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Upgrading old Mac Pro to 8800 GT graphics?

I emailed engadget again and let them know that the original description on the Apple Store did not list any requirements about PCIe 2.0, and that Apple had to call everyone who placed an order for the card to see if they were planning on using it in an older Mac Pro. Not sure if they will amend the story, but we'll see. I told them all this in my original message, but they didn't seem interested did they...
 
Redemption AT LAST! ! !

Finally some GOOD news!

Update right off of Engadget's Story:

Update: Nvidia's Director of PR emailed us to let us know that the company is "in the middle of bringing out an upgrade kit based on the NVIDIA GeForce 8800 GTsolution for all Intel-based Mac Pros." What's more, this upgrade kit "should be out in a few weeks." So there you have it, folks. We'll see if they deliver as promised.


YES YES YES, please let this be true. . . so I can set fire to my crapppppppyyy X1900XT for GOOD!
 
macbaj said:
Finally some GOOD news!

Update right off of Engadget's Story:

Update: Nvidia's Director of PR emailed us to let us know that the company is "in the middle of bringing out an upgrade kit based on the NVIDIA GeForce 8800 GTsolution for all Intel-based Mac Pros." What's more, this upgrade kit "should be out in a few weeks." So there you have it, folks. We'll see if they deliver as promised.


YES YES YES, please let this be true. . . so I can set fire to my crapppppppyyy X1900XT for GOOD!
Click to expand...

Ah good, perhaps now everyone that had flames coming out of their ears can calm down and we can get back to normal. That is, until the next Apple tragedy.
 
macbaj said:
Finally some GOOD news!

Update right off of Engadget's Story:

Update: Nvidia's Director of PR emailed us to let us know that the company is "in the middle of bringing out an upgrade kit based on the NVIDIA GeForce 8800 GTsolution for all Intel-based Mac Pros." What's more, this upgrade kit "should be out in a few weeks." So there you have it, folks. We'll see if they deliver as promised.


YES YES YES, please let this be true. . . so I can set fire to my crapppppppyyy X1900XT for GOOD!
Click to expand...


While I am glad see some glimmer of hope here, one thing to keep inmind, that about the same time as this is suppossed to be due, the new 9800/8900 (number/names seems to depend on who you ask) series of cards are set to be launched. Which will put the MacPro right back where it was when it was originally launched with the 1900 as a "supperior card" A new machine shipping with what will be hardware that is close to the end of its "life" cycle.

Screw it, I think this MacPro that I currently have, will miss out on the update to a 8800, and will be left as it is (other than more ram and HDD) and used mainly as a audio work station, web/mail box. And I'll build myself a *shudders* PC for my gaming concerns, I just have to think given Apples history, and the history of game software companies lack luster performance on porting over to the Mac, that gaming on a Mac is something that is unfortunately a long ways away.

I know one thing, I'll definetly have to think twice before going with Apple when I build another work station though.
 
Cowinacape said:
While I am glad see some glimmer of hope here, one thing to keep inmind, that about the same time as this is suppossed to be due, the new 9800/8900 (number/names seems to depend on who you ask) series of cards are set to be launched. Which will put the MacPro right back where it was when it was originally launched with the 1900 as a "supperior card" A new machine shipping with what will be hardware that is close to the end of its "life" cycle.

Screw it, I think this MacPro that I currently have, will miss out on the update to a 8800, and will be left as it is (other than more ram and HDD) and used mainly as a audio work station, web/mail box. And I'll build myself a *shudders* PC for my gaming concerns, I just have to think given Apples history, and the history of game software companies lack luster performance on porting over to the Mac, that gaming on a Mac is something that is unfortunately a long ways away.

I know one thing, I'll definetly have to think twice before going with Apple when I build another work station though.
Click to expand...

Ah, the next Apple tragedy already!

Incidentally, how did you manage to build your Apple workstation? Or were you speaking figuratively?
 
macbaj said:
Finally some GOOD news!

Update right off of Engadget's Story:

Update: Nvidia's Director of PR emailed us to let us know that the company is "in the middle of bringing out an upgrade kit based on the NVIDIA GeForce 8800 GTsolution for all Intel-based Mac Pros." What's more, this upgrade kit "should be out in a few weeks." So there you have it, folks. We'll see if they deliver as promised.


YES YES YES, please let this be true. . . so I can set fire to my crapppppppyyy X1900XT for GOOD!
Click to expand...

Thanks for that update. Hopefully they stay true to there word now. I guess everyone was right with saying we should focus on annoying NVIDIA for the fix to really get things going. Thanks antzona for sending the story out. Might have been the cause for a company to actually notify us about what's happening.
 
I am glad to see the update on engadget. I hope that this is what actually happens. I certainly wish that Apple could be more forthright with information. They knew this was happening and communicated zero information. It took an article on engadget to get the attention of someone at nVidia, and we finally get some straightforward information on the problem. I look forward to a resolution, and I look forward to having one of those cards in my Mac Pro.
 
Hmm..

its interesting that Apple is not releasing some sort of announcement itself as we are getting this news from Nvidea. Jobs never misses an opportunity to show how great Apple treats its customers.

I wonder if this is an independent driver fix being offered by Nvidea and not Apple. If so, I wonder if it will be made available by Nvidea directly as a software DL to an existing card?..perhaps the current new Mac Pro upgrade kit?

I wonder if they do this without the blessing of Apple? I would imagine this is possible without Nvidea breaching any kind of patent restriction that Apple has. Who knows what the politics are between the two companies but I would imagine that between Apple and Nvidea, Nvidea has more leverage as Apple makes a small part of its market share while Apple probably needs NVidea in order to offer top of the line cards in the future.
 
giantrobot said:
its interesting that Apple is not releasing some sort of announcement itself as we are getting this news from Nvidea. Jobs never misses an opportunity to show how great Apple treats its customers.
Click to expand...


