Ive never took apart/busted down a mac pro before, only an imac, just sitting here with the side off of it currently typing on it. Am i gonna have to remove my only optical drive for this gpu or are there already 2 open sata ports on the mobo? all my drive bays are full with drives although I could take 1 out and use that SATA port if needed. Does it matter or even work like that? little bit of a noob. feels better knowing i have all the right cables coming now though. Would you mind detailing how i would go about plugging the stuff up ? mainly like what to where? thanks bro its really appreciated
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MP 1,1-5,1 Using Vega 56 in MP 5,1 - questions
- Thread starter macman4789
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GPU's might differ a lot between manufacturers and models, I think between makes of cards too, so I can't say if you need to switch to low power mode or not. I don't know if your card even have that possibility.
2x SATA power should be enough for one 6-pin, and 2x mini 6-pin should well be enough for one 8-pin. I wouldn't want to stress just one SATA power to one 6-pin. Many do this, but it's too risky for me at least.
It's just that the connectors on the cables might not be of high quality, and if stressed long periods of time, they might heat up and eventually burn out, and maybe cause some nasty havoc inside the Mac.
So if you plan to game with it, take good care of your cabling and try to buy quality components, if it's possible to find out about the quality. Most often there's no means to know about quality, sadly. Even the price does not mean anything today, not necessarily.
There is software to monitor the power usages. I used an outdated one, Marcel Bresinks Hardware Monitor. He stopped developing it long time ago. You can still find supported software to measure your Mac Pro watts and amps though.
Good Luck and Happy Gaming I wish !
2x SATA power should be enough for one 6-pin, and 2x mini 6-pin should well be enough for one 8-pin. I wouldn't want to stress just one SATA power to one 6-pin. Many do this, but it's too risky for me at least.
It's just that the connectors on the cables might not be of high quality, and if stressed long periods of time, they might heat up and eventually burn out, and maybe cause some nasty havoc inside the Mac.
So if you plan to game with it, take good care of your cabling and try to buy quality components, if it's possible to find out about the quality. Most often there's no means to know about quality, sadly. Even the price does not mean anything today, not necessarily.
There is software to monitor the power usages. I used an outdated one, Marcel Bresinks Hardware Monitor. He stopped developing it long time ago. You can still find supported software to measure your Mac Pro watts and amps though.
Good Luck and Happy Gaming I wish !
the mailman just dropped off the card, theres 2 8-pin ports on it, these say to 6 pin tho so is this ok ? or should it be dual sata to 8 pin? i ordered that one cause i thought i read them using 6 pins iv never actually seen the card or cords till now
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i would have just ordered a better card if i wanted to do pixlas mod, i thought this is what i needed, now i looked up the red dragon version and see it is 6 and 8. instead of 8 and 8 like the sapphire. They have a dual sata to 8 pin, can i just get that and still be good?
Dual SATA is not rated for 150W, which is what 8-pin is rated at. I wouldn't do that, though I'm sure many have done it.
I recall there are cards which do accept 6-pin to be attached in one of their 8-pin connectors, but I don't have any experience with those. Nor do I know about your card enough, sorry.
Maybe you can return the card to seller, especially if the information was incorrect in the first hand about the 6-pin/8-pin arrangement, and maybe find another one that suites your needs better.
I recall there are cards which do accept 6-pin to be attached in one of their 8-pin connectors, but I don't have any experience with those. Nor do I know about your card enough, sorry.
Maybe you can return the card to seller, especially if the information was incorrect in the first hand about the 6-pin/8-pin arrangement, and maybe find another one that suites your needs better.
Hi if you search my username you will find loads of posts regarding the vega 56
Simply…..
Simply…..
- buy an EVGA powerlink they cheap. It balances the power draw from each 6pin PCIe power connector. Search this forum there is old thread discussing this
- plug the powerlink onto the Vega GPU
- use the 2 PCIE power connectors on the mother board to the powerlink. You can use 6pin cables. You do not need 8pin cables. The extra 2 pins are sense and ground wires, they do not deliver any power
- On the side of the card is a small micro switch which selects between full power and economy mode. Switch it to economy mode. The card instructions tell you which way to move the switch. In economy mode you get less power draw but only a small loss in performance iirc -7%
- Make sure you are using the latest version of Mac OS Mojave or newer. This OS provided optimised drivers for the vega card.
- I have been using a vega 56 for quite a few years for mainly for photo and video editing. It has worked without a hitch.
Yes I agree with the above, there are many ways to get it going. There are 8+6 and 8+8 Vega56 cards out there. TDP's seem to vary at 210W to 280W or maybe even more. Manufacturer suggested PSUs go from 550W to 750W.
I think the card was said to be used for gaming, which could be a very demanding task for the card, and for long periods of time?
Normal mode:
If the card is this, the spec says it's power consumption is rated at 280W. Normally PCIe slot draws hit somewhere between 20-30W, maybe 40W. So at max. levels of draw the two mini 6-pins would have to deliver are (280W-40W)/2 = 120W per mini 6-pin. That would be at self shutdown levels. And we haven't taken into consideration the power spikes which happen time to time, we can read about it in Tsialex post about power spikes in this same thread a couple of years ago. I've measured those spikes myself too with aforementioned HW monitor, though not with this card.
So even with EVGA powerlink the Mac would be very likely to shutdown itself if the card is stressed heavily.
About EVGA powerlink, EVGA powerlink needs extra cables for this card to fit it in the chain. The two connectros are in the middle of the card. But it can be done ofcourse.
Low BIOS mode:
With the low bios mode these calculations would be much lower, so you might very well be able to game with it. Or work, as krakman witnesses above. Sapphire product page didn't have that info though, but probably the dip switch is in there.
