[angelmb]

From Accelerate Your Macintosh

ATI guys say:

That's our brand new mainstream product. PC & Mac compatible. With support for Apple's 30" display on both PC and Mac. Ships with Mac and Windows software in the box and should support Linux with driver download.
It has a special ROM structure and the ability to dual-boot designed into it.

It's gone out to production and boxes should be in the process of being packed. It's been announced to the channel in preparation for a public announcement. Stores aren't supposed to be listing it yet in any publications though. Web content has been prepared for it and will be live when it's officially announced.
It's AGP 4x and for Windows I believe requires a minimum of Windows 2K (XP SP2 recommended). For the Mac I think we're supporting 10.3.x minimum (Tiger recommended)... "

So you are going to be able to drive the Apple 30 inches even with an 'old' PowerMac, how cool is that?

[Agent69]

Announced as I am selling my MDD. Figures.

[SSharon]

Under $200! This does sound good.

[Lateralus]

Color me impressed.

Here I was, thinking that ATI had given up on the Mac retail market. This is good news, though not the greatest of news since this card will perform slower than the 9800 Pro which you can already find from a variety of places for around $200-225.

[Taipan]

Hi!

I wonder if any Windows users would by such a card if they can get a Radeon 9800 Pro for little more than half the price.

[jhogarty]

From Buy.com:

RADEON× 9600 PRO PC & MAC EDITI 256MB AGP - 100-435060

Our Price: $196.99
Temporarily Sold Out.

Might have to pick me up one of these. And who cares about Windows users?

J.

[Todd Madson]

How would this card fare against the 9600 XT that came in my G5 dual?
It sounds like a similar card but with more memory. Does anyone have the details?

[Lateralus]

The only two things that separate any 9600 series card are clock speeds and memory. So, it'd probably outperform your 9600 XT in a few things, because of the larger memory. Once overclocked to 9600 XT speeds though, it'd be better on the whole.

Bottom line is that it really isn't worth the upgrade unless you're driving large displays.

[Agent69]

Originally Posted by Lateralus

Here I was, thinking that ATI had given up on the Mac retail market.

Once Apple switches to Intel processors there won't be anymore "Mac specific" cards, since they should work out of the box (provided drivers are available). Personally, I think this will be a real boon to PowerMac users.

[Al G]

Originally Posted by Agent69

Personally, I think this will be a real boon to PowerMac users.

Big understatement.

[Lateralus]

I'll reserve my stance on the future of Mac video cards until we know exactly how proprietary Apple can make an Intel Mac.

[polendo]

From a PC perspective those cards look like 3 years old now. AGP 4x as maximum is a rare thing on an AGP PC card (they scale down 8,4,2 pending on the mobo) .. practically all are now 8x, PCI Express or the old PCI.

I bought last month an ATI x700 Pro for my PC gaming rig and sincerely didn't saw a 9600 or 9800 on display. Those are considered a past generation video card, then again it doesn't mean they are "old". They do in fact perform well in pc games. As a reference my x700 cost me 199 USD. Having said that, I do not think it is a good deal for a pc user, since that card has a price of a current generation video card with specs of an older one.

[gizzard]

Originally Posted by Agent69

Once Apple switches to Intel processors there won't be anymore "Mac specific" cards, since they should work out of the box (provided drivers are available). Personally, I think this will be a real boon to PowerMac users.

Not true. The situation will remain as it is now. ATI's workload will likely increase because they will have to perform QA for 2 platforms.

[danman]

I agree. As it is now, AGP on the PC is AGP on the Mac platform. The hardware is virtually the same. Drivers will still be completely different as they are written for different OS's.

[Link]

The situation may or may not change with mac video cards depending on the firmware apple decides to use in the end...

BIOS: same selection of video cards as PCs
OF: same selection as currently available (you'd be able to stick a current mac video card into an intel mac)
EFI: who knows.

