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Jeff Kilgroe
Well-known member
OK, I finally got the new Mac pro last thursday night and got it all set up. I don't have time to post a detailed review full of benchmarks at the moment, but here's a review.
Test system: 2009 "Nehalem" Mac Pro, 8-core 2.93 GHz, 16GB 1066MHz DDR3, system shipped with ATI 4870 video card. Dual 30" DELL 3007WFP displays.
The current drivers for OSX suck. They are shit. The glowing reviews this card is getting in Apple's online store and on NewEgg are highly questionable... WTF?? Do these people actually try to make use of the card. Or are these artificial reviews to get the sales ball rolling?
Under Windows [Vista64 Ultimate on this system], the GTX kicks ass. Nothing else to say here. It handled the Cryostasis tech demo at 2560x1600 with all available options cranked to the max and GPU accelerated physics calcs. Ran the demo twice before the fan even turned itself up.
I won't go into further details about the Windows performance of this card. Plenty of GTX 285 reviews out there for Windows and Linux users.
So here's my take on the OSX aspect of this card:
Unlike the 4870, this nVidia card has two DVI-DL connectors. This is a big deal for anyone looking to drive two large monitors, such as the 30" Dell or even Apple's own 30" cinema displays. Apple is currently the only supplier I am aware of that offers a displayport to DVI-DL adapter and theirs has seen nothing but trouble since entering the market. It will not properly drive a 30" display at 2560x1600, not even their own cinema display. It seems there is a power issue with the adapter. So right off the bat, my second 30" Dell monitor is dead in the water on the new Mac Pro without this GTX 285 video card.
The GTX 285 card requires OSX 10.5.7 to be installed as well as the proper drivers for the video card before OSX can boot with the card in the system. This is a real problem if you need to boot from an OSX install CD at some point. Even though the new system was shipped just last week, it included OSX 10.5.6 media. No big deal though. I finished the installation and did all the upgrades before installing the nVidia drivers and swapping cards. Made myself a disk image of my clean install w/ nVidia drivers too just for a safety net.
Like the ATI 4870, the card uses both 12V power leads on the system logic-board. This remains an unanswered question for those of us planning to buy the RED Rocket as the Rocket card will also require a 12V power lead. I don't see a Y-cable working off the logic board without causing an overload. RED Rocket users will probably have to run a small extension up to the second optical bay to get their power. Sorry to get off-topic there, but figured I'd mention this.
As I said above, the current OSX drivers (last updated June 12, as of this posting) are a joke. General GUI performance is pretty lacking. Noticeably slower on large redraws and window moves than the 4870 card. But the drivers are very stable and most features are there such as independent display LUTs and rotation. No 10bit color support yet, but nVidia hasn't enabled it on Windows either, even though the card supports it. EVGA advertises this support for their cards and leaves the fine print to say that it will come in some future update.
Where the drivers really fall apart is 3D performance. The GTX 285 has three operating states or power consumption modes. Under windows, the drivers are intelligent and work properly with the hardware to ramp up the speed of the GPU and onboard memory when needed. On OSX, the card only wants to ramp up occasionally and it seems only with certain CUDA functions. So the problem with the card is that it's typically stuck operating at it's slowest speed when in OSX. It could also be an EFI issue. The BIOS obviously works fine as the card performs properly under Windows. However, the problem under OSX is most certainly driver, and possibly EFI, related. I remain hopeful that it will be fixed. It's being discussed at Macrumors, Macforums, Apple forums and the EVGA community. Everyone is bitching about it. The current work-around is to load a small CUDA demo app that will kick the GPU into high gear and then leave that running while running an app that we want to benefit from the faster GPU settings.
Certain games and apps are having issues with the current drivers. I don't have it or play it, but there seem to be a lot of complaints about the Sims 3. I have some OSX display glitches with Modo 302 and Maya.
When I load the CUDA teapot app to kick up the GPU, Maya screams along way faster than with the 4870 card.
I'm leaving the card installed for now so I can drive both 30" displays. I will do more performance testing once the next driver version is released. Anyone considering this card should hold off unless they need to drive two large LCDs via DVI-DL. Take a wait and see approach until the drivers mature some more. If your Mac is also used to run Windows or Linux, this is the card to have.
...Over at the nVidia forums, two separate nVidia employees have posted that they are actively seeking a solution to the speed level glitch under OSX. And that the solution will have to come from Apple in some part, as part of the problem has to do with the power management stack in OSX.
