dude1

Hello,
Soon I'm thinking about doing an eGPU set up for my retina MacBook Pro primarily for gaming in bootcamp but also for the odd did a bit of video encoding/editing and such on the Mac side.

I'm thinking about going with the the Akitio node using the thunderbolt 3 to 2 adapter from Apple because I imagine my future computers either Mac and/or PC will have thunderbolt 3 so it's my way of future proofing the enclosure or at least future me will have one less dongle.

My main question is what GPU should I look at buying for my MacBook?

I imagine with thunderbolt 1 being major bottleneck that going out and buying at 1080TI would be a waste of money.

Basically is there're a point where a better card won't make a difference e.g. 1060 will run the same as a 1050  or 970 etc. because of the thunderbolt bottleneck

Primarily i'll be playing on one of my 2560x1440 Display port monitors but may want to us the internal display at times eventhough i read that makes the bottleneck worse

thanks

ps. Here is another possibly stupid question, I know that thunderbolt1 is 10GBs and thunderbolt2 is 20GBs,  is there any device that i could attach to aggregate 2xTB1 into 1xTB2 to futher help with the slowdowns?

I appreciate that everyone's very excited about TB3, but could we also get you Akitio guys to test backwards compatibility with TB2 laptops via adapter, however unofficial/unsupported that usecase might be?

Seeing how the promise of turnkey TB2 eGPU never came to pass (at least not with a feasible pricetag), I'm still looking for a purpose-made eGPU box, provided it was backwards compatible with my current laptop.

 

For now my plan is to get the Node, apple TB3<>TB2 adapter, and connect that to my late 2013 rMBP, which is running bootcamp. Would that work?

 

I also want to know that

On 2016-11-04 at 0:04 PM, oaoleley said:

Welp. Now I'm crying too 

 

Please post updates on how the Node performs with older TB1/2-equipped MBPs using TB3 adapters. 

 

If the Node (with appropriate Thunderbolt adapter attached) + Windows 10 (bootcamp) combo works seamlessly with my 2012 rMBP, I will be instabuying the Node when released.  

 

 

I totally agree this will be a instant buy if this is the case.
currently ive got a 2012 rMBP with thunderbolt 1 for my personal laptop and would love to be able to connect it to a eGPU, but thunderbolt 3 is in my present/near furture.
 my curent dell work laptop already has thunderbolt 3 and once apple releases a MBP with 32gb of ram  (2017 hopefully) I will be upgrading my personal laptop.

so I'd much rather invest in thunderbolt 3 enclosure and have reduced speeds using a  adapter on my current laptop to future proof myself