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Macintosh PCI Graphics Card Database

macuserman

Well-known member
Alright so this is something I've been wanting for a while, if this exists already somewhere I haven't found it. But I wanted to make a comprehensive source for PCI based mac cards. Ultimately I will make it into a filterable table, and perhaps find a better place to host it besides a Google sheet. I also plan to make a .hda file to share that has benchmarks loaded, that can be used to benchmark some cards that I don't have access to so that the data can be more complete, and consistent. In the meantime though I figured I'd toss this out there to see if there is any interest in at least helping me fill out my table with known cards and data. If you have something you'd like to add just comment it here and I'll add it to the table, open to any suggestions. Really just wanted to make it easier to search for and know what card you have and what it's capable of when you come across it.

Even if you don't know the exact specs a start would just be even having a complete list of possible cards so that I know how big the scope is, so if you have some names I don't have and I know there are quite a few as I just started this please just shoot them here even if you don't have any other details so I can add them. All variations are wanted even if they are just rebranded, or different memory configs I think that is part of what adds to the confusion so I want to add that sort of thing as well.

Google Sheet Document
 

bakkus

Well-known member
I'd love a "minimum OS" column too see which ones work for those of us who have no love for OS X.
 

chelseayr

Well-known member
just had a quick look while on the go here and mm I only have these small suggestions;
shorten 'dual display capable' to 'dual display'
perhaps 'memory' would be 'fixed vram' instead..
and add 'max vram' column to the right of above
did pci cards always use svideo or just change that to 'tv'?
maybe 'brand' be supplemented with optional-to-use 'chipset' column

I only bought the last suggestion up because then the table could then read as eg 'villagetronic - 3dfx - mp540' rather than only 'villagetronic - mp540' which would be a simple way to indicate to a new user what sort of graphic platform the expected card was based after on

and the vram thing was because naturally some cards may have 2mb onboard but could be actually running with 4mb total which would make a difference to the actual resolution it can support
 

Powerbase

Well-known member
Plus, should flashed cards be included? Pictures of the cards, for identifying?

Its a good start and definitely something that needs to be done.
 

Phipli

Well-known member
Plus, should flashed cards be included? Pictures of the cards, for identifying?

Its a good start and definitely something that needs to be done.
As a second entry described as "flashed" and the ROM used, I think it would be interesting to see any difference :)
 

joevt

Well-known member
Plus, should flashed cards be included? Pictures of the cards, for identifying?
Flashed cards need to be included because they can exceed the capabilities of unflashed cards.

I'd love a "minimum OS" column too see which ones work for those of us who have no love for OS X.
Also need a minimum Open Firmware version. Some cards require New World ROM instead of Old World ROM.
Does the card have 2D acceleration in OS < 9 or OS X? 3D acceleration? Core Image? Quartz Extreme?

The patches at https://forums.macrumors.com/thread...l-work-in-a-beige-power-macintosh-g3.2303689/ allow using 512MB VRAM cards in Macs that have an Open Firmware version that ordinarily only supports 128MB or 256MB VRAM.
That thread also has ROMs for Nvidia cards that allow them to work in Old World Macs.
 

macuserman

Well-known member
shorten 'dual display capable' to 'dual display'
Done.
perhaps 'memory' would be 'fixed vram' instead..
and add 'max vram' column to the right of above
I wasn't entirely sure if perhaps the different sized cards would just have a duplicate entry, it will be hard to show things all on a single line for multiple ram values. I plan to do benchmarks with these and once I get that part figured out and standardized it will be difficult to indicate which size card was used for the test unless they are seperate entries. But wide open to suggestions, still figuring this thing out.
did pci cards always use svideo or just change that to 'tv'?
I'm not sure if they always use S-Video but it's the most common for sure, there are other outputs and inputs on varius cards but I figured most people wouldn't care about that particularly, but perhaps I should consider that just for completeness.
maybe 'brand' be supplemented with optional-to-use 'chipset' column

I only bought the last suggestion up because then the table could then read as eg 'villagetronic - 3dfx - mp540' rather than only 'villagetronic - mp540' which would be a simple way to indicate to a new user what sort of graphic platform the expected card was based after on
I like this idea, I'll work on getting that done.
Plus, should flashed cards be included?
We can do flashed cards, although I was trying to keep the scope to something that is attainable, but it's simple to add that as a seperate entry as we get results for those and data.
Pictures of the cards, for identifying?
I would really like to do this, but I don't know how to do that easily.. Suggestions for a better way to host this info that would easily allow me to add photos?
This site may be helpful in this endeavour.

It is a (fairly) complete list of all known PowerPC GPU ROMs, including differentiation between AGP and PCI versions.
That is super helpful! Thanks for that link.
Also need a minimum Open Firmware version. Some cards require New World ROM instead of Old World ROM.
Does the card have 2D acceleration in OS < 9 or OS X? 3D acceleration? Core Image? Quartz Extreme?
We can add this easily, and for that matter any stats that we want, but these in particular will need to be filled out by someone more knowledgeable than myself, esp the open firmware vs and new vs old world rom, where do you even find that kind of info?

I'm seeing that this project is going to be quite a big bigger than anticipated so if any of you would like to help please let me know, also please keep the ideas and info coming it's been very helpful.
 

3lectr1cPPC

Well-known member
I can mirror this sheet as an HTML table on my website if you'd like. It would make a good resource to have there! It would also be very easy to add photos into said table.

Release year of each card might be a good thing to add as well. Definitely a very useful resource in the making here!
 
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