MP 6,1 Upgrading the 2013 nMP for maximum performance

[sparkplug37]

Regarding the eGPU box and a 5k monitor thoughts.

I have a 6 core Mac Pro 2013 with D700 and I have now got a Razer Core X, and Apple Thunderbolt 2 adaptor, with a Sapphire AMD Radeon VII graphics card driving a single Dell 5k UP2715K monitor via two Display ports. It just works really well I have no issues except for boot time when the fan of the graphics card go full speed but that's an issue with that graphics card in general believe.

The card has four display ports so I suspect I could drive another 4k monitor but I do not have one to test with.

I'm currently getting a score on Geekbench 5 Metal test of 44700 for the eGPU and 28000 for an internal D700 so its a great setup.

 

[MrTed]

Sorry, Pro Tools user here, so I can't speak for Logic Pro.

I found this:

About the Multithreading setting in Logic Pro for Mac - Apple Support

Use the Multithreading setting in Logic Pro 10.2.1 or later to fine-tune performance.

support.apple.com

Since it's only about playback maybe track bouncing is only single core.
Check out the advanced tab, I just own compressor as a native apple application and you can setup additional cores in the advanced preferences tab.

View attachment 860690

The article you mention is about playback performance. I really need to know if Logic bounce (like render in video world) is using one core or many. Because if clock speed is more important than number of core I'm not sure I need to ugrade my 6 core CPU to 12 ...Thanks.

 

[chfilm]

Regarding the eGPU box and a 5k monitor thoughts.

I have a 6 core Mac Pro 2013 with D700 and I have now got a Razer Core X, and Apple Thunderbolt 2 adaptor, with a Sapphire AMD Radeon VII graphics card driving a single Dell 5k UP2715K monitor via two Display ports. It just works really well I have no issues except for boot time when the fan of the graphics card go full speed but that's an issue with that graphics card in general believe.

The card has four display ports so I suspect I could drive another 4k monitor but I do not have one to test with.

I'm currently getting a score on Geekbench 5 Metal test of 44700 for the eGPU and 28000 for an internal D700 so its a great setup.

Wow thanks so much for this insight!
You wrote you suspect you could drive another 4K Monitor but I guess you meant 5k?
what does the tech spec sheet of your cars say about that?
Are you using Premiere and notice any difference?

 

[chfilm]

Wow thanks so much for this insight!
You wrote you suspect you could drive another 4K Monitor but I guess you meant 5k?
what does the tech spec sheet of your cars say about that?
Are you using Premiere and notice any difference?

oh I just realize the radeon VII can’t run two of my displays

 

[mikas]

Regarding the eGPU box and a 5k monitor thoughts.

I have a 6 core Mac Pro 2013 with D700 and I have now got a Razer Core X, and Apple Thunderbolt 2 adaptor, with a Sapphire AMD Radeon VII graphics card driving a single Dell 5k UP2715K monitor via two Display ports. It just works really well I have no issues except for boot time when the fan of the graphics card go full speed but that's an issue with that graphics card in general believe.

The card has four display ports so I suspect I could drive another 4k monitor but I do not have one to test with.

I'm currently getting a score on Geekbench 5 Metal test of 44700 for the eGPU and 28000 for an internal D700 so its a great setup.

I am considering the eGPU aproach too with Mac Pro 2013. I find your result a little bit strange with your D700. I just ran GB5 Metal test, and received a 23042 with D300 GPU. Only 500 less than your D700.

If I can't even double that with something like Radeon VII eGPU, then I don't think there is much point upgrading to eGPU. Maybe it's the thundelbolt 2 limitation, or what do you or other members think about that?

 

[AlexMaximus]

Hi Mikas,

I did ponder on that 6.1 + eGPU set up a while ago and asked around, but ended up with a Pixlas Vega7 on my 5.1 instead, that is so far really great.
In those 6.1 days, one had to consult this egpu.io website very frequently in order to get it going at all. The BlackMagic Davinci brotherhood
was very hot on the eGPU side because the software uses every and any GPU and eGPU that is installed. Unfortunately, the support is less evolved on Apple's side. I would say it really depends on the application. If you use Davinci, by all means, go for it. If not, you need to read more application-specific info on that, if indeed it makes sense.
But since you are an expert in the 5.1, you may consider a Pixlas mod with one strong or two medium AMD GPU's.
I just recently added the new Thunderbolt controller Titan Ridge to my 5.1 that enables TB2/TB3 connectivity. This way I will be able to even think about an eGPU as well. Bandwidth will be of course the bottleneck because of the PCIe slot limitation, but I am sure Davinci and other apps will take it never the less. In my case its more of a hobby anyway.
Hope this helps. Thanks for those setup pics in the other blog.

