if I go for the GTX 285 2Gb and GT 120 for resolve, how will it affect other graphic apps?

[Sascha Haber]

Sure,

first this, forget the 285 and get the 470.
Same price or less, double the performance.
Like having two Quadro 4000s
Second, your AE performance will drop, but most of AEs functions are CPU based so it doesnt matter that much.
I upgraded from a GT120 to a Quadro4000 and I dont really feel it, not in AE at least.
So essentially, the best “in the box” config today is Quadro 4000 as main card and GTX 470 (mod) as the DaVinci card using a Y-splitter.
Its a painless install on Lion, only thing you need to do is deleting the PowerManagement.kext and you are flying.
And no worry about power, I am also running 5 HDs and my MacPro5.1 is happy

A slice of color…

DaVinci 8.2.1 OSX 10.7.2
MacPro 5.1 2×2,4 24GB
RAID0 8TB
GTX 470 / Quadro 4000
Extreme 3D+

ICA Instructor
https://www.icolorist.com/Sascha.html

[Jonathon Lee]

Hey Sascha,

What power y-cable did you use? I just fried my mac pro using one… it was a 6-pin to 2x 6-pin splitter. Thank God I had apple care, but they said I toasted the power supply & proc #1… I’m on a 2009 MP.

best,

Jonathon

[Sascha Haber]

Well, I am using a German one, that works 😉

A slice of color…

DaVinci 8.2.1 OSX 10.7.2
MacPro 5.1 2×2,4 24GB
RAID0 8TB
GTX 470 / Quadro 4000
Extreme 3D+

ICA Instructor
https://www.icolorist.com/Sascha.html

[Jonathon Lee]

I drive a German car and I use German microphones, so I suppose it is time to switch the power cables too.

[Pierre Paré-blais]

Thanks Sacha, this is very helpful info I will look into.

Pierre P. Blais
Multimedia performance and VFX artist
Pierre P. Blais Productions
Perception Films
https://www.vimeo.com/user1771129

[David Pirinelli]

Jonathon Lee,

Could you elaborate on what cards you were powering and what happened?

Also how many drives and other cards you were using?

I think it would be very helpful to many people to know how much is “too much”

MVC

[Jonathon Lee]

Hey David,

The configuration was:

slot 1 – GPU GTX 285
slot 2 – GPU GT 120
slot 3 – atto 42ES
slot 4 – Avid Pro Tools HDX (audio DSP card)

I had a 6-pin Y cable that fed the GTX card connected to the 1st aux power port. Then I had another Avid supplied 6-pin to multi 4-pin cable for the Avid HDX card. The new Avid Pro Tools HDX cards also need aux power.

Then when I powered up the system it did not make the normal start up chime. I could hear a relay clicking in the machine some where, but it would never start up after that. Even with all of the boards removed. Nothing.

Machine is at apple store being resurrected via apple care. I have a feeling the problem was with the Y cable which I bought on amazon. I got greedy and wanted to run too many things in one box.

I may switch the resolve to PC anyhow as there are more GPU and MOBO options. After considering the cubix, I may be better off just spending a little more and building one of supermicro 4x GPU systems. The cubix seems to be too much money for what it does. @ around 3k you can actually find z800 systems on google, which is the price of the chassis.

– Jonathon

[Colin Travers]

Do you think it is ok/safe to get one of the 480’s available now for Mac on ebay? Just trying to decide if it’s worth the extra 100 bucks for only 40 or whatever more Cuda cores…and possible power or heat issues?

DaVinci 8.1.1 OSX 10.6.8
MacPro 12-core 5,1 2.66 Ghz
32GB RAM (x4 owc 8gb sticks)
RAID0 8TB
Nvidia GT120/GTX285
BMD Extreme3D
HDlink3D DisplayPort
Dreamcolor/Panny VT25
Tangent Wave / Wacom

Drivers:
Nvidia Cuda 4.0.50
DecklinkExtreme3D 8.6
HDLink3D DisplayPort 3.5.1

[Sascha Haber]

I would not get the 480 but the 470 if its for internal use.
Get the 480 only for the Cubix.

A slice of color…

DaVinci 8.2.1 OSX 10.7.2
MacPro 5.1 2×2,4 24GB
RAID0 8TB
GTX 470 / Quadro 4000
Extreme 3D+

ICA Instructor
https://www.icolorist.com/Sascha.html

[Reuben Fink]

I noticed you mentioned that with the 470 I would take a performance hit in after effects so you also run a Quadro 4000. I can only afford one card and I was hoping to get a cheaper card than the 4000 that would cover all the bases including AE. Is the 570 going to be that card?

OSX 10.6.4
Equipment: 2.8 ghz 8 core Intal Mac Pro, 20 gig of ram
Aps: CS5 Production Bundle, FCP Suite 2, Avid Media Composer