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DIY eGPU Macbook experiences


oripash

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Is that video about your setup? Your questions are not really precise… maybe you write a longer post explaining what your setup is and what you want to know in detail.

DIY eGPU Setup is @Tech Inferno Fan baby. Guess he can help you in a better way.

My setup doesn't need DIY eGPU Setup.

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hey guys,can you help me build a eGPU for my mac

im running a macbook pro retina 15inch mid 2012 with :

-i7 3615QM 2.3 GHz

-16GB RAM DDR3 1600 MHz

-512GB SSD

-intel HD Graphics 4000 1024 MB

-Nvidia Geforce GT 650M 1024 MB

-OS X Yosemite 10.10.2

-Bootcamp Win 7 / 64bit

-TB 1 2 ports

is it possible i can run the eGPU without using external display ?

i didn't have space at my desk

im interested on GTX 750 and GTX 970

Thank you

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hey guys,can you help me build a eGPU for my mac

im running a macbook pro retina 15inch mid 2012 with :

-i7 3615QM 2.3 GHz

-16GB RAM DDR3 1600 MHz

-512GB SSD

-intel HD Graphics 4000 1024 MB

-Nvidia Geforce GT 650M 1024 MB

-OS X Yosemite 10.10.2

-Bootcamp Win 7 / 64bit

-TB 1 2 ports

is it possible i can run the eGPU without using external display ?

i didn't have space at my desk

Please see if you can successfully enable the Intel HD4000 to run your internal LCD under Windows. http://forum.techinferno.com/implementation-guides/8558-%5Bguide%5D-macbook-enabling-optimus-internal-lcd-mode.html

If you can, then can use your desired GTX750/GTX970 with NVidia Optimus driver to render the image but display to the internal LCD.

The easier solution is to use a candidate Macbook with only a Intel iGPU and no dGPU, eg: MBA, 13" MBP or 15" MBP with Iris Pro graphics.

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The Windows logo boot, show in the internal screen? or in external (hdmi 970 output).

it appear sometime in the internal and sometime in external, now i have the same problem of this guy: http://forum.techinferno.com/diy-e-gpu-projects/7910-diy-egpu-macbook-experiences-38.html" the external screen still be blocked like the second image of the link...

now i'm trying and trying again... i hope

UPDATE: now the problem is PCI_ALLOC_VALID says NO ... why?

thank you for your help !

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it appear sometime in the internal and sometime in external, now i have the same problem of this guy: http://forum.techinferno.com/diy-e-gpu-projects/7910-diy-egpu-macbook-experiences-38.html" the external screen still be blocked like the second image of the link...

now i'm trying and trying again... i hope

(yes, the DIY recognize my egpu)

thank you for your help !

- - - Updated - - -

it appear sometime in the internal and sometime in external, now i have the same problem of this guy: http://forum.techinferno.com/diy-e-gpu-projects/7910-diy-egpu-macbook-experiences-38.html" the external screen still be blocked like the second image of the link...

now i'm trying and trying again... i hope

thank you for your help !

OK,I always go to DIY and always make the compact.One ach restart. not asked @Tech Inferno Fan I store:D

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I am referring to the command "all compact..." in DIY boot, every time you reboot, sorry for my English

now the problem is PCI_ALLOC_VALID says NO ... why?

i followed this step:

"initialize eGPU/run compcat all except sata ecc/startup.bat test run/ (at this step PCI_ALLOC_VALID says NO) so i'm blocked here

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now the problem is PCI_ALLOC_VALID says NO ... why?

i followed this step:

"initialize eGPU/run compcat all except sata ecc/startup.bat test run/ (at this step PCI_ALLOC_VALID says NO) so i'm blocked here

The PCI_ALLOC_VALID flag reports if *all devices* are allocated, which if you do a PCI compaction of only a portion of the devices may not occur. Upon completing of PCI compaction it will report if it was successful or not after which you should proceed to do a Chainloader->Test Run to test if that PCI compaction provided a stable system.

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I am running a Sonnet Echo Express III-D with an MSI ITX GTX760 on an rMBP (15", early 2013, TB1, GT650M). The configuration works well but I have been unsuccessful getting audio working over HDMI on the GTX760. I've read some other guides/posts that indicate modifying /System/Library/Extensions/AppleHDA.kext/Contents/PlugIns/AppleHDAController.kext and adding <key>IOPCITunnelCompatible</key>

<true/> to the end of the <key>CFBundleIdentifier</key> section should enable it. I don't see an hdmi audio device in the output device menu. Can anyone who has had success with HDMI audio chime in? I'm missing something obvious.

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Well, I can't believe I've done it.

Over the past two weeks or so I've tried putting an EVGA GTX 980 and a Sonnet SEL inside the Sonnet III-D's chassis and using its 300W supply, because 980 + III-D doesn't work at all with a 750M rMBP. That means taking out the III-D's logic boards and slicing the metal enclosure covering the PSU away.