Test system: 2009 "Nehalem" Mac Pro, 8-core 2.93 GHz, 16GB 1066MHz DDR3, system shipped with ATI 4870 video card. Dual 30" DELL 3007WFP displays.
The current drivers for OSX suck. They are shit. The glowing reviews this card is getting in Apple's online store and on NewEgg are highly questionable... WTF?? Do these people actually try to make use of the card. Or are these artificial reviews to get the sales ball rolling?
Under Windows [Vista64 Ultimate on this system], the GTX kicks ass. Nothing else to say here. It handled the Cryostasis tech demo at 2560x1600 with all available options cranked to the max and GPU accelerated physics calcs. Ran the demo twice before the fan even turned itself up.
I won't go into further details about the Windows performance of this card. Plenty of GTX 285 reviews out there for Windows and Linux users.
So here's my take on the OSX aspect of this card:
Unlike the 4870, this nVidia card has two DVI-DL connectors. This is a big deal for anyone looking to drive two large monitors, such as the 30" Dell or even Apple's own 30" cinema displays. Apple is currently the only supplier I am aware of that offers a displayport to DVI-DL adapter and theirs has seen nothing but trouble since entering the market. It will not properly drive a 30" display at 2560x1600, not even their own cinema display. It seems there is a power issue with the adapter. So right off the bat, my second 30" Dell monitor is dead in the water on the new Mac Pro without this GTX 285 video card.
The GTX 285 card requires OSX 10.5.7 to be installed as well as the proper drivers for the video card before OSX can boot with the card in the system. This is a real problem if you need to boot from an OSX install CD at some point. Even though the new system was shipped just last week, it included OSX 10.5.6 media. No big deal though. I finished the installation and did all the upgrades before installing the nVidia drivers and swapping cards. Made myself a disk image of my clean install w/ nVidia drivers too just for a safety net.
Like the ATI 4870, the card uses both 12V power leads on the system logic-board. This remains an unanswered question for those of us planning to buy the RED Rocket as the Rocket card will also require a 12V power lead. I don't see a Y-cable working off the logic board without causing an overload. RED Rocket users will probably have to run a small extension up to the second optical bay to get their power. Sorry to get off-topic there, but figured I'd mention this.
As I said above, the current OSX drivers (last updated June 12, as of this posting) are a joke. General GUI performance is pretty lacking. Noticeably slower on large redraws and window moves than the 4870 card. But the drivers are very stable and most features are there such as independent display LUTs and rotation. No 10bit color support yet, but nVidia hasn't enabled it on Windows either, even though the card supports it. EVGA advertises this support for their cards and leaves the fine print to say that it will come in some future update.
Where the drivers really fall apart is 3D performance. The GTX 285 has three operating states or power consumption modes. Under windows, the drivers are intelligent and work properly with the hardware to ramp up the speed of the GPU and onboard memory when needed. On OSX, the card only wants to ramp up occasionally and it seems only with certain CUDA functions. So the problem with the card is that it's typically stuck operating at it's slowest speed when in OSX. It could also be an EFI issue. The BIOS obviously works fine as the card performs properly under Windows. However, the problem under OSX is most certainly driver, and possibly EFI, related. I remain hopeful that it will be fixed. It's being discussed at Macrumors, Macforums, Apple forums and the EVGA community. Everyone is bitching about it. The current work-around is to load a small CUDA demo app that will kick the GPU into high gear and then leave that running while running an app that we want to benefit from the faster GPU settings.
Certain games and apps are having issues with the current drivers. I don't have it or play it, but there seem to be a lot of complaints about the Sims 3. I have some OSX display glitches with Modo 302 and Maya.
When I load the CUDA teapot app to kick up the GPU, Maya screams along way faster than with the 4870 card.
I'm leaving the card installed for now so I can drive both 30" displays. I will do more performance testing once the next driver version is released. Anyone considering this card should hold off unless they need to drive two large LCDs via DVI-DL. Take a wait and see approach until the drivers mature some more. If your Mac is also used to run Windows or Linux, this is the card to have.
...Over at the nVidia forums, two separate nVidia employees have posted that they are actively seeking a solution to the speed level glitch under OSX. And that the solution will have to come from Apple in some part, as part of the problem has to do with the power management stack in OSX.
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