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Radeon 3850/3870 thread


netkas
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At least we are miles closer than before...there was a suggestion to modify the Device ID in the bios of the HD3850. If anyone has any tools that are known to work this is rather easy. I tried it last night with RaBit...however it can't calculate the correct checksums, hence it work work.

 

I saw Netkas' suggestion to change the devid and also tried RaBit. I have used it many times before successfully. It seemed like it edited the file ok, so I flashed and rebooted. Soon I was staring at blackness. Not only would the card not post, but my mobo wouldn't post with the card plugged in. I was finally able to get the card flashed back to normal in another computer.

 

I saw on a forum where people had figured out how to hexedit voltages and clock speeds of their bios, but I never saw any mention of changing the device id:

http://www.xtremesystems.org/forums/forumdisplay.php?f=136

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i think to buy a shappire ati hd3870, confirm that all work with leopard?? (also the DVI output without a DVI to VGA converter)

it's true thet this card will be supported natively from 10.5.2???

 

 

everybody can help me??

 

yes

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I got menus by simply disabling QE via Quartz Debug (Xcode Package). Nice workaround until it will work.

 

I got a Visiontek 3850 working last night on a Kalyway 10.5.1 install on a Asrock Conroe945g-dvi motherboard.

 

I installed Kalyway onto a formatted GUID drive, selected Vanilla kernel, ACPI fix, Azalia Audio (I think that was it). Installed all my apps.

 

Then I got the Radeon package from #IRC, installed that, installed the Triakis_2400_2600_2900_3800.zip package, rebooted (on GMA950 still - still worked, though glitches in menus - mirror-looking-at-a-mirror kinda artifacts).

 

Installed the 3850, rebooted, and everything was working except for the white menu problem.

 

Installed Developer Tools, and turned off QE in software with Quartz Debug.

 

It's not much slower than GMA950 performance, though Final Cut Pro refuses to run without QE, so you have to play the Enable -> Run program -> Disable game, though I'm not sure if that'll make it crash in use.

 

I'm hoping new iMac's get released with 3850 support (I'm bummed the new Mac Pro's don't have it - ugh!) next week. It's a pretty sweet card - quiet inside my Antec P180 case, low power consumption when not in gaming mode, and it plays Crysis pretty well (I'm used to playing FEAR and HL-2 on my GMA950 :-))

 

-Dan

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I am planning to buy a 3850 card, to upgrade my 6600TD(slow)

Is it possible to make this card work in OS X, without the BIOS hack? Because I want to keep my dual boot for games :P

 

Also, will this card work on my tiger 10.4.10? Or do I have to install/update tot Leo 10.5.1/2?

Currently my tiger install works very smooth, I rather keep it that way.

 

I have an A8N-SLI nforce4

Athlon 64 3200+

2 gig RAM

200+80 gb SATA + 160gb PATA(OSX install disk)

nvidia 6600TD

 

thanks!

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I am planning to buy a 3850 card, to upgrade my 6600TD(slow)

Is it possible to make this card work in OS X, without the BIOS hack? Because I want to keep my dual boot for games :D

 

Also, will this card work on my tiger 10.4.10? Or do I have to install/update tot Leo 10.5.1/2?

Currently my tiger install works very smooth, I rather keep it that way.

 

I have an A8N-SLI nforce4

Athlon 64 3200+

2 gig RAM

200+80 gb SATA + 160gb PATA(OSX install disk)

nvidia 6600TD

 

thanks!

 

Yes, with caveats (see my post above). You get white menus if you enable Quartz Extreme. If you disable QE, it looks great, but software that requires it will fail checks (namely, Final Cut Pro, Aperture). I refuse to do a BIOS hack, as I hear it will make it inoperable in XP (which is my main reason for getting the card)

 

I am assuming that with 10.5.2, and MacWorld's probably updated iMacs, this will all get sorted out - Apple tends to put low-end cards in computers, so I think a 3850 would get used before a 3870 (though more likely a 3650, unfortunately...)

 

I haven't tried on my 10.4.11 setup yet, though I see there's a Tiger driver on IRC with HD2600 support.... I'm going to try, as my Leopard install isn't as bomber-stable as my 10.4.11 setup is, but it's raining, and I want to play some games, too! :-)

 

-Dan

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wow, that's great!

I don't exactly know if I use programs that require QE, do I know I dont use Aperture or Final cut pro :(

I hope it will work on tiger. Plympton, if you've tested it on tiger, please let me know the results! (But don't let it get in the way of your raining gaming time :()

I will probably buy it in a couple weeks or so, so 10.5.2 is out a little time then. And hopefully everything is fixed.

My main reason is ofcourse also to use it in xp, for games. Great to hear it is also useable on OSX without the BIOS hack!

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wow, that's great!

I don't exactly know if I use programs that require QE, do I know I dont use Aperture or Final cut pro :)

I hope it will work on tiger. Plympton, if you've tested it on tiger, please let me know the results! (But don't let it get in the way of your raining gaming time ;))

I will probably buy it in a couple weeks or so, so 10.5.2 is out a little time then. And hopefully everything is fixed.

My main reason is ofcourse also to use it in xp, for games. Great to hear it is also useable on OSX without the BIOS hack!