That's what it comes down to

[elvis2000]

Originally Posted by polendo

From a PC perspective those cards look like 3 years old now. AGP 4x as maximum is a rare thing on an AGP PC card (they scale down 8,4,2 pending on the mobo) .. practically all are now 8x, PCI Express or the old PCI.

I bought last month an ATI x700 Pro for my PC gaming rig and sincerely didn't saw a 9600 or 9800 on display. Those are considered a past generation video card, then again it doesn't mean they are "old". They do in fact perform well in pc games. As a reference my x700 cost me 199 USD. Having said that, I do not think it is a good deal for a pc user, since that card has a price of a current generation video card with specs of an older one.

But as you know... the 9800 is still well within current generation's high-performance range.

[Link]

You can get a 9800 pro and flash it over for a lot less..
http://www.directron.com/sa9800pro128mb.html

Granted that, the flashing process is still one with risks, it's usually going to go over just fine but some people aren't fine with that one.

[polendo]

Originally Posted by elvis2000

But as you know... the 9800 is still well within current generation's high-performance range.

I beg to differ. Don't get me wrong, the 9800 was considered a beast of a video card. I wouldn't question it if we were in 2003. Two generations have passed already and video card reviews (at least in Anandtech) do not even list the benchmarks of the 9800 series cards. For example the 9800 (pro 256) core clock speed and RAM clock speed are going at 380/700 mhz respectively with 8 pixel pipelines. The current generation of ATI high performance video cards are hitting 520/1120 with 16 pixel pipelines. If you pc game it means alot, otherwise its a waste of money.

By the way, I'm talking here about desktop PC video cards.

[Mac_happy]

ATI says they have never heard about this card? the have 9600 Pro card that is 1-dvi and 1-vga connections but the 30"apple display requires 2-dvi connects?

So whats up? Are you blowing hot air here?

Originally Posted by angelmb

From Accelerate Your Macintosh

ATI guys say:

That's our brand new mainstream product. PC & Mac compatible. With support for Apple's 30" display on both PC and Mac. Ships with Mac and Windows software in the box and should support Linux with driver download.
It has a special ROM structure and the ability to dual-boot designed into it.

It's gone out to production and boxes should be in the process of being packed. It's been announced to the channel in preparation for a public announcement. Stores aren't supposed to be listing it yet in any publications though. Web content has been prepared for it and will be live when it's officially announced.
It's AGP 4x and for Windows I believe requires a minimum of Windows 2K (XP SP2 recommended). For the Mac I think we're supporting 10.3.x minimum (Tiger recommended)... "

So you are going to be able to drive the Apple 30 inches even with an 'old' PowerMac, how cool is that?

[ChrisF]

Originally Posted by Mac_happy

ATI says they have never heard about this card? the have 9600 Pro card that is 1-dvi and 1-vga connections but the 30"apple display requires 2-dvi connects?

So whats up? Are you blowing hot air here?

The 30" display requires what is called a dual-link DVI connection. It is not two physical connections to the card.

[Al G]

It's a new version of the 9600 that hasn't been released yet. The people you spoke to at ATI either don't know about it or have been told not to talk about it until it's officially released.

And as has already been pointed out, dual-link DVI is a single DVI port which has extra internal connections which aren't wired in regular DVI. One port and one cable but it's different than regular DVI.

[Link]

A better analogy for "Dual link" DVI is like this:

Regular DVI = Half Link = Not all the pins on the DVI port are used for anything
Dual Link DVI = Full Link = all the pins on the DVI Port are used for something.

Simple nuff

[Clive]

Originally Posted by Agent69

Once Apple switches to Intel processors there won't be anymore "Mac specific" cards, since they should work out of the box (provided drivers are available). Personally, I think this will be a real boon to PowerMac users.

Dream on. I don’t know where people are getting this crap from - did Apple say that, did ATI say that? No. Everyone seems to think that because Apple may use Intel processors then everything will be level in the PC world, all the periferals will just work. Think again, moble phones and hand-helds use Intel chips, but they can't run these cards either!

