[ReggieX]

http://www.coffeehaus.com/radeon8500.html

if you want my own instructions that are better than his, I'll post them. Once again DO NOT PLUG IN THE MONITOR during the initial flashing. That'll screw you more than anything.

[lenox]

I'd just like to add another success story to this thread, as well as thank everyone else who has contributed.

I won an auction for a pc ati-built radeon 8500 (the seller specified 'NOT LE' and 3.6ns ram) for about $50. When the card arrived, I gave it a good once-over to make sure it was ati-built and looked the same as what I had seen on the web.

Then, I prepared my mac (mdd dual 867 with geforce 4 mx prior gpu) by booting into os 9, selecting "mac os 9 base only" as the extension set, and putting the ROM UPDATER in the Startup Items folder. I rebooted the machine, and waited for about 10 minutes. After turning the machine off and plugging the monitor into the VGA port, I rebooted, holding down shift so as not to flash the card again. No picture.

So, I replaced the geforce 4, and booted, holding down 'shift'. I removed the ROM UPDATER, and replaced it with the ROM RESTORE flasher. I disabled any reference to NVIDIA in my extensions manager, and installed the latest ATI drivers (October 2002, I think).

After going through the motions once more, I plugged the monitor into the DVI port of the Radeon using the Apple-supplied DVI->VGA adaptor.

Success! I got picture. I played a bit with the ATI display control panel, and the Monitors control panel. I noticed that I had fewer refresh rate options than I did before, but this was fixed by putting the monitor back on the VGA port of the card.

Next, I booted into Jaguar, and installed the drivers there. Worked like a charm. Rebooted, and zapped the PRAM about 4-5 times. I played a few games, to test the performance...later, I finally ran the ROM UPDATER in os 9. Updated just fine.

From my experience, games ran with a very noticeable performance and quality boost. DVDs ran just fine, as well. Quartz ran fine as well, no real performance gain felt...

I did, however, notice one somewhat annoying thing. Colors in some games that used the card were incredibly....high-contrast, for lack of better term. Actually, I only noticed it in the japanese game 'GetAmped' (can be obtained from macgamefiles.com for testing), and the only 2d static screen in the RealMYST demo. GetAmped shows it very noticeably, with the texture colors not blending at all and seeming WAY too saturated.

I have a feeling this has to do with big-endian vs. small-endian color spaces and references. Does anyone have any info about this? It's not such a big problem, and only seems to crop up in games that aren't really geared for hardcore 3D performance. Q3, RTCW, and other games based on that engine run like a DREAM. UT2k3 had no problems at all, and also ran very well. I even tested various console and arcade emulators' fullscreen OpenGL mode, and they ran just fine, with no color problems.

So...chalk this up as another overall success! The color thing really doesn't bother me, as most people would never see it... and if they did, it really wouldn't be a "deal-breaker".

My next step is to clock the card up a bit, as it's running at the default 250/275. First thing I will do is put it up to 275/275 and move up from there, does that seem to be working out for everyone? Thanks.

[bstone]

Look at my signature for my experience with the 128mb version.

[severance]

New to the forums.

The startup folder trick does work like a charm. One thing that was neglected to mention is you want to place the RADEON 8500 Firmware RESTORE in the startup folder and reboot using THAT utility. Using the other file gave zero results.

So not I have:

G4/400 (AGP Graphics)
1 GB PC133 CL3 3-3-3
1 x Hitachi DeskStar 7200 RPM 120 GB HDD
1 x Western Digital 7200 RPM WD1000 (100 GB)
1 x Pioneer DVR-104
ATI Radeon 8500 (NOT LE) 64mb DDR SDRAM AGP (was PeeCee, Now a Mac)

Next on my laundry list is extracting the zip drive and modding that slot to accommodate a 52x24x52x10x CDRW/DVD-ROM drive (for faster CDR/W burning pleasure).

May or may not go with a faster processor. Not sure what the speed limit is on the board or the zif socket.

If anyone happens to know, I can go from there. Once done, I plan on selling this on eBay and using the money to buy 2 more G4's to mod and give a boob job to. And some plastic surgery.

[severance]

Originally posted by ReggieX:
http://www.coffeehaus.com/radeon8500.html

if you want my own instructions that are better than his, I'll post them. Once again DO NOT PLUG IN THE MONITOR during the initial flashing. That'll screw you more than anything.

It will?

I had a PL150M attached during the flash...my wife hasn't mentioned anything yet about it being f*cked...

