PNY nVidia Quadro FX 4500 x 2 in Mac

[xlight63]

First of all, I am new to this board and the reason I know here is I read a lot of awesome posts in the insanelymac.com from aquamac. I don't know if I post this question in the right place but please forgive me if I do put in the wrong place.

I just turned my pc into mac and before I did this, I purchased a very expensive PNY nVidia Quadro FX 4500 x 2 (http://www.nvidia.com/object/quadro_fx_4500_x2.html), I didn't know I need to flash this card to mac compatible because the card is original for PC, PNY doesn't make this for mac use. I found the FX 4500 driver and rom in the insanelymac, however, it seems doesn't work in my FX 4500 x 2.

One thing very suck is, I am totally new for this kind of thing, one possibility is I don't know what I am doing when I try to install the driver, maybe I did something wrong...........and the other one possibility is the driver need to do some adjustment to fit my FX 4500 x 2.

Here the most important thing is I do really need help and I really appreciate any advice or any help. I don't want to waste my baby FX 4500 and I also don't want to break it because of my poor knowledge. Can anybody help me?

thank you so much, thousands of thanks

[aquamac]

xflight,

I am currently away from home for the next week, but I think someone did get one of these going over at Insanely Mac. It will most likely be motherboard dependent. If I find the link tonight I will put it up here.

[xlight63]

Jun 22, 2009 5:16:34 GMT aquamac said:

xflight,

I am currently away from home for the next week, but I think someone did get one of these going over at Insanely Mac. It will most likely be motherboard dependent. If I find the link tonight I will put it up here.

Hi,

Very happy to see you reply my post personally, first of all I want you know how much I respect you regarding to all those information you post here and also at insanelymac.

Sorry I didn't post my computer information but I hope this can help to figure out what's going on in my system and FX 4500 x 2.

Here is my computer info:
Motherboard: TYAN Tempest i5000XT (S2696)
CPU: Intel Xeon e5345 quadcore x 2
RAM: 6G ECC RAM
Sound Card: Sound Blaster Audigy 2 zs
Graphic Card: PNY nVidia FX 4500 x 2 1G

The OS I install right now is iDeneb 10.5.6 but I also have iPC and iATKOS, do you think it going to change anything if I switch to OS to iPC or iATKOS?

Also, I got some issue with my audio card. Maybe you can also give me some advices about that. I also got some driver package from www.nvinstaller.com/ but doesn't help.

I hope the computer information can do a little help for you because right now I am pretty much freak out for that super expensive FX 4500 card just hanging there and nothing happened..........

again, thank you so much and please help me out here

best,

CK

[xlight63]

Jun 22, 2009 5:16:34 GMT aquamac said:

xflight,

I am currently away from home for the next week, but I think someone did get one of these going over at Insanely Mac. It will most likely be motherboard dependent. If I find the link tonight I will put it up here.

Hi,

To make the problem more clear, here I just type the error message when I tried to flash my rom, the error message below:

Checking for matches between display adapter(s) and image(s)......
Adapter: Quadro FX 4500x2 (10DE, 029F, 10DE, 0357) H:09:SP0 B:0A, PCI, D:00, F:00
Overriding PCI subsystem ID mismatch
Adapter: Quadro FX 4500x2 (10DE, 029F, 10DE, 0357) H:09:SP1 B:0B, PCI, D:00, F:00
Overriding PCI subsystem ID mismatch
No matches found


To be honest I don't really know what's that means but would you please kindly tell me what's going on or maybe you can fix it for me?

I have the original rom from my FX 4500x2, when I tried to back up my rom, the nvflash ask me two times I think they want to treat it as 2 FX4500

If you need my original rom, I can send to you but I don't know how to attach my rom files here

again, very very appreciate your time and help

CK

PS. I just post my original rom in the inanely mac , here is the link www.insanelymac.com/forum/index.php?showtopic=108342&st=20#entry1184421

would you please check it out if you have time? I believe that you might need my original rom. thank you so much

[aquamac]

The 4500 GX2 is basically 2 cards strapped together. It also has 2 roms onboard but they are both different from each other. The roms need to be extracted individually with different commands, I am struggling to remember how I did it, something like:

nvflash 0 save.rom, then
nvflash 1 save1.rom.

BUT, I am sure the guys I saw over at Insanely Mac got it going without flashing. I really would leave that as a last resort. Whether this works or not is largely going to be down to your motherboard. I have a similar card (7800 GX2) and once got one of the cards going, but it stuck at the blue screen when I enabled the second card with GFX strings. It was pretty noisy too as the fan on the second card was running at full whack. Did you do a search on Insanely Mac for the 7800 GX2 thread yet? As far as OSX is concerned these would be very similar cards to set up.

You need to install Vista or windows 7 to find your 2 PCI addresses or Location Paths as they are called in windows. This card will have to setup with GFX string I would think.

