Uhm, regarding the whole ATi is not Apple's big video card provider statement -
iMac
iBook
PowerBook
All based on ATi graphics.
Only one product line isn't, and this past year Apple's portable sales were higher than their desktop sales for the first time ever, so ATi was supplying more cards and chipsets than nVidia, as per usual.
EDIT- ADDED:
Oh and while it is conjecture, it would make sense that Apple's contracts with its OEM suppliers such as ATi and nVidia state who is responsible and in the case that the supplier is, Apple might very well not have either the access to the necessary information or the legal right to write the drivers.
Now, here is my get out of jail free card.
Fact is, if it is in Apple's hands then they were dead wrong to drop support like this, it was in poor taste and poor customer relations.
But before we have more fun bashing them we should find out, for sure, who we should be bashing.
Plus, like it or not, ATI is the company that has to write the drivers (or at least provide enough information to Apple). ATI doesn't provide the downloads because the drivers are already built into the Classic Mac OS.
Apple announced support for the 'older systems' at the WWDC in May of 2000. Apple had no way of knowing of the impending fallout with ATI a few months later.
It is ATI's responsibility to support their hardware. Support was obviously intended for the older cards, but ATI won't develop. Apparently ATI has decided not to write the drivers as Apple has announced they will not support those cards.
It doesn't matter Apple is the one that made the statements. Apple is the one responsible to back them up. No one else is responsible but Apple. If Apple claims hardware they ship runs OS X then it should. It's about taking responsibilities for ones actions or speech. Apple and only Apple should be responsible for their claims.
<strong>This <a href="http://maccentral.macworld.com/news/0007/26.ati.shtml"; target="_blank">article</a> makes reference to the fallout between ATI and Apple after ATI leaked info about new Macs 2 days before the keynote.
Plus, like it or not, ATI is the company that has to write the drivers (or at least provide enough information to Apple). ATI doesn't provide the downloads because the drivers are already built into the Classic Mac OS.
Apple announced support for the 'older systems' at the WWDC in May of 2000. Apple had no way of knowing of the impending fallout with ATI a few months later.
It is ATI's responsibility to support their hardware. Support was obviously intended for the older cards, but ATI won't develop. Apparently ATI has decided not to write the drivers as Apple has announced they will not support those cards.</strong><hr></blockquote>
Again. Apple made the claim, It's Apple's responsibility to back it up Not ATIs. How hard is that to understand? IT would be different if the card wasn't one that Apple shipped with Macs but this isn't the case. ATI says that Apple is responsible for the display card upgrades for the cards that shipped with the Macs in that page I posted. Again Apple made the compatibility statement NOT ATI.
[quote]ATI says that Apple is responsible for the display card upgrades for the cards that shipped with the Macs in that page I posted.<hr></blockquote>
The page only mentions distribution of drivers. Not development.
Apple wanted to distribute the drivers of the ATI cards with the Classic Mac OS to make sure that everything worked properly. That doesn't mean that they wrote the drivers.
<strong>Ok, maybe I should post this in terms people will understand.
Apple CAN'T write the drivers.
<hr></blockquote></strong>
They can't can they? Care to show me some proof?
[quote]<strong>
ATI WON'T write the drivers.
<hr></blockquote></strong>
ATI isn't responsible for writing the drivers for a OS they don't make. This has always been up to Apple to do. Apple usually is the one that hands out the updated drivers. Apple has always been the one that you called for support.
[quote]<strong>
No amount of petitions, complaining, phone calls, or letters is going to make Apple able to write those drivers.<hr></blockquote></strong>
Sure there is. If enough people complain and boycott Apple wont have a choice. Apple unlike MS doesn't have the mkt share to go through this. If Apple doesn't back up it's claims they are going to lose a lot of customers.
[quote]<strong>
Apple said that these machines would work when they were on good terms with ATI.
<hr></blockquote></strong>
Sounds like a apologetic argument. As someone said themselves. Apple STILL ships Macs with ATI cards. Their terms can't be THAT bad.
[quote]<strong>
At least Apple came out and said that the drivers will never be produced rather than leaving everyone waiting for non-existant drivers to come out.</strong><hr></blockquote>
Heh yeah and this justifies what they did how? More apologetic knee jerks. Apple never gave anyone a reason for their actions. I am ashamed of Apple right now.