In my experience (and yes, I do have quite a bit of experience with monitors, CRT & LCD), it may be probable for a signal to stray up the 15-pin D-sub cable to the monitor, but as to whether it has ever destroyed a monitor? I'm not quite certain I'd believe that fable so quickly.

Again, It theoretically could happen. But I think there's more chance of a spaceship from some alien race crashing on you while walking down the street in stream boots.

But who knows, right?

[gvmelbrty]

I just snagged a video card from e-bay that the seller *claimed* is a Radeon 8500 *Mac Edition* pulled from a Mac. But I'm not sure this is true.

Can someone plz post good close-up pics (front & back) of a Radeon 8500 MAC EDITION? Either a retail box version and/or an OEM one that came with your Mac?

After reading this entire thread, I can't see any other way to positively identify this card as a true Mac Edition.

The 8500 I got is working, except that now Marine Aquarium 2.04 & 2.06 is freezing my Mac (G4 400 Gigabit, OSX 10.28) five seconds after display, requiring a reset.

The only pic I can find of a true Mac Edition is on xlr8yourmac.com (http://www.xlr8yourmac.com/Graphics/radeon_8500/), but it's not close enough to be able to tell anything.

I've been to ATI's web site where they talk about identifying your card (http://www.ati.com/support/identify/...phProduct.html). But none of the methods worked. The ID sticker on the back of my card is missing, therefore no "102" number. (I can see the glue residue where it was once located. Why was it removed? Another reason I'm suspicious.) ATI tech support told me: "The only way you can identify the card is by the 102 P/N which is located on a white sticker on the card."

Thxs, tom

[ReggieX]

Originally posted by severance:
but as to whether it has ever destroyed a monitor? I'm not quite certain I'd believe that fable so quickly.

Not screw the monitor (that's next to impossible), screw the card. I should have written that better.

CoffeeHaus' instructions were not great, I learned the unplug your monitor tip from here and feel the need to repeat is as often as possible. Some folks earlier in the thread flashed their cards with their monitor plugged in, and it gave them phantom monitor problems, etc. Better safe than sorry.

Remember all: "RADEON 8500 Firmware RESTORE" is the one to do FIRST, with the OS9 boot disk set to have minimal Extensions and the monitor UNPLUGGED.

[bstone]

Originally posted by ReggieX:

Remember all: RADEON 8500 Firmware RESTORE is the one to do FIRST, with the OS9 boot disk set to have minimal Extensions and the monitor UNPLIGGED.

I always unplig my monitor.

[ReggieX]

Originally posted by bstone:
I always unplig my monitor.

Good! You don't want to see the nightmares I've had over on MacOSX.com forums!

[Langdon]

Has anyone found these flash-able cards for sale recently? I found a few but they seem to be the LE versions. At this point I would be happy with the 64MB version so I am not just looking at the 128 versions.
I found this reseller but I can not tell from the info given if it is an LE or not. http://www.magic-pro.com/product/ati/8500.htm

please PM me if you have any info

[lenox]

I found mine on ebay quite easily. They're still readily available there. Mine even said "NOT LE!", hehe.

[ReggieX]

Originally posted by Langdon:
I found this reseller but I can not tell from the info given if it is an LE or not. http://www.magic-pro.com/product/ati/8500.htm

The 275/275 clock speeds are not LEs. What's the price?

[Langdon]

Originally posted by ReggieX:
The 275/275 clock speeds are not LEs. What's the price?

About $60 in USD. So this one can be flashed for sure?

[lenox]

That sounds like the card I got (which worked splendidly, check my earlier post). Do you happen to know the speed in nanoseconds of the ram?

I think 3.6-4 is acceptable, not sure.

[EthoX]

I have the above, and would like to "flash" it as well. 1. can i get it's last firmware update, which is 1.2, and simply place it into the StartupItems folder and go that route. And/Or 2. is there a hack for this card to give me just the simple performance boost in general. since i am not interested in purchasing a new card, i plan to upgrade in Feb-04, i thought that someone has figured out something. any advice will be appreciated.

B&W 450 UWSCSI /Rage Pro 128 Model

[lenox]

That was a very confusing post. What two things are you contemplating?

[EthoX]

1. Is there a firmware for this board that I have, the current is 1.0, but i see there is a 1.2, can I flash-upgrade it by placing it in the StartupItems folder in X, or do I need to have 9 installed, which I don't, at all. And/Or 2. Is there a hack for mine, to get quartz up, so to speak. I hope that I am clearer?