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Pny Nvidia Quadro Fx4800 For Mac

Pny Nvidia Quadro Fx4800 For Mac 4,1/5 8691 votes

Mac'rs, I recently purchased a Mac Pro 3.2MHZ Quad Core machine and in an attempt to save money purchased a separate Nvidia Quadro FX 5600 Graphics card on Flea-bay with the intention of installing this into my new Mac Pro. I have now learnt that the standard PC BIOS Nvidia Quadro does not have a Mac compatible EFI ROM installed and so I now have a very expensive video card with no use. So my objective is to flash the Nvidia Quadro FX 5600 with an EFI ROM so I can use it on my Macintosh.

This seems simple in principle: 1) Install Card Into PC 2) Boot to command prompt from Floppy or USD 3) Run Nvidia ROM flash utility (nvflash) to extract current ROM (for safety) 4) Run Nvidia ROM flash utility to load new Mac compatible EFI ROM 5) Put card into my Mac Pro and bingo.!! There are two problems with this. 1) I do not have a PC with PCI-express bus. 2) I need to get the ROM from a proper Mac Pro Nvidia Quadro FX 5600 I have read numerous 'Hackintosh' threads on converted ROMs etc, but as I am not trying to get a 8800GT or other card to work as a Quadro FX 5600, I am not sure that these ROMs and techniques they are talking about are appropriate. I just want to get standard Apple/Nvidia Quadro FX 5600 ROM and copy it to my currently useless Quadro FX 5600. Has anyone here flashed a PC BIOS Quadro FX 5600 ROM to a Mac compatible EFI ROM? Thanks in advance.

Zebity (MacBook Pro, Mac Pro & Mini Mac). No risk compared to some other Aussie things.

NVIDIA Quadro 4000 for Mac by PNY graphics card Product Details NVIDIA Quadro 4000 for Mac by PNY graphics card If you're an artist, designer, or video professional with an Apple Mac Pro, you can accelerate your entire workflow with the NVIDIA Quadro 4000 for Mac graphics solution. Q4000 = NVIDIA Quadro 4000 for Mac Q4800 = NVIDIA Quadro FX 4800 (Mac edition) GTX285 = NVIDIA GeForce GTX 285 (Mac edition) R5870 = ATI Radeon HD 5870 (CTO option for 2010 Mac Pro) CPU = result when GPU render option is not chosen. NewEgg has the PNY Quadro 4000 for MAC priced at $800.

Chilz0r, the risk is relatively low compared to battling the boxing kangaroos, man eating wombats, deadly snakes and spiders that we Aussies have to contend with on our regular walk to walk each day. I am pretty confident that you can recover a dead Nvidia board as long as you have saved the earlier ROM image. So am willing to take the risk. First problem I have come up against is that most desktop PCs do not seem to have enough space to take the Quadro board, so I might have to get a temporary motherboard to use as experimental working set. Cheers, Zebity (MacBook Pro, Mac Pro, Mini Mac).

# nvflash -version NVIDIA Firmware Update Utility (Version 5.67) Adapter: GeForce 8800 GT (10DE,0611,10DE,054F) H:NRM B:01,PCI,D:00,F:00 The display may go.BLANK. on and off for up to 10 seconds during access to the EEPROM depending on your display adapter and output device. Identifying EEPROM. EEPROM ID (C2,10): MX 25L1005 2.7-3.6V 1024Kx1S, page Reading adapter firmware image. #nvflash -version NVIDIA Firmware Update Utility (Version 5.67) Adapter: Quadro FX 5600 (10DE,019D,10DE,0409) H:NRM B:01,PCI,D:00,F:00 The display may go.BLANK. on and off for up to 10 seconds during access to the EEPROM depending on your display adapter and output device. Identifying EEPROM.

EEPROM ID (1F,60): Atmel AT25F1024 2.7-3.6V 128Kx8S, page Reading adapter firmware image. Click to expand.So yes Mac ROM is larger, but it is not clear exactly what size the Quadro FX 5600 ROM is. I think the ROM size if given by: 'Atmel AT25F1024 2.7-3.6V 128Kx8S' which comes to 1024K, while the Mac 8800GT is: 'MX 25L1005 2.7-3.6V 1024Kx1S' which comes to 1024K as well.

