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DIY eGPU Macbook experiences


oripash

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To see additional resolutions press Option key while you click “Scaled”. SwitchResX might also help.

Did not know about the option settings, but 1080p is still the highest available, thought it did show a bunch more (all <=1600x900). I'll look into SwitchResX.

Thanks for being so attentive and helpful!

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Thanks to the guidance found on these forums and everyone's experiences, I was able to get a GTX 980 setup running perfectly with the AKiTiO case opened up and PSU barrel plug modification. I'm powering external monitors with it on both Windows 10 and OS X. Thanks everyone for posting their experiences so we can all learn!

I do have one issue I wanted to see if anyone has a solution for.

Whenever I shutdown / reboot the computer I always end up having to shut the Macbook Pro off / on multiple times before I can get the system to post and start loading the OS if the eGPU is hooked into a Thunderbolt 2 port. I'm using a late 2013 MBPr 15" with a built in 750m. This happens if I'm trying to boot into either OSX or Windows. Everything starts normally on the first try if the eGPU is disconnected (though Windows makes me reinstall drivers if I start it up without the eGPU and then start it again later with it... so I try to avoid that).

Edit: The GPU is a eVGA Geforce GTX 980 FTW

Has anyone come across this problem before or have any ideas?

Thanks~

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Sounds like a ground loop me. Try those things: 1)connect all power from same wall outlet and see 2) change usb cable 3) change to balanced cables 4) if the buzz is still there with balanced cables open one end on each and disconnect the ground (dont worry that is safe to do)

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Sounds like a ground loop me. Try those things: 1)connect all power from same wall outlet and see 2) change usb cable 3) change to balanced cables 4) if the buzz is still there with balanced cables open one end on each and disconnect the ground (dont worry that is safe to do)

Thanks for the advice! Can you be more specific with ''open one end on each and disconnect the ground''? Don't really now what to do here :D

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I am looking for some help from this community. I have searched around and read a lot of FAQs on these forums and still seem to be having some trouble and was hoping I might be able to get some guidance. After reading the Bizon box rip-off thread It seemed like the major complaint was the outrageous price. Due to a lack of time to work on projects like a DIY eGPU, I bought a Bizon Box at a $200 discount, thinking I was paying about $100 or so to spare me the time of putting this whole thing together myself. "Bizon-Tech" support seemed helpful at first but I am becoming increasingly frustrated with them...

I apologize in advance If this is posted in the wrong place, or if I could have chosen a better title for my post.

My hardware is as follows:

Macbook Pro 15" Late 2011 Model

HDD drive swapped for an SSD

Optical drive removed and replaced with an HDD

Windows 10 upgraded from Windows 7 Home

Bizon Box aka AKiTiO Thunder2 PCIe Box with ZOTAC gtx970

Using "Bizon-Tech's" setup guide I managed to get all drivers installed on my OSX partition, however, anytime I start a game in Steam it opens and then Immediately crashed before any graphics are rendered. This does not bother me too terribly much because I really want to use this egpu on my windows partition, however, when I try to install drivers I get...

NVIDIA installer cannot continue

This graphics driver could not find compatible graphics hardware.

Which I assume is because the system is not recognizing the card. However when I plug the egpu in before I boot my windows partition, the internal display does not work, making it impossible to do anything. I tried uninstalling my current video drivers, and the internal display worked when I booted with the egpu already connected, but I was unable to install the drivers, i.e. windows was still not recognizing the egpu.

"Bizon-tech support" said downgrading back to windows 7 "might" help, recommended bootlegging a copy of Windows 8.1, and also recommended clean installing win10 instead of using an upgrade from win7.

Can anyone give me any sort of guidance on how to get my drivers installed in windows?

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Windows 8.1 is currently the best way to go.

Could you please try the following boot procedure for Win10:

- power on MB

- press and hold "alt"

- wait for boot chime and partition selection

- power on the eGPU/connect the TB cable

- wait a few seconds

- boot into windows

Edit: Is the card in any way listed in the Windows device manager?

