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  • Hey all, just changed over the backend after 15 years I figured time to give it a bit of an update, its probably gonna be a bit weird for most of you and i am sure there is a few bugs to work out but it should kinda work the same as before... hopefully :)

Best graphics card for current 12 core mac tower?

Are all these mac machines Hackintosh machines? I have not seen any of these graphics cards offered for Mac....I have quadro 4000 and i thik the only card i know offered for mac....where are these new GTX cards? OR is there a hack to get them working?
 
Jon MIchael Puntervold said:
We run a GTX580, originally made for pc's in our mac. The card is supported by OSX 10.8 out of the box.
Click to expand...

Well then, things are changing i see. So 10.8 supports cards originally for PC?....so then, what is the card with SDI out that is reliable for Mac....670?
 
Yes, but be aware that it's not working 100% as a card originally made for Mac, and it's not officially supported. For instance we draw more power from the mainboard then the spec sheet on the Mac Pro allows, and there is no boot screen.
 
No HD SDI on Mac GPUs ...

No HD SDI on Mac GPUs ...

Johnny Friday said:
Well then, things are changing i see. So 10.8 supports cards originally for PC?....so then, what is the card with SDI out that is reliable for Mac....670?
Click to expand...

No SDI out with the Mac GPUs ... you need to install BMD DeckLink or AJA Kona 3 depending on your grading application .... of course, if you're only grading EPIC files and using RedCine X Pro then go with RedRocket card ... has HD SDI out as well.

Neil
 
I have a Matrox mxo2 now...and use it...but trying to think where i'll be soon...and BM or AJA might be the logical choice---but all depends what color grading software one goes with....AJA to me looks like the winner to work with....BM seems only for Davinci...so if i want to use Speedgrade or anything OTHER than Davinci, matrox and AJA are the ones to choose....But i don't believe either of those will work with Davinci as an I/O for SDI out....So then Davinici & BM are clearly out of the running for me....

....Anyone have thoughts on this? for best card or I/O device now for color work ? that allows use of various color software?

...in my case i often shoot/cut/grade in mixed format 720p, 1080p and 4k/5k files....
 
Johnny,

The 580 does work on the mac, I've confirmed this with actual users. It's about a 30% performance increase over the GTX 285.


Jon MIchael Puntervold said:
We run a GTX580, originally made for pc's in our mac. The card is supported by OSX 10.8 out of the box.
Click to expand...
 
Will Keir said:
Johnny,

The 580 does work on the mac, I've confirmed this with actual users. It's about a 30% performance increase over the GTX 285.
Click to expand...

But is there any benefit then going from Quadro 4000 to the GTX 580? I can't imagine there is much of a gain...and with no sdi, and having to go with a complete different I/O for that...my Matrox MX02 works now, but looking at AJA. But i'm not seeing much from going Quadro to GTX580 then....
 
Not worth the step up right now, the 4000 is on par with the GTX 285, maybe 5-10% faster on specific applications. Either way, your best playback on Ppro will be 1/2 rez, maybe less if your rig isn't a beast.

it's always nice to not limit your software color correcting choices based on your hardware choice. i havent' had a chance to try either speedgrade or Resolve. You basically want a card to go SDi out to a grading monitor, correct?
 
Yep....i've cut a doc on CS 5 using Matrox MXO2 via SDI & HDMI out (but that's only 8bit).....so this has been a difficult and costly road to travel looking for best color (software/hardware) configuration...Would be easier i think if i was on a PC...but Mac makes it a bit difficult. AJA is looking good at moment. But then again, Davinci and BM are pretty standard in color world.
 
Johnny Friday said:
Yep....i've cut a doc on CS 5 using Matrox MXO2 via SDI & HDMI out (but that's only 8bit).....so this has been a difficult and costly road to travel looking for best color (software/hardware) configuration...Would be easier i think if i was on a PC...but Mac makes it a bit difficult. AJA is looking good at moment. But then again, Davinci and BM are pretty standard in color world.
Click to expand...

What are you editing on now, Ppro I assume? Of course your own tests will mean a lot more, but I hear only good things about Davinci Resolve, I'm hoping to try it sooner rather than later. God, am I happy not to be forced into using Apple Color. Not because it was a bad interface, which it could have been better, but because it has so many limitation to the workflow and round trip. Adjust my editing timeline heavily so I can color correct? Are you mad! :)
 
The GTX570 is actually the best choice for the Mac Pro over the 580. Been playing with them here now that Mountain Lion has better support for these non-Mac cards. The 580 can over-draw power on the Mac. But it's not so simple as that, a lot depends on the make/model and from which manufacturer and which reference design they followed. I like the PNY and EVGA ones best. Just be sure you don't go overboard and buy the hot-rod, OC models or anything like that. They suck even more power and in some situations won't even fit in the Mac Pro tower (or several PC systems for that matter) -- I'm looking at you GTX580 CLASSIFIED ULTRA, why u no fit in my HP?. Not sure if that helps though. Production on these models is slowing though, so that could be why they're getting harder for you to find.

Best official card is still the Quadro 4000. It's a solid card, but overpriced in light of what can be used now. The K5000 is coming to Mac, but details are still a bit sketchy and it seems now that it very well could be delayed until the new Mac Pro arrives so there will be a proper slot to put it in.
 
Jeff is correct, as usual. I chose the 570 for my mac pro, and put my 580 in my hackintosh. I pretty much only use EVGA, and found the EVGA GTX 570 2.5gb for a good price easily. It has been running solid in my Mac Pro for a few weeks now. It's benchmarks aren't as great as the 580, (for the AEcs6 benchmark above, I got 6:45 vs 5:15) but i feel good knowing its not drawing too much power.
 
The 570 is definitely recommended due to power considerations. The 580s work, but may have long-term effects or undesired performance issues due to the power situation. Of course, if you supply them with additional power to compensate, then that solves that issue.

Paul is correct, you definitely want 2GB+ RAM on the card. The 570's are available with 2.5GB RAM and shouldn't be too hard to find.
 
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