External Graphics Card For Mac
External graphics processing units (eGPUs) sound great. You can get desktop-quality graphics on a laptop, which means you only need one computer for portability and high-level gaming.
Notes on using a Nvidia PCIe Graphics Card in a Thunderbolt case with a MacBook Pro. Includes notes on mods and internal display/external display benchmarks of internal GPU vs Thunderbolt cased Nvidia GT740 card in Cinebench and Games. Updated with troubleshooting tips/things to check such as an external power supply for the video card and jumpering the atx power support to power on without a. BIZON custom workstation computers optimized for deep learning, AI / deep learning, video editing, 3D rendering & animation, multi-GPU, CAD / CAM tasks. Liquid-cooled computers for GPU intensive tasks. Our passion is crafting the worlds most advanced workstation PCs and servers. What do yo mean by 'my mac since it runs mainly on high temperature'? Currently I am not aware of any way to run an external PCLe graphics card that will display via the PCLe graphic's card output. If you could graphics card output would likely be slow since PCLe is much faster than USB3 or Thunderbolt. Jun 05, 2017 Apple bringing VR, external graphics and game engines to Mac. You'll be able to plug a box with an external graphics card into your. Discuss: Apple bringing VR, external graphics and game. Welcome to our guide to Mac eGPUs. In this article we explain the advantages of using an external graphics card with your Mac or MacBook, and round up the best buying options currently available.
Phenomenal graphics power How to set up your Mac with an external GPU Warning: This isn't officially supported by Apple yet, and a bit hacky. But if you want top-tier graphics performance, here's what you need to do. With Apple equipping all its recent Macs with Thunderbolt 3 ports, using an external GPU – or eGPU – is a very convenient way to boost graphics performance. Apple already sells two of them.
But do they stand up against internal GPUs? Is it worth dropping a few hundred bucks on a dock? How much performance can you really expect? Unfortunately, expectations and realities may differ with external GPUs.
But they can still be useful. Let’s take a look.
1. How Do External GPUs Work?
In most cases, you’ll see an external GPU hooked up to a dock. An external GPU dock has a PCIe port for the graphics card and usually either a Thunderbolt or USB-C cable to connect to your computer.
Using a dock is as a simple as installing the card, installing the drivers, rebooting, and installing any custom software. (Of course, your experience will vary depending on your hardware.)
Once you have it set up, your computer routes graphics requests to the external GPU instead of the default one supplied with your computer. In theory, this process will get you better graphics performance as, by and large, laptops don’t have much graphical processing power. (Bear in mind that you can use an external GPU for your desktop, but they are much more common for laptops.)
By using the bigger, more powerful card, you get better graphical performance. Maybe even enough to play some graphically intense games. Sounds great, right?
2. External Performance Doesn’t Stack Up
Unfortunately, using an external GPU doesn’t give you the same performance as it would if you had the same GPU mounted internally. How much performance do you lose, then? Estimates put the loss at around 10 to 15 percent. That isn’t a big deal, especially considering the monstrous capacity of the latest high-end graphics cards you can buy today.
However, the loss is something worth knowing about. If you’re hoping to play the latest AAA titles on ultra-high settings, an external laptop GPU setup might not do it for you. That’s not to say the external GPU won’t improve the graphical performance of your laptop; it definitely will. But the gains might not be as game-changing as you think.
Why not? Mostly because laptops just aren’t set up to handle that much power. And if they are, there’s a strong chance the laptop has an integrated GPU already, negating the need for an external GPU. Furthermore, while a PCIe port can transfer a lot of data very quickly, even the latest Thunderbolt and USB-C ports cannot match that data rate.
Your laptop CPU probably wasn’t designed to handle a powerful external GPU, either. Again, it’s not a deal-breaker, but you might notice the effects. This is especially true for older and slower CPUs.
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3. External GPU Docks Are Expensive
Though an external GPU dock is basically just a small piece of motherboard with a PCIe port and a connector cord, you can end up shelling out a surprising amount. You’re looking at a couple hundred bucks or more. And that’s on top of the already expensive GPU to go in the dock. (Not forgetting the existing cost of your laptop, of course.)
Some docks are also only compatible with certain brands of laptops, which means you won’t be able to transfer them if you get a new one. That’s another cost to consider. On the flipside, many laptops that aren’t officially certified to work with a specific external GPU dock will, in fact, work just fine. You might have to do a little bit of tinkering to get them working.