<strong>So the argument is that OSX's pre-emptive multi-tasking indirectly requires a beefed-up graphics card to perform simple operations? What is the processor busy doing? Drawing pretty Aqua buttons the entire time?
And as for there not being enough RAM to hold the frame buffer:
1) It works in OS9, how do you explain it magically fitting in a different OS?
2) AGP
If Aqua is hogging too many resources maybe they should have re-thought that when laying out the requirements for the OS. It's bad faith to pull the bait and switch, which is essentially what Apple has done.
Razz:
Usually you get your existing product working properly before going on to bigger and better things. That's the theory anyway.
What's the next excuse, will the TiBook not be supported by OSX.5 because the thin titanium design clashes with Aqua 2.0?</strong><hr></blockquote>
1) MacOS 9 doesn't use VRAM for much of anything, and its use of the graphics acceleration is quite limited. I'm guessing that MacOS X will finally include a decent, forward thinking, and well-architectured graphics engine that will take advantage of hardware acceleration. Unfortunately to do that you have to make certain base assumptions, and if you want to do something progressive and competitive then your base assumptions are more severe. If older hardware doesn't meet the requirements, it isn't usable. I've done this before, and believe me there just isn't a way around it. You can't hide all of the differences in a driver either so the 3rd party software guys would have to bear some of this pain as well -- something they aren't eager to do, I'm sure.
2) The hardware in question does not support AGP, so that isn't a factor. In fact, if it DID support AGP then it would probably be more useful hardware.
To stay competitive in the market it is often necessary to build things thinking about the future and laying the groundwork in advance. It simply is not possible to do everything, software is limited by physics just like everything else. Go see how well DirectX 8 runs on the Rage2 and RagePro (if it does at all), and yet in 6 months people will demand that Apple's OpenGL compete with DirectX 9.
Can't have it both ways guys. As I said before, technical issues aside, Apple has really botched this situation...
The page only mentions distribution of drivers. Not development.
<hr></blockquote></strong> And tech support and updates. Apple handles that. If something isn't working right it's Apple job to get it fixed.
[quote]<strong>
Apple wanted to distribute the drivers of the ATI cards with the Classic Mac OS to make sure that everything worked properly. That doesn't mean that they wrote the drivers.</strong><hr></blockquote>
Again doesn't matter WHO wrote the drivers. What if Apple and Nvidia get into a spat tomorrow? Is it ok for them not to support these cards in future OS X updates? How is that justifiable? It's not. Again Apple made claims it needs to back up. Claims to it's consumers. Apple is trying to pull a bait and switch. They are beginning to remind me of MS here lately. Apple used to care about it's customers. Not screw them over.
ATI has always written the drivers for their own cards. The proof is that the one set of drivers they have provided download on their website are for the Radeon. They write the drivers, Apple distributes them. That's the deal they have.
Plus, if Apple isn't as committed to ATI overall, what incentive does ATI have to go back and write drivers for cards that are 2-4 years old?
<strong>ATI has always written the drivers for their own cards. The proof is that the one set of drivers they have provided download on their website are for the Radeon. They write the drivers, Apple distributes them. That's the deal they have.
Plus, if Apple isn't as committed to ATI overall, what incentive does ATI have to go back and write drivers for cards that are 2-4 years old?</strong><hr></blockquote>
AGAIN. it's NOT up to ATI to make sure all the Macs that APPLE said would be OS X ready to make sure that they are. This is on APPLE'S shoulders. I am sure they could pay ATI to make drivers if they wanted. You think ATI wouldn't do it? Hah! Apple is just pulling a bait in switch in the middle of the game. They are expecting users to take it up the ass and not complain. Now will they give you a reason why they are giving it to you up they ass? No they are just doing it.
[quote]I can't find anything on Apple's website to support this claim.
In fact, th is ATI web page seems to indicate otherwise.
While they do not make the drivers available for download in anything other than what comes with Mac OS X, they have made drivers available for download to use with the 'classic' Mac OS. <hr></blockquote>
that page shows nothing. Of course they made drivers for "classic" Mac os. their retail drivers work with the integrated chipsets however that situation is unsupported.
[quote]Most Partner Product manufacturers offer driver updates through their website or the support contact information that accompanies the product. Additionally, ATI offers reference drivers that will install on all Partner Products.
