Blue and White G3 video card flashed

[Dave040]

Hi,

I have searched and i cant find any information on flashing a pci video card for my B&W G3. I would like to put a fx5200 or any card that supports core image in it. Any information would be appreciated.

thanks

The current specs are:

950mhz powerlogix G3

1GB ram

DVD drive

usb 2.0

ATI rage 128

os 9 and 10.4.11

 

[kvanderlaag]

Easy enough. I actually just did an AGP card for someone's Sawtooth, and it was an FX5200. This assumes you have a PC that will take the card in order to do the flashing.

1) Create a Windows 98 DOS boot disk.

2) Download the current version of nvflash (http://www.softpedia.com/get/Tweak/Video-Tweak/nVFlash.shtml)

3) Place nvflash.exe and CWSDPMI.exe onto your boot floppy so that you can use them once you boot from it.

4) Download the correct firmware for your FX5200 (or whatever) from The Mac Elite (http://themacelite.wikidot.com/wikidownloads2). This will probably be under 'nVidia Modified PPC ROMs' and will correspond to the bit-width of your card's memory bus. I'm really not sure how to check this apart from looking up specs for your specific card, but the nice thing is that you haven't ruined it if you pick the wrong one the first time.

5) Save the .ROM file to your boot disk. Name it something short and easy like 'nvmac.rom'.

6) Install the video card to be flashed into the PC

7) Boot from your newly created floppy.

8) Once booted, type 'nvflash -list'

9) When it presents the list of adapters, remember the adapter number (far left) of the card you want to flash.

10) THIS IS IMPORTANT - type 'nvflash -b nvback.rom' to back up your card's existing firmware to 'nvback.rom' on the disk, in case you need to re-flash it for the PC

11) Now type 'nvflash --index=X -4 -5 -6 -j nvmac.rom' where 'X' is replaced with the number you remembered from step 9. Answer any and all questions positively, allowing it to flash the ROM. Ignore any warnings that it gives you about the GPU not matching or whatever, particularly if you're using an FX5200 ROM to flash an FX5500.

12) Shut down your PC after the flashing is complete.

13) Remove the card from the PC. Insert it into the Mac.

14) Power your B&W on, and hope you get video!

If it didn't work, pop the card back in the PC (hopefully the PC has onboard video) and try again using another display adapter to output to. As long as the card is inserted in a PCI slot, nvflash will see it, so you can either restore your old backup ROM, or you can try another one off that list.

)

 

[H3NRY]

An FX5200 is a good card for the B&W except that OS9 support is limited to generic VGA mode. Kvanderlaag's instructions are correct. I have flashed a pair of 5200s for mine.

 

[Dave040]

Thanks for the information

I have limited experience with windows because i don't own a pc. Is there a way to do it on a mac?

If there isn't i will just have to search for a cheap PC.

 

[H3NRY]

Sorry, the flashing utility is only for PC-DOS. You can use any old PC with PCI slots, so it won't cost much. You will need a DOS boot floppy and internet access to download the utility and ROM files to the floppy. You can do that from a Mac with a USB floppy drive. Instructions are on TheMacElite website. There is an NVidia updater for OS 9, but it won't flash a PC card, the card has to be flashed to Mac first from a PC, and I have had no luck with the Mac utility at all.

 

[Nathan]

Maybe you could load a linux live-cd, contrapt a dos emulator onto it and run the flash utility? Is that even feasible, anyone???

 

[Osgeld]

dunno, maybe, the deal with dos is you need direct access to the physical hardware in every case I have done it in, layering it through high end os's and emulators does not sound wise to me

pc is needed also cause you need to have the card's bios info (addresses etc) into the systems memory, and not just anywhere but in the space bios and the system expects, the only way I know to do that (unless your some uber hacker) is have the card in place and boot from it, if you could do that from the mac, we wouldn't be having this conversation

so a trip to the thrift store may be in the future, maybe the op knows someone that has a pc, and is not scared to open it, maybe someone round here will offer to do it

 

[Nathan]

Pity that, days like this, I wish i could mail a pc to somebody. Don't have the money and like my collection. I've got three computers with supposedly nearly identical intel motherboards and chipsets. Anyway, best of luck finding a pc. Ebay is a good place to look if you want one. Either go for dirt cheap or something that's worth the price.

 

[Osgeld]

pretty much any Pentium or better pc would work, around my parts they are 4$ at the thift store

 

[ppuskari]

Yeah, get a PC to do this... I did my last pci flash for my B&W now G4 450 machine on a IBM NetVista P4 3.0 ghz machine....

Do pretty much exactly like the guy stated below and you will be fine.

FWIW I am running a NV FX6200 in my box. Yes, just like the 5200 it's only 256 colors in OS9, but it absolutely rocks in OSX with full core image and opengl suuport.

Also keep in mind that the required OSX OPENGL extensions do NOT kick in until you get to OSX 10.4.9 if I recall that correctly. Not sure if that applies to the 5200 pci flashed for mac or not. BUT defintely on the 6200. I made the mistake of turning on the option for the Extreme 2D rendering before going to 10.4.9 and oops, nothing worked and had to start over from scratch..... I could be wrong but this might also only apply if you have a G4 in there instead of G3 too...

Good luck!