Lifehacker Guide with GA-EP45-UD3P Motherboard

[D-an-W]

As for that particular Gainward card, read below...

 

Since Stellarola updated the installer to PC EFI v10.5 (Thank you Netkas), the bootloader now detects the Nvidia card you are using beyond the 8 & 9 series of cards with support of the GT200 based cards. This does not require any kind of modification or special installers anymore.

 

Now keep this in mind, only the cards available as of when PC EFI v10.5 was released, are going to be supported. I know that Nvidia does have some others coming out that are revisions of the current GT200 die, mostly a shrink in die, but they also support DX11 (meaning a physical change in the GPU). They are the only ones of the GT200 series that will, I do not know the card identifications but as I am aware, all GTS 250/260/275/280/285 are supported. I think the GTX295 is recognized as 2 separate cards so its not worth that purchase. I am using the GTX275 simply because its the same chip as the GTX 280/285/295, 240 SP's and 32 Rop's, with the only difference being the memory size, and bit of the memory architecture (defined by the size of memory for Nvidia) and the price. Got mine on newegg for $230ish...

 

You can definitely say I know my graphics cards as I follow Nvidia closely, I am a die hard fan! Please do not take what I am saying as absolute for every install. The card I have is by EVGA and the reason for that is they stay close to the Nvidia reference designs. This means you will have better compatibility as some Nvidia partners can take a card reference design, and change it so it suits their needs and what they want for an end product. Typically XFX, EVGA, BFG (unless its very radical) and ZOTAC use the reference designs and can swap the cooler, or make a better one for the OC versions of the card.

 

Use at your discretion but as far as the V3 of the installer is concerned, it worked flawlessly off of a clean/fresh install with successful update to 10.6.2 with both DVI ports working on my dual Cinema Displays. Also, since my original Rosewill PCI NIC died, I installed a Netgear GA311 and it worked right out of the box. I disabled the onboard ports just to play it safe, and it has full Bonjour support!

 

Wow, thanks for that!

 

Would you happen to know what space in the case I need to install one of these (Say 275), I understand the lenght is usually 27cm but does that include the mounting bracket that sticks out as I don't think I have room in my current case otherwise?

[MacTech84]

Wow, thanks for that!

 

Would you happen to know what space in the case I need to install one of these (Say 275), I understand the lenght is usually 27cm but does that include the mounting bracket that sticks out as I don't think I have room in my current case otherwise?

 

Sorry if it was a bit long, I was thinking short answer then just started typing more and more. The GTX 275 that I have is almost the exact length of the 8800 GTX it replaced. And direct from EVGA - Height: 4.376 in / 111.15 mm & Length: 10.5 in / 266.7 mm. This could vary slightly with manufacturer and I do have to mention, if you saw the pics I put up of the case I built. Its completely open air and designed in such a way, I could fit a 2 foot long card so this was very easy for me. Here is the card I purchased from Newegg..

 

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx...N82E16814130475

 

And one thing to mention. STAY AWAY FROM THE CO-OP cards! This is a design Nvidia is throwing out before the 300/Fermi based cards come out next year. Its a sandwich design with a primary GPU and a secondary GPU, but the secondary one is for physX calculations only, and I think these include a die re-design, meaning it wont work for us, at least for now.

[rainmanjam]

I don't know if this has been addressed or not but has anyone tried installing 2 video cards in the same Hackintosh? I originally had one 9500GT in and now I am adding a second one. Is there anything I can do to get it to see the second card?

[MacTech84]

I don't know if this has been addressed or not but has anyone tried installing 2 video cards in the same Hackintosh? I originally had one 9500GT in and now I am adding a second one. Is there anything I can do to get it to see the second card?

 

As far as I am aware, the problem with Hack-Intoshes is that you cannot use dual cards, either in SLI (no drivers) or separately as 2 cards. I forget the actual reason but its something with the bootloader and drivers for OS X and recognition of the cards as 2 separate cards.

[Charlie97L]

i just built one to the exact specs, but my RAM is only showing at 4gb instead of 8gb?

 

any suggestions? it's working fine. dual channel is evidently enabled, per the startup screen, but the BIOS and mac info are only showing 2gb x 2 instead of 4gb x 2?

 

Is this a voltage issue?

 

Thanks so much!

Charlie

[MacTech84]

i just built one to the exact specs, but my RAM is only showing at 4gb instead of 8gb?

