Mark

Wow, that's interesting! That means that generally, the performance hit for a TB2 eGPU is in the region of 2% for 4K. That is almost nothing. But then again, single cards aren't really known to be excellent for 4K gaming (they can do 30+ FPS in most games, but not the 60 FPS every PC gamer wants)! Can't wait until I upgrade my 780 Ti now!

- That's how I found out that the eGPU doesn't power the internal screen! I dragged the Unigine Valley window from my external screen! - I get this issue when I am plugged in to my eGPU. I've had it happen to me on Mavericks with both the SEL and the III-D, as well as an EVGA and an MSI 780 Ti. I think that this issue may be specific to my laptop model. - Also, I waited until the final web driver for Yosemite was released! The one that I've been using all along was the web driver! Well, that's strange, but I have heard of people having issues with getting a 970 to run with Yosemite on their Hackintoshes. You've done it correctly on the .kext though.

If you are looking to get this to work with Windows 8.1, then please follow this link: http://forum.techinferno.com/implementation-guides/6689-%5Bguide%5D-2013-15-macbook-pro-gt750m-gtx780ti%4016gbps-tb2-sonnet-ee-iii-d-win8-1-a.html As all of you Mac users know, Yosemite has come out! I have spent ages trying to get my eGPU to work, and after trawling around the Internet as well as several clean installs, here is my guide for getting it to run possibly the most problematic NVIDIA GPU (bar the dual-chip GPUs) with Apple’s newest OS. My eGPU Setup: Late 2013 15” MacBook Pro with Retina Display and GT 750M dGPU Sonnet III-D Thunderbolt Expansion Chassis EVGA NVIDIA GTX 780 Ti SC with ACX Cooler Seasonic M12II EVO Edition Fully Modular PSU (620W) ATX PSU Jumper What software is needed: The latest NVIDIA drivers for Yosemite (NVIDIA DRIVERS Quadro & GeForce Mac OS X Driver Release 343.01.01), modded to skip the system check. There is a guide on how to do this here: How to Install OSX Drivers on Unsupported Systems – Daniel Kramnik's Project Log TextWrangler (NOT the Mac App Store version!) (Bare Bones Software | TextWrangler) Terminal Kext Wizard (Kext Wizard - Easy to use Kext Installer and more - New Releases and Updates - InsanelyMac Forum) The latest CUDA Drivers for Mac (optional, but why wouldn’t you want it?) (http://www.nvidia.com/object/macosx-cuda-6.5.18-driver.html) How to get it to work (Or how after so many tries and methods, I managed to get it to work): Do not plug in your eGPU yet at this point. After a clean install (I usually do every time an OS comes out), open up Terminal and type/copy this: sudo nvram boot-args="kext-dev-mode=1” (This is because Yosemite disables unofficial (or in this case, modded) drivers by default, so we’re just enabling it.) Press Enter, then type your password. Press Enter again. We will now be editing three .kext files! To do this, you need an editing program that supports it, such as TextWrangler. These three files are: /System/Library/Extensions/NVDAStartup.kext/Contents/Info.plist /System/Library/Extensions/IONDRVSupport.kext/Info.plist /System/Library/Extensions/AppleHDA.kext/Contents/PlugIns/AppleHDAController.kext/Contents/Info.plist On the Finder menu bar select “Go”. Then click on “Go to Folder”. It will ask you which folder to go to. Copy and paste one of them. It should get you straight to the file, and it should be highlighted! Open the Info.plist file with TextWrangler. <span class="s2">Now, look for sections beginning with: <key>CFBundleIdentifier</key> This section ends with </dict> At the same indent, and just before "dict", add the following: <key>IOPCITunnelCompatible</key> <true/> After that, save the file. Afterwards, do the same with the other two kexts.</true> There is one of these in the Info.plist in NVDAStartup.kext, three in IONDRVSupport.kext and a long one in AppleHDAController.kext. Open Kext Wizard. Click on the tick box named “System/Library/Extensions”. It should tick the two boxes below as well. Make sure the Target disk is the disk the OS is installed on. After that click “Execute”. After some time, it should be complete. Shut down the computer. Plug in the eGPU via Thunderbolt. Then switch it on. I switch on the PSU first, then plug in the Sonnet enclosure after a couple of seconds. It may be different for your set-up. Switch on the MacBook. After booting, install your modded NVIDIA Driver. Follow the steps then restart your computer. Now, what happened is that your NVIDIA Driver has reset one of the .kext files! So go back to: /System/Library/Extensions/NVDAStartup.kext/Contents/Info.plist Then, repeat the .kext editing process that you have done earlier. After doing that, run Kext Wizard in the same way as you have done earlier. Shut down your computer and switch off your eGPU. Switch on your eGPU first then switch on your MacBook. It should finally boot up with the eGPU! If it hasn’t (it might not sometimes), just restart the MacBook. Optional: Install the CUDA Driver. Some weird observations: When the MacBook’s screen is the primary display, “About this Mac” will show both screens (the internal and external one) powered by the laptop’s GPU. Making the external screen primary will show both screens powered by the eGPU. However, this is just a bug, as with Unigine Valley I was getting the same performance on the internal screen as without the eGPU. Without the CUDA driver, most scenes render at around 60FPS, except one or two. This makes me think that there is some sort of hard VSync going on with my GPU. Installing the CUDA Driver got rid of this problem. Talking about CUDA, every time I start up the computer, it’s pestering me to update to the newest version, even though it is the newest version. It is possibly because the newest version was released before Yosemite came out. As with Mavericks, Safari is glitchy as hell when the eGPU is plugged in. There are graphical glitches when scrolling or putting the mouse over links, etc. I’m stuck with Chrome, which is also a perfectly good browser anyway. It is only Safari that does this. When I first tried to get my eGPU to work on Yosemite, I changed the three .kexts after installing the driver (as you would normally do). However, I couldn’t get it to work at all, and the computer won’t recognise it either (Shows up as “NVIDIA Chip Model”). For some weird reason, I got this to work by changing the three .kexts before installing the driver, and changing the one that got reset after installing the driver. Performance: Better than Mavericks. 2,510 vs 1,935 on Mavericks on Unigine Valley Extreme HD, an improvement by just under 30%! Links (for reference): A Thunderbolt GPU on a Mac : How-to | Le journal du lapin Un GPU externe sous Yosemite | Le journal du lapin