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Thanks for the advice! Can you be more specific with ''open one end on each and disconnect the ground''? Don't really now what to do here :D

What you would have to do and it only works if your issue is really a ground loop and you have balanced connectors would be to disconnect pin 1 out of the XLR connector or the shield connected to the body (basically the one further away from the other two) on a jack.

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I would try a fresh install with Windows 10. I've been successful with Win 7, 8.1n and 10. I did nothing special with Windows 10 for my install - did a fresh install, installed bootcamp drivers, made sure the eGPU showed up in device manager and downloaded and ran Nvidia drivers. After that, I rebooted (think when it restarted both the internal screen and eGPU were displaying mirrored info, odd), extended my display to the eGPU (which broke the internal monitor) but the eGPU worked.

For me, I leave the eGPU powered on before I boot up. It does fight me at times where I have to reboot a half dozen times to get it to recognize, but when it works, it works overtime (until I do something like connect it to another machine or run Windows updates).

PS - I like Windows 10 over 8.1 due to not requiring your serial number during install (so you don't have to put it in over and over if you need to rip out the install and try again). Was a big disappointment moving from Windows 7 to Windo 8.1 due to that alone.

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Edit: Is the card in any way listed in the Windows device manager?

Not that I can see. I dont see it under "Display Adapters", or Other "Devices". Im starting to wonder if the windows partition is even booting when I select it from the partition selector, As my keyboard backlight is not on. Its almost like my boot just stops after I select the Windows partition.

The question becomes, perform a clean install of 10? or downgrade to 7? Or with neither help my situation and thus is it tied to another issue? I am thinking that my solid state drive upgrade might have something to do with, as my boot happens in close to 1 second.

- power on MB

- press and hold "alt"

- wait for boot chime and partition selection

- power on the eGPU/connect the TB cable

- wait a few seconds

- boot into windows

Following these instrusctions I am still booting to a totally blank internal display.

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If i have a macbook with discreet graphic (GT 650M/GT 750M), and don't have an external display, i can still use eGPU with the internal LCD only, with the "Dummy DVI" method described here, is it correct?

How is performance with this 'Dummy DVI" method, compared to the internal display with Optimus on Iris-only macbook? (with the same eGPU).

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I'm finishing my setup with AKiTiO Thunder2, and to my surprise using 2 x Thunderbolt cables actually decrease performance if compare to 1 x Thunderbolt cable. I'm using Far Cry 4 for testing. 1 x Thunderbolt cable gives me 68 fps on native resolution, meanwhile 2 x Thunderbolt cables gives me 45! fps. I'm confused. Can anyone confirm or refute?

Also i've noticed that in implementation hub under 'bandwidth' column some values like 16Gbps-TB2 are present. AFAIK TB2 has 10Gbps bandwidth.

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I'm finishing my setup with AKiTiO Thunder2, and to my surprise using 2 x Thunderbolt cables actually decrease performance if compare to 1 x Thunderbolt cable. I'm using Far Cry 4 for testing. 1 x Thunderbolt cable gives me 68 fps on native resolution, meanwhile 2 x Thunderbolt cables gives me 45! fps. I'm confused. Can anyone confirm or refute?

Also i've noticed that in implementation hub under 'bandwidth' column some values like 16Gbps-TB2 are present. AFAIK TB2 has 10Gbps bandwidth.

2 cables for what and how?

16 Gbps is correct for Thunderbolt 2.

10 Gbps is Thunderbolt 1.

Thunderbolt 3 will be 32 Gbps.

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2 cables for what and how?

16 Gbps is correct for Thunderbolt 2.

10 Gbps is Thunderbolt 1.

Thunderbolt 3 will be 32 Gbps.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thunderbolt_(interface):

Thunderbolt v1: 10 Gbit/s per channel (20 Gbit/s in total).

Thunderbolt v2: 20 Gbit/s aggregated channels (20 Gbit/s in total).

Thunderbolt v3: 40 Gbit/s

AKiTiO has 2 TB ports (for what? for 2xTB1 connection?) and Macbook has 2 ports.