It is recommended that drivers from the manufacturer of the Partner Product be used before trying the reference driver. Feature enhancements provided by the Partner Product manufacturer will be lost when using ATI reference drivers. ATI reference drivers are provided as an alternative solution for customers and are not supported by ATI. Reference drivers are located here.
<hr></blockquote>
[quote]Q8: How do I get technical support for a Partner Product?
A8:
Support will come from the product manufacturer. Retail Partner Products contain support information within the package. System integrators who include Partner Products in their computer systems can provide advice on how to get support for Partner Products supplied with complete systems.
<hr></blockquote>
[quote]
ATI writes the drivers for their chipsets. If ATI does not make the drivers available to the older cards, why is it Apple's responsibility to make them (even if they can)? That shows a lack of responsibility from ATI more than it does from Apple.<hr></blockquote>
as shown above it is Apple's responsibility. it is their OS. it is they who made the classic drivers incompatible due to a new OS. it is their hardware.
[quote]I have an original iMac (Rev. A, but does the name really make sense if it wasn't a revision?). The iMac has a 2MB Rage IIc graphics card. I also purchased a Voodoo 2 8 MB card for it. I can already say that the computer will never be running Mac OS X.
Why will the computer never run Mac OS X? The machine is too slow, it doesn't have enough RAM, and the hard drive doesn't have a gigabyte of available memory to install the new OS on it. The 2MB graphics card is the least of my problems.
So let's say that Apple and ATI decided to write the drivers for Mac OS X for this card. Is it really worth it to write the driver for a 2 MB graphics card? Then take all of the varities of cards currently 'not supported' by Mac OS X that are in 'supported' machines. That's a lot of graphics cards. <hr></blockquote>
for the most part we are not talking about your computer. for the most part we are only asking for rage pro support.
I don't know what you mean by "a lot of graphic cards". writing support for the rage pro would cover about 90 percent of the machines we are complaing about. the only exception would be first run imacs and beige G3s.
BTW, the rev a can be upgraded to 6 mb of VRAM making your point about too little VRAM mute.
[quote]
If ATI isn't willing to bend and start writing some drivers (or at least providing the info neccesary to get them done), then I wouldn't expect you to see Apple somehow making progress on these drivers. <hr></blockquote>
It's apple's hardware and OS. it is their job. ATI is under no obligation to rewrite drivers because Apple won't support their own hardware
Fine. You seem set in your opinion that Apple is wrong here. No amount of posts/explanations will be good enough for you, and that's fine with me.
But like I said, no one's making drivers for these cards.
If you want to boycott Apple because of it, by all means go ahead. No one will stop you.
I'm just trying to inform everyone here, that ATI writes the drivers and has written the drivers for these machines. Apple distributes the drivers through the OS.
Maybe Jobs will talk about this in his keynote, but I highly doubt it. It appears to me that this is a done deal for Apple, otherwise they wouldn't have told the public that drivers would never be written for Mac OS X.
[quote]Sorry, but try to at least get a little trace of clue before posting stuff like that.
Why do you think it takes Apple quite some time to fix bugs, release updates, complete developer documentation, etc. pp.? Why do you think they still didn't manage to get full AltiVec support in GCC3? Why is the current OS X UFS implementation years behind FreeBSD (softupdates, anyone?)?
Damn, do you really think being "a billiondollar compay with several hundred software engineers" allow Apple to have tons of engineers just sitting around idly all day waiting to write drivers for anything that crosses their path? Do you really think Apple doesn't write drivers for other companies' legacy graphics chips just to deliberately piss of their own customers? Or because they are simply to *lazy* to so, and just spend their working time doing coffee breaks?
I do understand you guys are pissed because you have obsolete hardware right now, but that's the way the IT business goes, and Apple is as much a profit-oriented company as anybody else.<hr></blockquote>
the only one not showing a "trace of a clue" is you.
To think that writing Rage pro support in would be a difficult talk is assinine. It would take 2-3 people maybe a few weeks plus testing. Don't give this bullshit that it would somehow limit Apple from making other advancements by dedicated 2 people to write a driver where the work has already been started.
and even if it did I would rather OS X work and support current hardware which is said to be supported then forget about it and move on.
[quote]I don't have a Mac with one of the old graphics cards, so I can't test it, but does OpenGL really not work *at all* on them? I remember that, on windows, OpenGL would also technically *work* on graphics cards that don't have any 3D capabilities at all, but it obviously would not be hardware-accelerated, and thus be awfully slow. Still, it technically *does* work. Is the same true for the MacOS on these older machines?<hr></blockquote>
depends,
ie: the screensavers "work" but they really go at around 5 fps.
games on the otherhand often don't work at all because they expect these machines to have hardware accelerated OpenGL.
