Re: Bad Video Card?

[t...@io.com]

On Feb 4, 1:49 pm, Valter Prahlad 
wrote:
> Il giorno 4-02-2012 10:54, pdimage ha scritto:
>
> > Both the X800 and the X850 will convert to mac but I gather they are
> > very troublesome and the dvi port never works as far as I know.
>
> As far as I can remember, the problem with a flashed PC X800 DVI port is it
> won't drive a DVI monitor, but it will still work with a VGA one (provided
> you use a DVI to VGA adapter on the port, of course).
> In other words, after flashing the card, the two display ports still work,
> but only for VGA monitors.
>
> I'm not 100% sure, but that's what I understood after getting an used PC
> X800 for 25£.
> (I didn't flash it yet, though, because it's working in my gaming PC right
> now :-)

I went and read the 29 page thread about X800/X850 conversion on
Strange Dogs.  Themacelite forum may be gone, but Strange Dogs is
still around.  Yay!

According to the long thread, things are as the previous poster wrote.

As with many of these conversions, there's a reduced Firmware to fit
in the PC 64K Flash.  The full Mac Firmware requires a 128K flash
chip, which usually means replacing the 64K Flash chip on the PC
versions of the card.

The X800 and X850 can be converted, but while the PC models have one
DVI port and one VGA port, the DVI port will only work with a DVI to
VGA adapter.

The reason is that the GPU has the circuitry for the DVI (or ADC)
output built in.  On an Apple card with ADC/DVI outputs, the card uses
the built-in circuitry to drive the ADC port and there is a separate
Silicon Images DVI chip on the card to drive the DVI port.

So, Apple card:  ADC port driven by GPU.  DVI port driven by dedicated
chip.

PC card:  DVI port driven by GPU.  VGA port doesn't need extra
circuitry.

And when you replace the PC X800/X850 BIOS with Mac Firmware, it tries
to program the GPU to output ADC format to the DVI port -- which
doesn't work.   And there's no dedicated chip to drive DVI on the
other port, and there's just a VGA connector there anyway.

Now, ADC is electrically compatible with DVI.  The converters between
the two just rearrange the wires.  They don't massage the signals --
except that DVI to ADC requires the addition of the 28V supply.

So this suggests that the DVI port on a converted X800/X850 probably
has the proper signals, but on the wrong pins.

The HP Fire GL X3 has two DVI ports and has the dedicated DVI chip on
board.  Apparently, conversion of the Fire GL X3 does yield two
working DVI ports.  It may require the full Mac firmware (Flash chip
replacement) to get that functionality.  I can't remember any more.

The Fire card is rated for a slower clock speed than the X850XT PE but
gets good benchmarks, nevertheless.

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Re: G5 issues

[JohnV]

Dan,
	your critiques of my lack of procedure are spot-on and I apologise.   
It is likely the primary cause for my current state of disarray,  
having had 3 machines that I relied on professionally, but did NOT  
know how to properly maintain, fall apart in various ways over the  
last 18 months, leaving me with a confused mess of badly-migrated  
systems and restores over several machines.
 I'm badly in need of bringing this all back to a semblance of  
simple useful work-sensible systems and, at least for the moment,  
pretty well not up to the task.


both the original 2.0GHz G5 and the loaner 1.8  run 10.4.11



On Feb 5, 2012, at 6:43 PM, Dan wrote:


At 1:54 PM -0500 2/5/2012, JohnV wrote:
When  a wonderful 2.0GHz G5 (8G mem) failed. I moved the drives  
into a 1.8GHz G5 (2G mem)


Did you clear and rebuild the kernel and system caches after you  
moved the drives?


and am really surprised at what seems to be its lack of  
performance... just doing youtube stuff, even without enlarging  
the playback, it stutters every 3sec or so on playback.


Neither the regular flash player nor perian are memory pigs.  And  
anything over .8 GHz should have no problemo playing YouTube stuff,  
regardless of the video card.


That the stutter is happening every 3 sec tells me there is  
something else going on.  Something else is running on that cycle,  
or your network connection is having issues.  Errant spotlight  
indexing is a prime candidate.  Use Activity Monitor to check things.


Use a tool such as AppleJack or OnyX to clear and rebuild your  
kernel and system caches.  Then clear out the user caches.  Make  
sure whatever app(s) you're using to play the videos are up-to- 
date, ditto the codecs.  Then do some speed tests and then some  
traceroutes to youtube...



In the future please provide basic hardware and software  
configuration information in your FIRST posting.  At this point,  
there are 4 messages from you in this thread and you still haven't  
said anything about the software environment!  We donno what OS is  
involved, whether it's up to date, what apps, what specific videos,  
etc... so suggestions that you replace the video card or add memory  
are totally premature.  It makes no sense to recommend expanding  
memory until you check to see if the memory have is even being  
used, etc.


