Mac Pro 5,1 GT120 + Nvidia GPU: Will it w…
Modded Mac pro 5,1 upgrade to mojave rabbit hole, can she be saved?
Hi there. so ive got a modded mac pro 5,1 that i bought and owned directly from apple in 2012 (so im the only owner).
The mods that are relevant to this are as follows:
GTX 980ti (unflashed)
EVGA G2 1000w gold+ PSU powering the gpu fully
Now this problem was purely from my own lack of research.
As apple advised in their guide on how to install mojave on a 5,1: i upgraded my firmware to 144.0.0.0.0
This worked fine, and had no issues. i should have left it here, but i got greedy.
i run mojave on my 2019 macbook pro, running final cut pro X for some of my indie projects i run a newer version on my laptop that is not compatible with os 10.13.6 (my Mac Pro OS at this time), so i wanted to upgrade for this reason.
So i started with removing my Raedon 5870, which i run together with the 980ti powering different displays. I did this because the mojave installer thinks the 5870 is my only gpu when its in there.
So i start the installer with the 5870 removed, it allows me to go ahead with upgrading my firmware. i upgrade the firmware (as mentioned earlier) and start it back up. now im able to install, great!
i begin the installation, it goes smooth for the first phase, when it restarts i knew i wouldnt see a boot screen for awhile as there was that second progress bar to go through. what i didnt know was there were no web drivers compatible, after an hour i shut the computer down via power button. i then added my 5870 back in, and rebooted holding option to choose my disk. it gave me 2 options: Mac os installer or Macintosh SSD
i chose Macintosh SSD, it manages to boot but there is obvious visual glitches and running horribly (as its using the unsupported GPU) i realize my mistake after checking the nvidia drivers and checking for updates.
my next step was to try and get high sierra back.. ok recovery mode should work?
boot up using CMD+R…. works fine. but only option is to reinstall mojave.
. which it doesnt allow me because my amd gpu is not metal capable, and i cant use the nvidia only because i wont see the recovery screen.
So i have a time machine backup.. many of them.. wipe the disk using disk utility and start a restore
1st snapshot fails @ 98GB
2nd snapshot fails @ unknown size (around the same)
3rd snapshot fails @ 98GB
try internet recovery mode
CMD+shift+opt+R… prohibitory symbol… eventually boots into normal recovery mode revealing mojave as option
opt+R… prohibitory symbol, same as above.
so my next option is to wipe the drive, use my macbook pro to create a bootable installer of os high sierra and use that to fix my damn mac pro.
so i do my normally google for the apple link to get os high sierra, it takes me to the MAS, great! i click «Get»… im running mac os 10.4.6 on this macbook, so it takes me to «software update» in system preferences, where it proceedes to give me this error
it should be noted aftter some research, i found this workaround WORKED FINE before the release of os catalina.
now the catalina has been released this feature is not possible.
great… so more research turns up there is a terminal command that will directly download a mac os installer via apple servers.. this command only works on OS catalina
i am a VFX artist and on-set coordinator in the film industry, so i rely on many applications and plugins.. many of which are not compatible with cataline yet, meaning upgrading is not an option
I’ve managed to download OS sierra (Which is literally just a direct link download dmg from apple, on an article «how to install mac os sierra» that is the EXACT same format as the high sierra article, yet the high sierra link goes to the app store..
so i contact apple support to get a solution to this, they advise me i must upgrade my laptop.
so apple’s solution was to advise me to lose my job until the devs can catch up with their yearly BS
so now im frustrated, and need some advice from a community member as i shouldve come here first anyways.
Should i:
install Mac os sierra via bootable installer, install my nvidia drivers, ensure they work and then upgrade to high sierra via upgrade or time machine backup?
or
keep trying to restore my machine from a backup hoping one of my many snapshots will work
or
try to find someone or (PREFERABLY APPLE!!!) to provide me with a mac os high sierra installer dmg
469
5
GeForce GT 120 Mac Edition
Summary
NVIDIA started GeForce GT 120 Mac Edition sales 20 January 2009.
This is a desktop graphics card based on a Tesla architecture and made with 55 nm manufacturing process. It is primarily aimed at gamer market. 512 MB of GDDR3 memory clocked at 1.6 GHz are supplied, and together with 128 Bit memory interface this creates a bandwidth of 25.6 GB/s.
Compatibility-wise, this is single-slot card attached via PCIe 2.0 x16 interface. Its manufacturer default version has a length of 145 mm. No additional power connector is required, and power consumption is at 50 Watt.
