Use of NVIDIA 8800GT Card in 1st Generation Mac Pro

I just visited my local Apple store to inquire about the "1st Gen. Mac Pro" 8800GT card. They have some with p/n MB 560Z/A on the box. But no one knows anything in detail about the card, or possible installation/operation problems. Is the MB 560Z/A the card version that should work in my 1st gen Mac Pro (purchased 29Aug06)?

That's the right card. The Mac Pro (early 2008) uses the MB137Z/A

Similar Messages

Video card for 1st generation Mac Pro

My X1900 card in the Mac Pro 1st generation has died. I've searched the board and the replacement cards seem to be older and not sold any more. Does anyone know what will work? I went to an Apple Store today and the "genius" said I needed a new X1900. I told him I didn't think they were made any more. I did a Web search and it seems Apple has known about this problem and was replacing them up to January 2011. Wish I was contacted about this by Apple; they have records that I purchased the card. I've had problems with this for quite some time. I thought upgrading to Snow Leopard would help but I seemed to get more crashes after the upgrade.

If this image attached is what you have that died you can have this to bolt on to your original graphics card, it should work just fine as a GPU replacement. It worked fine for me, it's just that the X1900 for me when I used the 1st gen Mac Pro didn't suit my needs.
I've never wanted to throw it away. The board and copper cooling system it was attached to was too cumbersome.
Let me know and I'll ship it to you.

Confused about upgrading Video card on 1st Gen Mac Pro

When looking in the Apple store under video cards it looks like the 8800 or even the ati 2600xt say :
PCI Express 2.0 but under the reviews for the ati card there are a few posts that say they used this card to upgrade their '06 ' and '07 Mac Pro from the Nvidia 7300 ...
But if the older Mac Pro's dont have pci express 2.0 how can this be ?
I also have read that a nvidia 8800 for the 1st gen mac pro may come out but what if it does not ? Whats the deal ? Will there be a video upgrade path for the 1st gen mac pro or not ?
Why are we being " left out " in the cold for buying a machine a year and a half ago ?
So basically there is the 7300 or the ati 1900 and thats it for the 1st gen mac pro's ?
Even my 4 year old PC has video options and its agp !

If you are bored you might be able to find an early post of mine from the early MacPro days when I commented that MacPro buyers should only buy if they can live with never being to upgrade the graphics card. Apple is Apple and if you know the history of Apple you know that graphics cards are all but ignored. I remain hopeful that Apple, through nVidia, comes out with an 8800 for older Mac Pros, but I don't count on it. The MacPro line has glaring strengths and glaring weaknesses and the dearth of video cards is a glaring weakness. Still better a MacPro with this weakness than a PC box, but with no official word from Apple and all this expectation from a single comment by an nVidia PR person (PR for gosh sakes!), I don't find the rumor to be terribly credible. Hope I'm wrong. Very much so. Hope the oft quoted email by steve j. regarding it being looked at is on the money and we have an announcement tomorrow. Holding my breath till then....

How/Can I install WINDOWS 7 64BIT on a 1st Generation Mac Pro ?

Hi, Is it possible to install Windows 7 64 bit on a 1st Generation Mac Pro 2.66Ghz? Apple suggests that it's not possible and yet I've seen several Googled posts where the users have successfully installed 64 bit on a 1st Generation Mac Pro. The problem is that they've done this creating a bootable iso disk(whatever that is) using a Windows computer with imgburn and windows commands. I'm pretty good at following instructions but I haven't seen any instructions on how to install Windows 7 on this machine using a Mac based approach.
I'm using BootCamp and was able to partition the drive into NFTS and "proceed" with installation; however all te installations failed during setup and Windows would not boot; disk repair was not possible. Besides, from what I've gathered, 32 bit is problematic around memory issues.
When I try installing 64 bits, I never get past the "select cd rom 1or 2" message where the keyboard won't work. It is at this point where others say they have successfully proceeded with moving forward by creating a bootable iso disk.
Problem is it's all Windows based with exe files and presupposes I already have Windows running.
I'm not sure I really understand how to create an iso disk, but I do have ROXIO TOAST 10 which is capable of burning "ISO" disks.Does anyone know how to do this and/or can you point me to a place where there are instructions on how to proceed?? While I realize Apple says that some mid 2006 mac pros aren't supported, there are multiple posts of windows users successfully installing Windows 7 on a 1st Generation Mac Pro.
Thanks.