- Dan.
--
- Psychoceramic Emeritus; South Jersey, USA, Earth.

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Re: G5 issues

[Kris Tilford]

On Feb 5, 2012, at 2:30 PM, JohnV wrote:

The video-card swap was a no-go. Don;t know why, but the machine  
would not boot past Blue Screens.

Put original card back and it's fine.


You need to Safe Boot to reset the caches. To Safe Boot you hold the  
Shift key at startup.


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Re: G5 issues

[Dan]

At 1:54 PM -0500 2/5/2012, JohnV wrote:
When  a wonderful 2.0GHz G5 (8G mem) failed. I moved the drives into 
a 1.8GHz G5 (2G mem)


Did you clear and rebuild the kernel and system caches after you 
moved the drives?


and am really surprised at what seems to be its lack of 
performance... just doing youtube stuff, even without enlarging the 
playback, it stutters every 3sec or so on playback.


Neither the regular flash player nor perian are memory pigs.  And 
anything over .8 GHz should have no problemo playing YouTube stuff, 
regardless of the video card.


That the stutter is happening every 3 sec tells me there is something 
else going on.  Something else is running on that cycle, or your 
network connection is having issues.  Errant spotlight indexing is a 
prime candidate.  Use Activity Monitor to check things.


Use a tool such as AppleJack or OnyX to clear and rebuild your kernel 
and system caches.  Then clear out the user caches.  Make sure 
whatever app(s) you're using to play the videos are up-to-date, ditto 
the codecs.  Then do some speed tests and then some traceroutes to 
youtube...



In the future please provide basic hardware and software 
configuration information in your FIRST posting.  At this point, 
there are 4 messages from you in this thread and you still haven't 
said anything about the software environment!  We donno what OS is 
involved, whether it's up to date, what apps, what specific videos, 
etc... so suggestions that you replace the video card or add memory 
are totally premature.  It makes no sense to recommend expanding 
memory until you check to see if the memory have is even being used, 
etc.


- Dan.
--
- Psychoceramic Emeritus; South Jersey, USA, Earth.

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Re: G5 issues

[Tina K.]

On 2012/02/05 12:58, Kris Tilford so eloquently wrote:

I don't know? On LEM-Swap there are three power supplies available right now for
only $30 each, buy one NOW before they're gone!!!:



Wow, it's magic. If I ask about an A1138 logic board will three of them magically 
show up on the swap list too?



Tina

--

Acceleron: HP Presario 2.8GHz Celeron D 2GB RAM Discrete graphics XP Pro
Luxo Jr: iMac 20" USB 2 1.25GHz G4 2GB RAM GeForceFX5200 Ultra 64MB VRAM 10.4.11
Worm: PowerBook G4 15" HR-DLSD 1.67GHz G4 2GB RAM Radeon 9700 128MB VRAM 10.5.8
Quadrophenia: Mac Pro Mid-2010 2.8 GHz QC 6 GB RAM Radeon HD 5770 1GB VRAM 
10.6.8

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Re: G5 issues

[JohnV]

The video-card swap was a no-go. Don;t know why, but the machine  
would not boot past Blue Screens.

Put original card back and it's fine.


On Feb 5, 2012, at 2:58 PM, Kris Tilford wrote:

Other question is can I swap the power supplies, even short term,  
to see if that is the real propblem with teh 2.0 (rather than a  
logic board failure)?

The 2.0 was a workhorse here...


I don't know? On LEM-Swap there are three power supplies available  
right now for only $30 each, buy one NOW before they're gone!!!:



thanks, just emailed him.

JV



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Re: G5 issues

[Kris Tilford]

On Feb 5, 2012, at 1:53 PM, JohnV wrote:


the 1.8 has 4 RAM slots
the 2.0 has 8 slots
Are the RAM sticks different size, and swappable?


They should both be compatible with PC3200, so as long as they're  
matched pairs, no problems.


Other question is can I swap the power supplies, even short term, to  
see if that is the real propblem with teh 2.0 (rather than a logic  
board failure)?

The 2.0 was a workhorse here...


I don't know? On LEM-Swap there are three power supplies available  
right now for only $30 each, buy one NOW before they're gone!!!:



--
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Re: G5 issues

[JohnV]

On Feb 5, 2012, at 2:40 PM, Kris Tilford wrote:


On Feb 5, 2012, at 1:25 PM, JohnV wrote:


SORRY... IS AS FOLLOWS


The FX5200 is a minimal 64MB video card, while the Radeon is at  
least 128MB, perhaps 256MB, and a little faster also. Swap in the  
Radeon video card. and since they both use PC3200 RAM you can also  
swap in some more RAM from the dead 2.0 while you're at it. Once  
you have 4GB RAM and the Radeon card the dual 1.8 should be a  
little quicker.


teh 1.8 has 4 RAM slots
the 2.0 has 8 slots
Are teh RAM sticks different size, and swappable?

