[mfox]

Now that Apple has finally given us the speed bumps on the new G5 models, I'm trying to decide how important the PCI-X feature is, vs. a second processor. The new bottom-of-the-line dual 1.8 looks very attractive, but it lacks this feature. I know that there are still single 1.8 units to be had that have the PCI-X, and probably for the same or lower cost than the current model, or I could buy the dual 2.0 with the PCI-X, but for a fair bit more money. The question is how important the PCI-X slots are going to be to a user who does mostly standard stuff and very little graphics, music or any content creation. Or perhaps there is a way to add PCI-X capacity to a base G5 model later?

[Maflynn]

Originally posted by mfox:
Now that Apple has finally given us the speed bumps on the new G5 models, I'm trying to decide how important the PCI-X feature is, vs. a second processor.

I think you need to do some research, first off the 1.8 (old & new) is a dual processor not a single. I'm not sure how you came to believe otherwise. So you can purchase the low-end and still have a dual processor.

Secondly I'm not sure you understand what PCI-x is. Its for expansion cards and you need a pci-x card to take advantage of that. So if you do not plan on upgrading or adding a PCI-X card then that feature doesn't matter.

I think the majority of users do not have a need that PCI-X could fulfill, so all in all save your money and purchse the dual 1.8.

Mike

[mfox]

Thanks for your reply, Mike. The single 1.8 model I was referring to is the middle-of-the-line that came out with the first G5's. With regard to PCI-X, I know it's for expansion cards and I don't have any at the moment in my present desktop (a QS G4/867), but that doesn't mean there isn't something on the horizon that I'll wish I had it for. I didn't think it was an issue until I read a previous post in this forum indicating that these slots are now being put in PC's. When they start doing that in "cost-conscious" machines, you have to wonder if even the average buyer isn't going to find this feature useful.

[DaveNinja]

I went for a new dual 1.8 G5 and pasted on PCI-x. a good number of people think that things are going to go PCI-extreme instead of PCI-x. Firewire 800 is really fast now and it seems that a lot of uses of PCI cards are now being made with firewire devices instead.

[Targon]

PCI-X is completely USELESS to me an many ppl i know. We can't use our old PCI audio or SCSI cards in ANY of the new G5s due to the slots being keyed differently and being unable to accept 5 volt cards with nearly all audio cards and SCSI cards are.

Amazes me how brilliantly stupid Apple can be.

Right now my option is, stick with the current G4 an look into building a PC and move all the audio workstations into the windoze environment.

Thanks for forcing us out in the cold Apple. Way to go !!

[Dennis the Phantom Menace]

PCI-X is pretty much pointless.

[booboo]

Originally posted by Targon:
PCI-X is completely USELESS to me an many ppl i know. We can't use our old PCI audio or SCSI cards in ANY of the new G5s due to the slots being keyed differently and being unable to accept 5 volt cards with nearly all audio cards and SCSI cards are.

Amazes me how brilliantly stupid Apple can be.

Right now my option is, stick with the current G4 an look into building a PC and move all the audio workstations into the windoze environment.

Thanks for forcing us out in the cold Apple. Way to go !!

There are plenty of PCI cards that work on 3.3V.

Apple does this repeatedly, you are right.

Like the forced USB migration, and then FireWire.

But if they hadn't kick-started the move to better technologies, we'd still be using SCSI and serial ports, and ADB . . .

And floppies.

Certainly, the PC market is no leader when it comes to pushing new and better standards.

[OreoCookie]

For those complaining about the lack of compatibility towards `old' hardware, the PCI-X slots that are featured by the new PowerMacs are just the next step in PCI development.

Some PC users face the same problem, but in the PC space, PCI-X is rather a feature of big server and workstation mainboards -- which is exactly Apple's market (workstation). 3.3 V PCI cards still work in PCI-X slots, so most of the newer cards should work. Other than that, a G5 features a whole bunch of expansion connectors -- FireWire, USB2, digital sound, WiFi, Gigabit Ethernet, SATA, and you can put it (among others) a FibreChannel cards.

I don't wanna sound like a sales rep, so I'll stop here.

What hardware cannot be used in the new G5s that you actually use?

[AngryAngel]

From presonal experience in my workplace, the following PCI cards require the 5V power the G5 slot is missing:

The capture card for Hamamatsu microscope cameras.

All the (few year old) Adaptec SCSI cards that we pass down from generation to generation of computers because the ZIP and Jaz drives they connect to are so slow (buying newer cards isn't worth the cost).

The cost to Apple of being back-wards compatible by including the old power terminal would have been almost nothing.

[OreoCookie]

Originally posted by AngryAngel:
From presonal experience in my workplace, the following PCI cards require the 5V power the G5 slot is missing:

The capture card for Hamamatsu microscope cameras.

