I've finally managed to get an Apple ATI Radeon X800XT (here, the guy seems to have some more in stock, and accepts a less costy offers than the card is listed), as an ultimate upgrade for my G5. But my joy didn't last long. Sometimes (not always) the computer hangs at startup. The grey screen shows up (refreshing slowly), even with screenbar present and that's all. Only hard reset helps. Then there's a second issue - sometimes the system boots, but there are artifacts present - in a form of horizontal, multicolour lines that float over the screen from left to right. The effect doesn't fade with time, and sometimes the display goes black for a second. When I reset the machine everything goes back to normal, no artifacts whatsoever.

I've bought the card as Radeon X800XT, but OSX (yes, it boots and works without any problem) says it's X850XT. It's connected through ADC to an acrylic Apple Cinema Display 23" running at 1920x1200.

Any help appreciated.

That's the exact same behavior I get from my flashed Radeon 9800 Pro. Are you sure your card is an Apple version?

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Damn sure. It's an AGP Pro all right, with an additional motherboard connector for USB/ADC, and with (working!) ADC connector in the back. If it's a 'fake' card then my Mac can be a 'fake' too.

Apple didn't make X850XT cards, so the entire situation is damned weird.
But I'd stress test it under OSX because artifacts are a hardware related problem.
And if it produces problems, ship it back and ask for a replacement or a refund.

The driver (which Frank and Mark both worked on) was tested out on an Apple X800XT (I ought to know, as I sent that card to Mark).
Further, several other posters here have used Apple X800XTs with no problems.

But, there is one higher card that will work with the G5 as well, a standard PC X1950Pro AGP card.
Although, since it works through a PCIe-AGP bridge chip, that card might actually be slower than an X800XT (and since its a PC card it won't display Open firmware prompts).

BTW - The card pictured on the web page you referenced definitely is an Apple card.
As long as yours looks the same, it certainly would appear that its a genuine Apple component.
The give away with flashed cards is the need for an additional power connector (usually a molex connector) as well as the lack of a n ADC power connector at the front of the card edge.
Standard AGP slots can not provide the power that an AGP Pro slot can.

[ Edited by Jim 20.04.2017 - 08:25 ]

> Apple didn't make X850XT cards

Apple also didn't make X1900GT cards, yet they do exist for the PCIe-based PowerMac G5, and were made by ATI :-)
And as you know, while not available in a retail version, Apple actually did offer the X850XT as BTO option with the early 2005 PowerMac7,3:

http://morph.zone/modules/newbb_plus/viewtopic.php?topic_id=11463&forum=11&start=6

> there is one higher card that will work with the G5 as well,
> a standard PC X1950Pro AGP card.

Wouldn't this also be true for other cards from X1xxx series?

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It could be an OEM upgrade, like Andreas said.

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So far it didn't. Youtube (when watched on MorphOS at first plays beautifully, then starts stuttering after a while up to a point where a reboot is needed - a hard reset, to be precise) works OK, OpenMark at 34478208 triangles (5 FPS) left for 10 minutes - not a single artifact. Weird, or what?

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And that could be a problem. If it's a real X850 then something might have changed and the MorphOS driver fails?

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It's the very same card, so I agree with you on that.

Yes, I own an X1900GT PCIe card, its in my Quad core G5.
I've never seen the BTO X850XT, but there is a rom available, so it probably exists (or the rom is a modified X800XT rom).

In any case, were the card is producing artifacts, it would not be a driver issue.
But from the description...its harder to diagnose.

I once considered modding and X850XT for G5 use, but the difference wasn't significant enough for me to bother.

The driver should work with an X850XT, its basically the same gpu, only clocked higher.
I don't know if its ever been tested though.

In the case of the R500, I know cards not even listed can work.
If I remember correctly, Ffrank even bragged about having an X1950XTX (which is a 512mb card with higher clock speeds).

Maybe I should have one of these (the card you bought) shipped to South Africa.

One possibility would be to reflash this card with the Apple X800XT rom.
It could be that the card was flashed with the X850XT rom to overclock it.

AND if there is an incompatibility issue related to the X850XT rom, that would take care of it.

Again, normal X800XT cards work fine (jacek even owns a flashed PC card that works).