2) The hardware in question does not support AGP, so that isn't a factor. In fact, if it DID support AGP then it would probably be more useful hardware.</strong><hr></blockquote>
<strong>Fine. You seem set in your opinion that Apple is wrong here. No amount of posts/explanations will be good enough for you, and that's fine with me.<hr></blockquote></strong>
Just how ISN'T Apple wrong here?
[quote]<strong>
But like I said, no one's making drivers for these cards.
<hr></blockquote></strong>
And that is Apple's fault
[quote]<strong>
If you want to boycott Apple because of it, by all means go ahead. No one will stop you.
I'm just trying to inform everyone here, that ATI writes the drivers and has written the drivers for these machines. Apple distributes the drivers through the OS.
<hr></blockquote></strong>
And this means ATI is at fault how? Apple can surely pay ATI to write the drivers. Problem solved.
[quote]<strong>
Maybe Jobs will talk about this in his keynote, but I highly doubt it. It appears to me that this is a done deal for Apple, otherwise they wouldn't have told the public that drivers would never be written for Mac OS X.</strong><hr></blockquote>
Not the first time Apple announced something to the public then retracted it after it got negative feedback.
all the ibooks in question use AGP 2X interfaces</strong><hr></blockquote>
Yes, but the RagePro doesn't have the ability to read textures from across the AGP bus, if I recall correctly.
And to the comment about how easy it is to write drivers for the RagePro, that isn't the case. Writing 3D drivers is a fairly complex task -- otherwise drivers would be a whole lot better! Getting acceptable performance out of the RagePro by working at the driver level and supporting all the features of OpenGL is a ton of work. Under MacOS 8/9 apps have to do some coding specifically for the RagePro even though they are using OpenGL, and that is because it isn't compliant nor fast.
So some RagePros can be upgraded to 6 meg VRAM... if supported it adds confusion and performance still isn't acceptable.
I agree that the whole situation is ugly, and Apple is to blame at least about not saying well in advance that machines with these lame chips couldn't support OpenGL properly. They knew it would happen, after all I told them about it at the time. No matter what though, I suspect owners of these machines aren't going to be happy... either it won't work at all (current situation) or it'll work so badly they won't be able to use it in any practical way.
I don't think you'll get very far by claiming that MacOS X doesn't work on these machines though. It does work, but not all the features are fully functional. Does the SCSI support work on your iMac or iBook? No. Would it be reasonable to complain about that because MacOS X's feature list includes SCSI and supported hardware lists an iMac and iBook? No.
I don't think you'll get very far by claiming that MacOS X doesn't work on these machines though. <hr></blockquote></strong>
Some of OS X works right. Just not some of the key Core features. And for hardware that was supposably OS X ready.. this isn't tolerable.
[quote]<strong>
It does work, but not all the features are fully functional.
<hr></blockquote></strong> And that my friend makes the hardware NOT OS X-ready
[quote]<strong>
Does the SCSI support work on your iMac or iBook? No. Would it be reasonable to complain about that because MacOS X's feature list includes SCSI and supported hardware lists an iMac and iBook? No.</strong><hr></blockquote>
If my iMac or iBook CAME with a SCSI card installed I'd be bitching if it didn't have SCSI support in OS X. See these cards CAME with the computer that was SUPPOSED to be OS X ready. If Joe Blow PCI card wont work with your Mac it isn't up to Apple to make it work. However Apple IS responsible in the hardware it ships with it's computers.
<strong>Applenut- the cards in Macs are 'Built by ATI'. The cards in the Nintendo Game Cube are 'Powered by ATI'.
Nintendo's graphics processor would make it a 'Partner Product'.
Apple's cards, however, are 'Built by ATI', and therefore, don't fall under the category of 'Partner Product'.
Yes, Apple's OS changed. That doesn't mean that Apple can write the driver for the card.</strong><hr></blockquote>
not true. Apple uses the ATI graphic chip and integrates ino its motherboard and makes changes where neccessary. If you actually read it you'll see this applies to all integrated chipsets which the iMac and iBook contain
Comments
iMac
iBook
PowerBook
All based on ATi graphics.