All the (few year old) Adaptec SCSI cards that we pass down from generation to generation of computers because the ZIP and Jaz drives they connect to are so slow (buying newer cards isn't worth the cost).

The cost to Apple of being back-wards compatible by including the old power terminal would have been almost nothing.

As for the microscope camera (I haven't heard of that one before), I guess there is no solution. But there are SCSI adapters out there for this, even FireWire-SCSI converters.

Also, of note, newer versions of `regular' PCI cards are 3.3 V, so your cards seem to be very old. How old are your cards?

[Targon]

Adaptec 2906 , 2930 cards r all current and will not connect to the slots on the G5 because they are physically keyed differently. I use Pro Tools with AM3 and Digi001, neither of these work in G5s either due to the slots being keyed differently.

sure u can use a hacksaw to hack a notch in the pci cards at pin 27 but no-one is gona risk that.

[OreoCookie]

Originally posted by Targon:
Adaptec 2906 , 2930 cards r all current and will not connect to the slots on the G5 because they are physically keyed differently. I use Pro Tools with AM3 and Digi001, neither of these work in G5s either due to the slots being keyed differently.

sure u can use a hacksaw to hack a notch in the pci cards at pin 27 but no-one is gona risk that.

Yes, those physical differences are the result of `voltage codes'. You shouldn'T temper with that.

How old are these cards?

[Scotttheking]

Originally posted by mfox:
I didn't think it was an issue until I read a previous post in this forum indicating that these slots are now being put in PC's.

That's PCI express, not PCI-X.
Apple probably won't discover PCI express for a while longer.

Personally, I think Apple should do what Tyan does on some of their boards. Multiple PCI-X slots, and then one 32bit 5 volt slot at the bottom. Other companies probably do the same.

If you need a 5 volt PCI card in a computer, why not just keep using a G4, or get the current dual 1.8 G5? Either of those options should solve your problem.

As for the zip / jaz drives, why not just go for USB or firewire versions, and add that cost in as part of the upgrade? Added cost, but it gets the job done.

[OreoCookie]

Originally posted by Scotttheking:
That's PCI express, not PCI-X.
Apple probably won't discover PCI express for a while longer.

Personally, I think Apple should do what Tyan does on some of their boards. Multiple PCI-X slots, and then one 32bit 5 volt slot at the bottom. Other companies probably do the same.

If you need a 5 volt PCI card in a computer, why not just keep using a G4, or get the current dual 1.8 G5? Either of those options should solve your problem.

As for the zip / jaz drives, why not just go for USB or firewire versions, and add that cost in as part of the upgrade? Added cost, but it gets the job done.

Ditto.
But on the other hand, Apple's 100-0 strategy has greatly pushed for the proliferation of FireWire and USB. Initially I thought, omitting SCSI when going from Lombard to Pismo was a mistake, I soon changed my mind.

[Targon]

Originally posted by OreoCookie:
Ditto.
But on the other hand, Apple's 100-0 strategy has greatly pushed for the proliferation of FireWire and USB. Initially I thought, omitting SCSI when going from Lombard to Pismo was a mistake, I soon changed my mind.

Well im still using SCSI hardware samplers and synthesizers with SCSI-2 to Xfer/Recv sample data, i have 4 of these devices plus the external SCSI storage devices for them all to use. This shiØT is critical if i can't have SCSI for these things and Apple can't provide a solution then ill be forced out of Macs and into Pcs.

There are a number of USB to SCSI convertors which would seem ideal at first until one investigates the details. Unfortunately, these such convertors support only 1 device on Mac OS X. However for some reason these same convertors connected to windowz machines support 7 devices exactly like narrow SCSI with their 'SCSI Emulation Mode Driver'. Obviously, the software engineers who write the drivers for these USB > SCSI convertors have run into serious issues with Mac OS X and cannot get 7 SCSI devices running off the convertor with their drivers for OS X. This is the case with both ratocsystems.com and adaptec.com who both offer USB > SCSI convertors.

Maybe if Apple stepped in to help get a driver working for 7 SCSI devices with these adapters then this would soothe a great deal of heartache. Hell make the relevant documentation publicly available and easily accessible.

As for the Audio cards, one is about 2 years old, the other is 6 months old.

Scotttheking> I agree with u. Unless Apple decides to manufacture or develop in partnership with say Adaptec or ATTO narrow PCI-X SCSI cards to provide us with at least some pathway, other wise Apple should provide 2 x PCI rev2.2 slots an 2 of the current slots UNTIL the market has solutions in place and thus provide us the migration path from PCI 2.2 expansion cards. Quite simply, Apple is losing sales point blank due to their execution of certain technologies with no solution in place.

