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DIY eGPU Macbook experiences


oripash

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Guys

Need help deciding. I can get a late 2013 top specced 15" macbook pro retina for almost the same price as a new 2015 13" retina macbook pro.

Now my gut tells me i want the new 13". Because of battery life, force touch, and faster SSD storage.

But on the other hand, the 15" has a faster CPU. Now the questions comes, when it comes to gaming and a egpu setup. How much difference will the quad core i7 do against the i5 dual core in the 13" retina. If i get much higher fps im leaning towards the 15".

Vote for Late 2013 15” rMBP. Why?

http://forum.techinferno.com/diy-e-gpu-projects/7910-diy-egpu-macbook-experiences-52.html#post127342

http://forum.techinferno.com/diy-e-gpu-projects/7910-diy-egpu-macbook-experiences-58.html#post128390

I haven’t seen a successful 2015 Mac eGPU implementation on Windows or OS X yet. I wish I could walk into a local Apple store with the AKiTiO box in my backpack and test. I am afraid of clicking “About This Mac”, revealing completely different Boot ROM / SMC versions. Anyone out there, who is using eGPU with the 2015 13” MBP?

If you dream about gaming BF4 64 player team DM on internal retina screen, i7 quad core is a must.

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Vote for Late 2013 15” rMBP. Why?

http://forum.techinferno.com/diy-e-gpu-projects/7910-diy-egpu-macbook-experiences-52.html#post127342

http://forum.techinferno.com/diy-e-gpu-projects/7910-diy-egpu-macbook-experiences-58.html#post128390

I haven’t seen a successful 2015 Mac eGPU implementation on Windows or OS X yet. I wish I could walk into a local Apple store with the AKiTiO box in my backpack and test. I am afraid of clicking “About This Mac”, revealing completely different Boot ROM / SMC versions. Anyone out there, who is using eGPU with the 2015 13” MBP?

If you dream about gaming BF4 64 player team DM on internal retina screen, i7 quad core is a must.

Oh wow, didnt know that. Sucks if Apple has blocked the option of thunderbolt GPU's in the new Retina Macbooks. Future is bleak :P

On another note on dual core vs quad core.

It seems there isnt that a big peformance hit

Allthough this is campaign and not MP. But ofcourse quad core will always be better. Really glad i read your post, i was going to buy the 13" or 15" tomorrow. But if it doesnt work with eGPU im really glad i read this first :)

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The 2013 and 2014 TB2 Macs got more difficult, will be sad if 2015 13" is impossible. If anyone in LA area wants to find out, I can test with Akitio and standard PC cards as well as eEFI cards. Would take maybe 30 minutes, tops.

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Hmm, now this is an interesting thing to investigate since more than a few of the guides I read said to install the CUDA driver. They made it sound essential. And - unlike your Mac mini - mine *does* have an AMD GPU in it. That page says it should be fine installing CUDA if you have both an AMD *and* an NVIDIA GPU; they're advising not installing CUDA if you *only* have an AMD GPU.

...however, since my AMD GPU (soldered to the logic board, unfortunately) is also what was impeding Physx from working in Windows, perhaps it is interfering here too. Worth a shot! I will remove the CUDA driver and report back.

CUDA driver is not compulsory. It’s required only if you use GPGPU software which uses CUDA. Most of people don’t know what it is. There are a plenty of applications from video processing to fuzzy logic. Eliminating factors one by one, I hope we will find out the reason. I browsed my emails but couldn’t find results regarding your Mac mini model, but what I have seen, generally any TB1 Mac should be near plug-and-play in OS X if the kext are correctly modified.

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Well, no joy. Removed CUDA framework, modified the kexts again from scratch. Still shows as NVIDIA Chip Model if I hot-plug the eGPU and still kernel panics instead of showing the login screen if I boot with the eGPU connected. Funnily enough, Windows really *is* plug and play as long as the eGPU is powered at the right instant.

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OK, and if you click in upper right corner on Nvidia, do you see this?

If using it in Windows it can play a game or run a benchmark we can rule out power as the issue.

Also, have you tried plugging in right after boot chime like what you do for Windows?

I would echo goalque, there really is no precedent for a TB1 Mac to have these issues. It really feels like some other outside issue.post-31171-14495000016482_thumb.png

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Thank you. I've read through all Mac related implementation guide within the community. With thomas_prince1 having the highest 3dMark scores through and identical setup.

But there seem to be errors appearing on iregret's setup. Likewise, eGPU may not boot every time. Hence my hesitance to shoot for the eGPU.

I understand iregret will be reinstalling the Nvidia desktop drivers and I'll definitely keep an eye out for his/her progress.