4800

So I speculate that both ROMS are the same size but have different layout.?? If there is a person in Australia who is willing to experiment with Mac Pro Quadro FX 5600 then I could extract the ROM from this and try to put it into PC Quadro. Cheers Zebity (MacBook Pro, Mac Pro, Mini Mac). A solution, maybe Hi Zibity I succesfully managed to flash a Nvidia Quadro PC card into an Apple card. In this case a Nvidia Quadro FX 4500.

First than all, you need to know about the capabilities of your own card. The most important issue is the ROM size. Apple Mac's works with an EFI ROM with an amount of code superior at the usual 64k ROM size of regular PC cards. You can see this here: 'Reading adapter firmware image.

Image Size: 57856 bytes' See, 57856 bytes more or less 64k bytes. Instead your GeForce 8800 GT with this: 'Reading adapter firmware image. Image Size: 126464 bytes' A 128k ROM, too large for most PC cards.

You can deal with creating you own ROM (a slim version). Taking apart the original PC ROM chip and solding a 128k ROM chip (quite hard, but if you like to build planes models likes me, this works fine).

Try to using HEX extensions in OSX works too. Well you can try hooking your monitor after the Mac boots, so you avoid EFI ROM load. All these are daft solutions, because I know that all you want to do is to use the power of your high-end card. I have to solder a 128K to my card because the original one was only 64k. But according your post you have an 'Atmel AT25F1024 2.7-3.6V 128Kx8S' that means an 128k ROM, so you're lucky enough to put a regular Mac bios in your card. All you have to do is to find a Mac ROM of that card. You can see that the GeForce is using a 'MX 25L1005 2.7-3.6V 1024Kx1S' or a 1024k ROM chip.

But the amount of code in tha chip is 126464 bytes, only 1/8 of the chip. I'm pretty sure you can flash your card, the major difference between the 2006-7's cards of the Mac Pro and the 2008's cards is just PCIe 2.0. So get a ROM from an Mac Nvidia Quadro FX 5600, from a friend, internet, etc. Then try to flash your card, doing your homework (saving your original ROM, getting the latest NVFlash). Have luck, and remember WE DO THIS, BECAUSE WE CAN. Ciao and greeting from Venezuela.

A solution, maybe Hi Zibity I succesfully managed to flash a Nvidia Quadro PC card into an Apple card. In this case a Nvidia Quadro FX 4500. First than all, you need to know about the capabilities of your own card.

Nvidia Quadro Fx 4800 Specifications

The most important issue is the ROM size. Apple Mac's works with an EFI ROM with an amount of code superior at the usual 64k ROM size of regular PC cards.

You can see this here: 'Reading adapter firmware image. Image Size: 57856 bytes' See, 57856 bytes more or less 64k bytes.

Instead your GeForce 8800 GT with this: 'Reading adapter firmware image. Image Size: 126464 bytes' A 128k ROM, too large for most PC cards. You can deal with creating you own ROM (a slim version). Taking apart the original PC ROM chip and solding a 128k ROM chip (quite hard, but if you like to build planes models likes me, this works fine). Try to using HEX extensions in OSX works too. Well you can try hooking your monitor after the Mac boots, so you avoid EFI ROM load. All these are daft solutions, because I know that all you want to do is to use the power of your high-end card.

Pny Nvidia Quadro Fx 4800 For Mac Pro

I have to solder a 128K to my card because the original one was only 64k. But according your post you have an 'Atmel AT25F1024 2.7-3.6V 128Kx8S' that means an 128k ROM, so you're lucky enough to put a regular Mac bios in your card.

Pny Nvidia Quadro Fx 4800 For Mac

All you have to do is to find a Mac ROM of that card. You can see that the GeForce is using a 'MX 25L1005 2.7-3.6V 1024Kx1S' or a 1024k ROM chip. But the amount of code in tha chip is 126464 bytes, only 1/8 of the chip.

I'm pretty sure you can flash your card, the major difference between the 2006-7's cards of the Mac Pro and the 2008's cards is just PCIe 2.0. So get a ROM from an Mac Nvidia Quadro FX 5600, from a friend, internet, etc. Then try to flash your card, doing your homework (saving your original ROM, getting the latest NVFlash).

