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DIY eGPU Macbook experiences


oripash

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3 Questions guys

1. Can I game with my eGPU under OS X

2. (Windows 8.1 or 10) When I game with my eGPU games like Rocket League or CS:GO; I am getting micro laggs for 1 Second without FPS drops or high pings. Is this a common problem?(M370X + GTX 970)

3. Sometimes the eGPU randomly turns off the Macbook during gaming....(now I decreased the %power of the eGPU with MSI Afterburner) and the problem is gone but is that normal?

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@eGPUfan:

1. Yes, with an external monitor set to primary display (currently not working for 5k iMacs)

2. Maybe your CPU is throttling at that moment. Can you monitor your CPU clock speed and temps?

3. thats odd… how high was your OC? %power? maybe your DA-2 was at its limit.

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@Dschjin

1. I have the feeling this does not work for me... It feels like the games still get rendered by the M370X..

2. I will do this and post it tomorrow(21.10.).. RocketLeague etc. does not have the micro lags when i play on the dGPU. Even when I adjust all graphic settings to low my eGPU has this annoying micro lags...

3. I didnt overclock the GPU it just turns off after 1-2 Minutes of gaming (default clock speed)

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@eGPUfan: And that external Monitor is set as primary display? So games autostart on THAT display? If you have a signal on that monitor (at all) the eGPU should work propperly. Can you try and run Ungine Heaven/Valley and check which GPU that benchmark is running on (should be displayed in one of the upper corners of the benchmark running).

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@w4vz I am on 10.11.1 an my web drivers are working

Im on 10.10.5 build 14F1021

Anyone else got it to work? Im a bit baffled because it is still 10.10.5 and I never had any similar issue before.

EDIT: New drivers out, sorted :D

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Hello, i want to buy a macbook pro retina display and i was looking to install an eGPU for it. So to play high quality games on macbook pro retina 15" i should buy only Intel Iris Pro Graphics one? not with nvidia or AMD? the cheapest one? Not to install windows for eGPU. To play games on internal screen. is this eGPU going to effect on video rendering? Need Help. Thank you. my email for more info : [email protected]

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hello nando

I have macbook pro late 2011 15 inch 8.2

I am trying to set egpu up for my macbook pro.

I have bought akitio thunder 2 pie box

evga 500watts psu

evga nvidia geforce 750ti ftw

jumper for pus

riser with molex plug

molex plug to barrel

and I just have bought the egpu set up as well through [email protected]

will this set up work for me?

thank you

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I am just wondering if anyone here at the Macbook part of the forum tested any VR stuff through an eGPU setup and how is that worked?

I suppose it's possible but sure, that must have been used with a Thunderbolt 2 connector.

I've used an Oculus (DK1) with my eGPU set-up and it's worked just as well as an external monitor has.

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I've just gotten my Thunder 2 box in and it's come with a basic video card preinstalled (couple FPGA chips and 4 HDMI ports). Of course I'll be ditching this for my 970, but I didn't realise the Akitio box shipped with this...?

Anyway I've been trying to get it all hooked up to my 2015 MacBook pro but can't seem to get anything detected on the machine. Both for the included card and my Zotac GTX 970.

For the PSU setup, I've tried four combinations:

- the included adaptor with included card

- external 400W SFX PSU for GTX 970 and included PSU to power the other boards

- external 400W SFX PSU with 12V tapped into the 4 wire jumper cable that goes across the two boards

- external 120W power brick broken out to PCIe power for 970 and also tapped into 4 wire jumper

The GPU I have is a Zotac 970 with an alphacool waterblock so fits right into the PCIe box without the need for an expander. I know this card works of course as I've pulled it from a working rig.

I don't have any powered PCIe risers but I don't think this is the issue, I know all the boards are getting power. When I power on the unit, the green LED on the thunderbolt board turns on, and when I plug the thunderbolt cable into the Mac, a blue LED on the board and the blue LED on the enclosure both turn on. After some time, the GPU gets warmer near the power regulation so I know its getting some power.

I'm not quite sure how to go about setting any of this up in OS X yet though, If I look at the "About this Mac -> System report" page, both thunderbolt ports say that nothing is connected. This doesn't change whether I hot plug, plug before boot, power just before boot. Both in windows 10 and OS X, nothing is detected.

Should the Akitio box be at least detected on the system report page once its plugged in even if nothing is installed yet?

I've also tried the Automate-EGPU.sh script and that tells me to hot plug the thunderbolt cable, but of course this does nothing. I've also tried manually editing the three .kext files but this has had no effect either.

I've read in a few places that some GPUs need to be powered on at specific times, however can't find any information on how to do this..

Any advice appreciated, I hope to create a watercooled eGPU build log eventually too. Many thanks!

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@HammerFET: Wait, what? It came with a card? Where did you buy it? Can you take some pictures?

If the AKiTiO (with its owm PSU, connected by a TB cable and no card installed) doesn't show up in the System report of the Mac, I would say the Box is broken.

After we got the basics we can continue with the other problems/questions.

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@HammerFET: Wait, what? It came with a card? Where did you buy it? Can you take some pictures?

If the AKiTiO (with its owm PSU, connected by a TB cable and no card installed) doesn't show up in the System report of the Mac, I would say the Box is broken.

After we got the basics we can continue with the other problems/questions.

Hmm, I suspected this might be the case. The box looks a little used and I'm missing the setup guide. I found it on ebay, supposedly new. I'll take a picture of the card when I get home tonight.

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Hi Everyone,

Thank you to goalque and everyone else for the amazing support and information. It is really fun to take on a project like this.

That being said, I'm having some trouble getting my eGPU set up working. The hardware is as follows:

2012 Mac Mini running Mac OS 10.11.1 (El Capitan)

Akitio Thunder2 PCIe Enclosure

Lenovo 120W power supply connected directly to Akitio

EVGA GeForce GTX 750 Ti SC

I was able to get everything connected fine and installed the drivers, etc. using goalque's script. Everything appeared to run smoothly after disabling SIP, but now I am unable to get output from the eGPU when I connect my external display. As you can see in the pictures, the eGPU is detected (although it does not list the specific model) and the NVIDIA software manager is running, but I only get the display signal from the internal GPU. When I reboot and connect the eGPU, the display says that it is not receiving any output.

Any help or thoughts would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks in advance!

Pani

post-40310-14495001097826_thumb.png

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Wow! That was the issue. I can't believe I missed that! Thank you so much for your help! I switched the power supply to the one included with the Akitio enclosure and now everything is working fine. I will likely need to find another 120W AC adapter that delivers 12V to ensure the eGPU receives enough power, but at least I know all the components weren't damaged!!

Thanks again!!

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Hey everyone,

Thanks again for all of the help. I have been able to get my set up working (listed below) and even have been sending 4K signal to my monitor via DP!! I had a couple of questions, however.

1. When booting I no longer can see the boot screen with the Apple logo. The first output the display receives is the desktop background. Is there any way to get the boot screen back?

2. I disabled SIP in order to allow goalque's script to modify the kexts. Is it safe to re-enable SIP after the installation is complete? I would obviously disable it again if I needed to re-run the script.

Thanks!

Pani

2012 Mac Mini running Mac OS 10.11.1 (El Capitan)

Akitio Thunder2 PCIe Enclosure

120W 12V 10A power supply connected to Akitio power input

EVGA GeForce GTX 750 Ti SC

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