Need graphic card suggestions for a new rig

[msingh]

Determined to buy components that are guaranteed to work with Snow Leopard, I hopped over to www.apple.com and started looking at the specs of the iMac and the Mac Pro.

 

The ATI Radeon HD 5670 card is natively supported in Snow Leopard, is it not ? Apple's iMac page lists it as an option:

 

http://www.apple.com/imac/performance.html

 

I found the following on newegg:

 

http://www.newegg.com/Product/ProductList....&IsNodeId=1

 

What is with all the rebranding ? An ATI Radeon HD 5670 is an ATI Radeon HD 5670, no matter whether XFX or Sapphire, or whoever puts some coloured plastic on it, right ?

 

You can probably tell that I am not a gamer. I do however, want the best and best supported card that I can afford for my new rig.

 

Ideal situation - zero patching, or use of anything non-retail. The entire idea of building a custom rig is to ensure that you have as much compatible hardware as possible.

 

Any other suggestions will also be welcome (including comments on the kind of cooling needed).

 

I am not a gamer, but I will be making intense use of graphics - data analysis of 3D data, blueray video, video encoding, etc.

[iBdb]

Determined to buy components that are guaranteed to work with Snow Leopard, I hopped over to www.apple.com and started looking at the specs of the iMac and the Mac Pro.

 

The ATI Radeon HD 5670 card is natively supported in Snow Leopard, is it not ? Apple's iMac page lists it as an option:

 

http://www.apple.com/imac/performance.html

 

I found the following on newegg:

 

http://www.newegg.com/Product/ProductList....&IsNodeId=1

 

What is with all the rebranding ? An ATI Radeon HD 5670 is an ATI Radeon HD 5670, no matter whether XFX or Sapphire, or whoever puts some coloured plastic on it, right ?

 

You can probably tell that I am not a gamer. I do however, want the best and best supported card that I can afford for my new rig.

 

Ideal situation - zero patching, or use of anything non-retail. The entire idea of building a custom rig is to ensure that you have as much compatible hardware as possible.

 

Any other suggestions will also be welcome (including comments on the kind of cooling needed).

 

I am not a gamer, but I will be making intense use of graphics - data analysis of 3D data, blueray video, video encoding, etc.

The short answer is No. Even the same model card's may come in different versions from the same manufacturer,

some may work better or not at all so research well. Apple cards are custom built & use Firmware NOT Bios's &

because of this will always be the best supported. You will probably need at least S/L 10.6.3 to get support for these

to start, also if you also run windows I'm unsure if the Apple card will work (anybody know the answer to this).

The same applies to other hardware, ie Mobo CPU & H/D's. What you end up with is only going to be as good as

your research. Remember there are no guaranties' but most tried & trued setup's are pretty stable these day's.

As to cooling the option's are many. I went Noctua because reported testing (googled) had them bettering some

H2o set up's & to me water & electricity is a bad mix. There has been significant improvements in most cooling

setup's since I purchased mine.