Will the new Mac Pro's video card work in present Mac Pros??

[fandsw]

Hey gang,

getting ready to make the switch from the Windows world to OS X, and a Mac Pro is in my future. I've been lurking here for months reading up on Macs to learn what I'm getting into. I was hoping the new ones would be here by Christmas, although it is looking doubtful now. Anywho, if I do pull the trigger and buy one of the present Mac Pros, I was wondering if the future Mac Pro's upgraded video cards (whatever they may be, but surely they'll be upgraded) will work in present Mac Pros?? The hardware architecture is not changing, so the only hurdle would be compatability of drivers. Would Apple possibly prevent the new cards from working in the present Mac Pros using firmware/OS/driver blocks?? It would be a way of forcing present Mac Pro owners to buy new ones instead of upgrading the present ones, however I just couldn't believe Apple would stoop to that kind of tactic.

 

[Check 6]

Great question as I'm about to order a Mac Pro this next week. I don't need a faster unit then the current one but would like the ability to upgrade the graphics card at some time. I will order with the ATI X1900 card with 512 meg of memory for now. The Nvida card is just too much for a "not leading edge card"

 

[cokersa]

I hope you are correct that Apple will make the new video cards backward compatible, and there would seem to be little reason not to. That said, when I made the switch to Apple the day the launched the Mac Pro, I thought they would be providing semi-regular video card updates, since that seemed entirely reasonable to me. I've subsequently learned that what I think is entirely reasonable apparently isn't so to Apple.

Don't get me wrong, I think my Mac Pro is a great system, but I thought the idea of moving to an Intel-based system with standard interfaces was to make it easier to provide updates/upgrades.

 

[Sun Baked]

The new cards may be PCIe 2.0 ... all depends on what the Intel 5400 chipset supports.

 

[fandsw]

Great question as I'm about to order a Mac Pro this next week. I don't need a faster unit then the current one but would like the ability to upgrade the graphics card at some time. I will order with the ATI X1900 card with 512 meg of memory for now. The Nvida card is just too much for a "not leading edge card"

I'm in the same boat, but the upgrade price for the X1900 is obscene for the technology you get. That's why I'm probably going to wait for the new ones: there is no way the video card won't be better, and the new Xeon Penryns Quad cores are priced almost the same as present Dual Cores. I gotta believe my money will get more bang for the buck with the new ones (when they finally get here....)