eGPU support in High Sierra officially announced

[kipwheeler]

I wonder what's going to happen with the Bizone Box 3? I understand it's spendier than similar options, but the extra money supposedly goes to plug-and-play ease of use, so buyers had to do little (if any) tinkering.

Now I wonder if that product will be affected (for good or bad) by Apple's decision to start supporting eGPUs? For instance, is the whole "ease-of-use" installation advantage now eliminated, and thus that will hurt its sales? Or is the fact that eGPU support is available likely to make eGPUs more widespread, and thus make the Bizone Box 3 more attractive? Any thoughts from those more in-the-know than I am?

 

[joebclash]

macOS froze during boot. System fans ran full speed then locked up. Apple really wants us to stop using this Mac Pro tower. I'm doing some kext editing and we'll see...

This sucks. Hopefully the crash is just because of beta version of macOS.

 

[theitsage]

I wonder what's going to happen with the Bizone Box 3? I understand it's spendier than similar options, but the extra money supposedly goes to plug-and-play ease of use, so buyers had to do little (if any) tinkering.

Now I wonder if that product will be affected (for good or bad) by Apple's decision to start supporting eGPUs? For instance, is the whole "ease-of-use" installation advantage now eliminated, and thus that will hurt its sales? Or is the fact that eGPU support is available likely to make eGPUs more widespread, and thus make the Bizone Box 3 more attractive? Any thoughts from those more in-the-know than I am?

The Bizon Box and its software package contains work from people in the eGPU community without their authorization. Goalque's automate-eGPU script and Khao's TB3-enabler script come to mind. Its enclosure is a modified version of AKiTiO Thunde2/Thunder3. Neither of which enclosures have the Texas Instrument TPS65983 (TI83). Definitely not worth the money.

On top of that, Bizon is not an Intel certified Thunderbolt vendor. After this announcement, I doubt people would spend that much money on Bizon boxes.

 

[H2SO4]

AKiTiO Node, Mantiz Venus, and Sonnet Breakaway Box are the three enclosures I tested and they work.

Not so sure I’d call that plug and play though. To me a plug and play device is one in which you don't have to stop what you’re doing to get it to join your workflow?

 

[Flint Ironstag]

Not so sure I’d call that plug and play though. To me a plug and play device is one in which you don't have to stop what you’re doing to get it to join your workflow?

I agree. Glad to know those gritty details of its operation though. Reminds me of the early days of iGPU to dGPU switching. Hopefully the logout process will go away with a software update. @theitsage , seen any performance increases?

 

[serge-m]

Hi All,

sorry, if this has been already mentioned here (actually not sure): will High Sierra support native PC cards with boot screen ? For example an Nvidia 1080 or 1080TI ?
If so: also full PCI 2.0 support ?

 

[SoyCapitanSoyCapitan]

The Bizon Box and its software package contains work from people in the eGPU community without their authorization. Goalque's automate-eGPU script and Khao's TB3-enabler script come to mind. Its enclosure is a modified version of AKiTiO Thunde2/Thunder3. Neither of which enclosures have the Texas Instrument TPS65983 (TI83). Definitely not worth the money.

On top of that, Bizon is not an Intel certified Thunderbolt vendor. After this announcement, I doubt people would spend that much money on Bizon boxes.

Benchmarks, please

Although I'm not expecting any difference in OpenCL or OpenGL. Metal benchmarking would be pointless until 2.0 tests.

 

[BillyBobBongo]

Hi All,

sorry, if this has been already mentioned here (actually not sure): will High Sierra support native PC cards with boot screen ? For example an Nvidia 1080 or 1080TI ?
If so: also full PCI 2.0 support ?

No, in regard to boot screens.

The eGPU kit being provided by Apple to Developers looks to contain a Sonnet Breakaway box to me, which has a single x16 PCIe 3.0 slot. Whatever is provided in the external case will most likely therefore be supported.

I can't see that they are going to be nice to Mac Pro users, so I don't expect things to be different in regard to either PCIE versions or boot screens in High Sierra. They want us to buy in to the new modular Mac Pro or that new iMac Pro.

You're clearly a Mac Pro user hoping that Apple is going to be nice to you. I wouldn't count on it.

P.S. There is very little real word difference between PCIE versions, don't worry about it.

 

[mrxak]

I wonder if the "modular" Mac Pro they're always talking about is going to require some kind of eGPU, and won't have any internal PCI slots at all.