 

any suggestions? it's working fine. dual channel is evidently enabled, per the startup screen, but the BIOS and mac info are only showing 2gb x 2 instead of 4gb x 2?

 

Is this a voltage issue?

 

Thanks so much!

Charlie

 

Just one quick thing, what is the voltage of the RAM you have? as gigabyte lists 1.8V max for the RAM, but that would be dependent on the settings you choose in BIOS if you were to overclock.

[Charlie97L]

Just one quick thing, what is the voltage of the RAM you have? as gigabyte lists 1.8V max for the RAM, but that would be dependent on the settings you choose in BIOS if you were to overclock.

 

newegg lists it as 2.0v

 

Should I try that?

[MacTech84]

newegg lists it as 2.0v

 

Should I try that?

 

Its possible the voltage could be messing with the recognition, its also possible you have bad RAM. I would double check gigabyte's site, and check the list of supported RAM modules under the GA-EP45-UD3P to see if the RAM you have is supported, otherwise you might need to get some new RAM, ugh

 

Update:

 

Taking a look back at the configuration I have, I also 2.0v RAM from my previous build, and its all seen. I again wonder if its simply bad RAM, or not fully supported by the board.

 

Update 2:

I almost forgot, during the BIOS boot, check and see what BIOS says or recognizes as the total amount of RAM.

[CoHPhasor]

i just built one to the exact specs, but my RAM is only showing at 4gb instead of 8gb?

 

any suggestions? it's working fine. dual channel is evidently enabled, per the startup screen, but the BIOS and mac info are only showing 2gb x 2 instead of 4gb x 2?

 

Is this a voltage issue?

 

Thanks so much!

Charlie

 

First, make SURE you keep the pairs together.

Next, pull out the secondary pair, make sure you still see 4GB.

Then, replace the primary pair with the secondary pair.

Still see 4GB each time? No? then you found the bad pair.

Yes? .....Voodoo

 

Hardware issue my friend, plain and simple.

The hardware detection of RAM has nothing to do with OSX.

Talk to Gigabyte if both pairs work individually. (Maybe bad sockets, and you would talk to the seller)

[Charlie97L]

Its possible the voltage could be messing with the recognition, its also possible you have bad RAM. I would double check gigabyte's site, and check the list of supported RAM modules under the GA-EP45-UD3P to see if the RAM you have is supported, otherwise you might need to get some new RAM, ugh

 

Update:

 

Taking a look back at the configuration I have, I also 2.0v RAM from my previous build, and its all seen. I again wonder if its simply bad RAM, or not fully supported by the board.

 

well it's supposedly exactly what they used on the lifehacker build, and that certainly worked.

 

it's not on the compatibility list. i guess ram doesn't have to be compatible or not with OSX, just the mobo.

 

i'm just really confused.

[stellarola]

well it's supposedly exactly what they used on the lifehacker build, and that certainly worked.

 

it's not on the compatibility list. i guess ram doesn't have to be compatible or not with OSX, just the mobo.

 

i'm just really confused.

 

Just out of curiosity is it possible you only bought 4gb of ram and not 8gb? If it's not working i'd say the ram could be bad? It's certainly not the OS since you say it only shows 4gb in the bios as well.

 

Stell

[Charlie97L]

Just out of curiosity is it possible you only bought 4gb of ram and not 8gb? If it's not working i'd say the ram could be bad? It's certainly not the OS since you say it only shows 4gb in the bios as well.

 

Stell

 

if it is, is there a way to test it? i believe it's labelled as 4gb.

 

ohhh yeah that's what it is, i bet. i bet it's labelled as 4gb bc it's a 4gb kit.

 

d'oh. verifying.

[MacTech84]

if it is, is there a way to test it? i believe it's labelled as 4gb.

 

ohhh yeah that's what it is, i bet. i bet it's labelled as 4gb bc it's a 4gb kit.

 

d'oh. verifying.

 

If that's what it is, don't feel bad. I have done stoop-id stuff like that all the time! And then I spend hours pouring over it only to realize, damn, it was me!

[D-an-W]

What I could do with knowing is where do they take the measurements from, the masterpiece below might help explain it better?

[CoHPhasor]

What I could do with knowing is where do they take the measurements from, the masterpiece below might help explain it better?

 

Likely the lower (relevant) portion.