[Link]

PCI express would be a lot more useful.

[OreoCookie]

Originally posted by Link:
PCI express would be a lot more useful.

I don't see how.
No PCI compatibility whatsoever, no cards available, ...
In maybe a year or so, this will have changed, but I don't follow your argument.

[OreoCookie]

Originally posted by Targon:
Well im still using SCSI hardware samplers and synthesizers with SCSI-2 to Xfer/Recv sample data, i have 4 of these devices plus the external SCSI storage devices for them all to use. This shiØT is critical if i can't have SCSI for these things and Apple can't provide a solution then ill be forced out of Macs and into Pcs.

There are a number of USB to SCSI convertors which would seem ideal at first until one investigates the details. Unfortunately, these such convertors support only 1 device on Mac OS X. However for some reason these same convertors connected to windowz machines support 7 devices exactly like narrow SCSI with their 'SCSI Emulation Mode Driver'. Obviously, the software engineers who write the drivers for these USB > SCSI convertors have run into serious issues with Mac OS X and cannot get 7 SCSI devices running off the convertor with their drivers for OS X. This is the case with both ratocsystems.com and adaptec.com who both offer USB > SCSI convertors.

Maybe if Apple stepped in to help get a driver working for 7 SCSI devices with these adapters then this would soothe a great deal of heartache. Hell make the relevant documentation publicly available and easily accessible.

As for the Audio cards, one is about 2 years old, the other is 6 months old.

Scotttheking> I agree with u. Unless Apple decides to manufacture or develop in partnership with say Adaptec or ATTO narrow PCI-X SCSI cards to provide us with at least some pathway, other wise Apple should provide 2 x PCI rev2.2 slots an 2 of the current slots UNTIL the market has solutions in place and thus provide us the migration path from PCI 2.2 expansion cards. Quite simply, Apple is losing sales point blank due to their execution of certain technologies with no solution in place.

It is weird that those cards are still 5 V cards ...
I have read an article in Germany's c't about the evolution of PCI and the author has had some problems finding a PCI 5 V cards. Hmmm.

As for SCSI, I haven't looked into the solutions, so I didn't know these details before. But there are SCSI PCI cards that you can simply plug in since PCI-X is backwards compatible to PCI (I have even learned today that this even works both ways!). So you can (in the worst case) buy a (regular) PCI SCSI card, e. g. an Ultra SCSI card by LMP which is listed for around 50 Euros.

Obviously SCSI160/320 cards are als available, but more expensive.

[Targon]

Originally posted by OreoCookie:
It is weird that those cards are still 5 V cards ...
I have read an article in Germany's c't about the evolution of PCI and the author has had some problems finding a PCI 5 V cards. Hmmm.

As for SCSI, I haven't looked into the solutions, so I didn't know these details before. But there are SCSI PCI cards that you can simply plug in since PCI-X is backwards compatible to PCI (I have even learned today that this even works both ways!). So you can (in the worst case) buy a (regular) PCI SCSI card, e. g. an Ultra SCSI card by LMP which is listed for around 50 Euros.

Obviously SCSI160/320 cards are als available, but more expensive.

Dude your source of info may i say , SUX!! and if your reply's have been based on referencing this source then i also say u need to research more thoroughly .

Every SCSI-1, SCSI-2 and Ultra SCSI and dare i say Ultra Wide (all narrow) cards on the market right NOW are 5 volt cards, they are all PCI rev 2.1 compliant. So it is NOT weird as u say, these cards are very very common an have been so for some years. Its not as if we are dusting off some old relics an expecting them to work in the current hardware, these are ALL current cards. using CURRENT interfaces, PCI 32bit will be obsolesced in 3 years maybe but it is not NOW!! Hell PCs still have PS2 ports for mice an keyboards an frankly this interface works better and is supported alot more than USB yet it is still around on nearly every PC board an USB has been around for like 4 years or so now.

Yes SCSI 160/320 cards are available at 10 times the cost of the card alone, have u not factored in the cost of the LVD hardware terminators and cabling that is required? LVD SCSI is very sensitive to cheep terminators an cabling, an thus quality components of this kind can cost more than the card it self. I know u didn't expand on this subject because even u point out its an expensive solution, i feel its excessive in both performance and cost thus i have ruled out this as a viable solution.

We simply cannot overnite dump an interface with a replacement when there are no alternative viable solutions on the market, thats my biggest gripe. This BS is affecting Apple's hardware sales PERIOD.

[The Placid Casual]

I use a PCI-X USB2 card... and have my eye on a few others. It is useful here.

