that, but it is news to me for a real Mac Pro. Thanks again - that's two 285s as my next target.
Yes - no SLi - important for gamers to note this - but GPU stuff for CUDA and OpenCL does not need SLi, unlike the games stuff - there are some nice multiGPU examples in the CUDA dev kit. Also a proper Apple card can boot and the other one kicks in later, so both cards do not have to have the full EFI ROM code in a two card setup.
glad to see this, hopefully this will work on my 2.66 mac pro. Also hopefully the price won't be to bad.
once we get osx drivers for gt200 chips (prolly with that quadro card release), you can get pc's gtx285 work fine in macpro/osx without flashing. (with same way - http://netkas.org/?p=83)
PC 285 partially up in 08 Pro
Partial success so far on this: hack of CoreVidia 1.0 (plist and binary both modded - truly horrible) has just got my PC 285 up (following 8800 boot). I have multiple res but not much more. Xdarwin has been asked for upgrade of corevidia (formerly nvdarwin) to make it less painful for when when we get good drivers. I plan to get the Mac version 285 anyway and see if this hack will pair with it to drive both GPUs at full throttle under 10.5.7 release.
Indeed. What's bugging me is that the info with, e.g. the Quadro suggests that the "drivers" will require both 10.5.7 or later AND stuff on the disk that ships with the card (perhaps likewise or better with 10.6). So all the happy injector writers and ROM flashers might be in an awkward position unless it all lives on the Apple OS, or NVIDIA do the decent thing and put their bit of the Mac drivers on their web site like they do for windows. I would put money on them not doing this for the Quadro as there is a lot of value in optimized drivers, but we might be lucky with a bit more latitude over the 285. My concern is that it is not going to be like it was with the 8800GT, where nothing else came with the card and it was all in the OS, leaving us pretty free to play with your stuff and related tools.
well, 10.5.7 beta drivers for hd4870 works fine in 10.5.6, so same will be with nvidia's i think
also, once drivers will leak, it will be all over web.
and, 10.5.8 will have them integrated for sure.
So it sounds like the GTX285 will be available in June but not as a custom configure via Apple, but you would have to buy it on your own?
Will it be easy to install myself? Maybe it will be as easy as plug and play?? I can install HDD in a Mac Pro, which is slightly more difficult than plug and play.
Will it be easy to install myself? Maybe it will be as easy as plug and play?? I can install HDD in a Mac Pro, which is slightly more difficult than plug and play.
No, graphic cards are secured by 24 screws in 3 different sizes. Also you have to solder a power connector to the GPU processor. Failure to install a graphic card correctly may therefore lead to incorrect volt values, possibly frying each and every component in your computer. It's kinda common, you should google it.
My wife's '08 iMac 3.06 with the 8800GS, runs WoW at max rez with the 'Good' Graphics setting (1 below Ultra) at 60+ FPS in most cases.
Sounds like you are like me iBug, I have a 2.8 octo MacPro but only 2GB of ram right now. Thats my limiting factor.
Dalaran is horrible and instances are much better (Naxx/Uld) because they use less memory. My free memory outside an instance is 20-40MB, but inside it is in the 200-300MB range.
Bottom a Mac Pro with 4+ Gigs of RAM an an 8800 GT or better will make WoW smooth as butter.
The GTX 285 has been out for a long time, as well as the GTX 295...what's the big deal?
@cindori You just stick it in a PCIe slot, plug in a couple power connectors, and BAM. That's how it's been for...forever?
@cindori You just stick it in a PCIe slot, plug in a couple power connectors, and BAM. That's how it's been for...forever?
I guess your wife does not raid, or use full AA.
You... thought...I...was...serious?
As for why this Mac Edition is a big deal... Try putting a PC card into the Mac Pro and boot OSX.
That's right.
I have 8GB ram and I can see 10fps if Dalaran is really crowded. Otherwise I'm at 90-100 fps as well.
They have been out for less than 4 months.
The GTX 285 is the most powerful single gpu video card available.
The GTX 295 is the most powerful 2 GPU on a single card available.
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