Multiple ATI Cards Topic on Snow Leopard

[berlindude]

Yeah, I second that - during my 10.6.2 install I chose to run a single card - once all was up and running I put my rig back together for Win7. Hearing all the grief about running two identical cards, I didn't expect OSX to boot; but sure enough, with two Gigabyte HD4850 1GB's it worked?!...Surprised me, especially when I didn't make any soft/kext changes - left all as is, plugged the card in, and booted.

 

ODD BEHAVIOUR:

* Boot time was around a minute longer.

* Took a second or so for the other two screens to bring up the default backdrop from the blue.

* When mouse moves onto the 3rd screen, it appears to scroll inversely.

 

Other than this, the system functioned as normal.

 

NOTE: I didn't change a thing, so with some tweaking - surely this is 100% possible. Cheers All.

 

Nice to hear this. I have the same issue, that it takes a little bit longer to boot and the sreen turns from gray to light blue and ends up perfect. Maybe you could check if on all of your monitors you can play video/hd video. so you can be sure that QE works. I do not know what about the 1GB of videoram, AFAK it might show up as 512mb but finally it should use the 1gb. I read a lot about it in other threads...

 

* When mouse moves onto the 3rd screen, it appears to scroll inversely.

 

Are you sure that you arranged the screens correct in systemprefernces? You know what I mean. You have to check that the arrangement in system prefernces is the same like with your physical monitors...

[demik475]

Yeah, I second that - during my 10.6.2 install I chose to run a single card - once all was up and running I put my rig back together for Win7. Hearing all the grief about running two identical cards, I didn't expect OSX to boot; but sure enough, with two Gigabyte HD4850 1GB's it worked?!...Surprised me, especially when I didn't make any soft/kext changes - left all as is, plugged the card in, and booted.

 

ODD BEHAVIOUR:

* Boot time was around a minute longer.

* Took a second or so for the other two screens to bring up the default backdrop from the blue.

* When mouse moves onto the 3rd screen, it appears to scroll inversely.

 

Thats what happens here too. Longer boot time, mouse {censored}ed up on second/3rd screen, etc. Lot of hex dump from ATIRadeonX2000.kext in syslog too. Depending on your configuration, two identical cards will boot or not (dunno why yet)

 

In fact you can run two identical cards. The problem is with ATIRadeonX2000.kext. if it's loaded twice (two cards), there is a lot of chance that you will get longer boot time, drivers crashes or mouse issues, even video playing hang sometimes. (It can scroll inversely, or at 4x the speed, etc...). I said it will not work with ywo identical cards because of theses issues, and because it's difficult or impossible to disable ATIRadeonX2000.kext for your second. But's with some work, you can get something .

 

Anyway, thanks for the feedback, it's interesting

[no_clue]

Thats what happens here too. Longer boot time, mouse {censored}ed up on second/3rd screen, etc. Lot of hex dump from ATIRadeonX2000.kext in syslog too. Depending on your configuration, two identical cards will boot or not (dunno why yet)

 

In fact you can run two identical cards. The problem is with ATIRadeonX2000.kext. if it's loaded twice (two cards), there is a lot of chance that you will get longer boot time, drivers crashes or mouse issues, even video playing hang sometimes. (It can scroll inversely, or at 4x the speed, etc...). I said it will not work with ywo identical cards because of theses issues, and because it's difficult or impossible to disable ATIRadeonX2000.kext for your second. But's with some work, you can get something .

 

Anyway, thanks for the feedback, it's interesting

 

Being I'm on the system now, thought i'd try berlindude's requested video tests, and as demik475 no doubt would've guessed, it's hard to drag movie windows to the other screens [due to mouse issues]-- but when you do, it just shows the last frame of the movie post leaving one of the primary adapters screen's (usually bounces the window back to either primary screen immediately). Oh yeah, I get both: inversely scrolling/moving mouse on the 3rd screen; and 4x speed or so on the 4th~ haha. Cheers Guys

 

Oh yeah, what are the hopes/prospects for 10.6.3 with all of the aforementioned-- anyone read/heard anything? Cheers

[berlindude]

Well I was messing arround at start up, which method would be the best. So I tryed hexstring and graphicsenabler=yes in applecomboot.plist file. But both gave me the same result. There is a method from aquamac for two cards. maybe you should try this? My cards show up in system preferneces in two pci-e slots (pcie1 and pcie2). I heard from other users that they had problems too, where both cards showed up on pci-e 1 may that causes the problem with multimonitor setup? check if your videocards are both on the same pci-e slot in system preferences... sorry that I am not able to give you more support cause I only have one monitor for testing...

