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Up to Discussions in Desktop Macs
2 Replies Last post: Jan 14, 2007 2:16 PM by mdawson  
Click to view budopo's profile New Member
budopo
48 posts since
Aug 22, 2003
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Jan 14, 2007 11:18 AM

My Video Card Died, Need a Replacement

The video card in my PowerMac G5 (dual 2.0GHz) is not working. I was thinking of upgrading before AGP cards become too scarce anyway, so it wasn't too bad. However, the ATI Radeon x800 XT I want doesn't seem to be available from any on-line vendor. Every one says it's either out of stock or back ordered. Are these cards no longer produced? Can someone suggest where I might get one? I'm assuming the x1900 won't be produced in an AGP version, so the x800 looks like the card to get, but right now my PowerMac is a giant paper weight if I can't get an AGP card of some sort.

A friend of mine gave me his GeForce 5900 AGP from his Windows machine (he had upgraded and no longer needed the card). I tried to install it, but my PowerMac has no connector for the small power cable that the card needs. Is there some way to use this card until I find a better AGP one?

TIA
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Click to view dougster's profile Old Hand
dougster
4,145 posts since
Feb 25, 2001
1. Jan 14, 2007 1:19 PM in response to: budopo
Re: My Video Card Died, Need a Replacement
-Hi,
Might give ClubMac a call. Also there are a couple on eBay if you want to go that route for the ATI x800.
Don't think you can swap the GeForce 5900 card to fit your Mac ::guessing::

-doug
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Click to view mdawson's profile Old Hand
mdawson
2,724 posts since
Aug 31, 2004
2. Jan 14, 2007 2:16 PM in response to: dougster
Re: My Video Card Died, Need a Replacement
Quote:<hr />
Don't think you can swap the GeForce 5900 card to fit your Mac

<hr />
Actually, you cannot use any Wintel-compatible graphics card in a Mac. Unlike every other peripherals OEMs, the graphics cards developers refuse to develop platform-neutral devices. There is no real technical reason not to make graphics cards platform-neutral as 1) it has been done before, 2) ATI currently has a dual platform card on the market and 3) now Macs run on the same CPU platform as Wintel systemsalthough all Macs are custom built systems designed and manufactured exclusively by Apple fro the ground up, whereas most Wintel systems are nothing more than a collection of prefabricated parts.

Hackers will sometimes flash the firmware on graphics cards to make them run on Macs, but there is no guarantee that flashing will work. Also, without the appropriate drivers, which do not exist for OS X where a great many graphics cards are concerned anyway, even a functional flashed graphics card will be limited. Flashing is best left to hobbyists and graphics cards that exist in both PC and Mac versions; there is no GeForce 5900 card for the Mac.

“Cannot run out of time. There is infinite time. You are finite. Zathras is finite. This is wrong tool.” 2.3GHz Power Mac G5/4GB/500GB HDD/OS X 10.4.11/30-inch ACD, 60GB iPod (Color)
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