Again, I think this community is awesome. But with my habit of upgrading within 2-3 years, upcoming release of Skylake and Thunderbolt 3, probable stability issue and unconfirmed future of eGPU, it does make me wonder if I should take the conventional PC approach.

Really a toss up between footprint, cost, stability and longevity.

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I don't think stability is often the problem. Any time I want to fire up my Mac Mini and play games it gets right to desktop in Windows 8.1.

And I mean like clockwork. And it almost NEVER crashes. Gaming on classic Mac Pros have same number of crashes.

Only real issue is ability to boot in the first place. On MBPs there is something that prevents OS X from display screen output on Nvidia cards. But it is quite likely that we (MacVidCards) will soon be offering cards that get around this on some TB2 Macs. We have been able to have these eEFI cards show boot screens, just as if output was from internal card.

We have been able to make this work on every TB2 Mac we have tested. There is some concern on the 2015 13" MBP, hopefully we'll get to test soon.

The only combo that has given us trouble is nMP and Windows. And this has more to do with the bewildering array of PCI to PCI bridges that weave 6 exterior TB ports with 3 internal ones that are also connected to other things.

Anyhow, there is reason to believe that we will be able to offer flashed cards that break some or most barriers. And also possible that some experimenters on here will figure a way to do a similar thing in EFI shell.

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I've been trying to get a plug-and-play eGPU set-up working on a 2013 Macbook Air under OS X 10.10.2. The idea is to make a nice portable OpenCL 2.0 development and computing tool. I'd like to keep everything inside the Akitio box and do a bare minimum of modding of the .kexts and (hopefully) no modding of the actual Akitio.

I was inspired by goalque's success with AMD and a Macbook Pro and AMD R9 280X and JimJ740's success with a Mac Mini and AMD R9 290X. They made it look relatively easy, but so far I've been a bit stuck myself.

I recently returned an AMD R7 250X I had tried out previously (wouldn't run off Akitio's power without modification), and replaced it with an AMD HD 7750 which is able to run on the 75W provided by the Akitio. But though the card is powered (card fan is spinning) and the AMD7000Controller, AMDRadeonX4000 and AMDSupport .kexts have been edited and sudo kextcache used, the card is not showing up in system report > extensions.

I have disabled .kext signing and rebooted before using sudo kextcache, and have double-checked that the .kexts are edited in the right places. I made sure to pick a card that already has a built-in Apple driver by looking up the PCI number in the .kexts (0x683f1002 for the HD 7750).

Is there a specific time I need to plug in the Akitio to the Air? I've read some windows installations that required quite a bit of fussing to find the right time during boot-up to plug the Akitio's Thunderbolt cable into the Mac, but nothing about this in OS X.

I don't know that this would be the problem, but I can't think of what else I might be doing wrong. Thanks in advance.

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I see that under the "eGPU candidate system list" it lists the broadwell rMBP and airs as compatible.

Now yesterday it was told that the 2015 models don't work with eGPU's, shouldn't it be updated to list as non compatible, ateast until we get confirmation from a experienced eGPU user.

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OK, and if you click in upper right corner on Nvidia, do you see this?

[ATTACH=CONFIG]14826[/ATTACH]

Yes, everything looks fine and console reports:

12/05/2015 22:32:21.000 kernel[0]: NVDAStartup: Web

12/05/2015 22:32:21.000 kernel[0]: NVDAGM100HAL loaded and registered

(although that is always immediately followed by "12/05/2015 22:32:22.000 kernel[0]: [AGPM Controller] unknownPlatform" and I don't know if that is something to be concerned about or not).

Anyway… new NVIDIA driver for Yosemite just came out today (346.01.02f03) so I'll try that. But I won't get my hopes up.

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Yes, everything looks fine and console reports:

12/05/2015 22:32:21.000 kernel[0]: NVDAStartup: Web

12/05/2015 22:32:21.000 kernel[0]: NVDAGM100HAL loaded and registered

(although that is always immediately followed by "12/05/2015 22:32:22.000 kernel[0]: [AGPM Controller] unknownPlatform" and I don't know if that is something to be concerned about or not).

Anyway… new NVIDIA driver for Yosemite just came out today (346.01.02f03) so I'll try that. But I won't get my hopes up.

DING DING DING, and we have a winner !!!

You have somehow borked that driver.

It shouldn't be loading that 2nd kext. It should be loading the one that ends with "Web"

The one it is loading hasn't got an entry for Maxwell cards, and thus says "Nvidia Chip Model"

Your problem is right there.