Only one product line isn't, and this past year Apple's portable sales were higher than their desktop sales for the first time ever, so ATi was supplying more cards and chipsets than nVidia, as per usual.
EDIT- ADDED:
Oh and while it is conjecture, it would make sense that Apple's contracts with its OEM suppliers such as ATi and nVidia state who is responsible and in the case that the supplier is, Apple might very well not have either the access to the necessary information or the legal right to write the drivers.
Now, here is my get out of jail free card.
Fact is, if it is in Apple's hands then they were dead wrong to drop support like this, it was in poor taste and poor customer relations.
But before we have more fun bashing them we should find out, for sure, who we should be bashing.
[ 12-30-2001: Message edited by: Bogie ]</p>
Plus, like it or not, ATI is the company that has to write the drivers (or at least provide enough information to Apple). ATI doesn't provide the downloads because the drivers are already built into the Classic Mac OS.
Apple announced support for the 'older systems' at the WWDC in May of 2000. Apple had no way of knowing of the impending fallout with ATI a few months later.
It is ATI's responsibility to support their hardware. Support was obviously intended for the older cards, but ATI won't develop. Apparently ATI has decided not to write the drivers as Apple has announced they will not support those cards.
<strong>This <a href="http://maccentral.macworld.com/news/0007/26.ati.shtml"; target="_blank">article</a> makes reference to the fallout between ATI and Apple after ATI leaked info about new Macs 2 days before the keynote.
Plus, like it or not, ATI is the company that has to write the drivers (or at least provide enough information to Apple). ATI doesn't provide the downloads because the drivers are already built into the Classic Mac OS.
Apple announced support for the 'older systems' at the WWDC in May of 2000. Apple had no way of knowing of the impending fallout with ATI a few months later.
It is ATI's responsibility to support their hardware. Support was obviously intended for the older cards, but ATI won't develop. Apparently ATI has decided not to write the drivers as Apple has announced they will not support those cards.</strong><hr></blockquote>
Again. Apple made the claim, It's Apple's responsibility to back it up Not ATIs. How hard is that to understand? IT would be different if the card wasn't one that Apple shipped with Macs but this isn't the case. ATI says that Apple is responsible for the display card upgrades for the cards that shipped with the Macs in that page I posted. Again Apple made the compatibility statement NOT ATI.
Apple CAN'T write the drivers. ATI WON'T write the drivers.
No amount of petitions, complaining, phone calls, or letters is going to make Apple able to write those drivers.
Apple said that these machines would work when they were on good terms with ATI.
At least Apple came out and said that the drivers will never be produced rather than leaving everyone waiting for non-existant drivers to come out.
The page only mentions distribution of drivers. Not development.
Apple wanted to distribute the drivers of the ATI cards with the Classic Mac OS to make sure that everything worked properly. That doesn't mean that they wrote the drivers.
<strong>Ok, maybe I should post this in terms people will understand.
Apple CAN'T write the drivers.
<hr></blockquote></strong>
They can't can they? Care to show me some proof?
[quote]<strong>
ATI WON'T write the drivers.
<hr></blockquote></strong>
ATI isn't responsible for writing the drivers for a OS they don't make. This has always been up to Apple to do. Apple usually is the one that hands out the updated drivers. Apple has always been the one that you called for support.
[quote]<strong>
No amount of petitions, complaining, phone calls, or letters is going to make Apple able to write those drivers.<hr></blockquote></strong>
Sure there is. If enough people complain and boycott Apple wont have a choice. Apple unlike MS doesn't have the mkt share to go through this. If Apple doesn't back up it's claims they are going to lose a lot of customers.
[quote]<strong>
Apple said that these machines would work when they were on good terms with ATI.
<hr></blockquote></strong>
Sounds like a apologetic argument. As someone said themselves. Apple STILL ships Macs with ATI cards. Their terms can't be THAT bad.
[quote]<strong>
At least Apple came out and said that the drivers will never be produced rather than leaving everyone waiting for non-existant drivers to come out.</strong><hr></blockquote>
Heh yeah and this justifies what they did how? More apologetic knee jerks. Apple never gave anyone a reason for their actions. I am ashamed of Apple right now.
[ 12-30-2001: Message edited by: Sinewave ]</p>
<strong>So the argument is that OSX's pre-emptive multi-tasking indirectly requires a beefed-up graphics card to perform simple operations? What is the processor busy doing? Drawing pretty Aqua buttons the entire time?
