FCP6… G4 graphic cards…

[Tracy Smith]

I had to work late so I didn’t get to post this, the card they put in our G4 was the 9800 pro.

[Jonathan Capra]

Im wondering which of these two cards is actually better:

1: https://eshop.macsales.com/item/ATI%20Technologies/100435068/

2: https://eshop.macsales.com/item/ATI%20Technologies/100435065/

The 9800 is more expensive, but it only has half the VRAM??

[Michael Bloodgood]

Just look at the specs. The 9800 has twice as many pipelines as the 9600. Just cause the 9600 has 256MB doesn’t mean that it could even utilize 128MB as well as the 9800.

Michael Bloodgood
Senior Editor
Horizon Entertainment Group

Ah yes, the laser fields

[Jonathan Capra]

Got those ATI Radeon 9800’s. We’ll see if they work tonight..

In the meantime, I took a followup survey for Apple on my support experience. I wrote the following:

I spoke to a sales representative in December prior to putting together a purchase proposal for upgrades to our edit suites. I saw the minimum system requirements for Final Cut Pro 6 was a 1.25 ghz G4. I had two G4’s that we wanted to keep in service, simply as cutting and tagging stations, using standard-def DV only. However it was important that project files be interoperable between workstations.

I called one of your sales reps to confirm that my G4’s would work properly with Final Cut 6 for the uses I outlined above. They confirmed it would work. I asked if there were any other factors that I was failing to take into account before purchasing copies of Final Cut Pro 6 for the G4’s. The rep said no.

We went ahead and ordered those copies along with two new MacPro workstations and associated software from a third-party vendor, for a purchase totalling $16,000 in Apple equipment and software.

When it came time to upgrading the G4’s with Leopard and Final Cut 6, I soon found the installer complaining about the video card in our machines. Nothing was mentioned about the video card during pre-sales calls, nor did I expect that it should — being that Apple and your representatives should know what video card were installed in 1.25ghz G4. One would think that if the minimum requirement is set at a 1.25ghz G4, then it would be compatible with all the hardware that shipped inside said G4.

Final Cut 6 did install, but upon attempting to run the program, it would complain about the video card again, but then crash and close upon clicking the Continue button.

When I called for assistance in the problem, the representative took a fairly apathetic attitude toward my issue. At first, he asked me if I ‘had considered purchasing another computer.’ I explained that I had purchased two brand new computers, and would have considered purchasing more if I had been warned during the pre-sales call.

He kept saying very unhelpful things like ‘I dunno.. That’s a really big upgrade…’ In the end, he reluctantly referred me to a third-party expansion card to replace the stock one that he felt might bring the machines up to minimum requirement.

But in the end, it was an online discussion group where I got the support that I needed — where other users were able to confirm that upgrading the video cards did in fact remedy the problem. But it is my strong opinion that your representative should have worked with me till the end to figure out how to resolve the issue.

I have just purchased two video card upgrades and intend to give another try at getting Final Cut Pro 6 running. Hopefully my problem will be solved, but if not I will be in touch… and hope that Apple will give me a better support experience.

[Drew Hudgins]

I’m getting the same thing. After having my Dual 2.5 G5 go down (It’s at Apple now… they had it for 24 days and it never worked since!) so I needed another mac. I bought the Dual G4 1.25GHz (FW800) and installed FCS2 with the stock config and Mac os 10.4.11. No go. It’s all the same behavior as described previously in this forum.

I started Googling and researching the cards… but I’m *really* afraid that the wrong card would
1) no work anyway
and/or
2) be my luck to fry my logic board. and *this* Mac is of course, out of warranty! I certainly don’t want any issues like that (and it seams like I’m the magnet for such issues in the past 50 days)

Would someone please tell me *exactly* which video card worked? I’m under the impression that the 9800 Pro had two configurations …? a 128 MB and a 256 MB of VRAM model? Is this correct?

Doggone, I found some on ebay… the PC cards are dirt cheap in comparison to the Mac versions (and yes, I found the “use the PC version in your Mac” article. I just don’t know if I have the spine for that. I’ve been burned so hard w/ issues that I just don’t feel at ease yet…

Thanks

Motivation is what gets you started. Habit is what keeps you going.
–Jim Ryun

[James Nielson]

FYI, i have a 9600 in my G4, and it crashes Final Cut. Only Final Cut Pro so far, though. I’ve successfully opened the rest of the suite, although i haven’t tried to do anything in it yet since i’ve only been using the G4 for conversions.

James Nielson
http://www.x-dissolve.net