We have no data on GeForce GT 120 Mac Edition benchmark results.
General info
Some basic facts about GeForce GT 120 Mac Edition: architecture, market segment, release date etc.
| Place in performance ranking | not rated | |
| Architecture | Tesla (2006−2010) | |
| GPU code name | G96C | |
| Market segment | Desktop | |
| Release date | 20 January 2009 (14 years old) | |
| Current price | $115 | of 168889 (A100 PCIe 80 GB) |
Technical specs
GeForce GT 120 Mac Edition’s specs such as number of shaders, GPU base clock, manufacturing process, texturing and calculation speed.
These parameters indirectly speak of GeForce GT 120 Mac Edition’s performance, but for precise assessment you have to consider its benchmark and gaming test results.
| Pipelines / CUDA cores | 32 | of 20480 (Data Center GPU Max NEXT) |
| Core clock speed | 550 MHz | of 2610 (Radeon RX 6500 XT) |
| Number of transistors | 314 million | of 14400 (GeForce GTX 1080 SLI Mobile) |
| Manufacturing process technology | 55 nm | of 4 (GeForce RTX 4080) |
| Power consumption (TDP) | 50 Watt | of 2400 (Data Center GPU Max Subsystem) |
| Texture fill rate | 8.800 | of 969.9 (h200 SXM5 96 GB) |
| Floating-point performance | 89.6 gflops | of 16384 (Radeon Pro Duo) |
Size and compatibility
This section provides details about the physical dimensions of GeForce GT 120 Mac Edition and its compatibility with other computer components.
This information is useful when selecting a computer configuration or upgrading an existing one. For desktop graphics cards, it includes details about the interface and bus (for motherboard compatibility) and additional power connectors (for power supply compatibility).
| Interface | PCIe 2.0 x16 | |
| Length | 145 mm | |
| Width | 1-slot | |
| Supplementary power connectors | None |
Memory
Parameters of memory installed on GeForce GT 120 Mac Edition: its type, size, bus, clock and resulting bandwidth. Note that GPUs integrated into processors have no dedicated memory and use a shared part of system RAM instead.
| Memory type | GDDR3 | |
| Maximum RAM amount | 512 MB | of 128 (Radeon Instinct MI250X) |
| Memory bus width | 128 Bit | of 8192 (Radeon Instinct MI250X) |
| Memory clock speed | 1600 MHz | of 22400 (GeForce RTX 4080) |
| Memory bandwidth | 25. 6 GB/s |
of 3276 (Aldebaran) |
Video outputs and ports
Types and number of video connectors present on GeForce GT 120 Mac Edition. As a rule, this section is relevant only for desktop reference graphics cards, since for notebook ones the availability of certain video outputs depends on the laptop model, while non-reference desktop models can (though not necessarily will) bear a different set of video ports.
| Display Connectors | 1x DVI, 1x mini-DisplayPort |
API support
APIs supported by GeForce GT 120 Mac Edition, sometimes including their particular versions.
| DirectX | 11.1 (10_0) | |
| Shader Model | 4.0 | |
| OpenGL | 3.3 | of 4.6 (GeForce GTX 1080 Mobile) |
| OpenCL | 1. 1 |
|
| Vulkan | N/A | |
| CUDA | 1.1 |
Benchmark performance
Synthetic benchmark performance of GeForce GT 120 Mac Edition. The combined score is measured on a 0-100 point scale.
We have no data on GeForce GT 120 Mac Edition benchmark results.
AMD equivalent
According to our data, the closest AMD alternative to GeForce GT 120 Mac Edition is Radeon HD 4550.
Radeon HD4550
Compare
Similar GPUs
Here is our recommendation of several graphics cards that are more or less close in performance to the one reviewed.
Radeon HD4550
Compare
Radeon HD
4570
Radeon HD
2600 PRO
GeForce GT
520
GeForce GT
230
GeForce
9600 GSO 512
Recommended processors
These processors are most commonly used with GeForce GT 120 Mac Edition according to our statistics.
Core 2
Duo E8400
10.7%
M1
Max
7.1%
Xeon
X5550
7.1%
Core 2
Duo E8300
3.6%
Core 2
Duo E7500
3.6%
Core 2
Duo E7200
3.6%
Athlon 64
X2 5200+
3.6%
Atom
D525
3.6%
Core 2
Duo E7600
3.6%
Pentium
N3710
3.