USB 3.x PCIe Cards for Classic Mac Pro

[joevt]

PCIe cards that have a x4 physical connector may actually be only x2 electrical connection. This includes many or all of the ASM1142 cards. Some PCIe controllers do not allow x2, and will negotiate as x1 instead.

Slot 3 and 4 of the Mac Pro 2008 will negotiate any x2 card as x1. Those slots are PCIe 1.0, and at x1, they allow 250 MB/s. That's faster than an HDD but less than half the speed of an SSD. It's still much better than firewire or USB 2.0.

Slot 1 and 2 of the Mac Pro 2008 are PCIe 2.0 and will negotiate x2, so they will allow 1000 MB/s.

Any PCIe slot connected directly to a Sandy Bridge CPU (2nd Generation Core Processor Family Desktop CPU's) will not negotiate x2, and at PCIe 2.0, will allow up to 500 MB/s for x1. That's almost as fast as an SSD.

I would like to see a card that does PCIe 1.0 x4 so I can get the full performance of USB 3.1 on my old Mac Pro 2008 without using slot 1 (where the graphics card goes) or slot 2. For the ASM1142, the manufacturer would have to add a PCIe bridge chip to convert the PCIe 2.0 x2 of the ASM1142 to PCIe 1.0 x4 of the PCIe slot.

Two quick questions regarding the Caldigit 6GU3 Plus:

1) Has anyone had any further success at 10 Gbps? It's been a little while...

2) Are the two USB ports on independent controllers? I've searched the forums, but only see mention of the 6GU3 Pro having one USB controller between both ports...

Thanks!
S

I had been using a Startech 2-Port USB 3.1 (10Gbps) Card - 2x USB-C - PCIe (PEXUSB312C)
https://www.startech.com/ca/Cards-Adapters/USB-3.0/Cards/2-port-pcie-usb-3-1-card~PEXUSB312C
It is a PCIe gen2 x2 card using the ASM1142 ASMedia USB 3.1 Host Controller.

I have recently tried a Caldigit 6GU3 Plus. The layout is like this:

pci12d8,2308: PI7C9X2G308GP PCIe2 3-Port/8-Lane Packet Switch, GreenPacket™ Family
    upstream port: 4 Lanes
        downstream port 1: 2 Lanes
            pci1b21,1242: ASM1142 ASMedia USB 3.1 Host Controller (2 ports)
        downstream port 2: 2 Lanes
            pci1b21,0625: ASM1062 ASMedia’s second generation Serial ATA Advantage HCI controller, two ports of Serial ATA 6Gps

The Caldigit uses the same USB controller but because there is a PCIe switch with 4 lanes upstream, the USB controller will have almost the same performance in my Mac Pro's gen 1 PCIe slot as the gen 2 PCIe slot (up to 1000 MB/s).

The Startech card can only operate up to 250 MB/s in my Mac Pro's gen 1 PCIe slot because that slot does not support x2 (even then it would only allow up to 500 MB/s).

Both USB ports (10 Gbps) are on the same USB controller, which uses a PCIe gen 2 x2 link so you can't raid them to get more than 1000 MB/s. The SATA ports (6 Gbps) have a similar limitation. You could raid the USB ports and the SATA ports together to get up to 2000 MB/s if the card is in a PCIe gen 2 slot.

The Caldigit card comes with USB 3.0 (5 Gbps) firmware so that it will be compatible with Mac OS X 10.11 (El Capitan) and earlier. I applied the USB 3.1 (10 Gbps) firmware updater from Caldigit's website which allows it to work only in macOS 10.12 (Sierra) or later but at 10 Gbps.

Both the Startech and the Caldigit cards show my OWC Mercury Elite Pro Dual mini bus-powered USB 3.1 Gen 2 RAID as "Up to 5 Gb/sec" but they both transfer at more than 5 Gb/sec (they read up to 745 MB/s in my Mac Pro 2008 and slightly faster in a Z170 Hackintosh), so this is probably a bug in the ASMedia firmware where it doesn't set the USB xHCI Port Status and Control Register (PORTSC) correctly (at least for this device). This register is read by Mac OS to display the current speed in System Information.app.

If you want a card with faster dual USB port support then it would need to use separate controllers or something like the ASM2142 which uses PCIe gen 3 x2. For a classic Mac Pro, that would need to be paired with at least a PCIe gen 3 2 port 6 lane switch.