[ Edited by Jim 20.04.2017 - 11:02 ]

Just to be clear, the aforementioned behavior happens very infrequently, at least to me.
Usually I came across screen artifacts on Aquaria (always), on some Cherry Darling's games and even less on QIII, AvP. On OWB sometimes when there is a doodle on Google homepage (but if I iconify the browser they go away).
Regarding slow down on boot, when Mark provided me with an altered driver that he disabled something, it has been working correctly for many years since then.
I would suggest you get in direct contact with Mark since it sounds to me like the driver issue I faced as well in the past. But at least I know that my card was flashed and I took my chances with it :P

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So did Jadacaps.
I've been hesitant to recommend flashed cards since I sent you that Radeon 9800 (which did work under OSX, but MorphOS...).

X800XTs do seem to be working.

> I've never seen the BTO X850XT

It can be bought for significant money :-)

https://www.google.com/search?q=661-3594

>>> there is one higher card that will work with the G5 as well,
>>> a standard PC X1950Pro AGP card.

>> Wouldn't this also be true for other cards from X1xxx series?

> In the case of the R500, I know cards not even listed can work.
> If I remember correctly, Ffrank even bragged about having an X1950XTX

I was more thinking of X1300, X1550, X1600, X1800 and X1900, which are listed as supported by MorphOS.

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Today as I got back home I've powered my PowerMac on and had a series of random fails with GPU - a full variety of them - from blank grey screen, hanging screenbar, lesser/bigger artifacts to none (but nevertheless hanging on YouTube). Then I've run OSX to test everything there. After that, when booted to MorphOS - everything works like a charm. Something with hardware initialization?

> [...] it has been working correctly for many years since then.

Many years? Venus years? Mercury years? ;-)

I just bought a 256MB X800XT for 45 GBP on ebay.

It's an Apple one rather than a flashed PC card AFAIK.

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When you get your card please let me know if the computer lists it as an X800 or X850 (OSX, that is. MorphOS always lists my card as Radeon X800, but with memory clock at 540 MHz and GPU clock at 507 MHz). I wonder if that seller knows exactly what he's selling.

If I enter the boot menu (even just to pick MorphOS to boot) the issues don't appear. If I just power up the machine - then it's a lottery.

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Will do, hopefully it'll come Monday but with the weekend getting in the way might be a bit later.

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Higher performing AGP cards? Maybe I should have put it that way.
And since there are X1800 AGP cards, they MIGHT work.
The X1950Pro definitely does.
The X1600 and below would probably not be better performing.

But thanks to the PCIe bridge chip issues, the X800XT might outperform the X1950Pro.

Has Mark been contacted about the "X850"/X800 card issue?

[ Edited by Jim 22.04.2017 - 10:06 ]

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I've sent him a PM.

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https://preview.ibb.co/hK7DJ5/IMG_20170427_123144.jpg OSX
https://preview.ibb.co/dd1UrQ/IMG_20170427_125201.jpg MorphOS 3.9 live CD

In osx I get 1920x1080i @ 60Hz, in MorphOS 3.9 I only get 1280x720 resolution.

https://preview.ibb.co/cW9Sd5/IMG_20170427_125127.jpg

I'll try with Ubuntu later tonight.

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That's strange because I get 1920x1200 just by default. Found any artifacts/glitches yet?

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Not had time to play with it properly yet.

My old MorphOS partition failed to boot so I wiped it ready to install freshly asv there was nothing important on it then went out. When I came back I booted the cd again but it gets stuck on a black screen with the red mouse cursor now.

Gone for a smoke, will try again in a minute.

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Finally booted after a couple of tries. Installed it and rebooted.

After choosing the MorphOS option in the boot screen fans go on full and it stays on a grey screen. Gonna put 9650 back in and see what happens.

Edit; OK, it boots to Ambient with the 9650.

That's a major problem right there lol

Edit: I put the X800 back in and it booted into ambient first time.

Something is not right here.


[ Edited by Intuition 27.04.2017 - 18:30 ]

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OK, it seems like something similar to my problems. I know well the "grey screen and fans full". Don't pull the X850 out, just turn the computer off and on again - it's almost sure it won't happen the next time. But there may be artifacts present...

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The entire screen was full of weird artifacts when I put the 9650 back in. Was very strange.

Mark is away on a work assignment and will not be home until Tuesday, but the quickest he said he could get to this was Thursday.
He said he would look into it.

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Cheers Jim.

No fix before 3.10 though. :/