4. Research Is Important
External GPU docks have a wide variety of compatibilities and features. For example:
- The OWC Mercury Helios 3 will only take cards up to 75″.
- The Akitio Node takes “half-length” cards.
- Alienware’s Graphics Amplifier doesn’t have any USB or Thunderbolt ports; it uses a proprietary connector instead.
- The HP Accelerator Omen has a SATA port for connecting an additional HDD or SSD.
In addition, each of the listed external GPUs comes with specific compatibility requirements that you may or may not need to consider. As previously mentioned, the Alienware Graphics Amplifier has a proprietary connector and will only work with Alienware laptops. The Razer Core external GPU dock only works with Thunderbolt 3. The ASUS ROG XG Station 2 is unclear about which non-ASUS products it will work with.
In short, if you want an external GPU, you need to spend some time researching to make sure it’s going to work. Fortunately, there are a huge number of people interested in external GPUs, and they’ve already tested many combinations.
If you’re not sure where to start, check out Reddit’s /r/eGPU. It’s an active subreddit with a lot of people who might be able to help.
5. You Will Get Better Graphics Performance
Despite the drawbacks, external graphics cards do work. You will get better graphics performance out of your laptop and they’ll enable you to play games or run apps that wouldn’t have worked before. (Which upgrades improve your PC performance the most overall?) There are plenty of benchmarks showing that external GPUs provide a huge boost in graphics power, especially in MacBooks.
It’s difficult to say exactly how much of a boost your external GPU will give, or even how easy it’ll be to get everything up and running. However, if your laptop cannot run a particular game and you really want it to, an external graphics card is a viable solution.
6. External GPUs Will Only Get Better
The Thunderbolt/USB-C bandwidth issue isn’t going to alleviate magically. External GPU hardware and software will continue to improve and it’s more than likely that external GPUs will continue to improve.
Many people are interested in external GPUs. Additionally, hardware manufacturers want to get their GPUs into more people’s hands. As such, there’s plenty of incentive for them to keep improving the technology.
7. What Are the Best External Graphics Cards?
Finally, there are several excellent external GPU options available, depending on your budget and requirements. Here are three for you to consider:
Best Nvidia External GPU: Gigabyte AORUS Gaming Box
Gigabyte AORUS Gaming Box GTX 1070 Graphic Card GV-N1070IXEB-8GD eGPUGigabyte AORUS Gaming Box GTX 1070 Graphic Card GV-N1070IXEB-8GD eGPU Buy Now On Amazon $639.00
Gigabyte is a long-established name in GPU manufacturing, and its AORUS Gaming Box packs a massive punch into a reasonably stylish external GPU dock. The AORUS Gaming Box comes with an 8GB GTX 1070 Mini ITX, which is smaller than its full-size desktop counterpart but still offers similar stock performance.
Gigabyte’s Gaming Box connects to your laptop using Thunderbolt 3. The GTX 1070 Mini ITX features one HDMI port, one DisplayPort, and two DVI ports, as well as four USB 3.0 slots. Another plus for the Gaming Box is its weight. It only weighs about 4.4 pounds, making it relatively easy to travel around with. Furthermore, the AORUS Gaming Box comes as a single package, so there’s no fiddly installation process, either.
Best AMD External GPU: Akitio Node Pro With AMD RX 580
Node Pro (Thunderbolt3 MacOS and Windows Certified)Node Pro (Thunderbolt3 MacOS and Windows Certified) Buy Now On Amazon $327.84
The Akitio Node Pro comes from a less-than-familiar name, but still comes with many advantages. Number one is the additional 500W power supply unit for the external GPU. For moments when you need maximum power from your external GPU, you can plug it in for optimal graphical output.
Furthermore, while this is an excellent choice for an AMD external GPU solution, you can easily swap your AMD GPU for an Nvidia card in the future.
You’ll find the Node Pro is a significant upgrade on its predecessor, the standard Akitio Node. The Node Pro weighs 10.2 pounds, which while not exactly lightweight, you could feasibly take it with you on public transportation. However, one definite downside is the Node Pro’s overall size. It is definitely better suited to living on your desk at home.