 

[Sko]

I tried two different USB 3.0 cards in a Mac Pro 1,1 running 10.11.3.

The Inateck KT4006 (2-port version, no power cable required) works great on cMP 1,1 (MacPro1,1 from 2006, now firmware updated to 2,1) with El Cap 10.11.3 in a PCIe x4 slot. However, it has problems drawing too much power when installed in a PCIe 1.0 x1 slot -- OS X says "USB Devices Disabled" on wake from sleep, only fix is to reboot. All is well if you install the card in an x4 slot rather than x1 in the Mac Pro 1,1.
...

Dammit, that card shouldn't be on the recommended list. There are no positive experiences with that card in the thread, just one negative experience.

I just installed the Inateck KT4006 in my Mac Pro 1,1 -> 2,1 with El Capitan 10.11.6 in slot #4. I setup my PCI slots to have four lanes for the Inateck as advised from the post above. No issues with this card, sleep works well.

I used a 5,25" -> 3,5" adapter to mount a 3,5" USB 3 front panel in the lower ODD slot. I needed to cut a little piece out of the drive cage to route the cable.

 

[Sko]

...

• Transferring data over USB 3.0 interferes with bluetooth reception and to a lesser extent 2.4Ghz Wi-Fi.

...

As a follow-up, I was switching BT and AirPort cables to get better reception. While the Mac was disassembled anyway, I installed some self adhesive copper foil over the bluetooth module (basically the same stuff that OWC is selling for Mac Mini).

Interference is gone. I don't know if it was the one mod or the other, but it works perfectly now.

P.S.: Sorry for interrupting and bringing up a none new-new-Mac-Pro thread.

 

[pastrychef]

In my experience, using 5GHz for Wifi helps with my Bluetooth A LOT!!

Also, be careful that the tape is not conductive.

 

[zedsdeadbaby]

Looking at grabbing an Inateck KT4004.
I believe I read some time back that despite the quote on Inateck's site that it's incompatible with El Cap it actually does work, and is stable. (And is working in Sierra as well.)
Can you anyone confirm before I pull the trigger?

EDIT: Refreshed Amazon and see they're in stock. Read a few reviews and found this:

" When Inateck says this card will not work on a MacPro running OS 10.11 they are correct. It installs in seconds, requires no drivers and is obviously much faster than USB 2. But after a day, I found strange things starting to happen. My mouse would not scroll, Lightroom became corrupted and camera memory cards could sometimes be read but not always."

Has anyone else experienced these issues?

 

[pastrychef]

Confirmed.

 

[zedsdeadbaby]

Thanks. Reading back through it looks like there's no way to add USB 3 without blutetooth interference. Has anyone found a solution that's working in 10.11 and 10.12?

(Sorry for the redundancy btw. You guys have taken these machines well beyond their limit. I don't know what I'd do without this forum!

 

[h9826790]

Thanks. Reading back through it looks like there's no way to add USB 3 without blutetooth interference. Has anyone found a solution that's working in 10.11 and 10.12?

There are plenty of solution. E.g.

1) shield the USB 3.0 card.
2) use external USB BT dongle
3) connect the BT card to a better / external antenna.

 

[ActionableMango]

Thanks. Reading back through it looks like there's no way to add USB 3 without blutetooth interference.

Some people can't even get their Magic Trackpad to work a few feet away. But for what it's worth, this is very much a "your mileage may vary" thing.

I have a USB 3 card and bluetooth interference, but am still able to use bluetooth devices just fine. Maybe my computer is closer to the devices, or maybe my desk doesn't block radio signals as much. Maybe it is because I'm not also using Wi-Fi (which typically uses the same frequency).

Sure I can't leave the room with my BT headphones on anymore, but that's the only noticeable problem for me. I did upgrade to bluetooth 4.0 and maybe that is more resistant to interference, but I seem to remember it was fine even before that.

 

[zedsdeadbaby]

Some people can't even get their Magic Trackpad to work a few feet away. But for what it's worth, this is very much a "your mileage may vary" thing.

I have a USB 3 card and bluetooth interference, but am still able to use bluetooth devices just fine. Maybe my computer is closer to the devices, or maybe my desk doesn't block radio signals as much. Maybe it is because I'm not also using Wi-Fi (which typically uses the same frequency).