This is what I have thought I have understood about this in my journey to it.
I think the card was said to be used for gaming, which could be a very demanding task for the card, and for long periods of time?
Normal mode:
If the card is this, the spec says it's power consumption is rated at 280W. Normally PCIe slot draws hit somewhere between 20-30W, maybe 40W. So at max. levels of draw the two mini 6-pins would have to deliver are (280W-40W)/2 = 120W per mini 6-pin. That would be at self shutdown levels. And we haven't taken into consideration the power spikes which happen time to time, we can read about it in Tsialex post about power spikes in this same thread a couple of years ago. I've measured those spikes myself too with aforementioned HW monitor, though not with this card.
So even with EVGA powerlink the Mac would be very likely to shutdown itself if the card is stressed heavily.
About EVGA powerlink, EVGA powerlink needs extra cables for this card to fit it in the chain. The two connectros are in the middle of the card. But it can be done ofcourse.
Low BIOS mode:
With the low bios mode these calculations would be much lower, so you might very well be able to game with it. Or work, as krakman witnesses above. Sapphire product page didn't have that info though, but probably the dip switch is in there.
This is what I have thought I have understood about this in my journey to it.
I also agree that 6600XT is a very nice option. However, on cMP, this assume the user know how to flash the 6600XT (or flash the cMP), and can give up all natively supported macOS but only run newer macOS via OpenCore.
hello , i won this card on ebay, and have a evga powerlink at hand<
will it be enough to use the 1x 6 pin / 6pin cable + 1x 6pin / 8pin cable , prefereably / eventually via the powerlink, or did you do something differently.
hope that this card has the low/power bios still intact.
thanks.
EDIT> oh , i have seen now that use
2 x SATA to 6-pin card power + 2x 6pin to 8-pin.
have already the 2x6pin to 8 pin (for RX580)
now , the 2x SATA to 6-pin card power cable>
would i need to disconnect the superdrive to get this working, since i dont want to loose any HDD bay? (but and neither would i like to loose the internal DVD drive..)
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If it's just a Vega56, but not 64 or FE, and you aren't going to stress it until you get the PowerLink. Then "1x mini 6 to 6" + "1x mini 6 to 8" is OK for temporarily use.
Normal booting, desktop, browsing etc isn't that stressful for the GPU, and it shouldn't draw more power than required which is high enough to trigger the hard shutdown protection.
If you want to go for the SATA route, you can manage to get power from the optical bay. It's your choice to use HDD bay power or optical bay power.
I got a Mac Pro 2010. High Sierra. Updated to the last firmware. I just bought the Vega 56 card and cable ( dual 6pin to 8pin ). Connecting 8 pin cable to one of the two 8pin connectors on card. The one close to the Radeon logo. The Radeon logo LED is turning on. But the card is not showing any screen on monitor. Please advice how did you made it work. Thanks
yours has 8+8pin, mine does have 8+6pin, and you certainly need another cable.
if you have already used up both mini-6pin for one 8pin cable, it seems what is left is the two sata cables that are in the tray where the superdrive is mounted.
what you could do:
you could get a dual-sata to 8 pin cable, trim the plastic away on one side of the edge so that it fits right into the sata cable that is left in the superdrive bay, and disconnect the superdrive and use that cable to connect into the other sata-connector of your newly acquired dual-sata to 8pin.
the other route is called "pixlas mod", and is more involved; have not taken it, but you will get good advice here in case it is that what you want to do.
EDIT: +there is Powerlink from EVGA, that could also be a possibility, in case that it would physically fit onto your card. in that case, you would need however the powerlink, plus probably 2 mini6-pin to 8pin cables. it has received praise on this forum, but i have not tested it yet, since could not fit it onto neither the rx580 nor the vega rx 56.
if you have already used up both mini-6pin for one 8pin cable, it seems what is left is the two sata cables that are in the tray where the superdrive is mounted.
what you could do:
you could get a dual-sata to 8 pin cable, trim the plastic away on one side of the edge so that it fits right into the sata cable that is left in the superdrive bay, and disconnect the superdrive and use that cable to connect into the other sata-connector of your newly acquired dual-sata to 8pin.
the other route is called "pixlas mod", and is more involved; have not taken it, but you will get good advice here in case it is that what you want to do.
EDIT: +there is Powerlink from EVGA, that could also be a possibility, in case that it would physically fit onto your card. in that case, you would need however the powerlink, plus probably 2 mini6-pin to 8pin cables. it has received praise on this forum, but i have not tested it yet, since could not fit it onto neither the rx580 nor the vega rx 56.
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You need two mini 6 pin to 6pin cables. The additional pins on an 8 pin plug do not supply any extra power.
A 6 pin plug will fit into an 8 pin socket.
You must supply power to BOTH the 8 pin connectors to make the GPU work.
Better still, buy an EVGA powerlink.
Read this thread from the beginning, all the info is here.
@royaltimetv *
+
but in your case the second cable better be dual-sata to 8pin so you need not thing of where to put second cable first.
but in your case the second cable better be dual-sata to 8pin so you need not thing of where to put second cable first.
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Yes. Exactly what I had in mind.
Know what to look for. Thanks.
Would be cool to find a female 8 pin to 6 pin. Then I can leave my dual 6 pin to 8 pin in place and just plug stuff into that. Bit of a pain plugging the cables to the board on the MP31 when swapping GPUs. Seems they assumed really dainty fingers.
I think there are plenty of 8pin female to dual 6+2 pin on the market.
TBH, my dual mini 6pin to single 6, is the unusal cable. In general, no need to use two mini 6pin to power one 6pin. But I saw that cable in a local store with very reasonable price. It also make the whole connection cleaner (less wires). So, I went for that one. And it works very well.