I got mine already flashed for mac over eBay.

 

[mikas]

Thanks for your insights again.

I forgot to mention in that other thread that I use TwinMotion 2020 for 3D rendering besides CPU based CineRender. TwinMotion is an Unreal engine and GPU based software. I've got a Vega 56 in a cMP 5.1 for that, and it's quite good forthat purpose. Speed is no issue with Vega. VRAM is the next step to upgrade (8->16GB). I could fit and render bigger models with a 16GB VII or Frontier etc.

So if eGPU appears to be not that ideal for TwinMotion, or it is not on par with my current solution, then there is no real incentive to go that way with 6,1. Maybe I'll just have to try it with my Vega, make the tests and do comparison. At least we would know then.

There is this ProRender too, but in my opinion it's not there yet, at least not for me and my GPUs.

 

[sparkplug37]

I am considering the eGPU aproach too with Mac Pro 2013. I find your result a little bit strange with your D700. I just ran GB5 Metal test, and received a 23042 with D300 GPU. Only 500 less than your D700.

If I can't even double that with something like Radeon VII eGPU, then I don't think there is much point upgrading to eGPU. Maybe it's the thundelbolt 2 limitation, or what do you or other members think about that?

Well GB5 did change a few things a while back and so results from different versions can give differing results so I have redone the test on the latest version and I get the following results:
D700 card 1 - 32785 - https://browser.geekbench.com/v5/compute/1568209
D700 card 2 - 32514 - https://browser.geekbench.com/v5/compute/1568220
Radeon VII (egpu) - 54654 - https://browser.geekbench.com/v5/compute/1568304

BTW over the last year I have upgraded a few more components in the MacPro so my current spec is:
10 core (was 6 core)
2 x D700
2TB Samsung EVO SSD
64GB memory
Radeon VII EGPU via tb2-tb3 adaptor and Razer Core X enclosure
Sonet tb2 to 10GB ethernet
tb2 RAID enclosure

 

[mikas]

Thanks for your reply. I'm already getting a 2690V2, arriving in a couple of days, and 64GB of memory ordered yesterday. And it happened I just bought a Radeon VII from eBay.de a couple of hours ago.

I was going to put the VII in a cMP with Pixlas mod, but I just might try the eGPU route. At least I would know for sure after comparing the alternatives by myself. Would it suit my needs.

And yes, there is a Razer X with MSI 5700XT 8GB on sale locally, and it's within reasonable € . But still I'd want that double VRAM next time within twinmotion, so that would be the VII in either of them (6,1 or 5,1).

You seem to have something more behind your ethernet too, I mean that 10Gbit ethernet adapter..?

 

[sparkplug37]

You seem to have something more behind your ethernet too, I mean that 10Gbit ethernet adapter..?

Just wanted a bit more speed then the standard 1GB I had going to my NAS for when I move media and it seemed a good price.

 

[gravotto]

Happy New Year!

I have been reading through this thread and I have to thank everyone for the great info! I have learned a lot and considering an upgrade to a 12 core with 64MB or 128MB RAM. I presently have the Mac Pro (Late 2013), 3.5 GHz 6-Core Intel Xeon E5, 32 GB 1866 MHz DDR3, AMD FirePro D700 6 GB.

For now, I don't have any major questions but I did come across a Geekbench profile that has really thrown me off and I was wondering if anyone might be able to take a look at this and share your opinions. Please look at the Topology and let me know what you see. I feel like it could be an error and if it is not how has this been achieved?

Here is the link https://browser.geekbench.com/v5/cpu/5651381

Thanks for your time, gravotto

 

[mikas]

It seems not to be a real Mac (nMP), but a Hackintosh with two processors.

 

[gravotto]

Hi Mikas, How are you? Thanks for looking into this, Hackintosh didn't even cross my mind. I was a little excited that someone figured out a hack for two processors in this machine. Now I just have to figure out what will suit my needs for the long term.
I am starting to think that an additional machine would be beneficial. One for rendering needs and another for Single-Core focus. I am not really sure, I might be overthinking it. I am a little hung up on this just because I have always loved the portability of this computer. I also ponder an eGPU for use with UE4, and Twinmotion. I then start to relax a bit when I think about Metal but how long will it be before everyone jumps on board? Patience is all we need, at this rate our nMP will last forever...or will it?

thanks again, gravotto