eGPU on the 15" non Touchbar

[ekwipt]

After reading this article, I was wondering does anybody have any information on the non Touchbar and if the Thunderbolt ports are running at full speed, like the 15" Touchbar, where the thunderbolt is connected directly to the cpu bypassing the PCH. I'm guessing not and this is where the savings come from, but the 15" non Tuchbar can accomodate for the Quad core chip.

https://egpu.io/macos-pascal-drivers-gtx-1080-ti-2016-macbook-pro/

 

[Sanpete]

All the 2016 15" models have the touch bar and the same ports. There's a 13" model without the touch bar. It has two Thunderbolt ports, but I don't know how they're wired. It would be a waste to hook up an eGPU to that machine in any case.

 

[Sanpete]

You want to match a 15W dual-core CPU with a 180W top-line GPU? I doubt the CPU could hold up its end, but I don't know how CPU-intensive the things you want to do may be.

 

[ekwipt]

maybe one with a quality power supply that could power the best Nvidia cards, but without the USB3 ports and ethernet... You could be on to a winner

 

[maflynn]

[MOD NOTE]
Some posts and replies were removed due to rules violations, the responses were removed as they did not make sense if left in the thread.

 

[ekwipt]

I'm guessing vendors cannot post? I thought at least he didn't try and sell his products just respond to a thread that I posted, the whole thread has been decimated

 

[theitsage]

@ekwipt I've tried the non-touchbar 13" MacBook Pro with a GTX 980 Ti eGPU setup. It's wired the same way the touchbar 13" is, except there's nothing on the right side. If you intend to use only one Thunderbolt 3 connection at a time, it will run at full speed.

The Mantiz Venus eGPU enclosure in the article I wrote is currently one of the better options for Thunderbolt 3 eGPU. Through a single Thunderbolt 3 cable you get an external GPU, 5x USB 3.0 ports, 1x Ethernet port, 1x SATA connection, and 60W power delivery to charge the laptop. The production unit will have 87W power delivery to accommodate the Late 2016 15" MacBook Pro.

 

[ekwipt]

cool, thanks for the info @theitsage

 

[richinaus]

@ekwipt I've tried the non-touchbar 13" MacBook Pro with a GTX 980 Ti eGPU setup. It's wired the same way the touchbar 13" is, except there's nothing on the right side. If you intend to use only one Thunderbolt 3 connection at a time, it will run at full speed.

The Mantiz Venus eGPU enclosure in the article I wrote is currently one of the better options for Thunderbolt 3 eGPU. Through a single Thunderbolt 3 cable you get an external GPU, 5x USB 3.0 ports, 1x Ethernet port, 1x SATA connection, and 60W power delivery to charge the laptop. The production unit will have 87W power delivery to accommodate the Late 2016 15" MacBook Pro.

Hey, I asked this in another post, but you may know the answer.

If you connect the eGPU to one TB3 port, can you still run a LG 5k screen from the other TB3 port and still get the benefits of the eGPU. Or do you need to run the monitor through the eGPU to get the benefits. This would be on a 15" to get the faster TB3 ports.

Sorry if this is an odd question, but I am super keen on an eGPU and don't understand exactly how it works in terms of providing the performance and how the monitors work through it.

Cheers!

 

[theitsage]

@richinaus not an odd question at all. What you want to do is possible and there are success reports on eGPU.io forum. It is a rather advanced implementation. The key is to use a ghost display adapter which connects directly to the eGPU output port so that apps launched through this ghost display have full acceleration. You can then switch these eGPU-accelerated apps to the internal display or the 5K display.

Step 1:

15″ MBP « » TB3 cable « » Thunderbolt 3 eGPU

Check System Information » Graphics/Displays to see the GTX 1080 Ti is showing with Metal support. Run an OpenCL app such as Luxmark to confirm the eGPU is working with your MacBook Pro.

Step 2:

15″ MBP « » TB3 cable « » Thunderbolt 3 eGPU « » Ghost Display adapter

Make sure you can switch apps from the ghost display back to the internal display. Once you accomplish this, proceed to add the 5K Thunderbolt 3 display into the mix.

Step 3:

5K TB3 Display « » 15″ MBP « » TB3 cable « » Thunderbolt 3 eGPU « » HDMI adapter

At this point there should be 3 displays: 5K, MBP internal, and ghost. The ghost display should be set as primary so that all apps are launched through it by default with eGPU acceleration. You would then proceed to switch the app to the 5K display through the use of Spectacle.

P.S. If you read all this and said to yourself this is confusing af and why would anybody go through all these steps to make it work, I feel ya. Apple could and should support eGPU so that it makes life easy for everybody.

 

[richinaus]

@richinaus not an odd question at all. What you want to do is possible and there are success reports on eGPU.io forum. It is a rather advanced implementation. The key is to use a ghost display adapter which connects directly to the eGPU output port so that apps launched through this ghost display have full acceleration. You can then switch these eGPU-accelerated apps to the internal display or the 5K display.

Step 1:

15″ MBP « » TB3 cable « » Thunderbolt 3 eGPU

Check System Information » Graphics/Displays to see the GTX 1080 Ti is showing with Metal support. Run an OpenCL app such as Luxmark to confirm the eGPU is working with your MacBook Pro.

Step 2:

15″ MBP « » TB3 cable « » Thunderbolt 3 eGPU « » Ghost Display adapter

Make sure you can switch apps from the ghost display back to the internal display. Once you accomplish this, proceed to add the 5K Thunderbolt 3 display into the mix.

Step 3:

5K TB3 Display « » 15″ MBP « » TB3 cable « » Thunderbolt 3 eGPU « » HDMI adapter

At this point there should be 3 displays: 5K, MBP internal, and ghost. The ghost display should be set as primary so that all apps are launched through it by default with eGPU acceleration. You would then proceed to switch the app to the 5K display through the use of Spectacle.

P.S. If you read all this and said to yourself this is confusing af and why would anybody go through all these steps to make it work, I feel ya. Apple could and should support eGPU so that it makes life easy for everybody.

Nope sounds fairly easy to me and thanks for posting - really appreciated. I noticed the HDMI adaptor on the back of an image so was wondering what that was for. All makes sense to me and will wait to the Nvidia drivers are more developed and out of beta.

Does the same apply if working in Windows on bootcamp?