EDIT: This gets even weirder. There shouldn't be a NVDAGM100HAL that doesn't have "Web" in it's name. Did you ever load a pre-release Beta or something? I literally mean there has been no such kext that I am aware of. Hopefully new driver fixes things.

Here are kexts loaded in my rMBP:

115 2 0xffffff7f80e49000 0x2d8000 0x2d8000 com.nvidia.web.NVDAResmanWeb (10.0.3) <87 82 78 12 7 5 4 3 1>

116 0 0xffffff7f82564000 0xd00000 0xd00000 com.nvidia.web.GeForceWeb (10.0.3) <115 87 83 78 12 7 5 4 3 1>

117 0 0xffffff7f81342000 0x1af000 0x1af000 com.nvidia.web.NVDAGK100HalWeb (10.0.3) <115 12 4 3>

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Hmm, well I'll explore that angle next but this is a (relatively) fresh install of everything. A few days into this saga I wiped the SSD and rebuilt from scratch with a totally clean install of Yosemite (straight to 10.10.3) and installed nothing but the latest NVIDIA driver - and I still had the symptoms (i.e. kernel panic instead of login screen). And I've posted this part of the console output previously too because I was asking about the "[AGPM Controller] unknownPlatform" - but I'll have to read back through my posts now to see if it was the same. (It probably wasn't, considering your surprise at seeing NVDAGM100HAL).

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Here are kexts loaded in my rMBP:

115 2 0xffffff7f80e49000 0x2d8000 0x2d8000 com.nvidia.web.NVDAResmanWeb (10.0.3) <87 82 78 12 7 5 4 3 1>

116 0 0xffffff7f82564000 0xd00000 0xd00000 com.nvidia.web.GeForceWeb (10.0.3) <115 87 83 78 12 7 5 4 3 1>

117 0 0xffffff7f81342000 0x1af000 0x1af000 com.nvidia.web.NVDAGK100HalWeb (10.0.3) <115 12 4 3>

post-34698-14495000017183_thumb.png

- - - Updated - - -

EDIT: This gets even weirder. There shouldn't be a NVDAGM100HAL that doesn't have "Web" in it's name. Did you ever load a pre-release Beta or something? I literally mean there has been no such kext that I am aware of.

There's no kext called NVDAGM100HAL in my Extensions folder:

post-34698-14495000017389_thumb.png

And looking at the plist file for NVDAGM100HalWeb.kext it has an IOClass value of "NVDAGM100HAL":

post-34698-14495000017542_thumb.png

…could it be that the correct kext loaded but it reports as NVDAGM100HAL?

In which case, why doesn't your console do the same? :D

This is the new driver that came out today.

post-34698-1449500001681_thumb.png

post-34698-14495000017027_thumb.png

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Yes, everything looks fine and console reports:

12/05/2015 22:32:21.000 kernel[0]: NVDAStartup: Web

12/05/2015 22:32:21.000 kernel[0]: NVDAGM100HAL loaded and registered

(although that is always immediately followed by "12/05/2015 22:32:22.000 kernel[0]: [AGPM Controller] unknownPlatform" and I don't know if that is something to be concerned about or not).

Anyway… new NVIDIA driver for Yosemite just came out today (346.01.02f03) so I'll try that. But I won't get my hopes up.

NVDAGM100HAL is correct, for me showed immediately after “NVDAStartup: Web” when devices are plugged as following:

Mac mini -> TB cable -> AKiTiO -> eGPU -> DVI cable -> monitor

Does this setup result in kernel panic as well?

Mac mini -> TB cable -> AKiTiO -> eGPU

|—> HDMI cable -> monitor

I guess you hot-plugged the eGPU after logged in. That doesn’t help to solve this issue. eGPU never works that way. Keep the TB cable plugged in from the beginning, we have to know what causes the kernel panic.

Time to dig more details.

1) Confirm that you have a fresh install of OS X 10.10.3 (14D136).

2) Follow my setup procedure for OS X (ignore the older version number):

http://forum.techinferno.com/implementation-guides-apple/8199-2013-13-macbook-pro-gtx980%4016gbps-tb2-netstor-na211tb-win8-1-osx10-10-%5Bgoalque.html#post111834

If still the same results,

3) Boot with HDMI display output from Mac mini

Open terminal and type:

grep -C 20 --color=always “NVDAStartup: Web” /var/log/system.log

And look for the lines before and after the colored string, what do you see?

Then type ls /Library/Logs/DiagnosticReports/Kernel*

If you had kernel panic, the details should be there. Starting up with verbose mode is useful too (Command-V).

