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IanK MacPro

macrumors member
Jul 6, 2018
68
43
Buckinghamshire, UK
Nice, an interesting read, cheers. We've certainly come a long way in performance-per-watt metrics for GPU in the last few years too!
[automerge]1580221836[/automerge]

Thats why GPU based rendering is driving such an increase in productivity. With each new generation release of GPU, there is a decent speed bump (25%-50% sometimes) where as CPU speed increases have slowed dramatically over the years, which is why these old 12 core 5.1's do so well for a 10 year+ machine.
 
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roobarb!

macrumors 6502
Jul 30, 2009
277
185
Well, for someone who just does photography and some occasional video work I sure ended up with a graphics card collection yesterday. The third one arrived; there's something about gear that arrives in damaged boxes - it always seems to perform better!

This final one runs perfectly well at stock clock and 1100 MHz memory at only 945 mV. It barely ramps its fans during Heaven and is perfectly tolerable even during FurMark. This one's staying!
 
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AlexMaximus

macrumors 65816
Aug 15, 2006
1,233
577
A400M Base
Well, for someone who just does photography and some occasional video work I sure ended up with a graphics card collection yesterday. The third one arrived; there's something about gear that arrives in damaged boxes - it always seems to perform better!

This final one runs perfectly well at stock clock and 1100 MHz memory at only 945 mV. It barely ramps its fans during Heaven and is perfectly tolerable even during FurMark. This one's staying!

Hey there,

Since you have a Pixlas Vega VII, I would like to know if you noticed any performance changes when you did the transition from Mojave to Catalina. I am dragging my leg a bit when it comes to Catalina. Somehow I am worried a bit. Mojave so far works really great for me, but some time down the line I will need to upgrade. What's your gut feeling about it? Did the Vega VII improve in Catalina, - any driver changes?
 

roobarb!

macrumors 6502
Jul 30, 2009
277
185
Since you have a Pixlas Vega VII, I would like to know if you noticed any performance changes when you did the transition from Mojave to Catalina. I am dragging my leg a bit when it comes to Catalina. Somehow I am worried a bit. Mojave so far works really great for me, but some time down the line I will need to upgrade. What's your gut feeling about it? Did the Vega VII improve in Catalina, - any driver changes?

There's no Pixla's mod on this machine; the Radeon VII runs only from the PCIe Boost sockets on the logic board through an EVGA PowerLink. :)

I also can't really help with your question! I only have Mojave on here as an emergency OS in case the NVRAM is reset (which would remove the -no_compat_check flag from boot-args) so as far as day-to-day performance is concerned, I just don't know. I jumped straight from High Sierra with a GTX 1080 Ti to Catalina with the Radeon VII. There's definitely an improvement in most things on the desktop between those two configurations, particularly anything graphically demanding in Apple apps (Photos is really smooth when editing now). If I'd see the any difference between Mojave and Catalina, I haven't got the experience to tell!
 

on the range...

macrumors newbie
Feb 14, 2020
11
1
Friendsville
There's no Pixla's mod on this machine; the Radeon VII runs only from the PCIe Boost sockets on the logic board through an EVGA PowerLink. :)

In prepping and upgrading the 2009 I've been working on this has been the thing that makes me most feel like a maroon (relative to a hack most is pretty easy really). So to be really clear, you have the dual 6 pin to 8 pin cable, the two 6 pins attach to the MB and the 8 pin to -one- of the two connectors on the powerlink, leaving one 8 pin still open on the powerlink. But the powerlink connector itself is distributing the (2x150W 6pin) power evenly to the card so there's no concern/problem not connecting the other powerlink 8 pin connector to anything. Is that correct? TIA ✌?
 

tsialex

Contributor
Jun 13, 2016
13,455
13,601
There's no Pixla's mod on this machine; the Radeon VII runs only from the PCIe Boost sockets on the logic board through an EVGA PowerLink. :)

I also can't really help with your question! I only have Mojave on here as an emergency OS in case the NVRAM is reset (which would remove the -no_compat_check flag from boot-args) so as far as day-to-day performance is concerned, I just don't know. I jumped straight from High Sierra with a GTX 1080 Ti to Catalina with the Radeon VII. There's definitely an improvement in most things on the desktop between those two configurations, particularly anything graphically demanding in Apple apps (Photos is really smooth when editing now). If I'd see the any difference between Mojave and Catalina, I haven't got the experience to tell!
Don't you think that you are overplaying your backplane power capabilities here?