And as for there not being enough RAM to hold the frame buffer:
1) It works in OS9, how do you explain it magically fitting in a different OS?
2) AGP
If Aqua is hogging too many resources maybe they should have re-thought that when laying out the requirements for the OS. It's bad faith to pull the bait and switch, which is essentially what Apple has done.
Razz:
Usually you get your existing product working properly before going on to bigger and better things. That's the theory anyway.
What's the next excuse, will the TiBook not be supported by OSX.5 because the thin titanium design clashes with Aqua 2.0?</strong><hr></blockquote>
1) MacOS 9 doesn't use VRAM for much of anything, and its use of the graphics acceleration is quite limited. I'm guessing that MacOS X will finally include a decent, forward thinking, and well-architectured graphics engine that will take advantage of hardware acceleration. Unfortunately to do that you have to make certain base assumptions, and if you want to do something progressive and competitive then your base assumptions are more severe. If older hardware doesn't meet the requirements, it isn't usable. I've done this before, and believe me there just isn't a way around it. You can't hide all of the differences in a driver either so the 3rd party software guys would have to bear some of this pain as well -- something they aren't eager to do, I'm sure.
2) The hardware in question does not support AGP, so that isn't a factor. In fact, if it DID support AGP then it would probably be more useful hardware.
To stay competitive in the market it is often necessary to build things thinking about the future and laying the groundwork in advance. It simply is not possible to do everything, software is limited by physics just like everything else. Go see how well DirectX 8 runs on the Rage2 and RagePro (if it does at all), and yet in 6 months people will demand that Apple's OpenGL compete with DirectX 9.
Can't have it both ways guys. As I said before, technical issues aside, Apple has really botched this situation...
<strong>
The page only mentions distribution of drivers. Not development.
<hr></blockquote></strong> And tech support and updates. Apple handles that. If something isn't working right it's Apple job to get it fixed.
[quote]<strong>
Apple wanted to distribute the drivers of the ATI cards with the Classic Mac OS to make sure that everything worked properly. That doesn't mean that they wrote the drivers.</strong><hr></blockquote>
Again doesn't matter WHO wrote the drivers. What if Apple and Nvidia get into a spat tomorrow? Is it ok for them not to support these cards in future OS X updates? How is that justifiable? It's not. Again Apple made claims it needs to back up. Claims to it's consumers. Apple is trying to pull a bait and switch. They are beginning to remind me of MS here lately. Apple used to care about it's customers. Not screw them over.
Plus, if Apple isn't as committed to ATI overall, what incentive does ATI have to go back and write drivers for cards that are 2-4 years old?
<strong>ATI has always written the drivers for their own cards. The proof is that the one set of drivers they have provided download on their website are for the Radeon. They write the drivers, Apple distributes them. That's the deal they have.
Plus, if Apple isn't as committed to ATI overall, what incentive does ATI have to go back and write drivers for cards that are 2-4 years old?</strong><hr></blockquote>
AGAIN. it's NOT up to ATI to make sure all the Macs that APPLE said would be OS X ready to make sure that they are. This is on APPLE'S shoulders. I am sure they could pay ATI to make drivers if they wanted. You think ATI wouldn't do it? Hah! Apple is just pulling a bait in switch in the middle of the game. They are expecting users to take it up the ass and not complain. Now will they give you a reason why they are giving it to you up they ass? No they are just doing it.
[ 12-30-2001: Message edited by: Sinewave ]</p>
In fact, th is ATI web page seems to indicate otherwise.
While they do not make the drivers available for download in anything other than what comes with Mac OS X, they have made drivers available for download to use with the 'classic' Mac OS. <hr></blockquote>
that page shows nothing. Of course they made drivers for "classic" Mac os. their retail drivers work with the integrated chipsets however that situation is unsupported.
for more information look here:
<a href="http://www.ati.com/na/pages/partnerproducts/faq.html#2"; target="_blank">http://www.ati.com/na/pages/partnerproducts/faq.html#2</a>;
specific quotes from above link
[quote]Most Partner Product manufacturers offer driver updates through their website or the support contact information that accompanies the product. Additionally, ATI offers reference drivers that will install on all Partner Products.
