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Upgrading old Mac Pro to 8800 GT graphics?
- Thread starter Fezzy
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But it does say
Which means we're now talking about whether the Mac Pro and Mac Pro (early 2008) are the same family or not.
The plot thickens.
I got a call from an Apple representitive this morning asking if I had the old Mac Pro, she told me the new cards are indeed NOT COMPATIBLE and if I wanted to cancel my order. I did. Words cannot describe how ****ing lame that is.
I'm not sure why people would consider a mac pro and a mac pro to not be in the same family. If there was an article talking about how powerbook and macbook components were not interchangable, would you assume that meant that applied to different generations of macbooks as well?
Here's something I found:
http://reviews.cnet.com/graphics-cards/asus-geforce-8800-gt/4505-8902_7-32738888.html
"We should also point out that the new G92 design is PCI Express 2.0-compatible. All PCI Express 2.0 hardware (like the ATI Radeon 3000 series cards as well) will work on the PCI Express 1.0 motherboard, so you don't need to worry about an additional hardware upgrade. And no game that we know of right now will flood the PCI Express pathway with that much data anyway. AMD already has PCI Express 2.0 motherboards out, and we expect both Nvidia, Intel, and others will follow suit early next year. Eventually the software will catch up, and if you go to put this card in a new system a year from now, you'll probably notice some benefit. But at that point newer cards will likely be on the market, so we wouldn't buy the GeForce 8800 GT, or any 3D card simply because it's PCI Express 2.0-capable, at least right now."
So PCIe 2.0 isn't an excuse for lack of compatibility. IF the card only worked on new MPs (and I doubt that will end up being the case) it would be for some other reason. Users have every right to expect this card to work, the whole point of going with a STANDARD like PCI is to be able to have a choice of components. And I think it will work - I think people are jumping to conclusions and getting info from bad sources. These cards don't even ship for a few weeks, so it seems silly to be grabbing the torches and pitchforks now ("lawsuit"?
) instead of just waiting for official info clarifying things.
I just got a call from Apple regarding my order for the 8800 card. They said they're calling everyone who placed any order to make sure they have the correct Mac Pro. They said it onlly works with the "new" Mac Pro and I said I didn't have the new one. They said they would cancel the order for me and forward me to a "Product Specialist" to chose a card. I hung up after they cancelled the order. I bet there'll be a lot of angry current Mac Pro customers...
I got the phone call from Apple too.
I noticed they require you to give a reason on the online store cancellation page, but "we at Apple decided to f**k you over" isn't an option.
I hope they're ready for the backlash.
Kinda sorry I bought the Pro now. This summer I was teetering between an imac 24 and a pro. I only decided to spend the extra on pro for the potential to upgrade.
Sure the pro performs very well but I was edged to buying it because of expandability. It was the big selling point for me.
So to me it feels like being cheated especially when compared to those other computer companies hardware choices.
I love OSX but I'm starting to think it's not enough to keep me around for another mac if I can't do what is a simple upgrade for almost everyone else's systems. Os's are cheap, I simply can't afford to upgrade my whole system as often as Apple expects me to.
Sure the pro performs very well but I was edged to buying it because of expandability. It was the big selling point for me.
So to me it feels like being cheated especially when compared to those other computer companies hardware choices.
I love OSX but I'm starting to think it's not enough to keep me around for another mac if I can't do what is a simple upgrade for almost everyone else's systems. Os's are cheap, I simply can't afford to upgrade my whole system as often as Apple expects me to.
This whole EFI32/EFI64 issue can be easily resolved, if by instead of waiting for the 8800GT card and trying it, why not try the ATI X2600 Card?
Presumably the ATI X2600 card will not work in older Mac Pros if the EFI32/EFI64 issue is valid. All it takes is someone who has bought the new Mac Pro to stick the ATI Card in an old Mac Pro, and whether it boots or not we'll know the answer there and then. No having to wait 5-7 weeks for an answer.
Mark
Presumably the ATI X2600 card will not work in older Mac Pros if the EFI32/EFI64 issue is valid. All it takes is someone who has bought the new Mac Pro to stick the ATI Card in an old Mac Pro, and whether it boots or not we'll know the answer there and then. No having to wait 5-7 weeks for an answer.
Mark
Blizzard seems like they are already on Apple's ass about this. See this thread: http://forums.worldofwarcraft.com/thread.html?topicId=3881778599&sid=1
They have some weight to throw around with Apple. They got many many Mac Pro owners new X1900 cards because theirs fried due to an overheating problem when Apple was giving people the runaround and claiming there was nothing wrong. So hoepfully they will "persuade" Apple to fix this issue also.