Also, look at what is happening right now with the Intel development machines that Apple is putting out to developers. It should have been obvious to anyone right from the start that these boxes are just PCs in a G5 case. Apple isn't going to build custom machines just so it can test a new OS, it's been testing on standard PCs all the way along.

But, if they were just going to release standard PCs why are they going to take the best part of two years to do it? Because they aren't. Apple will release it's own specific boards, that will most likely be as different to PC boards now as the G5 is

[Agent69]

If you look very closely at my statement, I said "should work". There is no reason, at this time, to think standard PC graphics cards will not work in a Mactel but since there is a possibility they won't, I said "should work". And your moble phone point is idiotic since moble phones are likely to use Intel ARM processors, not x86 processors, and they do not have PCIe or AGP slots in any case.

Get off your high horse.

[DrBoar]

So we are going to pay the price of a midrange card like the nvidia 6600GT to get what now is alow end gaming card like the 9600. Have we not have similar deals before
As a pure mac card for 130-150 dollars it would not be to bad...

[Todd Madson]

Thought.

How does the 9600 pro compare with the 9600 XT Pro?
I wasn't initially excited since I have already have a 128 meg 9600 XT in my G5.
Is there substantive improvements here?

I wish it was easier to figure out which cards were faster than the others
since the numbering scheme ATI and nVidia use aren't exactly intuitive.

It's obvious the X800 and 850 are the higher-end gaming cards to get but

[polendo]

Originally Posted by DrBoar

So we are going to pay the price of a midrange card like the nvidia 6600GT to get what now is alow end gaming card like the 9600. Have we not have similar deals before
As a pure mac card for 130-150 dollars it would not be to bad...

Exactly Doc.. very well written. From a PC side doesn't make sense to buy this card, since a current generation mid range video card can be found for that amount of money.

[Al G]

Originally Posted by Clive

did Apple say that, did ATI say that? No. Everyone seems to think that because Apple may use Intel processors then everything will be level in the PC world, all the periferals will just work.

Apple didn't officially say MacIntels would use regular PC video cards. They haven't officially said much of anything detailing future systems--they never do until they're released. However, some Apple engineers did say that. Obviously, those engineers don't officially speak for Apple and certainly don't have the final say in how things are done, not to mention lots of things could change along the way.

But, the biggest obstacle to PC video cards in a Mac--the endian difference between x86 and PowerPC--is going away when Macs switch to Intel. Of course we will still need Mac drivers, but at least ROM flashing monkey business to reverse byte order will no longer be necessary.

[metallimacman]

Originally Posted by Todd Madson

Thought.

How does the 9600 pro compare with the 9600 XT Pro?
I wasn't initially excited since I have already have a 128 meg 9600 XT in my G5.
Is there substantive improvements here?

I wish it was easier to figure out which cards were faster than the others
since the numbering scheme ATI and nVidia use aren't exactly intuitive.

It's obvious the X800 and 850 are the higher-end gaming cards to get but

Other than clock speeds (XT is clocked faster btw) and memory size they don't differ much performance wise. There would be no reason to go from a 128 MB 9600 XT to this 256 MB 9600 Pro unless you need to run a 30" Apple Cinema Display. Otherwise, would be a waste of your money and time. Only a 9800 Pro or x800 XT would give you a noticable game perfomance increase over your current card.

[a2daj]

Unless the Mac retail 9600 Pro is actually clocked at the PC retail 9600 Pro speeds. Anyone else remember the thread where folks discovered the 9600 XTs were clocked at the same speed the PC 9600 Pros were while the OEM Mac 9600 Pros were clocked significantly slower?

[a2daj]

It's officially announced now:

http://www.ati.com/products/radeon96...mac/index.html

According to the product comparison page
http://apps.ati.com/ATIcompare/


The Mac Retail Radeon 9600 Pro is clocked at 270 Memory/400 GPU. The PC Radeon 9600 Pro is clocked at 300 Memory/400 GPU. I don't recall the specs for the Mac OEM Radeon 9600 Pro.