 

[giggles]

Blame Apple, not NVIDIA.

https://forums.macrumors.com/thread...out-nvidia-pc-non-efi-graphics-cards.1440150/



If Apple could provide stable binary interfaces like Microsoft does, then NVIDIA could release drivers that worked across multiple OS versions.
[doublepost=1496696289][/doublepost]

Nvidia Pascal drivers for Mac made a big sensation in the tech/eGPU/hackintosh news.

Here I learn the whole ordeal is a cross-your-fingers kinda deal (if I have to worry at every point update I may as well build a hackintosh) and hoping nvidia commits to updating drivers fast enough (if at all)..

So to recap: the only peace of mind option for eGPUs is using AMD cards, right? With every OS level feature working and all. (maybe even internal display on macbooks one day...).

I wouldn't mind a nice compact Akitio Node Lite + rx560 (sub-75W models) combo...1050ti is more powerful but again what you described sounds like a PITA..

 

[UL2RA]

I wonder if the "modular" Mac Pro they're always talking about is going to require some kind of eGPU, and won't have any internal PCI slots at all.

That would be stupid.

 

[theitsage]

I wonder if the "modular" Mac Pro they're always talking about is going to require some kind of eGPU, and won't have any internal PCI slots at all.

Seeing what Apple has done to the iMac Pro, the next Mac Pro better has PCIe 4.0.

 

[koyoot]

Seeing what Apple has done to the iMac Pro, the next Mac Pro better has PCIe 4.0.

None of upcoming platforms in 2018 will have PCIe 4.0.

 

[SoyCapitanSoyCapitan]

As we have seen over the years each PCIE revision only provides modest boosts to gaming performance and even less for compute performance. It's better to have lots of VRAM then all the data can load into it and rely less on the PCIE bus.
[doublepost=1496775220][/doublepost]

That would be stupid.

Hypothetically you won't need slots forever, you could have blocks like Lego and just keep adding on whenever you need more power or storage. Then your computer would look completely personalised to you. It would require miniaturisation and efficiency 10 years ahead of today.

There are also now blockchains being developed so that anyone with a GPU earn some coin by renting out processor time over the blockchain. Basically a useful version of Bitcoin. It would need a lot of bandwidth and a great business front end to work.

 

[Xanix]

AMD R9 NANO on macOS Sierra / High Sierra | 0x73001002

Hello to all. As some of you already know, I'm using a R9 NANO, on my Mac Pro.
Today, I made a "clean" install of Sierra and the beta of High Sierra, on my system.

I've tried to "add" my card to the kext(s), that have the Baffin section. Didn't worked... no acceleration on both OS(s)!
I've edited all the kexts that have (AMDBaffinGraphicsAccelerator)... none worked!

Can anyone help me out? What kext is necessary to edit, so I can get my card working?

Thank you in advance for the help.

Kind regards,
Xanix

 

[SoyCapitanSoyCapitan]

Nvidia Pascal drivers for Mac made a big sensation in the tech/eGPU/hackintosh news.

Short lived hype. Until they saw the Nvidia web driver performance was far below Windows, that OpenCL bugs haven't been fixed for two years, and that iBooks show empty pages.

 

[giggles]

Short lived hype. Until they saw the Nvidia web driver performance was far below Windows, that OpenCL bugs haven't been fixed for two years, and that iBooks show empty pages.

I see.
AMD all the way then.
We already know Vega will be supported as soon as the iMac Pro is out (or even earlier). So we got plenty of choice between Polaris (<300$) and Vega (>300$) cards being natively supported.

nvdia and its shortcomings on macOS should probably be the choice for users with very specific nvidia-related needs (CUDA, etc.)...

 

[SoyCapitanSoyCapitan]

I see.
AMD all the way then.
We already know Vega will be supported as soon as the iMac Pro is out (or even earlier). So we got plenty of choice between Polaris (<300$) and Vega (>300$) cards being natively supported.

nvdia and its shortcomings on macOS should probably be the choice for users with very specific nvidia-related needs (CUDA, etc.)...

I'll buy a Vega next month for my PC. Will eventually test it in High Sierra and post results.

 

[Asgorath]

Short lived hype. Until they saw the Nvidia web driver performance was far below Windows, that OpenCL bugs haven't been fixed for two years, and that iBooks show empty pages.

A couple of notes:

- Metal is the only API that matters, and there are very few games/apps that use Metal and can be used for a fair comparison with Windows.
- I don't know which OpenCL bugs you're referring to, can you provide more details?
- iBooks is a "Library Validation" issue where Apple refuses to load the web driver because it isn't signed by Apple. I had heard this was fixed in the most recent OS versions though.