I too, have managed to get my 780 Ti + Sonnet III-D combo working under Yosemite. I'm currently writing a guide on how to do it. It should be up shortly. EDIT: Guide is here: http://forum.techinferno.com/implementation-guides/8059-%5Bguide%5D-2013-15-macbook-pro-gt750m-gtx780ti%4016gbps-tb2-sonnet-ee-iiid-osx10-10-a.html#post109983

Here's an update: I have indeed done something similar to kryzaach. However, I have modified a more commonly found 6 pin to 2x 6+2 pin splitter instead. I tried it on a 780 Ti, and it worked... until it crashed when running Unigine Valley on OS X for around 2 minutes. I guess my 780 Ti just draws too much power, being a factory overclocked card to start with. Can't wait to swap it for a 980!

I've tried using the splitter on my 780 Ti too, and my computer wouldn't boot up at all, with the fans spinning very loudly during boot. It's safe to say that the 780 Ti draws too much power for a standalone solution (this particular card has been problematic for some of us eGPU users anyway). I've also modified it so that it gets the power straight from the Sonnet's PSU. It worked, until around 2 minutes after I started Unigine Valley. Guess I'll just have to wait a few weeks for EVGA to step-up my 780 Ti to a 980, then I'll have some extra power left to mod my III-D a bit (I'm thinking of some LEDs inside )

Hey, I recently purchased a Sonnet III-D for my rMBP 15" and when I tried to boot this into Windows 8.1, my external monitor stayed on a black screen and suddenly restarted. I'm using an EVGA GTX 780 Ti SC powered by a Seasonic modular PSU. Any ideas as to why this is happening? It booted up fine on OS X.

My III-D has arrived! I ran Unigine Valley on OS X for 20 minutes (all the time that I had) and there were no problems. It won't boot up under Windows 8.1, but that's for another thread Anyway, I am going to be away for a few days, and I've ordered hopefully the correct plug for the SEL, I'm going to try and make an adapter for the SEL as soon as I get back.

Yeah, that's why I think that only the stock clocked ones should be safe to use, I think the official TDP for the 780 Ti is 250W but apparently since my GPU is factory OC'ed it takes up to 340W which is far more than what the PCIe slots/etc can theoretically provide (300W)

Nice setup mate! I was eventually planning to have this setup with my Late 2013 rMBP. I have 45 days to wait for NVIDIA to release the GM200 GPUs (otherwise I'll just get the 980 thanks to EVGA's step-up program ) What I want to ask though is that how stable is this setup (e.g. heavy gaming, Unigine Valley for 1+ hour without crashing)? I want to make sure that the only stable Thunderbolt eGPU solution at the moment is with the Sonnet III-D. Shame it's a lot of £££, buying one has left my wallet £650 lighter! EDIT: It seems like that the best high-performance eGPU Thunderbolt solution at the moment is the Sonnet III-D + GTX 980 (with stock clocking). No external PSUs are required and the 980's TDP of under 200W is far less than the 300W the Sonnet chassis can provide! However, in the UK it costs around £1,100 (£650 for the Sonnet chassis, £440 for the 980 and around £10 for the splitter)

I think that that might be the case, the adaptor might output 84W (12V x 7A), but only 60W is allocated to the PCIe slot itself. Also, sorry for the misunderstanding but what goalque has recommended to me yesterday was to use a powered riser with a molex connector with only one yellow wire, such as PCIe 16X extension cable 19cm powered 1X riser card. This didn't have the black ground wire like my riser has, so I assumed that if I remove it, it would function exactly the same as this one. I just purchased a Sonnet III-D earlier today, however, since 1. It has a broken fan that I need to replace so I can't sell it and 2. I really want to get this set-up working for anyone looking for a lower cost solution, I will look online for a barrel plug so I can get the SEL working under my PSU.