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@ShiftZ: But the used bandwidth is set by the PCIe lanes available. PCIe lanes exist in the steps x1, x4, x8 and x16 in the different generations of PCIe 1, 2, 3 and 4.

With TB2 you can PCIe2 with x4 at most, which results in 16Gbps. TB3 will offer PCIe2 with x8 or PCIe 3 with x4 = 32Gbps.

The two ports on the AKiTiO are for daisychaining TB devices (and a DP monitor at the end of the chain).

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@ShiftZ: But the used bandwidth is set by the PCIe lanes available. PCIe lanes exist in the steps x1, x4, x8 and x16 in the different generations of PCIe 1, 2, 3 and 4.

With TB2 you can PCIe2 with x4 at most, which results in 16Gbps. TB3 will offer PCIe2 with x8 or PCIe 3 with x4 = 32Gbps.

The two ports on the AKiTiO are for daisychaining TB devices (and a DP monitor at the end of the chain).

Thanks. Funny thing is that double cable has it's effect.

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Hi Guys,

will it be possible to use an AMD Graphics-Card as EGPU if my macbook has an implemented gt 750m? Should this work after i disabled my gt 750m in device manager?

Are there any EGPU worklogs with the new Fury X or Fury Cards?

Thanks in advance

Best regards

Daniel

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I've used this script and it works a treat. Got a 2013 MacBook Air 13" with a eGPU GTX 750 Ti to 2 screens (using them now) but when the machine sleeps - I get fatal errors and the machine crashes. Is there anything that I can do besides completely shutdown or leaving the laptop on? Must be something?

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I've used this script and it works a treat. Got a 2013 MacBook Air 13" with a eGPU GTX 750 Ti to 2 screens (using them now) but when the machine sleeps - I get fatal errors and the machine crashes. Is there anything that I can do besides completely shutdown or leaving the laptop on? Must be something?

Yeah don't do sleep or hot plug with eGPUs.

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Thank you for your hard work!

I am currently using a 2013 rMbp 2.6ghz 16gb ram with the 750m.

The egpu setup was going smoothly ,but once I enclosed it in a case and reinstalled the script, the gtx 980 gigabyte g1 has been continuously spinning at max fan speed, faster than when login in (Very Loud!). Rebooting,shutting down, and re-installing has not been able to fix the maxed out fan speed on the gpu. I also noticed that the cpu has been getting hotter although it is idling.

If anyone could help me solve this problem, that would be great! :)

Can you only edit the bios through windows?

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Thank you for your hard work!

I am currently using a 2013 rMbp 2.6ghz 16gb ram with the 750m.

The egpu setup was going smoothly ,but once I enclosed it in a case and reinstalled the script, the gtx 980 gigabyte g1 has been continuously spinning at max fan speed, faster than when login in (Very Loud!). Rebooting,shutting down, and re-installing has not been able to fix the maxed out fan speed on the gpu. I also noticed that the cpu has been getting hotter although it is idling.

If anyone could help me solve this problem, that would be great! :)

Can you only edit the bios through windows?

You're welcome. Sounds like a power issue. You were able to reinstall the script and GPU name was correctly detected? I remember that my Gigabyte 750Ti had the same full fan speed problem with a powered riser. Would you describe your power configuration?

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some of my more recent posts were removed, I assume because It was thought I was trying to game the system for more posts. I am still having trouble getting my eGPU working on the windows side of things. After successfully installing drivers on win7 and getting the dreaded error 12. I upgraded to win10. I now get one of 3 outcomes when I attempt to boot into windows with the eGPU connected, depending on the timing.

1. Boot succesful without eGPU deteceted.

2. Screen goes black, No boot occurs.

3. Freeze at partition selection screen.

I do however have the eGPU fully functional in OSX. Has anyone ever had any success with using Parallels with their eGPU to game in windows? To be honest Im not trying to get incredible performance out of it, I just want to be able to play a few steam games without my MBP overheating and shutting down.

Does anyone have any further advice?

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