It is recommended that drivers from the manufacturer of the Partner Product be used before trying the reference driver. Feature enhancements provided by the Partner Product manufacturer will be lost when using ATI reference drivers. ATI reference drivers are provided as an alternative solution for customers and are not supported by ATI. Reference drivers are located here.
<hr></blockquote>
[quote]Q8: How do I get technical support for a Partner Product?
A8:
Support will come from the product manufacturer. Retail Partner Products contain support information within the package. System integrators who include Partner Products in their computer systems can provide advice on how to get support for Partner Products supplied with complete systems.
<hr></blockquote>
[quote]
ATI writes the drivers for their chipsets. If ATI does not make the drivers available to the older cards, why is it Apple's responsibility to make them (even if they can)? That shows a lack of responsibility from ATI more than it does from Apple.<hr></blockquote>
as shown above it is Apple's responsibility. it is their OS. it is they who made the classic drivers incompatible due to a new OS. it is their hardware.
[quote]I have an original iMac (Rev. A, but does the name really make sense if it wasn't a revision?). The iMac has a 2MB Rage IIc graphics card. I also purchased a Voodoo 2 8 MB card for it. I can already say that the computer will never be running Mac OS X.
Why will the computer never run Mac OS X? The machine is too slow, it doesn't have enough RAM, and the hard drive doesn't have a gigabyte of available memory to install the new OS on it. The 2MB graphics card is the least of my problems.
So let's say that Apple and ATI decided to write the drivers for Mac OS X for this card. Is it really worth it to write the driver for a 2 MB graphics card? Then take all of the varities of cards currently 'not supported' by Mac OS X that are in 'supported' machines. That's a lot of graphics cards. <hr></blockquote>
for the most part we are not talking about your computer. for the most part we are only asking for rage pro support.
I don't know what you mean by "a lot of graphic cards". writing support for the rage pro would cover about 90 percent of the machines we are complaing about. the only exception would be first run imacs and beige G3s.
BTW, the rev a can be upgraded to 6 mb of VRAM making your point about too little VRAM mute.
[quote]
If ATI isn't willing to bend and start writing some drivers (or at least providing the info neccesary to get them done), then I wouldn't expect you to see Apple somehow making progress on these drivers. <hr></blockquote>
It's apple's hardware and OS. it is their job. ATI is under no obligation to rewrite drivers because Apple won't support their own hardware
But like I said, no one's making drivers for these cards.
If you want to boycott Apple because of it, by all means go ahead. No one will stop you.
I'm just trying to inform everyone here, that ATI writes the drivers and has written the drivers for these machines. Apple distributes the drivers through the OS.
Maybe Jobs will talk about this in his keynote, but I highly doubt it. It appears to me that this is a done deal for Apple, otherwise they wouldn't have told the public that drivers would never be written for Mac OS X.
Why do you think it takes Apple quite some time to fix bugs, release updates, complete developer documentation, etc. pp.? Why do you think they still didn't manage to get full AltiVec support in GCC3? Why is the current OS X UFS implementation years behind FreeBSD (softupdates, anyone?)?
Damn, do you really think being "a billiondollar compay with several hundred software engineers" allow Apple to have tons of engineers just sitting around idly all day waiting to write drivers for anything that crosses their path? Do you really think Apple doesn't write drivers for other companies' legacy graphics chips just to deliberately piss of their own customers? Or because they are simply to *lazy* to so, and just spend their working time doing coffee breaks?
I do understand you guys are pissed because you have obsolete hardware right now, but that's the way the IT business goes, and Apple is as much a profit-oriented company as anybody else.<hr></blockquote>
the only one not showing a "trace of a clue" is you.
To think that writing Rage pro support in would be a difficult talk is assinine. It would take 2-3 people maybe a few weeks plus testing. Don't give this bullshit that it would somehow limit Apple from making other advancements by dedicated 2 people to write a driver where the work has already been started.
and even if it did I would rather OS X work and support current hardware which is said to be supported then forget about it and move on.
[quote]I don't have a Mac with one of the old graphics cards, so I can't test it, but does OpenGL really not work *at all* on them? I remember that, on windows, OpenGL would also technically *work* on graphics cards that don't have any 3D capabilities at all, but it obviously would not be hardware-accelerated, and thus be awfully slow. Still, it technically *does* work. Is the same true for the MacOS on these older machines?<hr></blockquote>
depends,
ie: the screensavers "work" but they really go at around 5 fps.
games on the otherhand often don't work at all because they expect these machines to have hardware accelerated OpenGL.