I have a March 2009 Mac Pro dual quad core running Win7 Pro 64 bit. I have Windows installed on a dedicated internal hard drive. There are no partitions, the entire drive is for Windows use.
Here's how I installed it, I did not start with BootCamp. Make sure the drive you're going to use for Windows doesn't have any important files on it because it will be formatted.
1. Update Snow Leopard
2. Place the Windows cd in the Super Drive
3. Shut down the computer
4. Remove all the hard drives except the one you want Windows installed on. Keep track of the order they are in and at the end replace them in the same order.
5. Boot the computer holding down the Option key
6. Boot to the Windows cd
7. Install Windows and format the drive to NTFS
8. When Windows needs to restart during installation you'll need to hold the Option key and boot to Windows, not the Windows cd.
9. After Windows installs, place your Snow Leopard disc in the Super Drive
10. The Drivers for Windows will be installed along with a Windows version of BootCamp.
11. Go to Start > All Programs > Apple Software Update
12. Update again until it's done.
13. You'll also find a BootCamp under Control Panel, check it out.
14. Shut down the computer and replace the hard drives in their original order
14. Now if you turn on the computer it will boot to Snow Leopard, but if you hold the Option key during boot you can select Windows or Mac.

How can I install Windows7 -64BIT on a 1st Generation Mac Pro 2.66GHZ Quad?

Hi,
I posted this in Bootcamp but haven't received any replies so I am reposting it here where perhaps it really belongs.Is it possible to install Windows 7 64 bit on a 1st Generation Mac Pro 2.66Ghz?
Apple suggests that it's not possible and yet I've seen several Googled posts where the users have successfully installed 64 bit on a 1st Generation Mac Pro. The problem is that they've done this creating a bootable iso disk(whatever that is) using a Windows computer with imgburn and windows commands. I'm pretty good at following instructions but I haven't seen any instructions on how to install Windows 7 on this machine using a Mac based approach.
I'm using BootCamp and was able to partition the drive into NFTS and "proceed" with installation; however all the installations failed during setup and Windows would not boot; disk repair was not possible. Besides, from what I've gathered, 32 bit is problematic around memory issues.
When I try installing 64 bits, I never get past the "select cd rom 1 or 2" message where the keyboard won't work. It is at this point where others say they have successfully proceeded with moving forward by creating a bootable iso disk.
Problem is it's all Windows based with exe files and presupposes I already have Windows running.
I'm not sure I really understand how to create an iso disk, but I do have ROXIO TOAST 10 which is capable of burning "ISO" disks.Does anyone know how to do this and/or can you point me to a place where there are instructions on how to proceed?? While I realize Apple says that some mid 2006 mac pros aren't supported, there are multiple posts of windows 7 users successfully installing Windows 7 on a 1st Generation Mac Pro.
Thanks.
Mac Pro 2.66GHZ Quad Core

I have a March 2009 Mac Pro dual quad core running Win7 Pro 64 bit. I have Windows installed on a dedicated internal hard drive. There are no partitions, the entire drive is for Windows use.
Here's how I installed it, I did not start with BootCamp. Make sure the drive you're going to use for Windows doesn't have any important files on it because it will be formatted.
1. Update Snow Leopard
2. Place the Windows cd in the Super Drive
3. Shut down the computer
4. Remove all the hard drives except the one you want Windows installed on. Keep track of the order they are in and at the end replace them in the same order.
5. Boot the computer holding down the Option key
6. Boot to the Windows cd
7. Install Windows and format the drive to NTFS
8. When Windows needs to restart during installation you'll need to hold the Option key and boot to Windows, not the Windows cd.
9. After Windows installs, place your Snow Leopard disc in the Super Drive
10. The Drivers for Windows will be installed along with a Windows version of BootCamp.
11. Go to Start > All Programs > Apple Software Update
12. Update again until it's done.
13. You'll also find a BootCamp under Control Panel, check it out.
14. Shut down the computer and replace the hard drives in their original order
14. Now if you turn on the computer it will boot to Snow Leopard, but if you hold the Option key during boot you can select Windows or Mac.