Unfortunately, I've been getting nothing but kernel panics and BSODs since I've done this, even when I put everything back the way they used to be before I started tinkering with them (i.e. the SEL and the 980 were powered by a PSU inside a different case which worked minus the usual Maxwell card problems). Reinstalling everything didn't solve anything either.

Turned out that I have damaged my SEL's logic board while putting this together. RIP SEL, you were a great friend.

I was at a crossroads between either getting an Akitio box for £200 or selling my 980 and buying a 780 Ti for a £120 difference. I went back to the 780 Ti because that's a cheaper option for a ~5% performance hit and 780 Ti + III-D was the setup that worked flawlessly in my experiences so far.

The other stupid option was selling my 2013 rMBP with the 750M graphics (gave me nothing but trouble as far as Maxwell cards are concerned) and buying like a 2014 13" rMBP (the only reason why I bought mine is because it had a discrete GPU, no need for one now that I have an eGPU). It would've actually worked with a 980 + III-D. Unfortunately, it turns out I need a quad-core based Mac for CAD stuff.

Sorry I needed a place to vent but you never stop learning with these things.

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The PCI_ALLOC_VALID flag reports if *all devices* are allocated, which if you do a PCI compaction of only a portion of the devices may not occur. Upon completing of PCI compaction it will report if it was successful or not after which you should proceed to do a Chainloader->Test Run to test if that PCI compaction provided a stable system.

i have uploaded this video for show you which is my problem. i haven't found a solution yet...

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Hello,

First message on this forum after maybe read all the thread about macbook pro experience.

I got all my things to do the implementation.

I have a macbook pro late 2013 with a 750m

A benq rl2455hm external monitor

I have the famous akitio thunder2

A power riser

A switch on/off for the psu

A corsair cx600m

And i have my windows 8.1 installed

And a MSI gtx 970 4gib gaming

Soo do you have any little tips or tricks to improve the setup ?

If it's working good, i will post a guide .

Thank you

Sorry for my bad english, my first language is french.

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Hello, I'm attempting to run DIY eGPU setup 1.3 on a 2012 Macbook Pro (running Win7 under MBR.) I've got a Radeon HD 6850 hooked up through a PE4L-EC060A and Sonnet Echo ExpressCard to TB adapter.

I've already run the Disk Image setup which succeeded in giving me the eGPU Setup boot option. I also have an external LCD connected to the eGPU incase any pertinent info shows up there during setup, as the internal LCD won't work with ATI cards AFAIK.

However, I cannot boot to Windows in the first place if my eGPU is turned on before I turn on the PC/select the Windows partition from Startup Disk menu. I just get a black screen. If I wait until I see the boot options for windows 7/eGPU setup, and turn on the eGPU at that point (according to the troubleshooting guides), wait for the red light to turn off, and then boot into Windows 7, the eGPU is detected by windows, and shows up with Error 12 in device manager as expected.

If I do the above and select eGPU setup instead of Windows 7, I will get:

"Booting 'DIY eGPU Setup 1.30 disk image [/eGPU/eGPU-Setup-130.img]'

(hd0,3)"

And it will hang on that screen, presumably forever. I've let it go 15+ minutes and nothing.

I saw nothing in the troubleshooting about eGPU Setup hanging, so I've come here. Any suggestions? Further info that may be needed?

Reiterating my issue here after some troubleshooting via email with Nando. Still no progress. We can see no reason why this is happening; I've done a fresh reinstall of OSX and Bootcamp... the only things that I haven't changed are the RAM I upgraded in my Macbook and the Superdrive that I replaced with a second HDD.

Nobody ever experienced anything like this? I'm at a dead end.

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i have uploaded this video for show you which is my problem. i haven't found a solution yet...

Probably your devcon.txt file is missing a english "PCI BUS" section which compact ignores when found. If yours is in a different language then it will exclude allocating to that whole region, and so will always fail.

Please run c:\eGPU\eGPU-setup-mount to get a V: drive, the open v:\config\devcon.txt with notepad. Find and then delete the "PCI BUS" section which may be titled differently. If unsure of what to do, email me that file to look at.

Once complete, compaction will proceed. However, some hand editting of the resultant pci.bat file will be necessary as explained in http://forum.techinferno.com/implementation-guides/8006-%5Bguide%5D-2012-15-macbook-pro-gtx750ti-%4010gbps-tb1-akitio-thunder2-win8-1-bios.html#post109488 .

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Hi guys,

I have a problem about getting eGPU works here.

My system is

- MBP 15” 2012 with 650m

- Akitio TB 2

- GTX 960

- PCI Riser

I’ve already install everything (DIY eGPU Setup) and managed to use eGPU with Windows 8.1.

But after rebooting it always freeze at the white screen after the chime before go to black screen to select Windows 8.1 or DIY eGPU Setup. I have to force shutdown and unplug TB so I can boot to OS but this way will not make me use eGPU ( I can’t hot plug while in DIY eGPU Setup the F5 button couldn’t find eGPU)

I don’t know if I do anything wrong though I mailed to Tech Inferno Fan so many times and feeling bad to disturb him so I try to ask if anyone had ever encounter the problem like me

Things I did

- Try power up MBP without TB and hot plug after the white screen >>> no eGPU detected and can’t be detected after that.

