johan Posted August 23, 2005 Share Posted August 23, 2005 When i look in the drivermap of osx i see a lot of files. For example a file with the name ati 9700. It seems to be a driver for the ati 9700 video card. There seem te be a lot of other videodriver files. Still nobody seems to be able to get them to work. Why is that? Link to comment https://www.insanelymac.com/forum/topic/981-why-dont-the-videocard-drivers-work/ Share on other sites More sharing options...
Marcp1967 Posted August 23, 2005 Share Posted August 23, 2005 OS X drivers are for PowerPC Macs, and don't work with the Intel Mac OS. As for Darwin Drivers...I have no explanation as to why a driver for x86 darwin would not work on Mac OS x86 Link to comment https://www.insanelymac.com/forum/topic/981-why-dont-the-videocard-drivers-work/#findComment-6085 Share on other sites More sharing options...
Azurael Posted August 23, 2005 Share Posted August 23, 2005 OS X drivers are for PowerPC Macs, and don't work with the Intel Mac OS. As for Darwin Drivers...I have no explanation as to why a driver for x86 darwin would not work on Mac OS x86 <{POST_SNAPBACK}> Actually, they (the drivers in OS X/Intel) are universal (PPC/x86) - the reason they don't work seems to boil down to them depending on Mac BIOSes on the cards - editing the Info.plist file of AppleI386PCI.kext to include your AGP controller's Device ID for AGP support results in different non-functionality in many cases, but the drivers doesn't work. Link to comment https://www.insanelymac.com/forum/topic/981-why-dont-the-videocard-drivers-work/#findComment-6103 Share on other sites More sharing options...
cwestpha Posted August 24, 2005 Share Posted August 24, 2005 I would like to point out that everyone is still missing the real reason why graphics drivers dont work under OS X, yet so many native drivers do. What is the difference between a PC Radeon 9600 and a Mac Radeon 9600? Its the BIOS. Why would a difference in the BIOS make so much of a difference? Simple, the BIOS contains a basic Kext! Kexts are kinda like the drivers for OS X and a low level kext is included in its BIOS/Firmware of all modern Mac video adaptors. This Kext advertizes to the Kext on the system what the card is, what it isnt, what it can do, etc. Without this Kext in the BIOS the machine gets confused and "guesses" at which OS X kext on the system is corect. I bet you can see what the results are. Thats why removing the ATI files for an ATI card or booting with a -x work. It simply forces the machine to use a no frills generic driver that assumed 16 megs of RAM are present. Link to comment https://www.insanelymac.com/forum/topic/981-why-dont-the-videocard-drivers-work/#findComment-6340 Share on other sites More sharing options...
stevenh Posted August 24, 2005 Share Posted August 24, 2005 So you believe that in the developer machines they have written a motherboard BIOS/Firmware that will talk to Macintosh Graphics Cards? AFAIK, the Mac Graphics Cards wont even boot in a standard PC... why would they include the ATI drivers for MAC Bios'd Graphics cards if they can't be used in X86 machines? It would make sense if they had written their BIOS to talk to mac Graphic card bioses.. but it just sounds like a lot of hard work... Link to comment https://www.insanelymac.com/forum/topic/981-why-dont-the-videocard-drivers-work/#findComment-6436 Share on other sites More sharing options...
einstein Posted August 24, 2005 Share Posted August 24, 2005 Thats why removing the ATI files for an ATI card or booting with a -x work. It simply forces the machine to use a no frills generic driver that assumed 16 megs of RAM are present. does it mean, that removing of geforce kexts can halp for gforce cards too? Link to comment https://www.insanelymac.com/forum/topic/981-why-dont-the-videocard-drivers-work/#findComment-6448 Share on other sites More sharing options...
fozzylyon Posted August 24, 2005 Share Posted August 24, 2005 http://360hacker.net/forums/viewtopic.php?t=202 Link to comment https://www.insanelymac.com/forum/topic/981-why-dont-the-videocard-drivers-work/#findComment-6555 Share on other sites More sharing options...
chadwill Posted August 24, 2005 Share Posted August 24, 2005 i have no clue whatsoever about drivers and such..but isnt it possible to make a viritual "bios" for the graphics card..with the kext that is needed? (stupid question maybe) Link to comment https://www.insanelymac.com/forum/topic/981-why-dont-the-videocard-drivers-work/#findComment-6581 Share on other sites More sharing options...
PGHammer Posted August 30, 2005 Share Posted August 30, 2005 i have no clue whatsoever about drivers and such..but isnt it possible to make a viritual "bios" for the graphics card..with the kext that is needed? (stupid question maybe) <{POST_SNAPBACK}> Better yet, a .kext that can *read* the information in the BIOS of PC cards (which will be vastly different from that found in MAC cards); has *that* ever been considered? Basically rewriting the .kexts so that it looks for PC BIOS (as opposed to Mac BIOS) information? Link to comment https://www.insanelymac.com/forum/topic/981-why-dont-the-videocard-drivers-work/#findComment-9875 Share on other sites More sharing options...
cyrana Posted August 30, 2005 Share Posted August 30, 2005 This has 100% nothing to do w/BIOS. But, they do need to rewrite drivers to work with x86. I guess it indirectly does, but they don't need a 'mac' BIOS to work, PPC macs have one due to openfirmware, endianness, etc. Link to comment https://www.insanelymac.com/forum/topic/981-why-dont-the-videocard-drivers-work/#findComment-9879 Share on other sites More sharing options...
sHARD>> Posted August 30, 2005 Share Posted August 30, 2005 This has 100% nothing to do w/BIOS. But, they do need to rewrite drivers to work with x86. I guess it indirectly does, but they don't need a 'mac' BIOS to work, PPC macs have one due to openfirmware, endianness, etc. It's has 100% everything to do with the card and it's BIOS. The drivers are for x86, they just aren't for the right cards. I highly wouldn't be surprised if a 9600 Pro PC/Mac would work. Link to comment https://www.insanelymac.com/forum/topic/981-why-dont-the-videocard-drivers-work/#findComment-9882 Share on other sites More sharing options...
dogbert Posted August 31, 2005 Share Posted August 31, 2005 It's has 100% everything to do with the card and it's BIOS. The drivers are for x86, they just aren't for the right cards. I highly wouldn't be surprised if a 9600 Pro PC/Mac would work. <{POST_SNAPBACK}> no. the BIOS inits the card and provides basic functionality like VESA and text mode switching and stuff. all the major functionality is implemented in the drivers. the drivers on the dev DVD were prolly just a first quick and dirty attempt on x86. Link to comment https://www.insanelymac.com/forum/topic/981-why-dont-the-videocard-drivers-work/#findComment-9950 Share on other sites More sharing options...
cyrana Posted August 31, 2005 Share Posted August 31, 2005 BIOS is typically bypassed after boot. It is used to provide initialisation as dogbert implied. The GMA900 works fine, and its not like Apple programmed their BIOS to only work on a mac. Link to comment https://www.insanelymac.com/forum/topic/981-why-dont-the-videocard-drivers-work/#findComment-9970 Share on other sites More sharing options...
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