 

Well, mixed bag - I did an RsyncX on another GUID partition before trying the "tiger" drivers - no go, I got a kernel panic. Before I did that, I booted into Tiger and just tried it to see what happened. The 3850 is recognized as an ATI card, generic I suppose, with QE and.. hardware accelleration turned off. It appears to work, however, so that's cool. Looks usable for now.

 

The 3850's are a pretty good deal, I think. They play games good, are quiet, too. If you can fit/afford the 3870, they looks like they have a better cooler (exhausts out of the case), so that alone could be worth it. I was just being cheap. :-).

 

-Dan

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"Appears to work," does that mean resolution is changeble? Or is it just 1024*768, thats gonna suck on my 1650*1050 20" Dell!

I'm going to be cheap too, I think. Can always install a different cooler to exhaust out of the case, but if its already quiet... My case is pretty cool right now so i don't think it will be a problem :(

I will try to overclock to (near) 3870 speeds, in reviews it seems there's a high chance it will clock much higher than default. I don't think the 3870 is worth the additional 40Euro's, compared to the 3850.

Anyway, thanks for your replies!

I really look forward to buy this card and play some games with it! But I want to be able to continue using OS X then as well!

But the next 3 weeks I first got to study really hard :thumbsup_anim:

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"Appears to work," does that mean resolution is changeble? Or is it just 1024*768, thats gonna suck on my 1650*1050 20" Dell!

I'm going to be cheap too, I think. Can always install a different cooler to exhaust out of the case, but if its already quiet... My case is pretty cool right now so i don't think it will be a problem :)

I will try to overclock to (near) 3870 speeds, in reviews it seems there's a high chance it will clock much higher than default. I don't think the 3870 is worth the additional 40Euro's, compared to the 3850.

Anyway, thanks for your replies!

I really look forward to buy this card and play some games with it! But I want to be able to continue using OS X then as well!

But the next 3 weeks I first got to study really hard :(

 

"Appears to work" means that you can switch resolutions, or at least be at whatever resolution you force in your startup (I'm at 1600x1200 on a 20" Dell).

 

I kinda wish I got the 3870 for the better exhausting fan - I'm looking at my idle temps remotely via VNC and the GPU is idling at about 58-50C and my CPU is about 44C, but my drives are around 44C (which is a bit high, I think). I'm going to bump my case fan up a notch tonight and see if it's any better.

 

-Dan

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"Appears to work" means that you can switch resolutions, or at least be at whatever resolution you force in your startup (I'm at 1600x1200 on a 20" Dell).

 

I kinda wish I got the 3870 for the better exhausting fan - I'm looking at my idle temps remotely via VNC and the GPU is idling at about 58-50C and my CPU is about 44C, but my drives are around 44C (which is a bit high, I think). I'm going to bump my case fan up a notch tonight and see if it's any better.

 

-Dan

 

Two other things about the 3850 worth note:

 

With QE off, you lose the ability to stream quicktime files through Safari - it just plays Audio. Turn it back on, and you get the video. Strange, but that's what it is.

 

I also think that the GPU runs at full speed (none of the ATI low-power throttling going on), because when I rebooted into Windows, the GPU core was at 80C or so, which is what it is after playing Crysis for a few hours.

 

-Dan

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GPU runs full speed, is bad !!!

 

was thinking of getting a fanless sapphire HD3850,....

but if it runs full speed, it will fry !!?

and heard, problems, with the 3850 changing bios, where the windows craps out ,.....

 

thats not cool,..

any suggestions ?

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GPU runs full speed, is bad !!!

 

was thinking of getting a fanless sapphire HD3850,....

but if it runs full speed, it will fry !!?

and heard, problems, with the 3850 changing bios, where the windows craps out ,.....

 

thats not cool,..

any suggestions ?

 

Wait for Macworld and see what they ship in the new iMacs... if it's still 2600pro's, well, yer outta luck. 3870 folks should be OK since they almost shipped those on new Mac Pro's (there was a screen capture where the Apple store "compared" the 3870 in the BTO apple.com store....

 

-Dan

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Some one please help, I have a great install of OSX Leopard on my x86. And i have been trying endlessly to get my 3870 video card working properly. Im stuck looking at my 2 24" monitors at 1024x768. It is horrible! I would like to use dual monitors and have native rez, but i understand if the drivers are still iffy. Can someone please send the link to download these drivers, or send me some instructions to get them. PLEASE, im dying! This is my first experience on a MAC OS since grade school. Id like to give it a solid chance and get to like it, but without my rez theres not much i can do. Please anyone help - asb2106@gmail.com. I tried to get the files from the IRC channel but i was not able to get the files, I have never liked IRC and because of that Ive never figured it out. Please any help would be greatly appreciated!!!

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Here is a copy of the irc header which includes the files mentioned:

 

(8:12:48 PM) The topic for #RadeonHD is: Radeon HD, all but 2400: DVI works with fixed Triakis - http://tinyurl.com/yrlnps | 38x0 qe/ci/gl driver - http://tinyurl.com/2hnulx | old drivers: install pkg(TIGER only) - http://tinyurl.com/2eay4v | leopard 10.5.1 drivers 2600/2900 http://tinyurl.com/34rgay | 2600 Pro Fix http://tinyurl.com/3244gx

 

Hope that helps :angry:

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