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Powermac g4(gigabit) Video cards

Dangol

Dangol

macrumors newbie
Original poster
Dec 29, 2020
12
1
Greetings, I have a g4 gigabit I'm looking into upgrading the video card on.

It has the standard rage pro already in it, and I've been looking into compatibility on prospects, but I get mixed messages as to what is and is not compatible.

I'd rather not have to flash but of course I will if I have to.

I was looking into a Firegl x3 to use, but it'll require flashing.

What about the geforce 4 ti4600? Its mac/adc, 128mb, etc. Sounds like Id just have to tape the pins and install drivers.

Any help will be appreciated, thank you.
 
There's also the Radeon 9200, the 9600 and the 9800 Pro. All come in Mac versions. The 9800 Pro requires additional Molex power.
 
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Or the Radeon 9650 that was standard in some G5s. A 9600 but with dual-link DVI. Requires taping but works in Jaguar and later versions of Mac OS X.
 
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So as long as it is the mac version, the only thing required would be drivers, and taping the pins? No flashing?

Thanks for the replies. I enjoy this machine quite a bit and wanted to breath some new life into it. As a side question, are any of those os9 friendly?
 
Dangol said:
So as long as it is the mac version, the only thing required would be drivers, and taping the pins? No flashing?

Thanks for the replies. I enjoy this machine quite a bit and wanted to breath some new life into it. As a side question, are any of those os9 friendly?
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Flashing is only required if you're trying to convert a compatible PC graphic card to Mac. Mac versions are already Mac. No drivers necessary as OS X already comes with all that.

Taping pins is simply to get a G5 card to work in a G4 and only applies to AGP cards, not PCI.
 
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Amethyst1 said:
The 9200 has drivers for OS 9, the 96x0 and 9800 don't. X3 - nope.

The GF4Ti is regarded as being the best card for 9.
Click to expand...
And this is why I've had eyes out for a 9200 for my G4 MDD. Not only does it work with OS 9, but it also works properly with Linux, unlike the Radeon 9000 currently in the system. Sure, there are more powerful AGP cards, but I also want to keep native OS 9 support.
 
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as for the 9800 pro, anything to look for in particular? I'm confused on the difference between agp and agp pro. I've seen some mac edition 9800 pros but they are agp pro.

Thanks for the replies.

-edit, I believe I understand the differences now.
 
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I have a GeForce 6200 in mine, however that card also has no OS 9 support. Basically the rule of thumb is if it supports CoreImage, it doesn't support OS 9.

A Radeon 9000 Pro out of a MDD would be a good fit. It has decent 3D support and even Leopard works pretty well on it despite not being CoreImage. It also has OS 9 support if that is a requirement. It should work out of the box as well.
 
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I ended up getting a 9800 pro, of course ill have to tape and flash it, but with the ssd I put in it its already snappy. This would finish it. Thank you all for the replies.
 
Dangol said:
I ended up getting a 9800 pro, of course ill have to tape and flash it, but with the ssd I put in it its already snappy. This would finish it. Thank you all for the replies.
Click to expand...
If it's a 9800 Pro meant for a G5, yeah - and that may not work in a G4. I believe the ones for the G5 were 512mb and the G4 versions were 256. Is the card blue?

If it's red, that'll be the G4 version and you don't need to tape pins. I had a 9800 Pro in my Quicksilver for a while. It does need additional Molex power.
 
It's red but I believe it was for a windows pc as it doesn't have the apple display connection. Although the rage pro in it also doesn't have the adc stuff, so perhaps I can get away with not taping. I still need to flash it, but I'm waiting on some thermal paste to come in to redo the heatsink & new pads for the memory.
 
The native G4 256 model is really hard to find. I have one in one of g4's 128 model, 9000 pro in the other g4.
 
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Sorry for the late update. Some good news and some bad news. I successfully flashed the 9800 pro. At first the computer would not boot. I desoldered the two resistors and it booted right up. Flashed with graphicaccelerator and it seems to work fine except for yellow lines. Not your typical artifacts. Its strange, as it even shows up on screensharing. I tried another rom and same issue. Any advice? I hope the card isn't the issue.

Thank you in advance.
 

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Does it do the same thing if you lower the RAM/GPU frequency? Is temperature a factor?
 
Yes, I set the the core and clock to 9800 no pro frequencies to no success. I tried both the sprinter and gotoh roms.

Here is the actual gpu,

www.techpowerup.com

Sapphire 9800 PRO Ultimate Specs

ATI R350, 380 MHz, 8 Pixel Shaders, 4 Vertex Shaders, 8 TMUs, 8 ROPs, 128 MB DDR2, 340 MHz, 256 bit
www.techpowerup.com www.techpowerup.com
 
"No success" as in the yellow bars are still there, or it doesn't work at all? My guess is the card is bad. If you put the peecee ROM back in there and try it under dos and see the same thing then that would confirm it.
 
G
ervus said:
"No success" as in the yellow bars are still there, or it doesn't work at all? My guess is the card is bad. If you put the peecee ROM back in there and try it under dos and see the same thing then that would confirm it.
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Good idea, I'll do that this weekend. No success as in same issue.
 
eyoungren said:
Flashing is only required if you're trying to convert a compatible PC graphic card to Mac. Mac versions are already Mac. No drivers necessary as OS X already comes with all that.

Taping pins is simply to get a G5 card to work in a G4 and only applies to AGP cards, not PCI.
Click to expand...
Not compleedly correct, taping is required for AGP 8X cards to work in a G4

Correct me if im wrong… normally most G5 GPUs are not working inside a G4, because the ADC power connectors are on different positions. There were one or two card who don't need extra power and don't have ADC as well (i think it was the 9600 XT and Pro dual DVI). I think these two cards will work with taping.
 
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