The Akitio Node Pro external GPU dock also features a single integrated DisplayPort, as well as two integrated Thunderbolt 3 ports.
Is an External GPU Right for You?
All this information should give you a good idea of what you’re getting if you want to invest in an external GPU. In the end, putting that couple hundred bucks toward building your own cheap gaming PC might be a better investment.
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Will external graphics work with internal graphics
I have a msi gs65 with 8gb of
gtx 1060. If I install 8gb of gtx 1080 maxq will it deliver a power
Of 8*(gtx1060+gtx1080) simultaneously.if they work together how much % power loss can i expect...?
Please answer
My plan was to attempt to run an external Graphics Card (GPU) via the Thunderbolt port of my MacBook Pro 13' (Retina, Late 2012) and see see if I could improve on the poor performance of the built-in Intel 4000 GPU (included in my Macbook Pro's 2.5GHz i5 processor).
The theory is as follows, GPU's are typically connected via PCIe ports and since there are several manufacturers that provide Thunderbolt to PCIe expansion chassis for MacOS, physically connecting a GPU to a Thunderbolt equipped Macintosh is easy. However, there is a catch; as delivered MacOS doesn't support or recognize a GPU connected to an external PCIe chassis via Thunderbolt.
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Conducting some pre-purchase research on the internet was not encouraging since most of the opinions confirmed that MacOS will not drive displays over Thunderbolt and even if it would, since the PCIe bus is so much faster than Thunderbolt, a GPU will be continuously constrained by the bandwidth of the Thunderbolt interface. There were also a few articles by people that had successfully enabled video cards over Thunderbolt.
Due to the increasing popularity of Thunderbolt accessories, the price of PCIe Thunderbolt docks has dropped to the point where I was prepared to take the plunge and buy an AKiTiO 'Thunder2 PCIe Box' to connect to my MacBook Pro (Retina, 13, Late 2012). This particular AKiTiO box supports a single half length PCIe card and supplies 25W of bus power (as per the PCIe specification).
Since my Macbook is fitted with a Thunderbolt 1 interface and the AKiTiO chassis has a Thunderbolt 2 interface (2x the transfer rate of Thunderbolt 1), my chosen combination will have the Thunderbolt 1 port on the MacBook Pro as the speed limiting bottleneck, however I still wanted to see what performance could be possible.
Half length GPU's are much rarer than full length ones which tends to limit the available choice, notwithstanding since MacOS 10.10 natively supports NVIDIA cards, I acquired a cheap Gigabyte GT 740 GPU (with 2 gig of ram), and a 600w AT (ATX?) Power supply to power the GPU (actually the GPU would have also been fine with a much less powerful power supply).
(See 'Troubleshooting' notes below for general info on external power supply, jumpering and cables.)
External Graphics Card For Mac Mini
I then followed the excellent instructions found on www.journaldulapin.com/2013/08/24/a-thunderbolt-gpu-on-a-mac-how-to. In addition to the guide, I used 'Nano' contained within the MacOS terminal to actually perform the editing of the files and I also needed to issue the command 'sudo kextcache -system-caches' to actually get the MacOS to boot and recognise the revised kext files. (and check permissions after editing.) With these tasks complete, I rebooted my MacBook with the GPU connected via Thunderbolt, startup was normal on the MacBook and the external screen remained blank. Once the log-on screen was completed, the external screen came to life and I was running two screens. NB I have successfully run this modification on pretty much all versions of MacOS 10.10 (up to 10.10.5 at the time of writing).
'About this Mac' reported the two screens and also identified the Intel GPU for the MacBook Screen and the NVIDIA Card for the external display.
Interestingly the 'System Information' correctly identifies the GPU and screens under 'Graphics and Displays', but is unable to identify the NVIDIA card under PCI. (Because it's used via Thunderbolt?)
How does it perform, in short - very well.
I ran two benchmark tests, firstly the FurMark test from Geeks3D GPU Test, this reported 8fps for the Intel HD4000 GPU and 19fps on the NVIDIA GT 740.
