PCI video card from 9600 compatible with G4 500?

mdntmosesmdntmoses
Posted:
in Current Mac Hardware edited January 2014
I've got a couple of quick questions I hope someone can answer.



I own a Mac G4 500 Dual AGP and I also have a Mac 9600/233 (that I no longer use) that has an extra PCI video display card (an XClaim3D) for a second monitor.



My first question is: would the PCI video card from the 9600 be compatible with the G4? I'm using the G4's DVI out to an Apple Studio Display and would love to use one of my 17" ViewSonics from the old machine for more screen "real estate" (I use Logic Express 7, Final Cut Express and PhotoShop a lot and really need the room.)



I just want to be certain that I won't do any damage to the G4 by putting this card into it.



My second question: since I'm running OS 10.4.4, am I correct in assuming there wouldn't be any drivers needed for this?



I also have an AGP dual-head RGB video card that would let me use both of the old monitors on the newer computer, but it only has analog outputs and I don't want to give up the Studio Display.....



Any help anyone could give me would be greatly appreciated.

Comments

  • Reply 1 of 4
    splinemodelsplinemodel Posts: 7,311member
    Possibly, since the old ATI card in the 9600 might not have a driver for OS X. The 9600 was never supposed to run OS X, so the card may not be supported. The high-end beige G3s, which are the oldest macs supported by OS X, came with IxMicro UltimateRez (8MB!!!) PCI graphics cards, which are supported by OS X, as is the onboard ATI Rage chipset on the rest of the Beige G3s.



    I think the card from the 9600 is pre-Rage, and I don't think you'll have much luck getting it to run on OS X.
  • Reply 2 of 4
    lundylundy Posts: 4,466member
    Quote:

    I just want to be certain that I won't do any damage to the G4 by putting this card into it.





    While I don't think anyone can be CERTAIN that there won't be some way that it could foul up something, it is a PCI card after all, and PCI is PCI for the most part. But who knows if Apple did some kind of removing/adding of one of the connectors....



    The only way to know is to try it. If the machine still runs OK, then you could search the web for drivers. Who knows, some of the ATI drivers that come with OS X just might work. From looking at the video drivers in /System/Library/Extensions, there are Rage128 and RagePro there.
  • Reply 3 of 4
    mdntmosesmdntmoses Posts: 5member
    Thanks for your replies....I finally got a reply from a local Apple tech (I called about this over a week ago), who said it should work fine and that there would be no harm in trying it. So I went and dug out the 9600 (it was pretty much buried behind a bunch of other stuff in storage - I guess the REAL reason I posted this was that I wanted to reasonably certain I wasn't going to risk screwing up my back yet again for nothing. )



    I pulled the card and the largest chip on it read: "3D Rage II+DVD"....so as soon as I can get the card in and test it - which basically calls for rearranging my ENTIRE studio just to make room for the honkin' huge ViewSonic - I'll post an update a to whether it works or not.



    Again, THANKS!!
  • Reply 4 of 4
    dfilerdfiler Posts: 3,420member
    A word of caution: Using a PCI video card in conjunction with your AGP card on this machine will degrade performance on both monitors.



    I think this is a result of the 2nd card not having quartz extreme support. Hardware acceleration was thus disabled on both monitors.



    This may have been since been fixed though...
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