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Ahaa that's fair enough. I have the Titan X, which is the Maxwell one. However, as new drivers were released by NVIDIA, I will modify this, but I won't hold my breath. Otherwise, it's 10.10.1 for me for now. For the record, my Titan shows up as "NVIDIA Graphics Device" with the correct amount (12287 MB) of RAM.

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Hi all, still trying to understand why my Powercolor HD 7750 with Akitio is not showing up in OS X 10.10.2 on my 2013 Air. Here's the status:

Akitio starts up when I boot the Air (Thunderbolt is connected prior to start-up, not plugged in during start-up). I'm using a 120W external power brick to provide 25W for the Akitio board + 75W for the HD 7750. The HD 7750 doesn't need any power connectors besides the PCI slot itself. HD 7750 fan starts on boot, so the card is powered.

I did edit the .kexts per goalque's instructions here, and I made sure to edit the AMDRadeonX4000 .kext block for AMDVerdeGrapicsAccelerator, to match the 0x683f PCI ID of the HD 7750. I disabled .kext signing and rebuilt the cache.

Checking the console boot log, there are no messages with "IOPCITunnelCompatible needed" or such. But the AMD7000Controller and AMDRadeonX4000 kexts are not loaded when I check System Report > Software > Extensions, and System Report > Graphics only shows the internal Intel gpu.

I also booted using Command-S to see if I could see any boot messages about the card, but I didn't see any relevant messages.

The Akito itself is showing up as a Thunderbolt device in System Report, so it's not a problem with the Akitio. It simply appears the card itself isn't showing up.

Let me ask a question to those of you who might have used an eGPU for compute or rendering; if you don't edit the .kexts with <key>IOPCITunnelCompatible</key> <true>, does the card still show up in the system? Is this modification only needed if you want the eGPU to be able to drive the display?

I did try to boot with the original un-edited .kexts, and the card did not show up in this case either.

I'm getting close to returning the Akitio and cutting my losses. Maybe the HD 7750 just doesn't work.

P.S. I got a delayed message from OWC tech support about the power extension cable mentioned in the Helios manual. I had hoped that this cable would connect the Helios' mini-4 pin PCB-mounted connector to a 6-pin graphics card connector. It turns out there IS a cable included, but it has a SATA connector at the other end, not a 6-pin. Guess the Helios doesn't offer much advantage for those looking for a plug-and-play closed-box eGPU option, unless you want to wire up your own internal connector cable.</true>

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<true>I did try to boot with the original un-edited .kexts, and the card did not show up in this case either. </true>

When you did that, did you then get the complaints in the log/ colsole about IOPCITunnelCompatible being required?

Have you ever seen them? Because if not, nothing you’ve said suggests the ATiKiO thunderbolt board can talk to the PCIe board. I think your symptoms are what you’d get if it were supplying power to the GPU and nothing else.

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Wait, which cable? Don't use two PSUs at the same time! It might work, but could damage your setup. The Antec itself should be fine powering your whole setup.

i have re-installed win 8.1 64bit, i've connected the akitio to the original power supply, i tried to connect the akitio to the evga gtx970 without riser card extender but nothing... when i'll try to open any games the system crash... any idea?

this user has the same kind of problem (not solved)

http://forum.techinferno.com/diy-e-gpu-projects/6526-problems-crashes-mid-game.html

things that i've already did:

RMA the card

re instal windows 8.1 64bit

with PRECISION X: downlock the card, set the fan to aggressive

install win 7 64bit

tried without riser molex

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Hi all, still trying to understand why my Powercolor HD 7750 with Akitio is not showing up in OS X 10.10.2 on my 2013 Air. Here's the status:

Akitio starts up when I boot the Air (Thunderbolt is connected prior to start-up, not plugged in during start-up). I'm using a 120W external power brick to provide 25W for the Akitio board + 75W for the HD 7750. The HD 7750 doesn't need any power connectors besides the PCI slot itself. HD 7750 fan starts on boot, so the card is powered.

I did edit the .kexts per goalque's instructions here, and I made sure to edit the AMDRadeonX4000 .kext block for AMDVerdeGrapicsAccelerator, to match the 0x683f PCI ID of the HD 7750. I disabled .kext signing and rebuilt the cache.

Checking the console boot log, there are no messages with "IOPCITunnelCompatible needed" or such. But the AMD7000Controller and AMDRadeonX4000 kexts are not loaded when I check System Report > Software > Extensions, and System Report > Graphics only shows the internal Intel gpu.

I also booted using Command-S to see if I could see any boot messages about the card, but I didn't see any relevant messages.

The Akito itself is showing up as a Thunderbolt device in System Report, so it's not a problem with the Akitio. It simply appears the card itself isn't showing up.