I also ran Cinebench R15, this test generated much more interesting results, since under Cinebench the same GPU operated both screens, that is if I set the MacBook to run its built-in screen as the main display then Cinebench rendered using the Intel HD 4000 GPU on both displays, however if I started the application with the external screen connected to the Thunderbolt port as the main screen, then Cinebench would use the NVIDIA GT 740 to render on both screens. (? I'd think the internal display only uses the internal graphics, as that's the only connection it has. The 740's output is only connected to the external display. Unless it's using the 740 for rendering and passing that data to the Intel 4000's shared vram onboard memory? Like a 2013 Mac Pro uses the 2nd GPU for rendering/computations.)
This was a surprise, as all of my prior research had suggested that MacOS was incapable of using an external Thunderbolt GPU to render on the built-in MacBook Screen (only an Apple supplied discrete GPU such as the one fitted to the MacBook Pro 15' was capable of displaying on internal screen)
For Cinebench the following was observed:
- Intel HD 4000 GPU: MacBook Screen 15.25fps : External Screen 14.47fps
- NVIDIA GT 740 (T'Bolt): MacBook Screen 40.32fps : External Screen 43.73fps.
Following loading of the NVIDIA 'Web Driver' (and re-modifying the kext files since they were reset), I ran Cinebench again and now 48.32fps was returned on the external screen and 41.34fps on the MacBook screen. so the NVIDIA driver is worth about 10% more speed on an external display for this test, however it had no real effect on the internal display. Clearly there is some additional overhead needed to pass a signal back along the Thunderbolt connection to the built-un display after it has been rendered by the external GPU.
(FYI: Nvidia web drivers are specific to OS X version/build numbers (and build numbers change when applying OS X security updates, which means another Nvidia driver update is required). I try to keep links to the latest (non-beta) drivers and CUDA posted at Nvidia's website for OS X 10.9.5 and later on the Video topics page. As noted above however, they will need to be modified for cards used in a Thunderbolt case. (Updates appear first in Nvidia Web Driver Prefs before they post a D/L page.)
BTW: Resetting the Mac's nvram will clear Nvidia Web driver setting and revert to the standard OS X driver, which doesn't support some PC Nvidia card models. (For instance as of this post date (fall 2015), the Nvidia GTX 780Ti and Titan Black require the Nvidia Web drivers *and* OS X 10.9.2 or later. The Nvidia GTX 750Ti, GTX950/960/970/980/980 Ti and Titan X require OS X Yosemite or later *and* the Nvidia web drivers.) I don't use OS X 10.11 El Capitan but I suspect these driver edits/mods will not work with 'System Integrity Protection' enabled.)
Based on the benchmark tests, the NVIDIA GT 740 over Thunderbolt 1 offers over double (and almost triple) the performance of the Intel HD 4000 GPU, and you also get CUDA enabled with the GT 740.
External Graphics Card For Macbook Pro Mid 2010
Regardless of the selected GPU or screen, Cinebench returned the same CPU performance index. (GPU not used for that test.)
While I don't generally play games, I own a copy of Deus Ex - Macintosh Edition (not steam) and I also purchased a copy of Bioshock Infinity to see how the system would perform in this environment. In both cases I had the GPU connected to a HD TV and set the game to 1920 x 1080 resolution and standard quality settings. Deus Ex comfortably ran at a average of 55 - 60 fps and Bioshock made 25 - 30 fps. Increasing Bioshock to high quality settings has the frame count remain at about 25 - 30 fps. Both game exhibited some vertical sync issues (resulting in some screen tearing when panning the view)
A faster GPU would no doubt work better, and with modifications to the AKiTiO enclosure, a full length GPU card could be accommodated.
The GT 740 does not appear to be limited by the Thunderbolt 1 interface speed, however this is not a particularly fast GPU and maybe a faster card would show limitations to the Thunderbolt 1 standard. Recent Macintoshes have the faster Thunderbolt 2 ports and will be less affected.
Notwithstanding this simple and relatively cheap peripheral has effectively extended the life of my MacBook Pro and also made it more flexible. If Apple improves the Mac mini specification (bring back the Quad Core i7 option please) I think that the combination of its Thunderbolt 2 ports and the external GPU will make quite powerful and cheap alternative to a desktop Macintosh (which was my original motivation for this experiment).
A final word of warning, MacOS needs to be hacked for the card to be recognised and while Thunderbolt is a hot-pluggable standard, unplugging the Thunderbolt box with a GPU while the mac is running causes a Kernel Panic that requires a restart to clear.
-Andrew'