Thursday, 4 April 2013

EVGA announce GTX680 Mac edition

EVGA have announced a new graphics card for the Mac Pro, the GTX680 Mac edition.

The specifications are the same as the 2GB PC version although it does show PCI express 2.0 not 3.0.

I assume that is a limitation of the Mac Pro, not the card.

Core Specs

1536 CUDA Cores
Base Clock: 1006 MHz
Boost Clock: 1058 MHz
Bus: PCI-E 2.0
Texture Fill Rate: 128.8 GT/s

Memory Specs

Memory Detail: 2048 MB GDDR5
Memory Bit Width: 256 Bit
Memory Clock: 6008 MHz
Memory Speed: 0.33 ns
Memory Bandwidth: 192.26 GB/s

Key Features

NVIDIA GPU Boost
Supports four concurrent displays; two dual-link DVI connectors, HDMI and DisplayPort 1.1
NVIDIA CUDA Technology
PCI Express 2.0 Support
OpenGL 3.2 Support
OpenCL Support

The card is compatible with Mac Pro 3.1 (Early 2008) or later running OSX 10.8.3

Newegg are taking preorders for the card with shipping from April 8th, price is $599.99 compared to $479.99 for the PC version, so you can still save some money by going with the PC card.

It will be interesting to see if the Mac version gives anything more than the boot screen, there is no information about the type of BIOS on the card but I assume it must support EFI to be called a "Mac edition" There is also no mention of BIOS switching as there is on the Sapphire 7950

If you get your hands on one please let me know in the comments,

Cheers,

Neil



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12 comments:

  1. Anonymous9 April 2013 at 10:46

    Neil have you seen the 7950 Saphire card for Mac? Would that work on a 2008 Mac? What are your thoughts?

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Neil Roberts9 April 2013 at 12:33

      Hi there,
      I actually wrote an article about it here:
      http://www.redsharknews.com/technology/item/538-sapphire-release-mac-pro-compatible-graphics-card
      According to Sapphire the card is only compatible with 2009 Mac Pros and later.
      Also you would not get CUDA acceleration with the Radeon so if you are planning to use software like Adobe CS6 or Resolve then I think the Nvidia cards are better.
      Cheers,
      Neil

      Delete
  2. gcastro3d26 May 2013 at 09:25

    Hi Neil! I came here via a google search. Nice to see you helping ppl out with similar questions. Here's mine :)

    my geforce 8800 gt is dying on my mac pro 3,1. Looking to replace.

    I'm still on snow leopard, but i see there are better options if i upgrade to mountai lion. I will hesitantly upgrade to get the better video card if need be.

    I currently run maya, zbrush and adobe cs 5.5 production premium. I don't do bootcamp or run windows on my machine. only os x.

    my budget is $300. From what i've read in your other post, seems like gtx 660 ti is the way to go? Is there a particular brand i should side with?

    a side question. i was going to upgrade to the next adobe suite, but not too kean on the whole adobe creative cloud. So now i don't know if i should upgrade to cs 6 or just stay at 5.5.

    Thanks Neil!

    -George

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Neil Roberts26 May 2013 at 11:50

      Hi George,

      Thanks for posting,

      The GTX660ti certainly seems to give the best bang for the buck and can be powered by the Mac Pro power supply.
      Don't forget you will need two power cables for it.
      I went with the standard EVGA model but see what is on offer in your area. As always, buy from somewhere that will let you return it if you're not happy.

      As for your Adobe question, as a CS5.5 user you can get a discount on your upgrade to CS6 and also a discount on your first year of Creative Cloud.

      There is a lot of scare mongering about Creative Cloud, you don't need to be connected all the time and your files are all local so its not true that if you don't have an internet connection you can't work. And of course you always have the latest versions.

      It really depends how much you use Adobe software. Do the maths and figure out what's best for you.

      Let me know how you get on,

      Neil

      Delete
  3. gcastro3d16 June 2013 at 20:16

    Hey Neil, thx for the reply. Just want to confirm that this is the card i want to get: http://www.amazon.com/EVGA-GeForce-2048MB-Graphics-02G-P4-3660-KR/dp/B008S15X3W/ref=sr_1_5?ie=UTF8&qid=1371406439&sr=8-5&keywords=660+ti

    Seems there's many variations. hehe. I'll be ordering this tonight if it is indeed the correct card.

    Thanks,
    George

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Neil Roberts18 June 2013 at 10:39

      Hi George,

      That's the one :-)

      Let me know how it goes,

      Cheers,

      Neil

      Delete
  4. gcastro3d19 June 2013 at 07:29

    i forgot about the extra power cable. doh! Must wait another day. Neil, should i be installing any drivers before hand? i've already upgraded to osx 10.8.4 Do i need to install anything else before switching out the video card?

    Thanks,
    George

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Neil Roberts19 June 2013 at 10:54

      Hi George,

      The card should run in 10.8.4 but Nvidia have released updated drivers here:
      http://www.nvidia.com/object/macosx-313.01.02f01-driver.html
      I would try the stock drivers first and then backup the system before you update.

      Let me know how it goes,

      Cheers,

      Neil

      Delete
    2. gcastro3d20 June 2013 at 02:52

      Monitors not responding. Black screens. Did I miss a step?

      Delete
  5. gcastro3d20 June 2013 at 09:41

    Well after a full day of trying to get it to work, i think i'm going to return this video card. I just could not get it to work. The monitors were saying that there was no signal coming from the computer. I did buy it from the amazon warehouse where this 660 ti was sold a bit cheaper. Maybe it was used. Either way it's going back. I may try Fry's and see if i can get another card to work. I'll keep you posted.

    -George

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Neil Roberts20 June 2013 at 12:21

      Hi George,

      Are you sure the card was getting power?

      Cheers,

      Neil

      Delete
    2. gcastro3d20 June 2013 at 17:48

      Well, i put the old card back in and used the new cable that i had bought to see if maybe there was no juice coming from that port, but it worked fine. I don't know if maybe overall there wasn't enough power to run the 660 ti, but i don't know how i can could determine that. I will try another card and if it still doesn't work, then that's gotta be the issue. Keep you posted.

      -George

      Delete

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