Ati radeon hd 4870 for 1st generation mac pros?

unfortunately the ati radeon hd 4870 is working for all mac pros except the first generation: http://store.apple.com/us/product/MB999ZM/A?fnode=MTY1NDA5OQ&mco=NDE4NDMxOA
are there any other graphics cards that have a mini displayport connector and are compatible with a mac pro first generation?
thanks for the help!

The information on the AMD/ATI site actually says the 4870 has lower power requirements than the 3870.
The PCIe power limit of 300W is the same for the 2008 Mac Pros as the 2007 8-core Clovertown Mac Pro. Power is not an issue. EFI appears not to be an issue either as Rob's tests have shown.
Can anyone give a logical or technical reason why the 4870 is not being made available to 1st Gen Mac Pros like the 3.0 GHz 8-core. I can't think of anything.
Surely Apple aren't restricting this cards use in an effort to persuade users to upgrade? Are they?

1st Generation Mac Pro 2.66 dual Core(4 cores total) 5gigs of RAM

I'm still on Logic 8/Tiger. All running very well. Typical projects run about 30 tracks. Use lots of Vi's Omnisphere, Trillian, and RMX included.
Wanting to move to 10.6.2/Logic 9.1. Is my first generation Mac Pro up for the upgrade? Will I still have plenty of juice?
4 drives(OS, audio, samples, and backup)
Thanks for any input!
Message was edited by: Gearjunkeee

I also have a similar set-up but with 8 GB's RAM. I kept the old HDD with the Leopard 10.5.8 and Logic 9.02. Installed a new HDD then did the upgrade. To be honest, it was a PAINFUL process re-loading in all of the software plus updating the software! But, for me at least (knock on wood), I've had no problems with Snow Leopard and Logic 9.1. My first "test" was to run my lastes sequencing project which has a total of 30 virtual instruments and plug-ins from various companies (Kontakt 2.5 Player, Music Lab, "External Instruments", Audio Ease's Altiverb, Universal Audio plug-ins) and all worked well. Now, to be very clear, please realize that this was only 1 "test". But I noticed right-away better usage of the CPU than the previous version. For the previous versions (Leopard 10.5.8 with Logic 9.02) of this one "test" I had to set the buffer to 512 in order to do a problem-free mix-down. But with the upgrade of Snow Leopard/Logic Pro combo, I was able to mix down this project with a buffer setting set to 128. (I'm quite happy with that setting.)
FYI, I'm using Logic Pro 9.1 in 32-bit mode. I tried the 64-bit mode, but some of my plug-ins didn't work in that mode (Music Lab's RealStrat and RealLPC, which I tend to use frequently.) But I'm happy using 32-bit mode, especially using Native-Instrument's Kontakt 4.04. Again, all works well.
Just thought I would share a positive experiece with the upgrades. Good luck with your decision.

Installing XP on Boot Camp help for 1st Generation Mac Pro

hi all,
i am trying to make my way through the documentation so that i can get WINDOWS XP back on my first generation Mac Pro since i need to run some programs for work. the old drive that i had this information on was running Snow Leopard (I believe) but it has died.
i have a formatted Fat 32 drive in Bay 2 and i am running Lion on my OS drive in Bay 1 and i am hoping someone can point me to the correct URL for doing this.
my understanding is that i need to use Boot Camp 4 but there appears to be a number of different versions of 4 and i am also having a hard time remembering /how/ to do this. i guess i download the Boot Camp 4 version that i need to my OS drive in Bay 1 and i somehow install this on the drive in bay 2? then i insert the XP disk and it automatically installs itself on this drive?
do i have to do something special with drivers?
ALSO, is there anything to be careful about if i have a PARTITION on the drive in Bay 1 that contains a Boot Camp of Windows 7?
TIA

