Customer Reviews

Radeon 3870 Rohs 512MB

5 star:		(5)
4 star:		(6)
3 star:		(2)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(2)

 

 

I have only had this card for 2 days now. Therefore, I am not in a position to comment on the performance or features at this time. Perhaps if I have the time, I will revise my review in the future. In order to write this review, I had to select a number of "stars". I have chosen four, but be advised... I am here to comment on one thing and one thing only... this card is LOUD. I was happy to have finally had an almost silent computer (Intel based Mac Pro). This card quadruples the sound levels I have to deal with on a daily basis. The fan is literally audible from the next room. Also, it is constant, not just when it gets hot. If I had known this, I would not have made this purchase. So a warning to anyone that is concerned with noise levels and this type of issue. Good luck.

Awesome card, runs great and the price is right.

Couple of possible gotcha's. Install software before you open the machine up to drop the card in, otherwise you'll have to boot up in safe mode to install the drivers.

The card comes with power supply cords to cover nearly every PC configuration you'd need (3 different cords at the bottom of the box and the diagram shows you using the Hard Drive power supply chord). Do not follow that. The Mac Pro (original) motherboard has 2 six pin power connectors waiting to support video cards - be sure and use the small 6 pin connector (Mac Pro motherboard) to the large 6 pin video card connector.

The card emits a small amount of noise (like a very quiet CD spun up - much quieter than the Mac Pro's actual CD spun up), but you will notice it, if you had the original nVidia card in there - since it doesn't have a fan at all.

You gotta be running Leopard.

After plug in, it used it on initial boot up no problem, runs great. If you're running the original Mac Pro, this is the card to have. I'd buy it again.

I purchased this card with the intent of upgrading my first generation Mac Pro 2.66 GHz machine. I wanted to squeeze a little more performance out of Aperture and the NIK Software plug-ins that I use on a daily basis. Well to make things short and to the point, this card is a core-image monster. It has sped up my Aperture workflow by at least 25%. All actions run faster and the previews are almost instantaneous.

I also have "tested" this card against the X1900XT that I bought with my Mac Pro using Call of Duty 4: Modern warfare. My frames per second have gone from the 50-60 fps range to the 90-110 fps range. Gameplay is MUCH smoother and I am able to turn on anti-aliasing for a better looking game experience.

This was the best money I've spent on this particular Mac. If you want an upgrade for your 1st gen Mac you can't go wrong with this card. A memory purchase and a Radeon 3870 will make my Mac Pro a viable workstation/gaming machine for the next couple of years. Highly recommended.

I have an original 1st generation Mac Pro and this card was a big upgrade from my Radeon X1900 that came with it. It was easy to install, just pop out the old card and put in the new one. Though I do have an open slot in the back now, as the X1900 took up two PCI slots.

The fan does seem to run pretty much all the time, but it is quiet compared to the X1900. The X1900 would also ramp up to wind-tunnel speeds while playing games or doing anything intensive, and this card pretty much stays steady the entire time.

World of Warcraft on the Mac plays great, easily double or triple the framerates I had before with all settings maxed out.

In Windows with Boot Camp the card works great as well. I downloaded the drivers from ATI's web site to make sure it had the most up to date drivers and now I can play any modern game just fine. I can play Left 4 Dead and Bioshock at 1920 x 1200 resolution with the settings maxed out and it is super smooth.

Highly recommend upgrading with this card if you have a Mac Pro. It's one of the only upgrade options we get, but it's a good one.

I got this card when my original graphics card went bye-bye. The Radeon is supported on the earlier Mac Pro's (I bought mine around April of 2007) under 10.5.7 (that's what I'm running anyway). It's been working fine for the last few months and even though it's starting to get pretty hot around here (was in the 90's outside today - about 85 degrees inside) I really don't notice much fan noise (which others have mentioned as a problem).

A pretty good card for my purposes (I don't do much gaming, tho, so YMMV)...

Pulled out the X1900 and popped in the 3870 and the fan noise harshed my mellow.

I had modded the X1900 with an AcceleroX2 aftermarket fan and it's clear I'm going to have to do the same with this card (Accelero S1 Rev2 to be precise). Another $25 and 30 minutes.

I bought this for a first gen Mac Pro 3.0 to replace the Radeon x1900xt that came with it. The first one booted OK but the fan ran at full speed all the time, even when booted into windows via bootcamp. I RMA'd it to Amazon, which they shipped immediately without receiving the unit I was returning (Kudos, Amazon!). The second card did the exact same thing so they both went back for a refund. I handled all of this via email and web with Amazon, they were great. I later bought an Nvidia 8800GT from another web site which worked fine.

The major reason I purchased this video card was to upgrade the speed and quality of video using flight simulation programs such as FSX and X-plane. My average frame rate, which averaged about 18 on a mac pro, increased to about 32 and often maintains 34 (maximum). I was very impressed with such an improvement for such a low investment. I was considering purchasing a new computer for over 2K, but now feel like I can wait for a couple of years. I also use aperature and final cut pro for the Mac. Both programs operate as well if not somewhat better than before the upgrade.

I picked up this card and just dropped it in my Mac Pro expecting it to sound like a jet engine from the other reviews. Frankly I can barely hear it. Now maybe it is loud relative to some cards, but I just had an X1900XT in this box and it had tremendous overheating problems. So to help compensate I was cranking up the fans in the computer really high.

Now with the new card I don't have the overheating issues (at least not yet) and I don't have to run my fans at max. So overall DB's are much lower now. Plus my computer isn't constantly crashing and giving me graphics glitches. YAY!

I may find other issues with the card but so far so good...

Graphically the card works very well, however, the fan has been an issue. When I received the card the fan would not ramp up when the card got hot. I sent it off for repair and when it came back the fan now runs at full speed all the time. Maybe I'll update the firmware or replace the heatsink because that will be much quicker than the 20 day turn around time for repair. Anyway, I would recommend the card with the caveat that the fan may be an issue.