[xlight63]

Jun 24, 2009 4:38:34 GMT aquamac said:

The 4500 GX2 is basically 2 cards strapped together. It also has 2 roms onboard but they are both different from each other. The roms need to be extracted individually with different commands, I am struggling to remember how I did it, something like:

nvflash 0 save.rom, then
nvflash 1 save1.rom.

BUT, I am sure the guys I saw over at Insanely Mac got it going without flashing. I really would leave that as a last resort. Whether this works or not is largely going to be down to your motherboard. I have a similar card (7800 GX2) and once got one of the cards going, but it stuck at the blue screen when I enabled the second card with GFX strings. It was pretty noisy too as the fan on the second card was running at full whack. Did you do a search on Insanely Mac for the 7800 GX2 thread yet? As far as OSX is concerned these would be very similar cards to set up.

You need to install Vista or windows 7 to find your 2 PCI addresses or Location Paths as they are called in windows. This card will have to setup with GFX string I would think.

Thank you for your reply. You know I really hate my poor knowledge of all these because I didn't know I have to go through all if it one day before. Please forgive me if I ask you something very stupid below.....really.........

I have tried to look for the threads about 7800 GX2 in insanely mac but have no luck. I only found one thread talk about all the device code of each card. Did you mean that guy use 7800 GX2 like you and he got through? Do you still remember the topic of the thread? I will try keep looking for it and I will let you know if I find it, would you please let me know if you can remember anything?

I did have a computer install vista 64bit and I can put my FX4500 on it and try to find the PCI address. But what should I do with those PCI address?

One more thing, I have tried to find GFX string for FX4500 but I am still out of luck. I have seem other GFX string for other model. Do I have to use GFX string for FX4500?

I am sorry I know this is gonna be a stupid question for you but it is really go over my knowledge, please help me.

thank you so much

[xlight63]

Jun 24, 2009 4:38:34 GMT aquamac said:

The 4500 GX2 is basically 2 cards strapped together. It also has 2 roms onboard but they are both different from each other. The roms need to be extracted individually with different commands, I am struggling to remember how I did it, something like:

nvflash 0 save.rom, then
nvflash 1 save1.rom.

BUT, I am sure the guys I saw over at Insanely Mac got it going without flashing. I really would leave that as a last resort. Whether this works or not is largely going to be down to your motherboard. I have a similar card (7800 GX2) and once got one of the cards going, but it stuck at the blue screen when I enabled the second card with GFX strings. It was pretty noisy too as the fan on the second card was running at full whack. Did you do a search on Insanely Mac for the 7800 GX2 thread yet? As far as OSX is concerned these would be very similar cards to set up.

You need to install Vista or windows 7 to find your 2 PCI addresses or Location Paths as they are called in windows. This card will have to setup with GFX string I would think.

Hello Aquamac,

I hope you still remember me. After few days fighting with almost everything beyond my knowledge, I finally get my Quadro FX4500 x2 be able to see in my OSX. This is a big step to me but still have problem.

Now I can see my FX4500 x2 show as two independent PCI-E cards, the first one system seems not be able to tell too many about it even the VRAM is 0, the second one is a little bit better, system can tell the VRAM is 512MB, and also show the CI is software and QE is not supported.

One thing very interested is both of this two cards show the same Device ID.

I know this is not right, need somebody help me to make it right. I also attach the screen shot of my video card device in the link over here: www.insanelymac.com/forum/index.php?showtopic=108342&st=20#entry1187589

I know you are very busy but would you please tell me what might goes wrong and is there any way to fix it? I am very appreciate for anything even just a deriction

thank you so much

CK

[aquamac]

Hi xflight63,

Are you using strings or an injector such as netkas's one. I would say you are using an injector as they generally report the second card as having 0mb ram. This is only a visual problem and does not affect the running of the card.

The fact that you do not have CI & QE is more of a problem though. If you are running Chameleon 2, then you have an Extra folder. If you try GFX strings for dual cards, then you need to place your fixed com.apple.boot.plist in here as well.

If you have a DSDT.aml file in your root drive (the Hard Drive you are booted from - it will be in there along with your Applications, System & Library files, delete it and make a new one with PCWizz's OSX 86 Tools. If you change your card without doing this it can stop QE and CI from working.

[xlight63]

Jun 29, 2009 8:41:14 GMT aquamac said:

Hi xflight63,

The fact that you do not have CI & QE is more of a problem though. If you are running Chameleon 2, then you have an Extra folder. If you try GFX strings for dual cards, then you need to place your fixed com.apple.boot.plist in here as well.

According to your direction, can I ask question just to make sure?