Have luck, and remember WE DO THIS, BECAUSE WE CAN. Ciao and greetings from Venezuela.

Size of eeprom Briquick & others, thanks for update. Bits, bytes whatever. 1024 K = 1024 x 1024 = 1Mbit = 1M/8 = 131,072 bytes So I believe that the FX 5600 EEPROM is big enough for Mac code without need to solder. Only way to confirm this is to get a ROM and try it.

So where is a volunteer with a Mac Pro FX 5600. If I can't find anyone is there any one looking to order a new Mac Pro with 8800 GT card? If they ordered with FX 5600 then I would do a swap of this for my 8800 GT and pay the CTO cost difference. Unfortunately this would only be viable for US based purchaser as price difference between the two in Australia is huge (around $4000) and so it is not viable. Oh finally it is not clear if the FX 5600 is PCI-express 2.0 or 1.x. All the technical material I have read does not make this clear.

I do not think there is anything special about the Mac FX 5600 beyond the ROM image. Cheers from Oz, Zebity (MacBook Pro, Mac Pro, Mini Mac). Code: #nvflash -version NVIDIA Firmware Update Utility (Version 5.67) Adapter: Quadro FX 5600 (10DE,019D,10DE,0409) H:NRM B:01,PCI,D:00,F:00 The display may go.BLANK. on and off for up to 10 seconds during access to the EEPROM depending on your display adapter and output device. Identifying EEPROM. EEPROM ID (1F,60): Atmel AT25F1024 2.7-3.6V 128Kx8S, page Reading adapter firmware image. Click to expand.The 7 and 8 series GeForce cards can now be soft modded to Quadro cards and people have done so.

You get good performance gains with some applications, nothing with others. You aren't really turning a gaming card in to a professional card though. It seems to be more of spoofing it's identity so you can install some more optimized drivers. There are still things missing which is why you get much higher benchmark numbers with the real professional cards. As for the identical hardware with a few tweaks and jacking up the price, well technically this is true (except perhaps the few part).

Professional cards don't just have optimized driver thoughs, they have grade-a support and certification and some have differing or additional hardware. All of that needs to be paid for and in a small target market that can afford too that means high prices for everyone.

Saving is relative. Firefly, savings are a relative thing, but if I had got my mac pro as configured on Australian apple web site it would have set me back around $21,000, as it is I spent around $12,000, so that is a savings of 45%.

Pny Nvidia Quadro Fx4800 For Mac

So I am not unhappy, with savings. Only thing I am unhappy with currently is that there appears to be problems with Apples OS X software RAID support on Fibre Channel. Which I am trying to work around.

There is no doubt that Mac Pros are relatively expensive in Australia compared to US prices. Cheers, Zebity (MacBook Pro, Mac Pro, Mini Mac). No pyromania required It is very simple process.

1) Put card into PC 2) Boot off USB or Floppy 3) Do a check on current flash to see if it as per details above 4) Optionally extract existing flash 5) Run NVFLASH over unzip Mac ROM image, it should report as per my posting 6) The Big one!! 'NVFLASH ' no special flags required and hey presto Mac Pro usable FX 5600. Make sure you check the result of initial ROM to make sure you have big enough ROM to fit EFI version. So far I have not seen an FX 5600 (PNY makes them all I gather), with anything but big ROM. Also make sure you check the unzip from via 'NVFLASH -version ' just in case something went wrong on zip and upload. It will again report exactly if it was being read out of the card directly.

Happy flashing. And don't worry it is only a few thousand pounds. And you can recover anyway by reflashing with saved ROM image. Mpu 401 driver. Cheers, Zebity (MacBook Pro, Mac Pro, Mini Mac). No luck with flash process zebity, thanks for all your hard work on this. I followed the process you outlined exactly. My nvflash -version and -pciblocks output matches yours exactly, yet when I put the 5600 in my Mac Pro I get no video output.

Even after the flash to the mac5600.rom, I can still use the video card on my PC.should this still be the case? I assumed I would stop getting video output on the PC since the card is EFI based now. At least that is what it is reporting from nvflash. I even tried reflashing just to make sure.success reported again.but still no video output on the Mac Pro.

Has anyone else tried this with success? Any suggestions? Please help!!!

(Mac Pro, Macbook Pro).

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