I want a 4K display. Will it work with my old graphic cards?

[Juno1337]

Hello,

I'm looking to get a 4K TV for my music home studio setup.

I won't use it for gaming, just general editing and stuff.

I don't know much about what I need to make this work, though. What I'm hoping to do, is to buy a 49" 4K TV, and somehow connect it to my hackintosh.

I've got 2x XFX Radeon HD 5770 1GB GDDR5 Crossfire graphics cards, and a Gigabyte GA-Z87X-UD5 TH motherboard.

Can I use the thunderbolt connection on my motherboard? (I've never used it before).

Can I connect my graphic cards, or are they too old to support the technology?


If the answer to both of those questions are no - what graphics card should I look into buying that will do the job without the bank?

Thanks!

 

[nobodynose]

Hello,

I'm looking to get a 4K TV for my music home studio setup.

I won't use it for gaming, just general editing and stuff.

I don't know much about what I need to make this work, though. What I'm hoping to do, is to buy a 49" 4K TV, and somehow connect it to my hackintosh.

I've got 2x XFX Radeon HD 5770 1GB GDDR5 Crossfire graphics cards, and a Gigabyte GA-Z87X-UD5 TH motherboard.

Can I use the thunderbolt connection on my motherboard? (I've never used it before).

Can I connect my graphic cards, or are they too old to support the technology?


If the answer to both of those questions are no - what graphics card should I look into buying that will do the job without the bank?

Thanks!

The AMD 5770 will do a maximum resolution of 2560x1600, which is not a "4K" resolution - 3840x2160 (UHD) is the minimum.

I use an Nvidia GTX 750 graphics card to get 3840x2160@60Hz on my Samsung U28D590 UHD display. I use DisplayPort because the HDMI is not v2.0, so it will only do 30Hz. The least expensive card you can buy today that does UHD resolution is a GT 710; however, I don't think there are any available with HDMI 2.0 or DisplayPort, so realistically you'll need at least an Nvidia 750 Ti (there are no regular 750's left on the market). But you can obtain a GTX 750 Ti for around $100. I don't know much about AMD graphics cards, so I'm not sure what's available that would work for you.

Thunderbolt won't do you any good unless the TV you buy has a Thunderbolt port; I'm guessing you won't find one of those (I could be wrong though).

 

[Fl0r!an]

Your HD 5770's should be able to do 3840x2160@30Hz through DisplayPort. HDMI will be limited to 1080, maybe 1440p.

Your mainboard doesn't seem to output more than that, so you'll need a new discrete GPU. Any Nvidia card with a "Kepler" core and DisplayPort output will be sufficient.

EDIT: Since you're looking for a TV: They usually don't have a DP 1.2 input, but HDMI 2.0, which is poorly supported in OS X. You might have luck with a "Maxwell" GPU and the "Pixel Clock Patch", but most likely you'll need to use an active DP 1.2 to HDMI 2.0 adapter.

 

[Juno1337]

Thanks a lot for your replies - plenty of things I didn't think about before you mentioned them.

I'm happy to buy a new graphics card, I just wanted to steer away from the expensive gaming cards, as that would be overkill for me.

From what I understand, running at 60Hz is necessary to get a good user experience. I haven't decided on a TV yet, but I was thinking about something like the LG 49" UHD LED Smart TV 49UH603V. It has 3 HDMI2.0a ports.

So if I buy a GTX 750 GPU with Displayport, such as this one:
https://www.asus.com/Graphics-Cards/STRIXGTX750TIOC2GD5/overview/

and I buy an active displayport 1.2 to HDMI2.0 adapter, such as this one:
http://www.accellcables.com/products/displayport-1-2-to-hdmi-2-0-adapter

Then everything should be all right? In the GTX 750 specifications it says "regular displayport", but I suppose that's at least displayport 1.2?

 

[Fl0r!an]

Then everything should be all right?

I can't guarantee it. It works for many people, but some others are still limited to 4K@30Hz on such an adapter, don't know why. 4K over a true DP 1.2 connection seems to be the way to go, but it's almost impossible to find a TV with DisplayPort.

 

[Juno1337]

That's slightly worrying, but thanks for the reality check.

So the adapter seems to be the weak link, or is it the whole combination of GPU, adapter and TV? Or is it a hackintosh issue?

After reading this thread
http://www.tomshardware.co.uk/forum/id-2554074/displayport-hdmi.html

it looks like there are adapters who are labeled "4K" adapters but are actually hdmi1.4.

Everyone on that thread says that this adapter should be good:

http://www.club-3d.com/index.php/pr...layport-12-to-hdmi-20-uhd-active-adapter.html

On compatibility, they write:
"Supports AMD GCN cards, Nvidia® Maxwell cards and Intel® Skylake HD 5XX series and newer. Not intended for older architectures (such as Intel Haswell HD 4XXX / NVidia Kepler 5xx series Graphics)"

If I understand correctly, GTX 750 was the first Maxwell-based GPUs.

Any thoughts?

 

[Fl0r!an]

From my technical understanding, any DP 1.2 capable GPU combined with that Club3D adapter should give 4K@60Hz through HDMI, and lots of people are using this combination successfully. Still there are some users reporting issues. It's hard to track down remotely, it might be just a bad cable but could also be a bigger problem.

 

[lafo]

Hello,

I'm looking to get a 4K TV for my music home studio setup.

I won't use it for gaming, just general editing and stuff.

I don't know much about what I need to make this work, though. What I'm hoping to do, is to buy a 49" 4K TV, and somehow connect it to my hackintosh.

I've got 2x XFX Radeon HD 5770 1GB GDDR5 Crossfire graphics cards, and a Gigabyte GA-Z87X-UD5 TH motherboard.

Can I use the thunderbolt connection on my motherboard? (I've never used it before).

Can I connect my graphic cards, or are they too old to support the technology?


If the answer to both of those questions are no - what graphics card should I look into buying that will do the job without the bank?

Thanks!

Hi Juno1337, I got the same motherboard then yours (Gigabyte GA-Z87X-UD5 TH) and I'm now using the internal HD4600 graphic on board via the thunderbolt port to drive two HD Dell monitors.

I just bought a Sony 4k TV that I want to use has a monitor via one of the three HDMI port available on the TV.

Just want to know if your plan to buy an NVIDIA graphic card and a display port to HDMI adapter has been successful?

Does it deliver 4K@60Hz?

Thanks