Mac Pro Tower - Which Fans Cool All of What?

So I have a 2008, 2.8 GHz 8-core Mac Pro tower. I'm one of the many people who have problems with the fans. In my case, I can get really high fan speeds, and the problem seems to be due to a faulty temperature sensor. (Using iStat, it will sometimes show unreasonably high temps on a couple cores [or the heat sinks, apparently] immediately after turning it on, whether or not it's been off for awhile. Sometimes, it will even show negative temperatures, in which case the fans will really go into overdrive. Yes, I've already tried resetting the SMC and cleaning it out - nothing.)
What I've ended up doing so far is download Macs Fan Control and setting it to base the fan speeds off CPU temps that don't give faulty readings. This works really well for lowering the fan speed (and thus noise), but I understand that different fans cool parts of the system besides just the CPU. The fan names give basic descriptions, but not a lot of detail beyond that. I've been trying to find a diagram showing which fans cool which parts of the system, but I mostly get results about fan noise, or minimalist diagrams that don't tell me all I want to know. I'd like to make sure my settings are fairly optimal before I do anything intensive.
Can anyone help me with this?

I think you are "barking up the wrong tree".
The fans in the Mac Pro are controlled by Software in the System Management Controller. They make a feedback loop based on measured temperatures. If you are getting racing fans, that is probably based on Bad Temperature inputs. Fixing the temperature inputs is where you should place your energy. The fans are slaves in this process.
One possible exception: Most of the fans do have an RPM output indicator, which tells whether they are spinning properly. If the diagnostic indicates a MOT error, that is likely to be a Fan Motor that is not showing high RPMs at High speed settings, and may be defective. The power supply fans were designed by a different team, and may not have the same controls.
What SMC Fan Control and similar software allows you to do is put a new Floor under the fan speeds. They will spin faster at idle, and it is possible they may move up to even higher speeds more slowly. What is does NOT allow you to do is any actual reduction in minimum fan speeds, regardless of whether it allows you to set lower numbers.
When the numbers get extremely large, the magnitude bits overflow into what is sometimes considered the sign bit. That has no meaning in this context -- all numbers should be treated as positive numbers. That probably indicates they took a shortcut and used general-purpose routines for signed numbers that were lying around instead of writing more correct versions for positive numbers from scratch.

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Which model of Mac Pro Tower can take 64BG RAM?

Hi everyone,
Been searching and going around in circles to find the true answer to this so I figured I'd just make this post.
EXACTLY which models of Mac Pro Tower can take 64GB of RAM. Looking on websites like OWC and asking people and I'm getting conflicting information and getting confused.
THANKS!

1. Yes.
2. Yes; Apple doesn’t update its specifications when higher capacity RAM becomes available. A few models require more recent firmware versions and/or OSes installed to reach the actual limit.
(115360)

No more iSight, so which Webcam can I buy for Mac Pro tower?

I have a new Mac Pro tower with 23" Apple Cinema display.
I need to buy a FireWire web cam. Dosn't need mic as I have headset, but won't matter if mic is built in.
I wanted iSight, but Apple don't make them and they area expensive used (UK price used is £100).
Can anyone recommend a decent web cam for use with Skype and iChat AV?
Thanks.

What there were are at the bottom of this page http://homepage.mac.com/john_kenn/video.html
You may find someone still has them on the shelf.
You do realise that OS 10.4.9 and above will use a USB Video Class camera without drivers ? (They are now in the OS).
10:37 PM Sunday; September 16, 2007