To be clear, I'm not advocating that you go and buy an NVIDIA card or anything, just pointing out that it's not as simple as you might think. Now that Apple has announced products that use Vega, there will be Vega drivers built into the OS and thus that will most likely be the best choice for a PCIe GPU if you are looking to upgrade an older system.

 

[SoyCapitanSoyCapitan]

Asgorath as usually needs to be reminded about OpenCL bugs we have discussed every month for two years. It's his game of misinformation and causing stress to people.

 

[theitsage]

Which of those is the smallest and most power efficient?

The Sonnet Breakaway Box is lightest and smallest. The 350 version comes with a 350W PSU vs. 400W in the AKiTiO Node and 550W in the Mantiz Venus. For a full list of Thunderbolt 3 enclosures, detailed specs, and reviews check eGPU.io buyers' guide.

The Sonnet Breakaway Box 350 only provides 15W of power delivery btw. The 550 version is the one that can charge MacBook Pro. It has 60W PD, good enough for 13" MBP, slow for 15" MBP. Currently, the Mantiz Venus is the only eGPU enclosure with 87W PD. If you want to build your own Metal 2 external graphics development kit, take a look here.

Hi All,

sorry, if this has been already mentioned here (actually not sure): will High Sierra support native PC cards with boot screen ? For example an Nvidia 1080 or 1080TI ?
If so: also full PCI 2.0 support ?

No boot screen. Off-the-shelf RX 470/480/570/580 should work in 10.13 via a Thunderbolt 3 enclosure (w/ TI83 controller). For those with older Thunderbolt-equipped Macs, Thunderbolt 2 enclosure such as the AKiTiO Thunder2 has been confirmed to work in 10.13.

AMD R9 NANO on macOS Sierra / High Sierra | 0x73001002

Hello to all. As some of you already know, I'm using a R9 NANO, on my Mac Pro.
Today, I made a "clean" install of Sierra and the beta of High Sierra, on my system.

I've tried to "add" my card to the kext(s), that have the Baffin section. Didn't worked... no acceleration on both OS(s)!
I've edited all the kexts that have (AMDBaffinGraphicsAccelerator)... none worked!

Can anyone help me out? What kext is necessary to edit, so I can get my card working?

Thank you in advance for the help.

Kind regards,
Xanix

Even though there's new drivers for more AMD cards, Apple made changes in 10.13 so that the same kext edits for Fiji and Polaris 10 GPUs don't work anymore. When the new iMacs with RX 580 get into people's hands, we may have new development for Polaris 10 GPUs in the Mac Pro tower.

 

[Asgorath]

Asgorath as usually needs to be reminded about OpenCL bugs we have discussed every month for two years. It's his game of misinformation and causing stress to people.

You see, most of the bugs you've been complaining about for 2+ years have already been fixed in the latest drivers. I'm genuinely curious about what bugs (if any) remain. Surely you can provide more details?

 

[mfletcher]

The Sonnet Breakaway Box is lightest and smallest. The 350 version comes with a 350W PSU vs. 400W in the AKiTiO Node and 550W in the Mantiz Venus. For a full list of Thunderbolt 3 enclosures, detailed specs, and reviews check eGPU.io buyers' guide.

The Sonnet Breakaway Box 350 only provides 15W of power delivery btw. The 550 version is the one that can charge MacBook Pro. It has 60W PD, good enough for 13" MBP, slow for 15" MBP. Currently, the Mantiz Venus is the only eGPU enclosure with 87W PD. If you want to build your own Metal 2 external graphics development kit, take a look here.

No boot screen. Off-the-shelf RX 470/480/570/580 should work in 10.13 via a Thunderbolt 3 enclosure (w/ TI83 controller). For those with older Thunderbolt-equipped Macs, Thunderbolt 2 enclosure such as the AKiTiO Thunder2 has been confirmed to work in 10.13.

Even though there's new drivers for more AMD cards, Apple made changes in 10.13 so that the same kext edits for Fiji and Polaris 10 GPUs don't work anymore. When the new iMacs with RX 580 get into people's hands, we may have new development for Polaris 10 GPUs in the Mac Pro tower.

Hi, if the RX 580 in the external GPU kit isnt flashed to provide boot screens - If I was to use this in a MacPro with High Sierra, would it work with full bandwidth or does it need to be flashed with an EFI bios?

 

[zoltm]

 

[dumbdumb]

So all I've seen are conflicting answers, but will older Thunderbolt 2 devices like late 2015 MBP be supported?