Thunderbolt eGPU Possibilities for Early Intel Macs?

[ToniCH]

That’s quite a bit for a GPU introduced in 2017 but the going prices for empty TB3 eGPU boxes alone somewhat put it into perspective.

Yes, I have been keeping my eye on eGPU boxes but second hand ones go for 300€+ and with a GPU of some sort they are often 400-500€. So, comparing to that I thought the Blackmagic was quite cheap. Plain RX580 8GB cards with unknown past go for 70-80€.

So I’d be interested in hearing if the iMac also has issues with Kryptonite, but it might be easier to use an unpatched version of macOS for that. Basically, I wonder if the issues are isolated to the 2011 MBP or not.

I have another 2011 iMac. I might give it a try with an unpatched OS.

I did try the Sonnet with this one a year ago and failed with it too but cannot remember how it went. I think the Kryptonite has not been updated for a long time so I might have had the exact same problem. Especially considering that the iMac didn't even boot with Kryptonite installed, didn't matter if eGPU was connected or not.

This time I made a new EFI partition to an USB stick, installed OCLP to it. Then test booted with it successfully. Then I used Kryptonite installer to install it to the EFI of the said stick. And then no boot.

 

[Amethyst1]

Plain RX580 8GB cards with unknown past go for 70-80€.

*cough* mining *cough*

This time I made a new EFI partition to an USB stick, installed OCLP to it. Then test booted with it successfully. Then I used Kryptonite installer to install it to the EFI of the said stick. And then no boot.

I see. Kryptonite doesn’t require OC to be already present.

 

[ToniCH]

I see. Kryptonite doesn’t require OC to be already present.

I know, I've installed it already dozen+ times to different machines. Most of my eGPU-relevant machines run native Mojave or Catalina but many also OCLP+Monterey.

I need to investigate how it behaves with other OCLP-machines than this iMac.

 

[TheShortTimer]

@TheShortTimer — have you tested Kryptonite on your 2011 MBA?

I honestly can't remember. I'll check later and let you know.

 

[ToniCH]

I honestly can't remember. I'll check later and let you know.

Discussion earlier in this thread indicates that you have. Have a look for example from post #51 onwards where its mentioned several times in a way that sounds like you had problems with it.

 

[TheShortTimer]

Discussion earlier in this thread indicates that you have. Have a look for example from post #51 onwards where its mentioned several times in a way that sounds like you had problems with it.

Oh yes, that's right! You've triggered my brain cells. Thanks.

Ultimately I switched to PurgeWrangler for both the 2011 MBA and MBP because Kryptonite never worked well on both machines. This is something that I'll have to revisit given that I've effectively retired the 2011 MBP in favour of its 13" 2012 successor - which is running Ventura and apparently Kryptonite is currently incompatible with it.

 

[ToniCH]

I just tried the Kryptonite + BlackMagic RX580 with my headless MBP 2014 i7 2.5GHz DG (Big Sur). This is a very fast machine for its age.

Year ago when I tried Kryptonite + eGPU last time (with this headless machine) I didn't get it to work but this time for some reason no problem. I might have answered the one question wrong in Kryptonite installer last time as I initially also did that this time. The installer asks: "are you using NVIDIA GPU?". I thought this was about the internal dGPU which was also addressed in the installer after that. But when reading the summary of settings before committing to install I noticed that the question was actually about the eGPU. So, i fixed that answer and now everything works. 👍

Again, I didn't (yet) try to disable the dGPU as I do not have an internal display at all. If you want to connect the display to the eGPU and thus get even better performance you should disable the dGPU in Kryptonite installer but I wonder how does it work as this machine no longer has its original display but is working as headless? Well, it might work just fine - maybe I'll try it later. But now I just try it by connecting the external display to machines HDMI-connector. But because of this I now have to set each software one at a time to prefer the eGPU when possible. Otherwise it will use original gpus automatically.

So, here are the results, very good improvement! 😍

Stock:

BlackMagic RX580 (using the MBP's HDMI out):

 

[TheShortTimer]

Thanks for sharing your results @ToniCH.

 

[ToniCH]

And here are the GB5 -results too (Metal on left and OpenCL on right):

 

[Amethyst1]

If you want to connect the display to the eGPU and thus get even better performance you should disable the dGPU in Kryptonite installer but I wonder how does it work as this machine no longer has its original display but is working as headless? Well, it might work just fine - maybe I'll try it later.

Theoretically, once the eGPU is working and outputting to the external display, disabling the dGPU shouldn’t be a problem. In any case, just connecting the display to the eGPU provides a performance boost.

 

[ToniCH]

Theoretically, once the eGPU is working and outputting to the external display, disabling the dGPU shouldn’t be a problem. In any case, just connecting the display to the eGPU provides a performance boost.

Yes, if I see the boot selector and dGPU is only disabled after Kryptonite is chosen (like I think it is) then it should not be a problem. I'll try that with a USB stick installation of Krypton OC EFI.

Main advantage on that is one less cable to the MBP, and some speed improvement should be seen too.

 

[ToniCH]

Okey, I have now tried it. It works*. 👍 But, I got some mixed results. 🧐

1. Heaven & Valley indicate improvement
2. GB5 is the opposite

* I need to unplug HDMI from eGPU and plug it into the MBP to boot and then mid way when the progress bar freezes plug it back. I have not been able to get a pic booting blind even though it defaults to Kryptonite and the process is simple. Booting with the HDMI plugged into the MBP and not disabling dGPU is easier.

Results (compare to post #107):

Two on top are when the display is connected to the eGPU and 2 on the bottom are when the display is connected to the MBP. I would have expected this to be other way around.

 

[ToniCH]

One more result to report. I just found out that the iMac 2011 works in Target Display Mode with my MBP mid 2014. And when doing so also the eGPU works with this combo. So, while using the iMac as a display its accelerated like any normal monitor. I tried several software and this far all worked normally. 👍

Connections are like this:
1. MBP to eGPU: connected with TB2 cable and Apple TB2-TB3 -adapter
2. MBP to iMac: TB2 cable

And this is what I get with Geekbench 5. It seems that this is the fastest GB result this far for this MBP+eGPU.

 

[Amethyst1]

I just found out that the iMac 2011 works in Target Display Mode with my MBP mid 2014. And when doing so also the eGPU works with this combo.

Ultimate test: Does the iMac work in TDM when it’s connected to the eGPU? (You need a second TB2-to-TB3 adapter for this.)

I’m asking because TB TDM has more specific requirements than an actual TB monitor such as the source being an Intel Mac running macOS. So I wonder if an eGPU with TB video output cuts it?

 

[ToniCH]

Currently I do not have another adapter, when I get one I will try.

I ran into a problem: Heaven and Valley produce black benchmark screen but I can hear the sound so its running and the computer is normally responsive. Tried a second screen, mirroring etc but same thing in both screens when TDM is active.