[OreoCookie]

Originally posted by Targon:
Dude your source of info may i say , SUX!! and if your reply's have been based on referencing this source then i also say u need to research more thoroughly .

Every SCSI-1, SCSI-2 and Ultra SCSI and dare i say Ultra Wide (all narrow) cards on the market right NOW are 5 volt cards, they are all PCI rev 2.1 compliant. So it is NOT weird as u say, these cards are very very common an have been so for some years. Its not as if we are dusting off some old relics an expecting them to work in the current hardware, these are ALL current cards. using CURRENT interfaces, PCI 32bit will be obsolesced in 3 years maybe but it is not NOW!! Hell PCs still have PS2 ports for mice an keyboards an frankly this interface works better and is supported alot more than USB yet it is still around on nearly every PC board an USB has been around for like 4 years or so now.

Yes SCSI 160/320 cards are available at 10 times the cost of the card alone, have u not factored in the cost of the LVD hardware terminators and cabling that is required? LVD SCSI is very sensitive to cheep terminators an cabling, an thus quality components of this kind can cost more than the card it self. I know u didn't expand on this subject because even u point out its an expensive solution, i feel its excessive in both performance and cost thus i have ruled out this as a viable solution.

We simply cannot overnite dump an interface with a replacement when there are no alternative viable solutions on the market, thats my biggest gripe. This BS is affecting Apple's hardware sales PERIOD.

OK.
I've found a link, unfortunately in German. It is explicitly mentioned that the card is G5 compatible, the names are "LMP Acard AEC67160" (SCSI 160, ca. 140 Euro) as well as its little brother "LMP Acard AEC 6712TUM" (48 Euro). shop.cancom.de > Mac > PowerMac > choose a current G5. Scroll down.

[Targon]

Originally posted by OreoCookie:
OK.
I've found a link, unfortunately in German. It is explicitly mentioned that the card is G5 compatible, the names are "LMP Acard AEC67160" (SCSI 160, ca. 140 Euro) as well as its little brother "LMP Acard AEC 6712TUM" (48 Euro). shop.cancom.de > Mac > PowerMac > choose a current G5. Scroll down.

Again, unfortunately this source is partially incorrect.

as u can see from this pic, the AEC 6712TUM will not work in ANY G5, its a 5 volt card, just look at the single notch in the cards pinout

http://www.acard.com/eng/product/ada...c-6712tum.html

A 64 bit PCI slot like the ones in the Low end G5 have an additional notch closer to the external connector side of the pin out.

here look at this

http://www.acard.com/eng/product/ada...ultra_160.html

see the other notch i mention?

here is the G5 support list of ACARD Adapters:

http://www.acard.com/eng/product/hd_list/g5.html

As i said there are no 5 volt Narrow SCSI cards on the market nor any narrow SCSI card as PCI-X.

[OreoCookie]

Originally posted by Targon:
Again, unfortunately this source is partially incorrect.

as u can see from this pic, the AEC 6712TUM will not work in ANY G5, its a 5 volt card, just look at the single notch in the cards pinout

http://www.acard.com/eng/product/ada...c-6712tum.html

A 64 bit PCI slot like the ones in the Low end G5 have an additional notch closer to the external connector side of the pin out.

here look at this

http://www.acard.com/eng/product/ada...ultra_160.html

see the other notch i mention?

here is the G5 support list of ACARD Adapters:

http://www.acard.com/eng/product/hd_list/g5.html

As i said there are no 5 volt Narrow SCSI cards on the market nor any narrow SCSI card as PCI-X.

According to the link, the ultra_160 card does work. SCSI is backwards compatible, so if you need to connect your devices, you can do so by a simple 68-50 adapter.

[hmurchison2001]

Apple simply cannot move forward if they let legacy cards hamper them too much. PCI-X is a requirement for high end Video capture cards. I think they might have been able to add a slot for legacy PCI but I'm not sure how technical that would be.

PCI-X is a must for high end uses. No one like moving to new hardware but it's a necessity to keep the speed up.

To answer the orignal topical question. PCI-X is important if you know you're going to need a high end card. If you do graphics then RAM is more important followed by a fast HD.

[Targon]

Originally posted by OreoCookie:
According to the link, the ultra_160 card does work. SCSI is backwards compatible, so if you need to connect your devices, you can do so by a simple 68-50 adapter.

Yes but at more than 3 x the cost of an Adaptec 2906 !! Plus, LVD cabling and termination is very expensive.

[OreoCookie]

Originally posted by Targon:
Yes but at more than 3 x the cost of an Adaptec 2906 !! Plus, LVD cabling and termination is very expensive.

As far as I see, you need just one 68-50 adapter.
Yes, the controller is probably more expensive, but 130-150 Euro is still ok, isn't it?