Tom's Hardware tested the load at each power input and at full load, a Radeon VII can spike up to 322W with ~298W sustained (~30W from PCIe slot, ~142W from the first PCIe power connector and ~126W from the second). Even with a Powerlink as a load balancer, MP5,1 can only provide ~240W from both PCI AUX A and B before the backplane monitoring circuit shutdowns the PSU.
 
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MIKX

macrumors 68000
Dec 16, 2004
1,815
691
Japan
Possibly not much help but extra SATA power can be added to the EVGa PowerLink by connecting a TWO X SATA to ONE by 6 pin using the spare 6 pin power input socket that comes with the PowerLink.


( Assumes that you can do without two onboard SATA HDD / SSD connections. )

DETAIL​

1.
Connect the SPARE 6 pin socket that comes with the PowerLinkto the PowerLink's power input side, use the small Allen key to install it.

2.
Now connect the 2 X SATA to 1 x 6pin cable to this PowerLink 6 pin power input socket.

For the GPU connect the two 8 pin male to female PowerLink OUTPUT cables to the Radeon VII

I've been using this setup for my RX 580 8gb as I'm paranoid about over-stressing power demand when I use X-Plane 11 in extreme settings ?. I have the PowerLink sitting on top of the PCIe area's input fan.


Codecil : Don't use a TWO x SATA to ONE by 8 pin as it will draw too much power from the backplane.
 

roobarb!

macrumors 6502
Jul 30, 2009
277
185
Don't you think that you are overplaying your backplane power capabilities here?

Tom's Hardware tested the load at each power input and at full load, a Radeon VII can spike up to 322W with ~298W sustained (~30W from PCIe slot, ~142W from the first PCIe power connector and ~126W from the second). Even with a Powerlink as a load balancer, MP5,1 can only provide ~240W from both PCI AUX A and B before the backplane monitoring circuit shutdowns the PSU.
Maybe I am; all I can say is I've been using this for a few weeks now and had not one shutdown issue. No problems during Furmark, Luxmark or the usual Heaven and Valley benches. The card is down-volted to 970 mV, which surely helps, and monitoring has never seen more than 8 A drawn from each boost slot, so ~192 W from those in total.

In fact, I'll grab Luxmark and run it again now just to see.

Screenshot 2020-02-14 at 19.24.39.png

That's pretty typical of what happens; power through the aux connectors pegs at 7.99 A and through the PCIe connector at 3.22 A, so that's around 230 W, which is in the ballpark of what the PowerPlay settings should be. I have it set at 200 W @ 120% so shouldn't see more than 240 W draw in total.

I'll attach the PowerPlay kext I use, which is 1890 MHz @ 970 mV, 1111 MHz HBM2 and 200 W (120%) limit.

Oh, if you look carefully at iStat you'll see there's no reading from the Aux A slot because I carelessly knocked the monitoring chip off the logic board some time ago. But the cables are physically ganged together even before they go into the PowerLink, so they'll be evenly balanced.
 

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roobarb!

macrumors 6502
Jul 30, 2009
277
185
So to be really clear, you have the dual 6 pin to 8 pin cable, the two 6 pins attach to the MB and the 8 pin to -one- of the two connectors on the powerlink, leaving one 8 pin still open on the powerlink. But the powerlink connector itself is distributing the (2x150W 6pin) power evenly to the card so there's no concern/problem not connecting the other powerlink 8 pin connector to anything. Is that correct? TIA ✌?

On this system it's a dual mini 6-pin to single 8-pin cable which goes from the two mini 6-pin aux sockets on the logic board into one of the 8-pin sockets on the PowerLink, leaving the other open, as you say. The PowerLink has the two 8-pin output connectors attached, which plug in to the two 8-pin sockets on the Radeon VII.

So yes, in my experience there's no issue at all leaving the second 8-pin input on the PowerLink unpopulated. There are only two rails inside the PowerLink anyway, one +12V and one ground, so everything is physically connected together.

Now, whether it's right or not that I'm pulling 192 W through one 8-pin connector which on paper is for 150 W is another matter. I'm fine with it; the physical capabilities of the cables and sockets are way more than that, it's really more of a preventative measure against user error in my book. And I appear to be staying within the 240 W cumulative maximum that can be drawn through those combined two aux sockets on the logic board, otherwise, in theory, the system would instantly power off.

