Mac Pro GPU advice

Posted:
in General Discussion
All - 

I've recently acquired a 2009 Mac Pro that's been flashed to 5,1 and upgraded to a 6 core 3.2 GHz CPU.  Runs well.  Most challenging use of it is FCPX, where students can use it to put videos together, some of them are moderately involved.  

However: It has the original GT120 graphics card, and relative to my MBP (a Late 2013 15" with 750m) the graphics are slow.  

After a lot of research, it seems as if my choices effectively boil down to the 5870 or the 7950.  Is the 7950 worth the difference, or is there another gpu I should consider?  

I'd like to stay between $100 and $200 for it - I got the MP itself for not much more than that.  

Thanks all in advance.  

Comments

  • Reply 1 of 3
    tallest skiltallest skil Posts: 43,388member
    Do what Mike says here and grab yourself something from… oh, you have a budget. Well, the 10xx cards will be outside that, but a GTX 960 can get down to that price point. All you have to do is download nVidia's web driver and an off-the-shelf card will work flawlessly (you lose the EFI boot menu, but you can still use it, just not see it). You don't need an Apple card at all (thankfully).
    edited April 2017 HBW1
  • Reply 2 of 3
    JacobVRJacobVR Posts: 11member
    The GT 120 is native in macOS, since it's part of some (still supported) genuine Macs. It should work fine with Inject/Nvidia=True and iMac14,2 SMBIOS.
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