Monitor goes dark on 2008 Mac Pro Tower with ATI Radeon 5870 Card

I have a 2008 Quad Core Intel Mac Pro Tower running 10.6.8.
The original graphics card had trouble with HD movies of any kind and eventually my screen would sometimes not turn on (stayed black) when the computer was turned on.
So I replaced the graphics card for both reasons to a ATI Radeon 5870 PCIe with a GB rather than the 256 that came with the machine.
The problem was solved. I got a new monitor, one that is like the latest ones and all has been working great for a few years.
Then recently the monitor started going dark while the computer was on. (no screen saver or anything like that, I can be in the middle of work on a photo or video).
Trouble shooting I have tried.
A forum said drag the mouse to the hot corner for a while and then back. Well, I tried, assuming I was dragging the mouse to the corner. Didn't work.
I tried using the keyboard commands to shut down the computer. It didn't work.
I tried plugging the keyboard into other USB ports and tried to shut down the computer. No luck.
The only thing that works is shutting down the computer with the power button.
on start up the monitor is back on.
Sometimes it works for days like this, other times the monitor stays on only minutes.
The monitor is fine. Tested my old monitor on the computer to make sure it wasn't my new monitor.
So the questions are:
Can it be over heating?
is it worn out, toast, done and or dead and dieing?
Should I buy a replacement graphics card VS finally upgrading and getting a new computer (lots of $$$$ but then I do work in HD Video so....)
any help is appreciated
thanks
john

Replacing FBDIMMs would be today inexpensive and worth doing.
No one knows if heat is an issue without your using thermal sensor monitor. Probably want to up the default fan speeds while at it.
And because you don't have Lion+ then even more reason to setup a small maintenace volume on another drive with OS X basic system for repairs. In fact you should always have a bootable backup or two you can rely on.
Restarting may work, or it may be you have now new issue with corrupt fies or directory that a safe boot even is no guarantee of fixing.
When in doubt, try a clean new OS install on another drive.
And FBDIMMs: $25 for a 2x2GB set on Amazon.com
You want to get the most out of what you have, a small investment in RAM, maybe recycle those drives for 2-4TB units. And an SSD will have system responding better and perform better.
My guess, the 5870 wasn't needed and was overkill and a 5770 for almost half would have been more than adequate.

I have a Mac Pro tower with two internal Hard Discs, each one 2TB. I purchased a 3TB Time Capsule. But it does not allow me to back up because it says there is not enough back up space available. Between the two HDs there are 3.3TBs. Can I daisy chain TC?

I have a Mac Pro tower (OSX version 10.6.3) with two internal Hard Drives, each one 2TB.
I purchased a 3TB Time Capsule. But cannot back up because it tells me there is not enough space.
I have more than 3Tbs to store to the new TC.
Can I daisy chain two TCs to store the 4TBs?
How can I back up only the internal HD that is already full, without backing up the other one?
How can I do back up using Time Machine to back up the 3.5Tbs?
Do I need to purchase another external HD (that is not TC) to be able to back up all of my photos?

Can I daisy chain two TCs to store the 4TBs?
No, you cannot link to produce a single large partition.
But you can have two separate backup jobs.. and use each partition. That is hard on TM but you can easily get a different backup software for it.
How can I back up only the internal HD that is already full, without backing up the other one?
In TM you do a different setup and exclude the other drive.
But it is better to use an alternative software IMHO.
How can I do back up using Time Machine to back up the 3.5Tbs?
You would need to use a network drive of more than 4TB .. it would also take forever. This is just wrong way to do it. Although you can buy a NAS that will work with Time Machine and load it with disks 16TB is possible.. if you can get a second mortgage.. the fragile nature of TM on 3rd party devices.. would leave me in cold sweat if anything went wrong.
TM is excellent at keeping incremental backups of files that keep changing.. as such you should use TM to backup your OS disk and main user directory.. exclude all files and directories that never change. Back them up separately.
Do I need to purchase another external HD (that is not TC) to be able to back up all of my photos?
Yes, that is a much better idea. You want to store photos safely and you want to store them in multiple places. If you have multiple TB of photos, dedicate a couple of disks to the backup. ie have at least two copies.. not in backup format.. in straight copy format if possible.. so you can keep one of the disks offsite.
I would be using your MacPro internal disk access, to place the disk onto sata bus and do the copy disk to disk direct. Or even buy esata card.. or sata to esata converter cable so you can use esata box. That will beat any other transfer speed except thunderbolt for which you would need third mortgage. (The MORT in mortgage is significant).
The great jurist Sir Edward Coke, who lived from 1552 to 1634, has explained why the term mortgage comes from the Old French words mort, "dead," and gage, "pledge." It seemed to him that it had to do with the doubtfulness of whether or not the mortgagor will pay the debt.

How do i sync macbook pro & mac pro tower

how do i sync my address book & calendar between my macbook pro & my mac pro tower?