They have some weight to throw around with Apple. They got many many Mac Pro owners new X1900 cards because theirs fried due to an overheating problem when Apple was giving people the runaround and claiming there was nothing wrong. So hoepfully they will "persuade" Apple to fix this issue also.
I don't understand this at all. Why would they sell this card separately as an upgrade now? Surely the only people 'upgrading' to the 8800 would be pre-2008 Mac Pro owners. New 2008 Mac Pro owners would include it with their custom build, no?
Or perhaps because the custom build only allows you one 8800. If you want two, you have to buy the second one separately...
I'm pretty sure that if these cards don't work in the "old" Mac Pros then Trading Standards here in the UK would be interested as the Mac Pro was sold to me as being expandable, heck he even went so far as to assure me that now that Apple had gone all Intel the graphics upgrades were "Guaranteed to be simple"
I'm reluctant to say this, as most of the time it's just people spouting out anger, but I for one will never ever buy another mac product if they screw me like this. I was a PC user for 20 years and just this last year bought about 10 grand in Mac equipment. I've been generally very happy, but my very expensive mac Pro is not at ALL worth the money if it can't be upgraded.
I use Aperture daily, which is very GPU intensive, and as digital picture files become larger and larger my system becomes slower and slower. Not being able to upgrade renders it useless in the long term.
I'll be heading back to PC land. I never tried Vista, but at least I'll be able to upgrade my machine instead of spending $5000 a year on a new system.
totally disgusted.
I use Aperture daily, which is very GPU intensive, and as digital picture files become larger and larger my system becomes slower and slower. Not being able to upgrade renders it useless in the long term.
I'll be heading back to PC land. I never tried Vista, but at least I'll be able to upgrade my machine instead of spending $5000 a year on a new system.
totally disgusted.
Same for me. They want to cancel my order.
After about an hour of transfers and such I found a tech hat understands hardware.
Bottom Line: Apple has no official stand on backwards compatibility. The tech understands the PCIe specs and stated exactly this:
So, KEEP YOUR ORDERS!!! I'm keeping mine!
After about an hour of transfers and such I found a tech hat understands hardware.
Bottom Line: Apple has no official stand on backwards compatibility. The tech understands the PCIe specs and stated exactly this:
So, KEEP YOUR ORDERS!!! I'm keeping mine!
Same here. iMacs are great if you need to upgrade everything, but I already had a good monitor and at the time graphics options were outdated across the board. So I went with the one that let me reuse what I had and let me upgrade the weak parts when a better option was available. So much for that.
They need to update this page.
Expand at (our) will.
My hope is that all this nonsense is cleared by the first report of an 8800GT working with the first generation Mac Pros.
This was posted at the official Mac Forum
ALERT TO OWNERS OF "OLD" MAC PROS! (CORRECTED)
The GeForce 8800 GT is *NOT* compatible with the older Mac Pro (August 2006, April 2007) as we assumed. I've been informed that new machines use EFI64, the old Mac Pros use EFI32, to work in an EFI32 machine you need an EFI32 ROM.
http://www.barefeats.com/york2.html
http://discussions.apple.com/thread.jspa?threadID=1331147&tstart=0
I can't believe this. G5 even when it was updated did not just entirely lose its "family" the next year.
To hype everyone up on an upgrade and then cancel their order is madness.
Why can't the video card just work and include the patch to work with both Mac Pros? Why can't this patch be available for "trusted" Nvidia products?
I was hoping to at least get an EFI update so I can buy an 8800 GT
but it seems the EFI won't be compatible until Mac Pro 07 is patched.
Great. Now I have to save money to get advanced funds to buy a new Mac Pro then sell this one.
I thought this Mac Pro would be the first good computer to have a Upgrade path. I'm really saddened if I have to go back to "PCs" again.
And the fact the bios is not fixed for windows to show over 2Gb of ram,
another reason for me.
I can easily get a powerful computer to compare with Mac Pro for 1/3 the price.
Somebody give me some hope to stay with Apple, I'm on the edge now.
Look at all the sales they could of generated and the huge party of rooters for Apple if this 8800GT would of been easier. But now
you can't buy it, only buy a whole new expensive computer.
I always rooted for Apple and converted finally last 2005 and told everyone about it. Now I just look stupid , I have no fire to back myself up
and my programs are still not yet workable in osx.
ALERT TO OWNERS OF "OLD" MAC PROS! (CORRECTED)
The GeForce 8800 GT is *NOT* compatible with the older Mac Pro (August 2006, April 2007) as we assumed. I've been informed that new machines use EFI64, the old Mac Pros use EFI32, to work in an EFI32 machine you need an EFI32 ROM.
http://www.barefeats.com/york2.html
http://discussions.apple.com/thread.jspa?threadID=1331147&tstart=0
I can't believe this. G5 even when it was updated did not just entirely lose its "family" the next year.