[D-an-W]

Thats what I am afraid of

[MacTech84]

What I could do with knowing is where do they take the measurements from, the masterpiece below might help explain it better?

 

The measurement is taken from the PCI cover/vent to the tail end of the card on the PCB. The hood over the card is not used for the measurement.

[sgunes]

Hello:

I had a Lifehacker/Stell setup working partially (some problems with Bonjour with the build-in ports, unable to recognize NTFS HDs...).

As my old Geforce 7800GT is not supported I want to upgrade and reinstall from scratch.

 

I was thinking about this MSI 260 GTX card from Newegg.

Does anybody know if it works with the 10.6.2 update and everything?

It has the 2 DVI outputs.

 

Update:

Sorry, I had not seen this list before:

http://stellarola.tumblr.com/post/17087638...atible-hardware.

 

Second question:

which GbE cards are fully compatible?

My Netgear GA302T does not really seem to work.

I have seen some other folks stating that their add-in GbE cards work.

Is there a list of them somewhere or could people respond to this with their working card models?

 

Thanks.

[MacWannaBe]

Hello:

I had a Lifehacker/Stell setup working partially (some problems with Bonjour with the build-in ports, unable to recognize NTFS HDs...).

As my old Geforce 7800GT is not supported I want to upgrade and reinstall from scratch.

 

I was thinking about this MSI 260 GTX card from Newegg.

Does anybody know if it works with the 10.6.2 update and everything?

It has the 2 DVI outputs.

 

Second question:

which GbE cards are fully compatible?

My Netgear GA302T does not really seem to work.

I have seen some other folks stating that their add-in GbE cards work.

Is there a list of them somewhere or could people respond to this with their working card models?

 

Thanks.

 

 

Get the Netgear GA-311 it works fine natively. Also the 260 should be recognized as well.

[MacTech84]

Hello:

I had a Lifehacker/Stell setup working partially (some problems with Bonjour with the build-in ports, unable to recognize NTFS HDs...).

As my old Geforce 7800GT is not supported I want to upgrade and reinstall from scratch.

 

I was thinking about this MSI 260 GTX card from Newegg.

Does anybody know if it works with the 10.6.2 update and everything?

It has the 2 DVI outputs.

 

Second question:

which GbE cards are fully compatible?

My Netgear GA302T does not really seem to work.

I have seen some other folks stating that their add-in GbE cards work.

Is there a list of them somewhere or could people respond to this with their working card models?

 

Thanks.

 

To answer your first question, you might want to read up on this:

 

http://www.insanelymac.com/forum/index.php...440&st=540#

 

Its a bit long (sorry) but worth it, and compared in price, the GTX 275 is a better bet as its not that much more in price.

 

As for your second question,

Trendnet makes several PCI compatible cards with the mac as well as Rosewill. Other vendors such as Linksys, D-Link, Netgear, will sometimes offer and list their hardware as Mac compatible, sometimes they don't as they just don't want to support the card. I am using the Netgear GA311 and for out of the box compatibility, OS X detected it as a standard Ethernet port, and did not ask me to add it to the list of ports in Networking. Full support for Bonjour services, as it works quite well with my Apple TV. Doing a quick google search or even hitting newegg to see what's Mac compatible can help you too.

 

As for NTFS drives, check this out...

 

http://www.macupdate.com/info.php/id/24481/ntfs-3g

 

Should help you for NTFS volumes

[sgunes]

To answer your first question, you might want to read up on this:

 

http://www.insanelymac.com/forum/index.php...440&st=540#

 

Its a bit long (sorry) but worth it, and compared in price, the GTX 275 is a better bet as its not that much more in price.

 

As for your second question,

Trendnet makes several PCI compatible cards with the mac as well as Rosewill. Other vendors such as Linksys, D-Link, Netgear, will sometimes offer and list their hardware as Mac compatible, sometimes they don't as they just don't want to support the card. I am using the Netgear GA311 and for out of the box compatibility, OS X detected it as a standard Ethernet port, and did not ask me to add it to the list of ports in Networking. Full support for Bonjour services, as it works quite well with my Apple TV. Doing a quick google search or even hitting newegg to see what's Mac compatible can help you too.

 

As for NTFS drives, check this out...

 

http://www.macupdate.com/info.php/id/24481/ntfs-3g

 

Should help you for NTFS volumes

 

Thanks for the detailed answer.