Hi ...
Helps to tell us which Mac OS X you have installed when you post for help.
If you have Lion v10.7.2 or higher installed, you can setup an iCloud account so that you can sync your Contacts and Calendars between your Macs via Wi-Fi.
Apple - iCloud - Learn how to set up iCloud on all your devices

FCP won't launch on new Mac Pro Tower

I just got a new Mac Pro Tower and installed Final Cut Studio, but Final Cut Pro won't launch. It just hangs on the opening splash screen and I can't even force quit out of it. Same thing happens if I try to open an FCP project. I have run all the updates, trashed prefs, etc.
Any ideas?

OK....so I think I found the problem even though it makes no sense to me. It seems that if I have my DVCam deck (which is connected via a 4-pin firewire to 9-pin firewire cable) powered on while I try to launch FCP, it causes FCP to hang on the splash screen. If I turn the deck off, and launch FCP, it launches perfectly.....and it continues to work after I power the deck on. Very bizarre behavior but I have tested it about 5 times now and it works fine when the deck is powered off and hangs when the deck is powered on. Anybody else have a simliar issie?

Max ram size for a quad core Mac pro tower?

I have a 4-Core, Xeon 3500 series, 3rd gen Mac pro tower with four DIMM slots and would like to know what is the largest size ram I can put in each slot and what is the best configuration for that ram? My main concern is maximizing the rendering speed of Final Cut Pro X and I have read that since it is a 64 bit program it can utilize much more ram than the previous version.
Can I get the benefit out of 8G sticks? Is it better to have the ram spread across multiple slots??
Thanks!

Andy Drefs wrote:
Just installed my 3 new 8G sticks and I see NO DIFFERENCE WHATSOEVER!!!! And now suddenly the cooling fan has kicked in to overdrive and is buzzing away - this is such a great result of spending over $300! What a waste of $$$$$$
Sometimes when you change hardware configurations -- internal drives, dimms. video cards -- it may help to do a smc reset.
If adding memory didn't change your performance perhaps you should look at how much disk space you have for your boot drive or consider a ssd as a boot drive.

Can I download and use final cut pro 7 on new mac pro tower?,or I must work with the new final cut pro x only?

can I download and use final cut pro 7 on new mac pro tower?,or I must work with the new final cut pro x only?

Disclaimer: This response assumes that a "new mac pro tower" is the new cylindrical model.
1. You cannot download Final Cut Pro 7. FCP7 is part of Final Cut Studio (2009) a.k.a "FCS3" and it was only released on a DVD set. It can still be purchased online (maybe even from Apple) for prices ranging from a few hundred to $1K and it is 5 years old and unsupported.
2. Although there are reports of systems running FCS3 on Mavericks, there are also a host of problems associated with this OS/software combination.
3. A new version of iMovie Pro Final Cut Pro X has been released which is reportedly very fast and is supported.
It's all a matter of what kind of movies you make...

Mac pro 1,1 fan issues

Good day Mac Pro users/technicians!!
So, a quick overview of my hardware, then of my problem. My Mac Pro 1,1 has 6 GB of RAM, the latest edition of Snow Leopard, and a brand new ATI Radeon HD 5770 graphics card (formerly an nVidia GeForce GT 8800 for Mac, that "burnt out" a couple months ago from excessive use, I guess).
Through the past 6 months or so (I think it's been that long), every once in awhile, when I attempt to sleep the computer, everything appears to spin down properly, the screen goes dark, and then within a second or two, it wakes itself, and the Mac Pro's primary fan spins up to max speed and STAYS AT MAXIMUM SPEED INDEFINITELY! Functionality remains normal, but I have to "hard" shutdown (not just reboot) the computer to get the fan to stop. The fan NEVER spins up to max speed (except briefly at startup, or sometimes the GPU fan spins up during graphics intensive processes), ever, except when I try to sleep the computer (or when I leave the computer on, and it attempts to sleep itself according to my energy saver preference). This problem used to occur only sometimes. Now it occurs almost everytime the machine is slept. As a consequence, I have to leave it on always, or shut it down completely, otherwise I'll arrive at my office/awake from sleep to the sound of a vacuum cleaner beneath my desk.
I researched Google as best as I could, to find other examples of this problem (as well as this forum/community). There were many people who reported incidences of unexpected fan-spin-up on older G5s, some other 2006 Woodcrests, and 2008 Nehalems, but none that I could find for the same reason or same duration (endless!!) as in my case.
THINGS I'VE TRIED:
1. I have tried the SMC reset (shut-down, remove power cord, hold power button for 5 seconds).
2. I downloaded a temperature monitor application to check for bad heat sensors, and everything appeared OK (which makes some logical sense to me, since I could run the computer undlessly without experiencing this problem unless I try to sleep it -- if a processor core/other heat sensor were bad, I presume that fan would be spinning up whenever the computer is on)
CPU Core temps range from 30-36 deg. C
Memory modules from 54-58 deg. C
The highest reading is from the "Northbridge Heat Sink" which peaks at 65 deg. C
The lowest from the "Ambient Air" sensor at 20 deg. C
3. Removed all peripheral devices prior to startup, but still able to reproduce problem
Can anyone suggest a course of action, besides something drastic like re-installing the system? Does this sound like some kind of hardware failure? I can always give up on sleeping the machine entirely, though it is quite convenient to be able to leave it on when I've got something running, and trust that it will go to sleep on its own without waking up the neighbors, or burn out it's fans from prolonged usage when I'm away.
Thanks for your help!
-saucony_jabroni (enthusiastically coddling his 5+ year old computer into the next decade!!)