Hmm...I percieve the thing utterly differently. Apples modus operandi seems to be :Deny,Deny,Deny. Or more accurately : Silence. Same thing in the last few years,only when the critical mass has been reached (by angry customers) apple reacts with a small note. I dont remember steve ever coming out and saying "sorry for fkuking up"?
Yes,apple likes to prasise how good ratings it gets in all the surveys, but...



giantrobot said:
I wonder if they do this without the blessing of Apple? I would imagine this is possible without Nvidea breaching any kind of patent restriction that Apple has. Who knows what the politics are between the two companies but I would imagine that between Apple and Nvidea, Nvidea has more leverage as Apple makes a small part of its market share while Apple probably needs NVidea in order to offer top of the line cards in the future.
Click to expand...

Yes,this actually is intresting.
Have the leadership at nVidia noticed that there actually is demand for better gfx cards among apple users, or is it that they feel that it is them who is getting bad publicity instead of Apple, and is trying to correct it?
But apple "needing" nVidia? It would be nice if it would be so,but apple have considered GFX cards as some kind of bastard child in the past. A neccessary evil.
Hopefully somebody have pulled their head up from their arse at apple and taken a notice that times have changed : More and more pro-programs are unloading computing to gfx cards.Including apples own programs...
 
Thats the thing, Aperture is gfx intensive, but they wont give you a better card to upgrade to????? I love my Mac Pro, but if Im going to use Aperture I need the best card i cant get to work effectively. Im really glad this looks to be turning up for us.
 
macbaj said:
Finally some GOOD news!

Update right off of Engadget's Story:

Update: Nvidia's Director of PR emailed us to let us know that the company is "in the middle of bringing out an upgrade kit based on the NVIDIA GeForce 8800 GTsolution for all Intel-based Mac Pros." What's more, this upgrade kit "should be out in a few weeks." So there you have it, folks. We'll see if they deliver as promised.


YES YES YES, please let this be true. . . so I can set fire to my crapppppppyyy X1900XT for GOOD!
Click to expand...

What friggen game do you NOT get a good response from on your x1900? Seriously.
 
Snowshiro said:
The only slightly disappointing thing I felt was that engadget rather underplayed the story and made it sound a bit like we're just dumb because we ordered an upgrade kit that wasn't designed for our machines. I felt they rather missed the bigger picture which is Apple screwing it's customers by selling a very expensive machine which is promised to be upgradeable and then completely going back on that promise.
Click to expand...


Engadget is an extremely biased ring of apple fanboys. Rarely is there a story that has a clear negative about apple be pointed as 'a clear negative'
 
The sad part being that som people are more focused on how it perform in games. A sad, sad state to be in.

It would be much better to know how well it does in professional applications that can offload some of the work to the graphic card. I mean, this is a workstation afterall.
 
What does Aperture do with the GPU? I am a heavy Aperture user and I have a 1900XT. So far I am happy with the performance.
 
WildPalms said:
What friggen game do you NOT get a good response from on your x1900? Seriously.
Click to expand...

Well it's off topic, but the x1900 pukes all over trying to run BF2142 at 1600x1200 resolution (native for my LCD). And I'm thinking of getting a 30" Panel, so I wont' even go there....

But Aperture is where I really want the upgrade! That and less noise and heat.
 
hugodrax said:
What does Aperture do with the GPU? I am a heavy Aperture user and I have a 1900XT. So far I am happy with the performances.
Click to expand...

Aperture does a LOT of it's adjustments in the GPU.

I'm shooting 10MP RAW files and could definitely use more speed. If you're shooting smaller files or not using RAW then that's probably why you haven't noticed.
 
pprior said:
Do you really think apple engineers don't understand the difference in PCIexpress slot types and backwards compatibility?

Just more song and dance from apple. They KNOW the card -would- work, they have chosen to make it NOT work.
Click to expand...

But of course, please read my previous posts. I am very excited that so many more of us have raised our voices. I love the Mac, I don't love Apple and especially Mr. Jobs. It is up to us to keep them honest and don't take this kind of manipulation.

It remains sad and pathetic we have to get excited about a video card which has been available for PCs for a while and in many different flavors. Personally I will probably skip this generation Mac Pro, I want to upgrade but don't have to. If the next generation is not at par with PC offerings and pricing, I will seriously consider switching to PCs after almost 20 years of very frustrating and difficult Mac-only usage. All my sweat, tears and money deserve better than the current Apple manipulative behavior.
 
WildPalms said:
What friggen game do you NOT get a good response from on your x1900? Seriously.
Click to expand...

Crysis.... Also i want dx10. I think i'm going to wait till the 9k series cards come out and the 8k series drops in price. By that time maybe someone has made the 9k series compatible either by conventional or unconventional means.

I would love ati and nvidia to start offering upgrade cards. I mean all they would have to do is offer 1 card in that series per release. So 1 new card every year or so. I don't care if its the most expensive.
 
WildPalms said:
What friggen game do you NOT get a good response from on your x1900? Seriously.
Click to expand...

Its not about that. . . I'm sick and "friggen" tired of these X1900XT's dying every six months. . .I'm about to have to RMA fora 3rd one. And getting RMAs from Apple on the X1900XT cards is like trying to sneak a gold bar out of Fort Knox.

I'm at my absolute wits end with this PoS card and am looking for any possible way to get away from it.
 
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