I would always have a wired connection, even if you generally want/need to use wireless.
I am not up on Airport or how to install.
http://discussions.apple.com/forum.jspa?forumID=1222
USB ethernet has never been a real option on Mac OS X.
Links to various troubleshooting articles:
http://support.apple.com/kb/TS1388
You can download most updates manually, very few that require using Software Update, so it is possible to download in Windows.
http://www.apple.com/support/downloads/
I have been happy with Netgear modems, routers and switches, which Amazon is always happy to sell!
http://www.google.com/search?q=MacPro+AppleAirport
http://www.xlr8yourmac.com/feedback/airportextreme2007-002/airportextreme2007-002.html
http://www.xlr8yourmac.com/archives/jan07/013007.html
http://www.google.com/search?q=appleairportextreme
http://www.sweetwater.com/store/detail/AirCardMP/

1st Generation Mac Pro Graphics

Right now, I have a 7300 GT for my first generation Mac Pro. If I got a 4870, and put it in the 32x slot, would it work under Windows? I know it wouldn't work under Mac, but if I moved the 7300 to the 16x slot, would it just fall back on that?
Thanks

There are not 32x slots, especially in 1st gen Mac Pro.
I'd make life easier on yourself:
http://www.barefeats.com/harper15.html
http://www.barefeats.com/harper18.html
4870
http://www.barefeats.com/harper19.html
Windows Vista x64 graphics:
http://www.barefeats.com/harper11.html

Anyone using the Ati Graphics Card 5770 with a Mac Pro 2.93Ghz (2009)

I would like to upgrade my stock Geforce Gt 120 cards in my Mac Pro 2.93Ghz 8 core (early 2009) to the Ati 5770 card which will be connected to 2 Apple 27inch Retina Displays.
I am aware that Apple states that the 5770 card is not compatible with the 2009 model but I have also read that Barefeats say this is not true and will work on the 2009 machines.
Having read numerous reports from people having problems when using the 5770 in there 2009 models such a faster fan speeds and excessive noise I really don't know what to do?....
Can anyone chime in with their experience and recommendations on the 5770 and also what Mac Pro model and OS version was used?.
I have looked at the Ati 5870 but it is a bit more than my current budget and my graphics power needs.
Many Thanks
Noodlez.

Very few problems. Some try to do something w/ the wrong dual link active adapters or to use HDMI or something else. I know of very few let alone "numerous" reports. But 10's of thousands of Mac Pro 1,1 and above love it and are fine and happy - and you need 10.6.5 (10.6.8 of course has a much improved driver whereas 10.6.4-1/2 was OEM and basic shoddy and not on the retail 10.6.3 DVD).
ML use to be trouble on a 2008 3,1 too. At this day and age unless you have PowerPC apps plugins or drivers and hardware 10.8.3 is the way to go. And 10.8.3 opens up more graphic card choices too. Nvidia GTX series or AMD 79xx and EVGA has Mac Edition as does AMD have 7950.
Barefeasts.com has test results
I think you want to double check but "RETINA" is a MacBook Pro only and might be thinking of Thunderbolt, which will not connect to a Mac Pro. There still is a non-Thunderbolt 27" which is.

1st generation Mac Pro

Would the apple wireless n airport card perform any better then the wireless N adapter I currently have?http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16833320048&cm_re=asus_wirel ess_n-_-33-320-048-_-Product

What do you mean by "perform better?" If you mean are the operating specs any different? They are not. Furthermore, I don't think you can purchase a standard Apple airport card that fits in your model. When the wireless cards were available for your model they were not "n" capable, and they had to be installed by Apple. The Apple Extreme wireless cards being used today are mini-PCIe cards that do not fit the slot in your model.