Other question is can I swap the power supplies, even short term, to  
see if that is the real propblem with teh 2.0 (rather than a logic  
board failure)?

The 2.0 was a workhorse here...

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Re: G5 issues

[Kris Tilford]

On Feb 5, 2012, at 1:25 PM, JohnV wrote:


SORRY... IS AS FOLLOWS


The FX5200 is a minimal 64MB video card, while the Radeon is at least  
128MB, perhaps 256MB, and a little faster also. Swap in the Radeon  
video card. and since they both use PC3200 RAM you can also swap in  
some more RAM from the dead 2.0 while you're at it. Once you have 4GB  
RAM and the Radeon card the dual 1.8 should be a little quicker.


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Re: G5 issues

[JohnV]

On Feb 5, 2012, at 2:13 PM, Kris Tilford wrote:



You need to max out both the RAM and the video card on the new one.  
Hopefully you can move the RAM & video card from the dead 2.0 over  
to the 1.8 without issues. If the 1.8 is a single, you may be able  
to upgrade to a dual CPU, but that might be a lot of work and  
expense. I'd concentrate on the RAM and video card for now.


You didn't specify the hardware exactly, but if the 2.0 was an  
"Early 2005" dual 2.0 and the 1.8 was an original single 1.8 there  
could be a quadruple whammy effect of half the CPUs, half the video  
card RAM, and 1/4 the actual RAM, and slower System bus.


SORRY... THE 1.8 IS AS FOLLOWS

Machine Name:   Power Mac G5
  Machine Model:PowerMac7,3
  CPU Type: PowerPC G5  (2.2)
  Number Of CPUs:   2
  CPU Speed:1.8 GHz
  L2 Cache (per CPU):   512 KB
  Memory:   2 GB
  Bus Speed:900 MHz
  Boot ROM Version: 5.1.8f7
  Serial Number:YM425AXSQPL

VIDEO CARD:

  Chipset Model:GeForce FX 5200
  Type: Display
  Bus:  AGP
  Slot: SLOT-1
  VRAM (Total): 64 MB
  Vendor:   nVIDIA (0x10de)
  Device ID:0x0321
  Revision ID:  0x00a2
  ROM Revision: 2060
  Displays:
CMC 17:
  Resolution:   1280 x 1024 @ 60 Hz
  Depth:32-bit Color
  Core Image:   Supported
  Mirror:   Off
  Online:   Yes
  Quartz Extreme:   Supported
DELL E207WFP:
  Resolution:   1680 x 1050 @ 60 Hz
  Depth:32-bit Color
  Core Image:   Supported
  Main Display: Yes
  Mirror:   Off
  Online:   Yes
  Quartz Extreme:   Supported


THE 2.0 IS LIKE THIS:

Serial number: G851467HQPM
Name: PowerMac G5 (June 2004)
Model: g5_june_04
Group1: PowerMac
Group2: G5
Generation: 2
ModelCode: g5_june_04
Machine Model: PowerMac7,3
Model introduced: 2004
Production year: 2005
Production week: 14 (April)
Production number: 7191 (within this week)
introduced test: GOED
CPU speed: 2.0GHz
Factory: G8 (USA)

WITH A RADEON VIDEO CARD


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Re: G5 issues

[Kris Tilford]

On Feb 5, 2012, at 12:54 PM, JohnV wrote:

When  a wonderful 2.0GHz G5 (8G mem) failed. I moved the drives into  
a 1.8GHz G5 (2G mem)  and am really surprised at what seems to be  
its lack of performance... just doing youtube stuff, even without  
enlarging the playback, it stutters every 3sec or so on playback.  
Making it larger makes it unwatchable.
Is this the nature of the thing? or is there a problem, or wrong  
setting somewhere that's causing this?


You didn't specify the hardware exactly, but if the 2.0 was an "Early  
2005" dual 2.0 and the 1.8 was an original single 1.8 there could be a  
quadruple whammy effect of half the CPUs, half the video card RAM, and  
1/4 the actual RAM, and slower System bus.


You need to max out both the RAM and the video card on the new one.  
Hopefully you can move the RAM & video card from the dead 2.0 over to  
the 1.8 without issues. If the 1.8 is a single, you may be able to  
upgrade to a dual CPU, but that might be a lot of work and expense.  
I'd concentrate on the RAM and video card for now.


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G5 issues

[JohnV]

When  a wonderful 2.0GHz G5 (8G mem) failed. I moved the drives into  
a 1.8GHz G5 (2G mem)  and am really surprised at what seems to be its  
lack of performance... just doing youtube stuff, even without  
enlarging the playback, it stutters every 3sec or so on playback.  
Making it larger makes it unwatchable.
Is this the nature of the thing? or is there a problem, or wrong  
setting somewhere that's causing this?


JV


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