[MindFad]

Will this new 9600 work in Quicksilvers? This would be a nice upgrade to my current 9000 in my dual 800.

[Lateralus]

Yes.

[Eug Wanker]

Nice to see, and it's nice that it's fanless, but it's still an old GPU. One can only hope that ATI will do this for future top end releases too. (Apple will have to incorporate PCIe into their Power Macs though of course.)

BTW, here is a review: ATI Radeon 9600 Pro Mac & PC Edition: One Card for All

[Todd Madson]

Seeing that at the time my G5 2.5 was made, it was a top of the line machine
wasn't the 9600 XT that came with it already including 30" monitor support? That
was my understanding anyway.

The extra 128 megs of memory would be nice for large-ish images but not
imperative. Humm...

[a2daj]

ATI Radeon 9600 XTs could not run the 30" displays. No Dual link DVI. The first display that could handle the 30" ACD at the native resolution was the GeForce 6800 series which came out after the dual 2.5s started shipping. The first ATI card which could run it was the Radeon X800 XT.

[Kenneth]

I will probably get one for my MDD, then I need the $99 DVI-to-ADC adapter as well.

BTW, I'm using the stock Radeon 9000 Pro 64MB right now.

[Leonard]

Originally Posted by Todd Madson

Seeing that at the time my G5 2.5 was made, it was a top of the line machine
wasn't the 9600 XT that came with it already including 30" monitor support? That
was my understanding anyway.

It's the OEM Radeon 9650 that runs a 30" monitor.

News is that prices are going to come down. The X800 is supposed to come down in price by $100 US according to http://www.macworld.com/news/2005/08/19/ati/index.php

[MindFad]

Originally Posted by Lateralus

Yes.

Holy crap. Sign me up! I think I'll pick one up when I get a little extra cash. Of course, I'll need a new monitor, too, but that's cool. I sure got screwed with this 17" CRT ADC.

[Lateralus]

Nah, I think it's probably the most beautiful monitor Apple ever designed. I never had luck of getting to own one, you have.

[angelmb]

Originally Posted by Lateralus

Nah, I think it's probably the most beautiful monitor Apple ever designed. I never had luck of getting to own one, you have.

I agree

[MindFad]

Originally Posted by Lateralus

Nah, I think it's probably the most beautiful monitor Apple ever designed. I never had luck of getting to own one, you have.

Oh, I agree. I think it looks great. It is indeed a sweet monitor. I'm just restricted as to which cards I can use it with on my current Mac. But know that I can connect it to a future X850 XT Power Mac? That's heartening, at least.

[Agent69]

I think that the 17" CRT ADC is a beautiful monitor. I bought one along with a G4 Cube. They were beautiful together.

[Todd Madson]

X-800 going down $100? That I would be interested in.

[gangster]

Originally Posted by Todd Madson

X-800 going down $100? That I would be interested in.

Is the x800xt actually dropping another $100? I see it at Buy.com for about $360 using a coupon discount, and this is almost $100 lower than Newegg. Did the price drop already?

And...the 9800pro 256mb is $210 after the stilll current $50 rebate.

I don't get the excitement over the 9600 pro dual platform edition, not for almost $200 and compared to the above. What are the core/mem speeds on this 9600 pro as well? This varied ALOT on the pc versions and made quite a difference.

[a2daj]

Yes, the price has dropped on the X800 already. It's just taking awhile for some stores to readjust their prices.

[angelmb]

Originally Posted by gangster

I don't get the excitement over the 9600 pro dual platform edition, not for almost $200 and compared to the above.

Well, I guess the main reason is being able to attach a 30 inches to an 'old' PowerMac AGP 4X, X800 XT is not G4 friendly. Of course if you have a G5 you better get the more powerful AGP 8X card.

[Kenneth]

It looks like ATI doesn't offer any trade-up program for the R9600 Pro card.

[legacyb4]

Either way, it's got to be better than the default Nvidia 5200 that shipped with my G5...

[gangster]

now i get it, G4 support!