1st Gen Mac Pro: Graphics Card Needed Urgently

My mac pro is first generation (Model Identifier: MacPro1,1) Not the 2008 Mac Pro.
I have Chipset Model: ATY,RadeonX1900
This card is failing. Pram reset, SMC reset, and/or repair permissions do not work. I cleaned the fan intake area as well... card is still failing (won't wake from sleep, no display on reboot, etc etc).
I have searched these forums high and low. Can anyone please provide me with a good option for a replacement card?
The closest I have gotten is the "Apple nVIDIA GeForce 8800 GT Graphics Upgrade Kit for 1st Generation Mac Pro" which is now discontinued (?)
I am getting really frustrated here, please help!

Hey,
I am having the exact issue with my Mac Pro (2.66 gig first gen intel). I have a discussion (unresolved) that you can find here.
http://discussions.apple.com/message.jspa?messageID=9666490#9666490
I wonder how many folks are having this particular card die early on them. I think the problem is more widespread than Apple would indicate on the phone.
Anyway, my concern is whether or not the replacement card will be able to use the Open CL (sp?) protocol that will come with Snow Leopard. This will allow the computer to use free cycles on the graphics card to boost processing power. The guy on the phone and at the Apple store I went to was fuzzy on this. The last thing I want to do is upgrade to an antiquated card.
He suggested the Nvidia GeForce 8800 GT which I cannot find (discontinued).
Does anyone know if the 4870 will take advantage of the new Snow Leopard features?
Thanks,
G

NVIDIA Quadro FX 5800 in a 1st Gen Mac Pro?

Hello, is it possible to use the new NVIDIA Quadro FX 5800 in a 1st Generation Mac Pro?

Not if it doesn't have EFI32 ROM code (firmware) on it. Any card to run in OS X needs special EFI firmware, and different for 2008 and before.
Of course, if you want to use it in Windows, should be able to.

1st Gen Mac Pro Graphics Card replacement??

I have a 1st generation mac pro and the nvidia geforce 7300 GT graphics card died.
what can I replace this with that is relatively inexpensive? Does it need to be 256 or 512 MB?

Thank You. That isn't quite my situation. There is a back on April 11th. 2010 and still unsolved. That is very disappointing considering there are a lot of people who are genius with technical issues on this forum.
It booted up OK from a long power down time but if I have to restart for any reason or power down and start up within a few minutes, I will have nothing on the display (black). The little light is on and if you touch the button the light will goes to sleep but nothing on the display. I checked everything and tried every combinations. What I ended up with is; 1. to leave the computer on forever until the end of time but I can't because sometimes the fan would come on high and stay on., 2. if I have to restart, I have to unplug both power chords and wait at least half an hour to forty five minutes then plug everything back in and start. Most of the time it will work. This puzzled me.
Everywhere I posted this problem, I've had zero answer. There must be some one who knows this issue and solved it before. Hello! Are you out there? Help me please!

Well its been about 7 weeks - Any news on a 8800Gt for 1st gen Mac Pro's ?

It was January when the masses were pacified with the announcement of a 8800gt card for us old timers - you know those super out of date , non-upgradeable video 1st mac pro's .....
Why are we being ' dead ended ' like this on video ? The 7300 and 1900 are not at all ' modern ' video cards - why are we being treated like this ? Did we do something wrong ? Did not enough people buy the first gen mac pro ? I the first gen mac pro so under engineered it cant handle the 8800gt or ati2600 ? (2600 is not officially supported by Apple for older mac pro's) ....
Why did my Mac Pro have slots ? Next time just solder the video on ... because thats what I feel like you did to me Apple...... Thanks alot....

+1 for that. Just looking for the answer to two things: will the 8800GT upgrade be available -- as promised -- for 1st generation Mac Pros; if so, what's the ETA?

Use of NVIDIA 8800GT Card in 1st Generation Mac Pro

Similar Messages

Maybe you are looking for