To hype everyone up on an upgrade and then cancel their order is madness.
Why can't the video card just work and include the patch to work with both Mac Pros? Why can't this patch be available for "trusted" Nvidia products?
I was hoping to at least get an EFI update so I can buy an 8800 GT
but it seems the EFI won't be compatible until Mac Pro 07 is patched.
Great. Now I have to save money to get advanced funds to buy a new Mac Pro then sell this one.
I thought this Mac Pro would be the first good computer to have a Upgrade path. I'm really saddened if I have to go back to "PCs" again.
And the fact the bios is not fixed for windows to show over 2Gb of ram,
another reason for me.
I can easily get a powerful computer to compare with Mac Pro for 1/3 the price.
Somebody give me some hope to stay with Apple, I'm on the edge now.
Look at all the sales they could of generated and the huge party of rooters for Apple if this 8800GT would of been easier. But now
you can't buy it, only buy a whole new expensive computer.
I always rooted for Apple and converted finally last 2005 and told everyone about it. Now I just look stupid , I have no fire to back myself up
and my programs are still not yet workable in osx.
Can't believe It
I've just received the call from Apple - saying the NVIDIA card is only valid in the new mac pro..
To say I'm angry is an understatement - I work for a well know consumer goods manufacturer and there is no way we would even consider this kind of BS - It seems Apple gets a kick out of torture testing their loyal consumers...
I've just received the call from Apple - saying the NVIDIA card is only valid in the new mac pro..
To say I'm angry is an understatement - I work for a well know consumer goods manufacturer and there is no way we would even consider this kind of BS - It seems Apple gets a kick out of torture testing their loyal consumers...
I just took a shower to calm down - it didn't work!
The last time I was this angry was when a couple of thugs with baseball bats illegally clamped my car. The scenario has similarities - people abusing their power, illegally, to stop you in your tracks for their profit.
Might sound a bit harsh but if Apple doesn't offer an upgrade option on the 'old' Mac Pros, make no mistake, this IS the scenario. With regard to the legal bit, I'm not a lawyer but I know enough to know that companies can't, for one, sell you a product based on a specification (upgradability) which isn't the case, and second, they are clearly abusing their monopoly poitision (within the 'mac' market) to put pressure on you to have to upgrade.
Isn't Steve Jobs speaking in London shortly? I think some flower and eggs might be in order!
The last time I was this angry was when a couple of thugs with baseball bats illegally clamped my car. The scenario has similarities - people abusing their power, illegally, to stop you in your tracks for their profit.
Might sound a bit harsh but if Apple doesn't offer an upgrade option on the 'old' Mac Pros, make no mistake, this IS the scenario. With regard to the legal bit, I'm not a lawyer but I know enough to know that companies can't, for one, sell you a product based on a specification (upgradability) which isn't the case, and second, they are clearly abusing their monopoly poitision (within the 'mac' market) to put pressure on you to have to upgrade.
Isn't Steve Jobs speaking in London shortly? I think some flower and eggs might be in order!
The next time someone gets a call from Apple can you confirm with them whether or not the ATi 2600XT works in the old Mac Pro?
If they say that it doesn't then we may be onto a winner here as Rob-ART over at barefeats says his "contact" (I hate that word) at AMD/ATi has confirmed to him that the 2600 works fine on the old Mac Pro.
If they say that it doesn't then we may be onto a winner here as Rob-ART over at barefeats says his "contact" (I hate that word) at AMD/ATi has confirmed to him that the 2600 works fine on the old Mac Pro.
Man, some of you (most of you) need a Xanax and a shot of whiskey.
I have an old Mac Pro, and I play World of Warcraft on it with a 7300gt, so I would have liked an 8800.
But, after reading that it probably won't work...I shrugged, took a sip of my Earl Grey (hot) tea, and went back to work.
The fact that some of you are talking about getting a lawyer or "never buying from apple again"... well, first of all your just chest-thumping and lying, and second of all, you're freaking out over something that is pretty minor.
Get over it.
I have an old Mac Pro, and I play World of Warcraft on it with a 7300gt, so I would have liked an 8800.
But, after reading that it probably won't work...I shrugged, took a sip of my Earl Grey (hot) tea, and went back to work.
The fact that some of you are talking about getting a lawyer or "never buying from apple again"... well, first of all your just chest-thumping and lying, and second of all, you're freaking out over something that is pretty minor.
Get over it.
Directly from Apple's Document:
All of these cards are only compatible with the family of computers with which they shipped.
In context with the rest of the document that clearly states that the 8800s are not compatible with the line of Mac Pros that had the X1900XT.
If you don't kick up a fuss, nothing gets done - have you ever noticed that?
Sit back, enjoy your tea, and wait for others to make a stand - it's not a bad gameplan!