ATI Radeon HD 2600 XT DVI channel 1 faulty, need new card but which 1?

[jules1066]

My card has gone faulty and I am looking around for a replacement. I seem to have read that 10.5.6 causes some of the cards to work harder and not at full frame speed. 10.5.7 and snow are supposed to correct his I believe.

My machine is
Model Name: Mac Pro
Model Identifier: MacPro3,1
Processor Name: Quad-Core Intel Xeon
Processor Speed: 2.8 GHz
Number Of Processors: 2
Total Number Of Cores: 8
L2 Cache (per processor): 12 MB
Memory: 10 GB
Bus Speed: 1.6 GHz
Boot ROM Version: MP31.006C.B05
SMC Version: 1.25f4

The following is what I have come up with

Which I Think means I can run the new ATI Radeon HD 4870 Graphics Upgrade Kit for Mac Pro (Early 2009 or Early 2008) - Apple Store (U.S.)

but that is well expensive

was thinking this might be good
NVIDIA GeForce 8800 GT

or this older model

ATI RADEON 3870 512MB 16x PCIe Video Card f... (100-435928) at OWC

OR
will this card work in my macpro?
XFX GeForce 8800GT 512MB DDR3 PCIE Dual DVI TV 600/1.8

Can anyone offer some advice please. I have two HP w2228h HDMi 22" displays but I don't do any gaming.

 

[heiko_s]

will this card work in my macpro?
XFX GeForce 8800GT 512MB DDR3 PCIE Dual DVI TV 600/1.8
displays but I don't do any gaming.

You won't be able to use a normal GeForce card for PCs unless its firmware chip is big enough (you'll need one with a 128K chip, while most PC cards come with a 64K one) in order to flash it with a firmware obtained from a geniue Apple 8800gt (64-bit EFI Version in case of a 2008 Mac Pro).

Further info can be found here.

 

[jules1066]

You won't be able to use a normal GeForce card for PCs unless its firmware chip is big enough (you'll need one with a 128K chip, while most PC cards come with a 64K one) in order to flash it with a firmware obtained from a geniue Apple 8800gt (64-bit EFI Version in case of a 2008 Mac Pro).

Further info can be found here.

Thanks for the info. I had seen the info on the 64k /128k chip but I couldn't find that information out about the board from the specs on the websites I have seen it on.
Have to look around or the best prices now.

Also found this GeForce 9600GT InsanelyMac Forum > GeForce 9600 GT natively supported in Mac OS X 10.5.6