Is there any hope for the perfect Imac & cMP replacement. A Mac Mini 2018 option with a fast GPU would have made a lot of people happy after all this time.
Got a tip for us?
Let us know
Become a MacRumors Supporter for $50/year with no ads, ability to filter front page stories, and private forums.
Any hope for a Mini Pro with Vega 20
- Thread starter rjtiedeman
- Start date
- Sort by reaction score
Why don't you buy a mini and plug a Vega 64 into it?
There is such an option. It is called eGPU.
People have asked for a modular Mac, and also a user servicable Mac. And Mac Mini is it. Attach whatever stuff you want. That is what TB3 is for. It is far easier than using PCI buses, and can be done without rebooting. Sure, you can't replace the internal SSD, but you are free to add as many SSDs as you wish by plug 'n play.
Mac Mini is now just the Macintosh. It is the base unit which you can expand as you see fit.
The Mac mini could never tolerate the heat generated by a modern dedicated GPU. There will not be a Mac mini with a dedicated GPU and desktop processors. Just too much heat.
Apple's answer is to go eGPU, which while sacrificing a little performance is not a terrible idea. I think in the end when the Mac lineup is fully fleshed out (Mac Pro), you will see that those who are in need of a dedicated GPU look to the iMac Pro and Mac Pro.
the 2018 macbook pro tolerates the vega 20 chip and it’s tighter than a mac mini. yes a eGPU for $1300 vs a $300 option on a macbook pro 2018.
The difference is the MacBook Pro uses mobile processors that have a lower TDP, while the Mac mini uses desktop processors which generate more heat but are more powerful.
Laptops are also notorious for thermal throttling below their base frequency under very heavy loads. This is one of the sacrifices you make when using a laptop vs desktop. Since the mini is a desktop, it’s been designed with desktop processors and cooling to sustain higher boost speeds for longer, and (in theory) never throttle below base frequency.
Apple could have made a mini with a dedicated GPU, but would have to compromise on CPU. And the mini seems to be largely targeted towards musicians, audio engineers, iOS developers, coding and server usage. To my knowledge, these markets greatly prefer more cpu and ram power than anything else. And that’s where the mini flourishes.
To your point see this test on the Mac Mini with eGPUs..
http://barefeats.com/mac-mini-needs-egpu.html
http://barefeats.com/mac-mini-needs-egpu.html
The Vega 20 is a mobile GPU in a laptop with a mobile CPU. That is not the same as the mini with a desktop CPU. The mini could not cool itself enough to handle a GPU without going to a mobile CPU.
None since the Mini won't be updated at all for another four years minimum. The Mac Pro is going on six years without an update.
The eGPU does not work properly. You have to disable encryption to see a boot screen to enter your password.
The only hope for the Mac is for Apple to sell it off to a company that thinks computers are important.
there are such capable mini like hp z2 mini with good graphics i think, so it should be perfectly possible.
I don't think Apple would make that product. I think that Apple thinks that as a pro you either need a good GPU and you will buy an upgradable eGPU or you don't need one. I can't see them upgrading the Mac Mini with an average GPU.
That machine has a Quadra M620 which is based on the Maxwell architecture that was succeeded by the Pascal architecture in 2016 which itself was replaced this year. It is a pretty old card at this point and not terribly powerful. Of course neither is the Vega 20.
It is true that the Vega 20 would greatly outperform the iGPU in the mini, but it would still not be a graphics powerhouse. It would be merely adequate, which one could argue the Intel part is not really even adequate. So, sure I agree that it would be great if Apple added something like the Vega 20, but I suspect the thermals in the mini or the mixture of desktop and laptop parts are the dealbreaker. I think we are stuck with the 630HD because the better integrated solutions are not available on desktop chipsets and mobile and desktop dedicated GPUs are either too hot, too large, or simply not compatible with the mini.
To me, I think if Apple doubled the height of the mini, they could do a killer machine. But it wouldn't be as pretty, so we are stuck.
2018 mac mini is hot enough as is, without a graphics chip. Vega 20 in the macbook pro is only about as fast as Radeon 580 egpu.
I do get the appeal of everything being in one box though. I kinda wish Sonnet Tech revised their 570 puck to be stackable with the mac mini (and maybe update the chipset to 590).
I do get the appeal of everything being in one box though. I kinda wish Sonnet Tech revised their 570 puck to be stackable with the mac mini (and maybe update the chipset to 590).
You mean a desktop RX 580? The Vega 20 in the MacBook Pro seems to be performing about the level of an nVidia 1050 Ti and quite a bit slower than a desktop RX 470. My RX580 (internal in a PC) OpenCL score in Windows is 134281. I am seeing 131000 from users online as an eGPU. The Vega 20 in the MacBook Pro seems to benching around 72000. The Vega 20 is nowhere close to the performance of an RX 580 from what I see.
I think I would add to the list of reasons why Apple went integrated is that the performance of the Vega 16/20 probably does not justify the expense (money, heat, and space) in a Mac mini. It provides decent performance, but not so much that someone who wants a dGPU wouldn't have to start looking at an eGPU anyway. It is still a mobile part after all. Who in their right mind would pay the upcharge for a Vega 20 instead of going for a much more powerful eGPU for almost the same amount, maybe even less?
Last edited:
My mistake then. I read somewhere that the vega 20 was about 37% faster then the 560, which would have been on par with a 580 with egpu bandwidth penalty. But if can only muster 72,000 in geekbench, then it's way worse then the 580 and further justify the egpu route (I know black magic 580 does about 115,000).
AMD should have made a vega 40 then lol
AMD should have made a vega 40 then lol
It is about 37% faster than the Pro 560 that was in the MacBook Pro. The naming AMD uses is really frustrating. The Pro series seems to be the parts they supply to Apple which are all slower than the RX equivalents. For example, the Pro 580 benchmarks at about 123000 to the RX 580s 132000. A Pro 560 gets an OpenCL of 43172 while an RX 560 gets 73725. It is Apple and AMD's way of trying to make people think that the GPU they are packaging will have similar performance to similarly named desktop cards.
Yeah the Pro is a lower clocked version of the RX. Same number and type of compute units, but the desktop SKU can boost up to about 25% higher clocks. The VRAM is also clocked a lot slower. Yay, power budgets :/
You mean like the intel nuc? It is very perfectly doable. A repaste on the MacBook Pro alone can drop the temps like 8+ degrees. The problem isn’t always hardware either but software. Watching YouTube on my 2017 burns it up.
Side note. Do you have an eGPU with your two 4K screens? If not, what scaling do you use?
I have no eGPU. I don't scale, I use the full native resolution (even if Apple calls it "scaled").