[no_clue]

Well I was messing arround at start up, which method would be the best. So I tryed hexstring and graphicsenabler=yes in applecomboot.plist file. But both gave me the same result. There is a method from aquamac for two cards. maybe you should try this? My cards show up in system preferneces in two pci-e slots (pcie1 and pcie2). I heard from other users that they had problems too, where both cards showed up on pci-e 1 may that causes the problem with multimonitor setup? check if your videocards are both on the same pci-e slot in system preferences... sorry that I am not able to give you more support cause I only have one monitor for testing...

 

G'day mate, nah - they're definitely separate. All appears well except for the ailments that occur. It's rather disconcerting having 4 x 24" monitors staring you in the face with only two being operational [for perfect stability anyway] -- oh well, two's better than none I'm sure a solution will present itself *soon*~ Cheers NC

[Monkey D. Luffy]

Hey demik475,

 

Great work. I'm just trying out some stuff out as I don't have dual video cards because some people reported that it worked with only a single card (46xx). Can you please send me your ati.c .. I just want to check something there. When I compile it myself and change motmot to Shrike, I get KP on X2000.kext. Using motmot, it works just fine. I'm using the stock X2000.kext from 10.6.2, I just added my ID which is 9498 (I have 4650). My 4650 works fine with VGA only (motmot). Since you discovered that Shrike works with DVI, I'll give it a shot.

 

Also, is there a way to compile using other modified rc4 releases like the one that rekursor/asere uses? I have Error 2 during compilation.

 

Thanks!

 

UPDATE:

 

I tried only changing motmot to shrike and it compiles without giving any errors. But If I go and to this step:

 

Search the following line (line 668) :

 

if(framebuffer[0] == 'M' && framebuffer[1] == 'o' && framebuffer[2] == 't') //faster than strcmp

Replace by :

 

if(1) // FIXME

 

That is where it gives error 2 in compiling. I hope I could see your ati.c so I can compare what you did from mine. I dont know why it gives error by doing the step above.

 

UPDATE 2:

 

I managed to successfully compile successfully (thanks demik for your ati.c) - I'm just here to report that Shrike does NOT work, it only gives a black screen .. I tried remote access using VNC and it does not even detect a monitor connected on all ports Anyway, this is for a single card so it is not related to the main post. I just tried to see what will happen By the way, I noticed that the new 10.6 netkas boot file lists 9498 using Peregrine, I changed it to Motmot + recompiled and now I'm using 10.6 by netkas only VGA though

[AuralArchitect]

Yeah, I had the same problem compiling as well. Those lines are a bit different in the sources I was using and that method of fixing it actually disabled the rest of the code in the entire file somehow!

I have never been able to get Shrike working on either the 4650 or 4670- I heard elsewhere that Shrike is for the mobility 4600 series... ? Anyway, I have found that Peregrine DOES work as well as Mot Mot- and it provides support for DVI output for my cards; but I use Mot Mot on my 4650 because that lets me get HDMI output (it's a bit complicated but that's what I need because of the configuration I have set up in Windows 7 with 'software' CrossfireX).

Give Peregrine a shot, keep in mind that the silly tricks you figured out to get Mot Mot working (a specific output, having something plugged into both ports, etc.) may not work with Peregrine!

[Monkey D. Luffy]

I'm still unlucky with Peregrine with my Asus EAH4650 I've tried all possible connection combination - even the unimaginable. I think I have all video cards adapter here .. you name it, I got it! .. lol. Still a nogo. I'm hoping that 10.6.3 may fix this issue. They say that FB was changed .. i just its hope for the good.

 

Yeah, I had the same problem compiling as well. Those lines are a bit different in the sources I was using and that method of fixing it actually disabled the rest of the code in the entire file somehow!

I have never been able to get Shrike working on either the 4650 or 4670- I heard elsewhere that Shrike is for the mobility 4600 series... ? Anyway, I have found that Peregrine DOES work as well as Mot Mot- and it provides support for DVI output for my cards; but I use Mot Mot on my 4650 because that lets me get HDMI output (it's a bit complicated but that's what I need because of the configuration I have set up in Windows 7 with 'software' CrossfireX).

Give Peregrine a shot, keep in mind that the silly tricks you figured out to get Mot Mot working (a specific output, having something plugged into both ports, etc.) may not work with Peregrine!

[demik475]

A quick note :

 

Dual Quartz Extreme / Core Image is still a no go with 10.6.4