Thanks again, Hatter for your help. Unfortunately, I'm still experiencing my problem. I don't use a UPS, since I live in a suburban area where we rarely lose power. I DO use a Tributaries brand surge surpressor, with indicator lights that confirm the device is protected and grounded. I'm not sure how I would test that my Mac Pro's PSU unit is faulty.
I attempted to run the Apple Hardware Test, and failed at that as well, for a reason which is off-topic (Maybe this part of the discussion should be moved to another forum). Sometime after installing Snow Leopard, I decided it would be a good idea to set up a firmware password on my Mac Pro, to prevent anyone from tinkering with my system. Unfortunately, doing so prevents booting from the OS X Snow Leopard install DVD. I spent a couple hours last night trying to disable my EFI password temporarily, and was unable to do so. According to Apple's instructions, the user must reboot their computer while depressing the Option key to pull up the EFI password prompt. When I do that, my Mac Pro appears to start the boot process normally (all the ordinary spin-up sounds of hard drives/fans/etc.), but the monitor never illuminates, and the boot process seems to stall. If I press the power button to re-boot, the machine shuts down immediately, without requiring a "hard" reboot. Is it possible that my EFI password prompt DOES come up, but ISN'T being displayed on screen? I have noticed that since I got my new graphics card (the ATI 5770), my screen remains blank right up until the end of the boot process. Maybe the updated OS X boot ROM doesn't initialize the new graphics card early enough in the boot process to view the EFI password entry prompt, or somesuch thing?
I apologize for the high degree of speculation in this latest post. I rattled it off JUST before heading off to work, and probably wasn't as clear about some stuff as I could have been. If you have any ideas why I can't pull up an EFI password prompt, so that I can disable my firmware password temporarily, and run Apple Hardware Test, I'd be curious to know what they are. If you think this post should be adapted for a different forum, I can do that after work today. If you think I should just go ahead and upgrade to a new Mac Pro, I'd be happy for that recommendation as well, but this WHOLE fiasco does seem to trivial in origin for such a drastic move. This machine still runs everything SO well.
Thanks for all you do!

Can I create separate folders to save media on my Airport Time Capsule? Issue is I have a 256GB HDD Mac Pro Retina which is almost full. TC will only take backup of my HDD. So where would I save my photos and videos from my iPhone and iPad?

Can I create separate folders to save media on my Airport Time Capsule? Issue is I have a 256GB HDD Mac Pro Retina which is almost full. TC will only take backup of my HDD. So where would I save my photos and videos from my iPhone and iPad?

It is a hard one.. laptops with small drives are a pain.
What you need is a home media server.
Some people use a PC running itunes for cost.. but that is nothing like as good as using a Mac mini.. they make great little HTPC device.. you can plug in large hard disks and store all your files and media. And share it with the network.. Read up apple's instructions on home sharing.
https://www.apple.com/au/support/homesharing/
For cost you can buy a mini from 2011 or 2012.. I would not recommend earlier ones.. the advantage of 2012 is they have USB3 ports. But you will pay more for them.. new mini is not as useful.. they have soldered in memory and you cannot upgrade.. the old mini was the most easily modified mac in the whole range. Uses little power and can be bought for a $300US for a good one second hand.. maybe less.

