*best* Video card for a XServe G5

[bd1308]

For whatever reason, I am using a XServe G5 as a desktop system. It's cool, loud, keeps my heating bill down --- whatever. My question is there has *got* to be someone who knows if there ever was a PCI card made for a mac that supported Quartz Extreme or Core Image (or whatever OpenGL Acceleration is) cause my card literally doesn't support anything except slinging pixels on the screen.

 

[MacJunky]

Short answer:

Core Image: No.

Quartz Extreme: Not with PCI.

Long answer:

Core Image: No.(as far as I am aware)

Quartz Extreme.... perhaps. There is a hack to enable quartz extreme if the AGP version of the card supported it. but IDK if it still works with later Mac OS versions and whatnot so YMMV.

But you are likely going to have to flash a card for it unless I am mistaken.

You can have OpenGL and no QE or CI, btw.

 

[Gorgonops]

Actually... completely speaking out of my posterior, you *might* be able to get Core Image using a flashed GeForce 5200FX. (or possibly better.) The AGP-bus check affected "Quartz Extreme" cards, but the rumor at least is that if a card looks like it's Core Image compatible that check isn't enforced.

Of course, you'll ultimately be limited by the bus speed of the card. I've never even heard of a PCI-X video card, so the very best you're going to get is 66mhz 32 bit PCI transfer speeds, same as a B&W G3.

 

[MacJunky]

Ah, yes that might be the best option. But that said, a GF 5200FX is a pretty miserable card. the GF6200 (non-turbocache(turbocache cards are worse IIRC)) is already complete garbage.

*shrug*

Best to get a different computer. This reminds me of cloud trying to use an xserve for desktop tasks.

 

[mcdermd]

I run a flashed,dual VGA 5200FX in my Xserve G5 and it does support Core Image. But I haven't used it since the initial install.

 

[bd1308]

Yeah -- I got this machine for $100 so I really cant complain. It's a awesome machine, and it fits neatly under my computer desk with my other 1U equipment in my condo.

mcdermd: If you happen to have more info on this --- that would be awesome. I'm not doing anything like video editing or gaming -- it's more for smoother OSX things, and getting hardware acceleration working for watching H.264 movies (not HD). Mostly, I use it for running X11 applications via X11Forwarding from my i7 xen machine or my laptop.

 

[bd1308]

What about this guy?

http://www.ebay.com/itm/Apple-Mac-ATi-Radeon-9250-128MB-PCI-VIDEO-Card-Model-109-A27531-00-Xserve-G5-/170971841204?pt=PCC_Video_TV_Cards&hash=item27ceb742b4

I've been watching this for quite some time now, and if it may work with CI/QE support, i'll go ahead and buy it.

 

[Gorgonops]

What about this guy?

According to the official requirements for Core Image any Radeon revision less than the 9550-9600 is a no go. The 9250 is a revised/die-shrunk 8500 so it ain't gonna help you.

(I'm guessing the card you have in your Xserve now is the lightweight Radeon 7000-based model that Apple stuck in the machines as the cheapest option? For the record 2D acceleration and straight-up OpenGL *does* work even on those. If your one nagging goal was to play GLQuake on your Xserve the 9250 would be a decent step-up: I have an R7000 out of an Xserve G5 in my B&W G4 and for OpenGL it's barely half again faster than the stock Rage 128. But that doesn't help you with the OS X interface candy, of course.)

To be honest I have to sort of question why you settled on an Xserve G5 as the ideal machine to use as a X-terminal, since even the weakest Intel Core Duo-class machine will provide better performance with less drama. It's not hard to lay your hands on an old Dell or whitebox with a Core Duo 2 for less than $100, after all. But, eh. OS X makes everything, er, better? (Even when it's an old version on iffy hardware with dwindling-to-nothing software support, right?)

 

[mcdermd]

There's a reason I'm retiring my dual G5 Xserve from service.

 

[Gorgonops]

I suppose in the G5's defense it was a pretty awesome machine in 2004. But 2004 was a long time ago.

 

[ClassicHasClass]

Still getting mileage out of mine. But the quad is a little more amenable to desktop duty than the Xserve, natch.

 

[mcdermd]

Using a G5 with 10.5 Server as a web server and mail server kind of sucks as you have to manually build all of your updates for Apache, amavisd, spam assassin, clamav, etc. I'm moving it all to a Ubuntu machine mostly for the automated updates.

 

[Gorgonops]

You could always install Teh Linux on the G5, but that's asking for a whole different category of pain and suffering. Outside of IBM mainframe hardware and the embedded space PPC Linux is in sort of an iffy state right now.

 

[mcdermd]

I just snagged a blade in my brother's old IBM chassis and loaded it with Ubuntu 12.04 Server. Sadly, even though it's an old netburst machine, it performs much better than the G5 with 10.5 Server and all security updates come through automatically. Package upgrades are simple. Using the Xserve for Internet-facing services just wasn't practical anymore.

 

[ClassicHasClass]

You know, when I was a system administrator, we compiled our own software from source (because we had SPARCs, RS/6000s, x86 and PA-RISC), and we LIKED IT.

 

[Gorgonops]

Sadly, even though it's an old netburst machine, it performs much better than the G5 with 10.5 Server

It might be interesting to slap a PPC Linux on the Xserve and do a bake off. OS X has some deep-seated (and well documented) architectural issues that make it a *lousy* server platform. (For instance, "fork" takes four times longer than it does on Linux and its threading performance is similarly lousy, leading to a situation were programs like MySQL scale approximately *eight times better* on Linux than OS X on the same hardware.) If your benchmark is Netburst-based hardware the Xserve just *might* pull off a win.

Granted, life is probably too short to waste your time on things like that. (Although there are some perfectly stable/boring distributions like Debian that still have PPC versions and should work just like Ubuntu as long as the software you want is available in a Debian repository.)

 

[mcdermd]

You know, when I was a system administrator, we compiled our own software from source (because we had SPARCs, RS/6000s, x86 and PA-RISC), and we LIKED IT.

You know, when I was younger and didn't have two kids taking up all my time, I liked it too.

 

[ClassicHasClass]

Spawning just seems to cause all these problems. (And remember, the problem with teen pregnancy is mounting.)

 

[Gorgonops]

Personally I was getting old and cranky about compiling everything over and over again even before I had kids. Work at a company that insists on running OSes like Net/FreeBSD on *everything* and you'll burn out on the whole "type make" thing real fast.