You said I need to put the fixed com.apple.boot.plist in new place, I assumed that I need to fix my com.apple.boot.plist first, do I?. I actually watched your tutorial of how to make the GFX String in Geforce 9 series cards and some FX cards (by the way, awesome tutorial) but in the string download list there is no FX 4500 x2 in.plist, how do I make the string by myself? The most close string file you have it FX4600 but I don't know if it will work in my card.

Also, I found that the best resolution I can get now is 1024x720, I am pretty sure my monitor resolution is far more than that, is it also have something to do with card doesn't support CI/QE??

PS. Every time you reply my question I always feel I am one more step closer to get my card working. Actually I also ask around in other forums and websites and unlike here, people over other place are either just discourage me or say something totally not contribute and useless.

VIVA AQUAMAC !!!!!

CK

[aquamac]

I have added an input plist here. Follow the instructions on this page. You will most likely have to modify the PCI addresses.

[xlight63]

Jun 30, 2009 5:20:42 GMT aquamac said:

I have added an input plist here. Follow the instructions on this page. You will most likely have to modify the PCI addresses.

Hello Aquamac,

I just want to make sure if I get you right. When I clicked the link you gave me, I can only see that there are three card strings be able to download :

Dual GeForce 9800 GTX 512 mb cards:
GeForce 7800 GX2 512 mb per card:
Dual GeForce GTX 280 1024 mb cards:

I didn't see FX4500 x2, I assumed that you want me to download 7800 GX2 because you mentioned this card to me before. Is that right?


thanks

CK

[aquamac]

Sorry, I must be going mad, it's up there now, take another look!

Link

[xlight63]

Jun 29, 2009 8:41:14 GMT aquamac said:

Hi xflight63,

The fact that you do not have CI & QE is more of a problem though. If you are running Chameleon 2, then you have an Extra folder. If you try GFX strings for dual cards, then you need to place your fixed com.apple.boot.plist in here as well.

If you have a DSDT.aml file in your root drive (the Hard Drive you are booted from - it will be in there along with your Applications, System & Library files, delete it and make a new one with PCWizz's OSX 86 Tools. If you change your card without doing this it can stop QE and CI from working.

Hi Aquamac,

So I stock here. When I put "./gfxutil -f ~display" the terminal show the following path:

DevicePath = PciRoot(0x0)/Pci(0x4,0x0)/Pci(0x0,0x0)/Pci(0x1,0x0)/Pci(0x0,0x0)

What am I supposed to do? I know this probably means the two different address, maybe just separate it into
PciRoot(0x0)/Pci(0x4,0x0)/Pci(0x0,0x0)
and
PciRoot(0x0)/Pci(0x1,0x0)/Pci(0x0,0x0)
??

I assume that maybe I can do this way and follow what you said in the tutorial..............however, after using this way and reboot the computer, nothing happened. CI & QE still not support and the VRAM still 256MB(supposed to be 512MB). I know one of the reason is probably I didn't delete DSDT.aml file and make new one (I don't know how to, that's the question I am going to ask you next).....would you please let me know if this is not right?

One more thing about this is in the original in.plist the device_type write "NVDA, GeForce", should I chage to "NVDA, Quadro" or "NVDA, G70", or it doesn't matter?

Other question is you said I might have DSDT.aml file in my root drive (yes that's right) and I need to make a new one with PCWizz's OSX 86 Tools, when I download the OSX 86 Tools, I have hard time try to understand how to use this utility program to make a new DSDT.aml file. It is possible you can give me some hints or directions?

I think my computer is pretty much messed up now so I decide to re-install the OS since I just got iATKOS 10.5.7, just want you know

thank you so much

CK

[aquamac]

No you cannot separate it, the long address you have is for the first card only and you need to paste into the first PCI address. You will need to obtain the second address with windows vista or windows 7 from device manager. The reason the address is longer is because there is a longer path to the card due to the extra bridge onboard your card.

[xlight63]

Jul 1, 2009 5:11:11 GMT aquamac said:

No you cannot separate it, the long address you have is for the first card only and you need to paste into the first PCI address. You will need to obtain the second address with windows vista or windows 7 from device manager. The reason the address is longer is because there is a longer path to the card due to the extra bridge onboard your card.

Thank you Aquamac, I put the windows vista ultimate 64 bit back to computer and check the device manager, my first card read as
PCIROOT(0)#PCI(0400)#PCI(0000)#PCI(0100)#PCI(0000)
my second card read as
PCIROOT(0)#PCI(0400)#PCI(0000)#PCI(0000)#PCI(0000)

I assume that is actually the same thing with "PciRoot(0x0)/Pci(0x4,0x0)/Pci(0x0,0x0)/Pci(0x1,0x0)/Pci(0x0,0x0)" in Mac.

I am going to try it again when I come back and hopefully I can have a good sleep tonight.

This is just a reference for people who maybe have the same card like me

thank you so much Aquamac, feels like one more step close to make it work agian

CK