My new mac pro tower might have died but i cannot tell. help

Left on my mac pro tower 4-core with 3 gigs of ram on all night as I often do. I merely power down the apple 23" monitor because that's the only that heats up. Came down in the morning, turned on the monitor and all I see is a white screen. just all white. never seen that before in all my years as a mac user. I made sure all connections were secure and rebooted. THen.... whiteness. blinding nothingness. I'm taking a wild guess here that the mother board is okay but the Hard Drive is dead? After work, I'll try to boot up from the start up dvd however.... it doesn't appear to even go through even prelim start up. i don't get the screen of death or anything. just nothingness.
Anyone had this problem? I got the computer and monitor about 6 months ago and it's been flawless. Didn't do anything different last night. no downloads..nothing.
Help!

Hi-
Try resetting your PRAM/NVRAM:
Resetting PRAM and NVRAM
-Shut down the computer.
-Locate the following keys on the keyboard: Command, Option, P, and R. You will need to hold these keys down simultaneously in step 4.
-Turn on the computer.
-Press and hold the Command-Option-P-R keys. You must press this key combination before the gray screen appears.
-Hold the keys down until the computer restarts and you hear the startup sound for the second time.
-Release the keys.
If that doesn't work, try booting to Open Firmware (commandoption+of) and reset the NVRAM:
http://docs.info.apple.com/article.html?artnum=42642
If still unsuccessful, but, able to boot to open Firmware, try disk repair using fsck:
http://docs.info.apple.com/article.html?artnum=106214

I have a brand new Mac Pro Tower that continually kicks me off the internet and sometimes starts up not connecting to the internet?

My brand new Mac Pro Tower that I spent a small fortune on sometimes boots up and does not connect to the internet when every other computer in my office does and other times it just kicks me straight off. My question is, is there a problem with the wi fi on these machines?

Brand new nMP Mac Pro 6,1 Late 2013.... and it is defective - the older silver tower might be easier to find parts but at least it is not 65 lbs and is something that can be taken in - which I think you really need to do.
When you run etrecheck from www.etresoft.com it can show what is installed, drivers and might help point to something on software side.
Grant is the go-to person here I think among others for networking issues.
Airport Express and signal strength, channel it is trying to use, whether the Network control panel settings are "correct" or need to be changed (even the order, what it is trying to look for and use).
If you move it to another spot or put another computer over in that general vicinity...? behaves the same.
I recall reading where the MacBook Pro model in 2012? and switched to a new chipset and some very long (huge) threads in their forum - which means also there was no real solution given.
No, should not be. And other than network tests would be booting into Apple DiagnosticsTest mode - pulls down from Apple servers.
http://support.apple.com/kb/HT5781

My Mac Pro tower quad core crashed and is showing a NO sign (the circle with a slash through it). How do I safely get it to come back up ? Model A1186

My Mac Pro tower quad core crashed and is showing a NO sign (the circle with a slash through it). How do I safely get it to come back up ? Model A1186

General purpose Mac troubleshooting guide:
Isolating issues in Mac OS X
Creating a temporary user to isolate user-specific problems:
Isolating an issue by using another user account
Identifying resource hogs and other tips:
Using Activity Monitor to read System Memory and determine how much RAM is being used
Starting the computer in "safe mode":
Mac OS X: What is Safe Boot, Safe Mode?
To identify potential hardware problems:
Apple Hardware Test
General Mac maintenance:
Tips to keep your Mac in top form
Troubleshooting: My computer won't turn on
https://support.apple.com/kb/TS1367
Where are your bootable backups and clones stored?
What do you have to boot from to restore or attempt to recovery files that are not backed up?
It won't be a PowerMac. People tend to think they look alike? or mean the same thing.
http://www.everymac.com/systems/apple/mac_pro/specs/mac-pro-quad-2.66-specs.html
Try zap PRAM and SMC Reset. If you have ATI 5770 which many have upgraded to you won't be able to use older DVD or systems than 10.6.5

Mac Pro Tower - Which Fans Cool All of What?

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