- Try Shutdown the system instead of reboot but no luck.

- Re-install both OS X 10.10.2 and Windows 8.1 Pro

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Probably your devcon.txt file is missing a english "PCI BUS" section which compact ignores when found. If yours is in a different language then it will exclude allocating to that whole region, and so will always fail.

Please run c:\eGPU\eGPU-setup-mount to get a V: drive, the open v:\config\devcon.txt with notepad. Find and then delete the "PCI BUS" section which may be titled differently. If unsure of what to do, email me that file to look at.

Once complete, compaction will proceed. However, some hand editting of the resultant pci.bat file will be necessary as explained in http://forum.techinferno.com/implementation-guides/8006-%5Bguide%5D-2012-15-macbook-pro-gtx750ti-%4010gbps-tb1-akitio-thunder2-win8-1-bios.html#post109488 .

Thank you very much! finally it works !!!

but now i have another problem, when i'm in windows and everything is working fine, i try to play to call of duty AW and the eGPU crash and the computer too. i can't play it because everytime the eGPU will restart... i have to install something? i've installed the latest driver's from EVGA website

UPDATE:

I found online that the problem could be call of duty AV that is crashing when i turn on the antialiasing, could you suggest some software to monitoring my eGPU or something which could keep more stable the eGPU? Thanks

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I have a 2012 Retina Macbook Pro, and I am interesting in using it for work. My current work desktop uses 3 Qnix QX2710 monitors, two of which are powered by DVI->DP active adapters, and one straight DVI. The 2012 Retina Macbook Pro doesn't support this many monitors, and I am considering an eGPU as an option.

The difference between my usage and the great examples for my laptop on this site is that I don't need raw graphics performance, just ports. My gaming is done on a gaming desktop, so the only thing I need out of this eGPU are 2 DP ports and a dual link DVI-D port. Is there anyone else with this goal in their build?

I noticed this build guide:

http://forum.techinferno.com/implementation-guides/8006-%5Bguide%5D-2012-15-macbook-pro-gtx750ti%4010gbps-tb1-akitio-thunder2-win8-1-bios.html#post109488

which uses a card and a powered riser in order to get power to the gpu, but are there any GPU options that don't require any external power at all? (Something not intended for gaming, but still has the required ports). It is very hard to find cards like this, because 99.999% of people buying graphics cards are buying them for gaming performance.

Any help would be great!

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@Dschijn

Hey Dschijn, a few months later and I finally got all the parts I needed to make my eGPU and I've assembled it! I decided I am probably going to be getting a case and pretty much followed your guide step by step to put it together (thanks!). Only differences are that I am using a different PSU and a EVGA GTX960 instead of a 970. I will probably end up getting the Silverstone Raven case you have as well. However there are two things though I have been unsure about...

1) I thought that I needed to install Optimus internal LCD to get my my internal MPB display to run; however, after the first time I shut down my computer, it booted up again with the GPU running and the internal display booted up as well. The first time my MPB internal display was non-responsive and I had to install Nvidia drivers via my external monitor but now I can have both monitors running extended and the graphics card still works. Does this mean that I do not need to install Optimus? Also, will this mean I be taking a hit in performance if I am using the internal vs. the external? If so, what would be the best way to load games onto the external if both displays are running? Duplicate/ Only show desktop 2?

2) I can't recall if any of my desktop PCs ever made a noise because they were cased in but now that I have the eGPU spread out on my desk, once I boot up a game the GPU starts to whine like crazy. Similar to this:

Do I have a defective card / is there anything I can do about the noise?

Thanks!

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@eleven: Glad you made it :D

make sure you check out the specs of the case and your PSU. The RVZ01 can only host small SFX or SFX-L PSUs. Please check out this thread:

http://forum.techinferno.com/diy-e-gpu-projects/8675-egpu-cases.html

1) Extend the desktops! Most important is to choose the correct main display! That is the one with all the icons and where all apps are starting by default. That screen needs to be eGPU accelerated or you can't play games. With an external display you have to set the external display as your main display. If Optimus is working you can easily test by making the internal display your main display and start sth like Valley Benchmark. Another test is to boot without an external display conencted at all (unplug it from the eGPU!!!!) and test if the internal display has eGPU performance = Optimus.

If Optimus doesn't work, that's when you only have Iris GPU performance, you should install another EFI Bootloader like in my guide (first sentence).

I am using only an external display, because I want to get the best performance and the best quality on the native resolution of my ext. display (1920x1200).

2) I do you coil whine as well. First it was a big problem of the GTX 970 that a lot of people have. I did about 5 RMAs to get a card that has less coil whine / coil buzzing. But I am still not coil whine free :(

I am not sure if my PSU is causing this or the card. But it's not as audible as in the video you linked.

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