Regarding the graphics card:

 

Memory Core Clock Stream Proc Mem Clock Price

EVGA GTX 275 896MB 633 240 2268 255 +S&H

 

MSI GTX 260 896MB 655 216 2100 170 after MIR with S&H

 

They both have dual DVI and the memory is DDR3 at 448 bit bandwidth.

EVGA is about 50% more expensive. Will it get me that much more speed?

 

 

I just found an Intel PCU GbE card: PRO/1000 MT. Does anybody know by chance if it works?

 

Thanks for the ntfs-3g link.

[MacTech84]

Thanks for the detailed answer.

Regarding the graphics card:

 

Memory Core Clock Stream Proc Mem Clock Price

EVGA GTX 275 896MB 633 240 2268 255 +S&H

 

MSI GTX 260 896MB 655 216 2100 170 after MIR with S&H

 

They both have dual DVI and the memory is DDR3 at 448 bit bandwidth.

EVGA is about 50% more expensive. Will it get me that much more speed?

 

 

I just found an Intel PCU GbE card: PRO/1000 MT. Does anybody know by chance if it works?

 

Thanks for the ntfs-3g link.

 

There are two things with the MSI card, and difference between the 260 and 275. The chips are different and seen in the Stream Processors. You might think, oh its only 24 off, but that is 24 processors you are missing, and they try to compensate with that by increasing the core frequency to 655. EVGA is more expensive but you get what you pay for, and from what I was saying in the previous post, they stick very close to the reference design from nivdia, which will ensure compatibility. MSI is one of the manufacturers that will stray from the reference design to suit their needs, and while it is still a GTS 260 it will work in Windows, but its that small little difference in the reference design that will change the cards ID, and hence make it non-functional with our setups. And the EVGA card you mentioned is the exact one I purchased and it worked right away.

 

As for the Intel card, I am not sure if that is going to work, I do not think I have ever seen an Intel based card compatible with a mac. If you have any doubts, either go with a PCI-NIC that has been mentioned here to be compatible, or find one that lists mac support, without the need of a driver using the Mac's built in software.

 

As for NTFS, you're welcome...

[SamTheGeek]

So sorry to interrupt the discussion on video cards (it's actually quite interesting)

I've got an issue that seems persistent and odd.

When I sleep my mac, whether through auto-sleep or manual sleep, the computer goes to S3 sleep (CPU and Fans off, USB power off). After approximately 15 minutes the fans, CPU, and power all come back on, but the computer remains asleep. My problem is that I'd like the computer to stay silent when slept (like my iMac and Macbook) and not be running the CPU at operating temps all the time. Anyone have a solution/idea why?

 

Also, with regard to the video card debate, I'm waiting for the GTX series cards to gain a fanless variant. Then my hack pro can go in a media center with my fanless CPU cooler (Zalman, IIRC).

[MacTech84]

So sorry to interrupt the discussion on video cards (it's actually quite interesting)

I've got an issue that seems persistent and odd.

When I sleep my mac, whether through auto-sleep or manual sleep, the computer goes to S3 sleep (CPU and Fans off, USB power off). After approximately 15 minutes the fans, CPU, and power all come back on, but the computer remains asleep. My problem is that I'd like the computer to stay silent when slept (like my iMac and Macbook) and not be running the CPU at operating temps all the time. Anyone have a solution/idea why?

 

Also, with regard to the video card debate, I'm waiting for the GTX series cards to gain a fanless variant. Then my hack pro can go in a media center with my fanless CPU cooler (Zalman, IIRC).

 

As far as sleep goes, be sure that your BIOS matches the same as the Lifehacker guide, make sure you have the latest BIOS installed from gigabyte, and that you have the v3 installer from stellarolla installed. That might fix that problem.

 

As for the fanless variant.... I don't think its ever going to happen. Even with a die shrink on the GPU, it puts out waaayyy too much heat for a fanless variant to dissipate. Fanless variants typically can be seen on some of the lower end cards such as the GTS 250/260 as they do not output as much heat. I know we never saw a fanless variant of the 8800 Ultra or GTX and they were behemoth's as well. While it would be nice, they just put out too much heat.

[Charlie97L]

so yeah, i only had 4 gigs of ram.

 

ordered 4 more today from amazon of the same type.

 

my 10.6.1 seems super stable, it's only going to be running protools, so it probably won't be upgraded (software wise) much past that unless digidesign needs it to be so.

 

thanks for the help.