Q4000 & GTX470 with built in MPro power

[Blase Theodore]

A: unlikely even in latest MacPro you could get away with it but can’t honestly say no for sure. I run my macPro with 470, Redrocket (I assume comparable to a gfx card in power needs) ATTO card, DL 3d+ card and 3 hard drives. Its possible that just the 470 and 4000 would work, but seriously doubt you’d get a full system to work.

B: There’s no advantage to doing this. The 4000 would act as the GUI card and wouldn’t be used for processing. Unless you threw in a 470/4000/120 combo, but really unlikely at that point. And at $1k, that 4000 card is not a deal in my book. Better off buying an expansion chassis and a 2nd 470 (even the cheap 40Gb/s one would be money better spent.)

[Margus Voll]

If you have Resolve dedicated machine then i see no point using 4000 as gui gpu.
Specially when you have limited power options.

—

Margus

https://iconstudios.eu

[Sascha Haber]

I see the point very much using Smoke, Nuke, Scratch, Premiere, AE, Motion and especially when dual booting to windows for games.
The Q4000 is the slimest Apple suported Fermi card.
Luxury, yes, weak compared to the 470( not even half that fast ) but it has a mini display port which works with the nice Apple Cinema display.
So its either that one, or buying a Kanex C247DL
Dual-link DVI To Apple LED Cinema Display 27-Inch 2560×1440… for another 150 bucks.
And replugging the screen all the time.

A slice of color…

DaVinci 8.0.1 OSX 10.7
MacPro 5.1 2×2,4 24GB
RAID0 8TB eSata 6TB
GTX 470 / GT 120
Extreme 3D+ WAVE

http://www.saschahaber.com

[Francois Driessen]

a. Do I assume correctly that you’re running only one card? the 470 for GUI & GPU in one?
External power might be the way to go. I don’t want to fry anything or have a half-breathing setup.

b. I hear ya for Resolve. But the Q4000 will definitely work its magic when we flip to Cinema4D / AE and other apps that does not look at the GPU. – This machine has to do it all!

[Francois Driessen]

Yup. That’s exactly it.
This machine will be used for AE, PPro, C4D a lot.

My current setup is a 5770 for GUI, and Q4000 for GPU. But at the price of the flashed 470 / 480 an extra 250 CUDA cores are tempting for sure. That means I’ll slide the Q4000 into GUI in slot2 and 470 / 480 into slot1 for GPU.

I know the 480 would definitely require external power. But I’m kind-of still stuck on the question if I could scavenge power for the 470 internally. Thoughts here are welcome between the 470 & 480 since they have the same amount of cores, right?

Anyone using the Newegg GPU power box? What’s your wiring plan? I don’t want to leave my box open.

Francois

FireTrigger Inc.
https://firetrigger.com

[Chad Terpstra]

I’m curious about this too. I have the 5780 in my machine now and am ordering a GTX 470. They both require two power cables to run as far as I know. What external power options are there? Is it safe to simply get another power supply and run the cables in? I don’t really want to downgrade to the GT 120 unless it’s the only option. Thanks!

[Chad Terpstra]

Anyone use this?
https://www.tigerdirect.com/applications/SearchTools/item-details.asp?EdpNo=5681047&sku=V261-0222

The alternative would be this:
https://www.tigerdirect.com/applications/SearchTools/item-details.asp?EdpNo=7300825&CatId=82

In my case the peak power of the two cards combined is around 400W when Apple’s site says that PCIe slots output up to 300W. However I think that means from the board itself and not from the power supply directly as with these cables. Also the GUI card shouldn’t be nearly maxed out.

Is this option safe to try?