Sure I can't leave the room with my BT headphones on anymore, but that's the only noticeable problem for me. I did upgrade to bluetooth 4.0 and maybe that is more resistant to interference, but I seem to remember it was fine even before that.

Cool, no wifi on my machine either so that's not an issue. Distance shouldn't be a problem since it's under my desk. We'll see how it goes when it arrives...

 

[MIKX]

Bluetooth interference.
I use a Bluetooth USB dongle with an extended cable so the dongle is about 1 metre away from my cMP .. no intereference at all.

 

[JamesPDX]

I hope this is still the right thread. For SSDs, has anyone had success with replacing the SATA2 connection with this card? https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00AZ9T41M/ref=ask_ql_qh_dp_hza (while retaining the onboard SATA 2 power connectors in the 4 bays?)

 

[crjackson2134]

I hope this is still the right thread. For SSDs, has anyone had success with replacing the SATA2 connection with this card? https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00AZ9T41M/ref=ask_ql_qh_dp_hza (while retaining the onboard SATA 2 power connectors in the 4 bays?)

This thread is about USB 3.x cards in the classic MacPro. Not really aimed at SATA or SSD specific answers.

 

[JamesPDX]

This thread is about USB 3.x cards in the classic MacPro. Not really aimed at SATA or SSD specific answers.

Here. I fixed it: https://www.amazon.com/Sonnet-Allegro-4-Port-Windows-Compatible/dp/B00GRGCV2G/ref=sr_1_3?s=electronics&ie=UTF8&qid=1496400468&sr=1-3&keywords=USB+3+card+for+Mac&refinements=p_72%3A1248879011

 

[InuNacho]

I recently picked up a SIIG branded ASM1142 3.1 card and it works out of the box on my 4,1 running 10.9.5. Unfortunately it does have a major issue with Bluetooth where if I use it for anything I mysteriously cannot mount any drives to it and it becomes unresponsive.
The airport card on my machine has been dead for years and I've been using a USB option and I haven't noticed any discernible difference there.

EDIT: Just found out it wasn't bluetooth but perhaps a sleep issue. It can got to sleep successfully but it kicks the drives off, not safely disconnecting them.

 

[William_si]

I ordered a bunch of mostly NEC based minipcie cards to put for testing in the airport slot on one of my 5,1s - plus one Renesas based one and lastly a USB-C 3.1 one which seems based on ASM (no more info from ebay seller).

They will be limited to 2.5GT/s (~half a USB 3 port) but i merely want to route them to front until i have all HW to build my next pcie multiplier iteration (using slot 1 (as dual height) to run 1x10G - Myricom at x4, 4x dedicated USB 3.0 - RocketU at x4, a x4 PCIe SSD - Kingston pre-production sample and lastly a slot for a x2 RAID card that mounts 4x M.2 SATA blades as filevault does not do encryption on SW RAID). First cards should arrive in a week or so, will update then.

Side note - my RocketU works perfectly fine aside of not being able to charge 2 iPads at once, Sierra.

 

[joevt]

I found this card called the Sunix UPD2018 which is basically just another ASM1142 based two port USB 3.1 gen 2 card, except that the USB-C output supports USB-C alt mode using a DisplayPort input.

Besides the Pros and Cons of using an ASM1142 chip already mentioned in other posts, this card has the following:
Pros:
1) Adds a USB-C alt mode port to your computer, so you can use USB-C alt mode displays and display adapters.
Cons:
1) This is a PCIe 3.0 x1 card. A PCIe 2.0 slot will limit USB speed to less than 500 MB/s. A PCIe 1.0 slot will limit the USB speed to less than 250 MB/s. Workaround: Use the card in a PCIe 3.0 expansion chassis.
2) Only provides 5V/1.5A=7.5W per USB port.

 

[Squuiid]

Has anyone tested any of these cards out in High Sierra? Wondered if there might be more support for them in the new OS.