Hope that's of some help?
 
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Grumply

macrumors 6502
Feb 24, 2017
285
194
Melbourne, Australia
I’ve been running mine with the 204w downvolt, powered by just the dual mini 6-pins, converted to a single 8-pin, which is then split into a dual 8-pin (to connect to the Radeon VII).

It’s been flawless under heavy loads.
 
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on the range...

macrumors newbie
Feb 14, 2020
11
1
Friendsville
On this system it's a dual mini 6-pin to single 8-pin cable which goes from the two mini 6-pin aux sockets on the logic board into one of the 8-pin sockets on the PowerLink, leaving the other open, as you say....Hope that's of some help?

Yes, thank you. I haven't stress tested it, but just running, playing videos/Youtube seems fine. I'm an audio guy and I use an AJA card for video playback w/Pro Tools, so I don't think I'll ever be stressing the card out that much. I have one of those cheap Dell PS's with 8 pins on the way just in case though.
 
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roobarb!

macrumors 6502
Jul 30, 2009
277
185
Yes, thank you. I haven't stress tested it, but just running, playing videos/Youtube seems fine. I'm an audio guy and I use an AJA card for video playback w/Pro Tools, so I don't think I'll ever be stressing the card out that much. I have one of those cheap Dell PS's with 8 pins on the way just in case though.
Ah, a fella audio guy! I build stuff and other people do most of the audio these days, but I know that world well. :)
 

Digitalboi

macrumors newbie
Feb 20, 2020
1
0
Orlando, FL, USA
Howdy All!, So i did the pixelas mod and installed the Vega VII for playing WoW and i am LOVING it! The performance is great! I really want to flash the card so i can use the boot menu as I do swap to BootCamp often. Does anyone have experience with this? Sorry if this is the wrong place but I’ve been searching online and have not been successful
 

tommy chen

macrumors 6502a
Oct 1, 2018
907
390
there is no flash or service for the radeon VII bootscreen

the only way is with opencore

 

DigitaLife

macrumors regular
Jan 24, 2019
170
13
Italy
One card like this (combine both mini 6pin as a single power source).
View attachment 889687

2nd card by Pixlas mod.
I would like to purchase an AMD Radeon VII for my Mac Pro 5.1 (for Editing Viedo) but I would first like to know how high it is (because in the second PCIe slot I have an IO Controller SSD NVMe) and if there is a guide for installing this card? Thanks in advance!
 

EddieK420

macrumors member
Jan 28, 2009
86
62
I would like to purchase an AMD Radeon VII for my Mac Pro 5.1 (for Editing Viedo) but I would first like to know how high it is (because in the second PCIe slot I have an IO Controller SSD NVMe) and if there is a guide for installing this card? Thanks in advance!

here is mine :)
 

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DigitaLife

macrumors regular
Jan 24, 2019
170
13
Italy
So the Dual VII's are working!
Only tested Luxmark and Bruce X FCPX so far.

Bruce x has gone from 12 seconds with the single VII down to 8-9 seconds.

Luxmark has gone from 52861 with the single up to 105791 with the duals.

View attachment 889890 View attachment 889891 View attachment 889892 View attachment 889893
I want to buy an AMD Radeon VII card but I can only find the XFX one online, while both PowerColor and Sapphire are unavailable. Do you think they are all the same or are there differences and is one better than the other? Thanks in advance for the help!
[automerge]1587738287[/automerge]
The machine with Radeon VII. View attachment 822719
Are there any differences between XFX's Radeon VII, PowerColor and Sapphire or are they all exactly the same?
 
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h9826790

macrumors P6
Apr 3, 2014
16,656
8,587
Hong Kong
I want to buy an AMD Radeon VII card but I can only find the XFX one online, while both PowerColor and Sapphire are unavailable. Do you think they are all the same or are there differences and is one better than the other? Thanks in advance for the help!
[automerge]1587738287[/automerge]

Are there any differences between XFX's Radeon VII, PowerColor and Sapphire or are they all exactly the same?
All Radeon VII are the same
 

tommy chen

macrumors 6502a
Oct 1, 2018
907
390
It is compatible with Open-End to Dual 8 Pin (6+2) PCI-E Sleeved Cable (Pixlas Mod)?


yes, i have pixlas mod in all of my cMPs for GPUs

the backplane power connectors are used by the GC-titan ridge


IMG_5820.jpg
IMG_5822.jpg
 
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