<strong>
2) The hardware in question does not support AGP, so that isn't a factor. In fact, if it DID support AGP then it would probably be more useful hardware.</strong><hr></blockquote>
all the ibooks in question use AGP 2X interfaces
Nintendo's graphics processor would make it a 'Partner Product'.
Apple's cards, however, are 'Built by ATI', and therefore, don't fall under the category of 'Partner Product'.
Yes, Apple's OS changed. That doesn't mean that Apple can write the driver for the card.
<strong>Fine. You seem set in your opinion that Apple is wrong here. No amount of posts/explanations will be good enough for you, and that's fine with me.<hr></blockquote></strong>
Just how ISN'T Apple wrong here?
[quote]<strong>
But like I said, no one's making drivers for these cards.
<hr></blockquote></strong>
And that is Apple's fault
[quote]<strong>
If you want to boycott Apple because of it, by all means go ahead. No one will stop you.
I'm just trying to inform everyone here, that ATI writes the drivers and has written the drivers for these machines. Apple distributes the drivers through the OS.
<hr></blockquote></strong>
And this means ATI is at fault how? Apple can surely pay ATI to write the drivers. Problem solved.
[quote]<strong>
Maybe Jobs will talk about this in his keynote, but I highly doubt it. It appears to me that this is a done deal for Apple, otherwise they wouldn't have told the public that drivers would never be written for Mac OS X.</strong><hr></blockquote>
Not the first time Apple announced something to the public then retracted it after it got negative feedback.
<strong>
all the ibooks in question use AGP 2X interfaces</strong><hr></blockquote>
Yes, but the RagePro doesn't have the ability to read textures from across the AGP bus, if I recall correctly.
And to the comment about how easy it is to write drivers for the RagePro, that isn't the case. Writing 3D drivers is a fairly complex task -- otherwise drivers would be a whole lot better! Getting acceptable performance out of the RagePro by working at the driver level and supporting all the features of OpenGL is a ton of work. Under MacOS 8/9 apps have to do some coding specifically for the RagePro even though they are using OpenGL, and that is because it isn't compliant nor fast.
So some RagePros can be upgraded to 6 meg VRAM... if supported it adds confusion and performance still isn't acceptable.
I agree that the whole situation is ugly, and Apple is to blame at least about not saying well in advance that machines with these lame chips couldn't support OpenGL properly. They knew it would happen, after all I told them about it at the time.
I don't think you'll get very far by claiming that MacOS X doesn't work on these machines though. It does work, but not all the features are fully functional. Does the SCSI support work on your iMac or iBook? No. Would it be reasonable to complain about that because MacOS X's feature list includes SCSI and supported hardware lists an iMac and iBook? No.
<strong>
I don't think you'll get very far by claiming that MacOS X doesn't work on these machines though. <hr></blockquote></strong>
Some of OS X works right. Just not some of the key Core features. And for hardware that was supposably OS X ready.. this isn't tolerable.
[quote]<strong>
It does work, but not all the features are fully functional.
<hr></blockquote></strong> And that my friend makes the hardware NOT OS X-ready
[quote]<strong>
Does the SCSI support work on your iMac or iBook? No. Would it be reasonable to complain about that because MacOS X's feature list includes SCSI and supported hardware lists an iMac and iBook? No.</strong><hr></blockquote>
If my iMac or iBook CAME with a SCSI card installed I'd be bitching if it didn't have SCSI support in OS X. See these cards CAME with the computer that was SUPPOSED to be OS X ready. If Joe Blow PCI card wont work with your Mac it isn't up to Apple to make it work. However Apple IS responsible in the hardware it ships with it's computers.
[ 12-30-2001: Message edited by: Sinewave ]</p>
<strong>Applenut- the cards in Macs are 'Built by ATI'. The cards in the Nintendo Game Cube are 'Powered by ATI'.
Nintendo's graphics processor would make it a 'Partner Product'.
Apple's cards, however, are 'Built by ATI', and therefore, don't fall under the category of 'Partner Product'.
Yes, Apple's OS changed. That doesn't mean that Apple can write the driver for the card.</strong><hr></blockquote>
not true. Apple uses the ATI graphic chip and integrates ino its motherboard and makes changes where neccessary. If you actually read it you'll see this applies to all integrated chipsets which the iMac and iBook contain