 

[MIKX]

I live in Japan and the Inateck 4 port SATA powered Fresco FL1100 UASP capable USB 3.0 card is called the " KT4001 " here. On the Inateck website it is called the " KTU3FR-4P.
Mine was delivered this morning via Amazon for about US $23

Works OOTB in Mavericks 10.9.5 and Sierra 10.12.5

Inateck website under the KTU3FR-4P model name https://www.inateck.com/inateck-ktu3fr-4p-usb-3-0-pci-express-karte-mit-4-usb-3-0-ports.html

The same card under the KT4001 model name on Amazon Japan https://www.amazon.co.jp/Inateck-4ポ...10?s=computers&ie=UTF8&qid=1498105705&sr=1-10


I have a USB 3.1 Asmedia 1142 2 port card for emergencies

 

[mrjayviper]

What other chips are macOS compatible OOB?

I've read about FL1100 and asmedia 1042a already.

also it would be great if someone can link me to a FL1100 that can be bought from a chinese/HK store. Amazon don't ship to my country. Thanks

 

[joevt]

What other chips are macOS compatible OOB?

I've read about FL1100 and asmedia 1042a already.

also it would be great if someone can link me to a FL1100 that can be bought from a chinese/HK store. Amazon don't ship to my country. Thanks

Supported devices are listed in /System/Library/Extensions/IOUSBHostFamily.kext/Contents/PlugIns/AppleUSBXHCIPCI.kext/Contents/Info.plist

XHCI is for USB 3.0 and later standard.
The PlugIns folder also contains drivers for OHCI, EHCI, UHCI (USB 1.1, 2.0)
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Host_controller_interface_(USB,_Firewire)

In the Info.plist file is a list of IOKitPersonalities. IOPCIPrimaryMatch matches the PCI device ID and vendor ID.
For FL1100, it is 0x11001b73 which represents vendor id 1b73, device id 1100.
If you google "pci 1b73 1100" then you get:
https://pci-ids.ucw.cz/read/PC/1b73/1100

You can look up the other device IDs there. The vendor ID 8086 is for Intel. All of those are the USB XHCI controller in the various motherboard chipsets, or the Thunderbolt 3 chips.

The IOKitPersonality named "AppleUSBXHCIPCI" uses a IOPCIClassMatch which matches against the class code of the device. 0x0c033000 represents class code 0C (Serial bus controller), sub class 03 (USB controller), program interface 30 (XHCI).

Device classes are listed here:
https://pci-ids.ucw.cz/read/PD/

Basically, any device with that class code should work. The Asmedia and NEC chips are included here. I suppose it depends on how well the Apple generic driver is written and how well the devices adhere to the XHCI spec. Boot support is another story. I don't know if the firmware of the Mac or a PCIe card needs to be changed to support booting?

macOS Sierra added support for USB 3.1 Gen 2 in the XHCI drivers. Previous Mac OS X versions would not support XHCI chips that specified that speed (10 Gbps). I don't know why Apple didn't support arbitrary speeds in the first place. If Apple still doesn't support arbitrary speeds then we'll run into problems again if XHCI goes beyond 10 Gbps.

 

[h9826790]

What other chips are macOS compatible OOB?

I've read about FL1100 and asmedia 1042a already.

also it would be great if someone can link me to a FL1100 that can be bought from a chinese/HK store. Amazon don't ship to my country. Thanks

You can buy KT4004 on Amazon, they ship it to Hong Kong. I did that already. That's one of the the best low cost card for cMP due to no extra power required.

However, if you want to go to a shop. Just go to SSP. Many shops sell the Orico PME-4U. This card also work flawlessly on cMP. But you need to get a correct cable to power it. The PME-4U suppose to come with a correct cable, but many store don't give it to you. And that cable is not inside the package. They have to give you separately.

 

[MIKX]

I'm curious as to whether anyone has had "recent" success in any flavour of OS X from Mavericks onwards for the VLI VL805 or the Etron EJ168 chips. I did do some searching in Macrumors but so far nothing definite came up or I missed some posts or what posts I found were well out of date.

 

[zedsdeadbaby]

This might come across as daft, apologies if so... Although the FASTA-6GU3 Plus is win in terms of speed for cMPs, it still doesn't provide a way to connect any TB peripherals to them, is that correct?

 

[h9826790]

This might come across as daft, apologies if so... Although the FASTA-6GU3 Plus is win in terms of speed for cMPs, it still doesn't provide a way to connect any TB peripherals to them, is that correct?

Correct, no Thunderbolt solution for cMP yet.