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philm001

macrumors regular
Original poster
Sep 29, 2018
109
5
Hello all,

This is more of an educational question rather then an issue.

I have 2 cards in my mac pro. The first being a Nvidia GT 120 and the second being an Nvidia GTX 280. I booted the machine and it is able to run fine.

However, when I go into the "About this Mac", it only recognizes the Nvidia GT 120. I was wondering, why is this the case? Am I able to switch it to display the "Nvidia GTX 280"?

So far, I am assuming that the Mac is reading the GT 120 as the primary card. Is there any way that I can have Mac recognize the GTX 280 as the primary card?
 

MarkC426

macrumors 68040
May 14, 2008
3,587
2,008
UK
It is probably because the 280 is not a mac ‘efi’ card like the gt 120, it is a PC card.
Does it show up under the graphics section in the detailed part of system report?
 

philm001

macrumors regular
Original poster
Sep 29, 2018
109
5
It is probably because the 280 is not a mac ‘efi’ card like the gt 120, it is a PC card.
Does it show up under the graphics section in the detailed part of system report?

Then that is probably it. Because the card displays in the system report. I take it that cards with a bootable efi file take priority?
 

skizzo

macrumors 6502
Apr 11, 2018
260
83
in your Display menu in System Settings you can select which screen has the "main toolbar". I noticed this because I was running with a GT120 and a RX580 and was surprised when I saw GT120 still at the "About This Mac" screen. Both cards obviously show up under displays and PCIe under system report. For me, when I dragged that toolbar from the GT120 screen to the RX580 screen it now has the RX580 as the default or main display and that is what is listed in the About This Mac screen. You will never see more than one GPU card listed in the About This Mac screen
 

philm001

macrumors regular
Original poster
Sep 29, 2018
109
5
in your Display menu in System Settings you can select which screen has the "main toolbar". I noticed this because I was running with a GT120 and a RX580 and was surprised when I saw GT120 still at the "About This Mac" screen. Both cards obviously show up under displays and PCIe under system report. For me, when I dragged that toolbar from the GT120 screen to the RX580 screen it now has the RX580 as the default or main display and that is what is listed in the About This Mac screen. You will never see more than one GPU card listed in the About This Mac screen

Oh ok, great, I will have to give that a shot later today.

It sounds like then that the screen that has the main toolbar (or the graphics card that has the main toolbar) will be the one listed under the About This Mac screen
 

skizzo

macrumors 6502
Apr 11, 2018
260
83
yes you understand correctly. it is on the screen where you can arrange the displays. move what I am referring to as the "toolbar" to the screen/GPU you wish to have as your main display/GPU and that is the GPU that will be listed in About This Mac screen
 
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