Hey guys, goalque has PM'd me a very good suggestion. I used a powered Molex x8 to x16 riser, however, it had a ground (black) wire. In theory, by removing it, I would also remove the ground loop that's the issue with using two power supplies to power the slot. What I've done is removed the ground wire. It was easy as I was able to remove the pin from the Molex connector. I've also used both PCIe cables from my Seasonic (so it now has access to the full 576W from the 12V rail rather than 288W from a single cable). I ran Unigine Valley on Windows. I was able to run it for 20 minutes before crashing to desktop (as opposed to crashing the entire computer). I thought that it was Valley with the problem, but when I ran Valley on OS X, it froze the whole system after 5 minutes. I'm just going to up sticks and buy a Sonnet III-D enclosure.

Have you run this setup on Unigine Valley for at least a couple of hours? I'm thinking of throwing money into a III-D enclosure too if this is a truly stable option!

Try running Unigine Valley for a couple of hours. This is possibly the best program for testing GPU stability. Which Sonnet adapter are you using by the way? The buzzing noise could just be the capacitors whining, I get that on my set up sometimes as well, I think that is normal.

I have indeed tried it with the powered riser when I tested it with another PSU. Apologies for not mentioning it haha

I just realised that my other PSU is sitting in here: my VS650. I plugged that in, and guess what? It still crashes under Valley. It has a maximum of 600W on its 12V rail, so it has more than enough power for it I can narrow it down to just three things: 1. There's an issue with the SEL supplying power through its PCIe slot 2. The SEL doesn't like Factory OC versions of graphics cards (reference stock-clocked cards may be the safest option) 3. I've been blessed with yet another faulty GPU I'm now contacting Amazon about my card, hopefully the RMA process will go smoothly. Worst case solution at this point: Drop £650 on a Sonnet III-D enclosure and another £450 on a GTX 980. Hopefully I can sell the SEL and the 780 Ti (the replacement if RMA is successful)

I had PrecisionX running when I did my Valley run. The GPU clock was 1162 MHZ whilst the Voltage was at 1.184 V. During Furmark, it was running between 98% and 101% TDP, mostly at something like 99.7%. Thanks! I didn't notice that at all! Unfortunately, my other modular PCIe cable is somewhere else so I'm taking it tomorrow. Anyway, I lowered my power target to 84% and changed the GPU clock to -105 MHz (the lowest it can be). Valley still crashed. Strangely enough, the sound works fine when my computer "crashes".

Thanks Nando, I'll try that too! I've been wondering if I can do this as well since I don't like having my eGPU taking up two plugs plus I have plenty of room for my perfectly good PSU. I just kept buying the wrong barrel plug so I gave up on it. Maybe I should try again!

Thanks! I'm starting to think that my eGPU is a bit bulky (if not unstable)

Yeah, my riser has a powered input via a molex connector. Doesn't crash under Furmark, crashes under Unigine Valley, and now a couple of games too. I now think it's because that I have an overclocked 780 Ti that possibly exceeds the 300W limit that it theoretically can take (PCIe slot 75W + 6-pin PCIe 75W + 8-pin PCIe 150W). I'm now seriously considering purchasing a reference GTX 980 and seeing how that goes. Apparently it draws less than 180W on peak load, far lower than the 225W theoretical maximum that the card can provide (2 x 6-pin 75W + PCIe slot 75W). EDIT: Ahh that might be why my eGPU is crashing? Is it because I have both the 6 pin and 8 pin PCIe connector coming from the same line? I'm going to get my other PCIe cable and see that. Just to be sure, I'm going to get another molex cable dedicated to the powered riser too.

Oops sorry, I think I had a brain fart when I wrote that question... What I meant is that how did he modify the AX860 cable into the ones with eyelets? Which of the eight pins are the 12V supply and which ones are for the ground? (They are all black so there's no easy way of telling haha)

Thanks, however, I would like to know which wires on the pin are the ground and which ones are the 12V connectors. Sorry if I wasn't clear!

Okay guys, here is an update: It was going well for a few days, and I thought that having a powered riser would've sorted it. However, I was running Unigine Valley for an hour under Windows and it crashed yet again. I don't know what to do with this anymore

Hey, I'm interested in doing this with a 780 Ti (or 980). How did you convert the PCIe cable into the Sonnet feeds? Which parts of the plug did you use for one feed and which ones for the other? Thanks!

I have used the SEL for this, however, I'm currently running into an issue where my computer crashes occasionally when using the GPU in high loads, such as gaming. Also, it only works with an external monitor I'm afraid.