Let me ask a question to those of you who might have used an eGPU for compute or rendering; if you don't edit the .kexts with <key>IOPCITunnelCompatible</key> <true>, does the card still show up in the system? Is this modification only needed if you want the eGPU to be able to drive the display?

I did try to boot with the original un-edited .kexts, and the card did not show up in this case either.

I'm getting close to returning the Akitio and cutting my losses. Maybe the HD 7750 just doesn't work.

P.S. I got a delayed message from OWC tech support about the power extension cable mentioned in the Helios manual. I had hoped that this cable would connect the Helios' mini-4 pin PCB-mounted connector to a 6-pin graphics card connector. It turns out there IS a cable included, but it has a SATA connector at the other end, not a 6-pin. Guess the Helios doesn't offer much advantage for those looking for a plug-and-play closed-box eGPU option, unless you want to wire up your own internal connector cable.</true>

You can investigate connected devices further by lspci:

http://forum.techinferno.com/diy-e-gpu-projects/7910-diy-egpu-macbook-experiences-62.html#post129975

Confirm that you have also added IOPCITunnelCompatible true values in AMDSupport.kext and IONDRVSupport.kext.

Answers to you questions

1) "if you don't edit the .kexts with IOPCITunnelCompatible , does the card still show up in the system?"

No. Only your iGPU/dGPUs. If IONDRVSupport.kext is modified, eGPU should show up with vendor, PCIe lane width, device id and no kext loaded informations.

2) "Is this modification only needed if you want the eGPU to be able to drive the display?"

IOPCITunnelCompatible modifications are always needed, you won’t get OpenCL/OpenGL acceleration without them. However, eGPU screen output with the AMDs is possible (very sluggish) even if you don’t modify the acceleration block.

I would suspect your power brick, would be worth to try with an ATX PSU to be sure.

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Just wanna express my happiness.

Just got a Retina Macbook Pro Late 2013, with upgraded 16gb ram, for 9500 NOK. To put it in perspective, a new macbook pro retina 13" 2015 model cost 12500 NOK. And a brand new 2014 15" retina macbook pro cost 20 000 NOK.

It was from a bankrupt sale. In pristine condition. Even the battery has almost no wear on it. Have ordered the akitio box also now and a gtx 970. So soon i will join the club. :D

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Just wanna express my happiness.

Just got a Retina Macbook Pro Late 2013, with upgraded 16gb ram, for 9500 NOK. To put it in perspective, a new macbook pro retina 13" 2015 model cost 12500 NOK. And a brand new 2014 15" retina macbook pro cost 20 000 NOK.

It was from a bankrupt sale. In pristine condition. Even the battery has almost no wear on it. Have ordered the akitio box also now and a gtx 970. So soon i will join the club. :D

You're one lucky guy then. ~1133€ for such a beast, well done :D

You're going to have much fun with it ;)

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You can investigate connected devices further by lspci:

DIY eGPU Macbook experiences

Confirm that you have also added IOPCITunnelCompatible true values in AMDSupport.kext and IONDRVSupport.kext.

Thanks goalque, that is useful - I didn't know it was necessary to add IOPCITunnelCompatible true to IONDRVSupport.kext as well. I have edited AMDSupport per your instructions, yes.

Which block of the IONDRVSupport.kext Info.plist file to I need to edit? The main text or the "1", "2", or "3" block?

Power brick is the same one nando recommended. Perhaps it doesn't really deliver 120W... I can try another.

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i have re-installed win 8.1 64bit, i've connected the akitio to the original power supply, i tried to connect the akitio to the evga gtx970 without riser card extender but nothing... when i'll try to open any games the system crash... any idea?

this user has the same kind of problem (not solved)

http://forum.techinferno.com/diy-e-gpu-projects/6526-problems-crashes-mid-game.html

things that i've already did:

RMA the card

re instal windows 8.1 64bit

with PRECISION X: downlock the card, set the fan to aggressive

install win 7 64bit

tried without riser molex

Please don't use the AKiTiO PSU at any time! You could damage your setup. Only use a PC PSU like the Antec you already have.

Did you buy and used the molex to barrel plug?

When you boot into Windows 8.1, the card is in Device Manager/Precision X finds the card? Do you get a display signal if you connect a display directly to the eGPU (not the MacBook display).

Have you connected all the power plugs to the card?

Molex to barrel plug or powered riser? If you use the barrel plug, you don't have to use the powered riser. Can you test the GPU in another system? Can you test your setup with another PSU?

Can you upload a picture of you setup so we can see how you wired everything?!

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