MP 1,1-5,1 Mac Pro 2012 Streaming Issue

[SnakeMan77]

Greetings,

I am new here, and I don't know much tech stuff when it comes to computers, so please forgive my ignorance. I have a mid-2012 Mac Pro (specs below) that I use primarily as an audio workstation. However, in light of the current economical crisis I have picked up some other work that involves streaming video into a private server in real time. I have tried unsuccessfully to do so with both OBS and Ecamm Live. After asking a tech-inclined friend, he told me that upgrading the video card should get me past the issue, but I had someone who knows both OBs and Ecamm tell me otherwise. He said:

"A GPU upgrade is unlikely going to help you. Both OBS and Ecamm Live are designed to run on machines that have hardware-accelerated video encoding. This is basically a special chip in the video card of all Macs (except Mac Pros) that can encode H2.64 video in real time."

I had one person tell me that a radeon rx 580 8gb graphics card would work, and other person tell me that even those do not encode H2.64 in real time. I have no idea what is true or untrue, and I don't even know what my options really are. I have two weeks to figure this all out, and I'm at a loss. Can anyone help me make sense of my options? I'd be very grateful for any help. And please remember that I know very little about these matters, so give it to me in plain speak! Thank you in advance.

- J.B.



SPECS:
Mid-2012 Mac Pro
Processor: 3.33 GHz 6-Core Intel Xeon
Memory: 24 GB 1333 MHz DDR3
Startup: SSD
Graphics: ATI Radeon HD 5770 1024 MB

 

[tsialex]

Read the first post of this thread:

Activate AMD hardware acceleration

[For existing OpenCore users, you can always download my latest OpenCore package at post #1314 for update] Full HWAccel achieved now! Everything is covered in the OpenCore thread. The step by step tutorial to enable AMD hardware acceleration is now at here, but I strongly recommend you go...

forums.macrumors.com

AMD hardware acceleration needs at least a RX 560/580 GPU, but works best with VEGA GPUs.

 

[SnakeMan77]

Read the first post of this thread:

https://forums.macrumors.com/threads/activate-amd-hardware-acceleration.2180095/ AMD hardware acceleration needs at least a RX 560/580, works best with VEGA GPUs.

All I see is Oops! We ran into some problems.
[automerge]1587574627[/automerge]
Nevermind. I see it now. Thank you!

 

[SnakeMan77]

Read the first post of this thread:

Activate AMD hardware acceleration

[For existing OpenCore users, you can always download my latest OpenCore package at post #1314 for update] Full HWAccel achieved now! Everything is covered in the OpenCore thread. The step by step tutorial to enable AMD hardware acceleration is now at here, but I strongly recommend you go...

forums.macrumors.com

AMD hardware acceleration needs at least a RX 560/580 GPU, but works best with VEGA GPUs.

Unfortunately, I have no idea what any of this means. I'm truly at a loss.

 

[SnakeMan77]

I have heard that messing with Kext can really mess up your machine -- especially if you don't know what you're doing --and I don't when it comes to that. Not at all.

 

[tsialex]

I have heard that messing with Kext can really mess up your machine -- especially if you don't know what you're doing --and I don't when it comes to that. Not at all.

So, you have to upgrade your Mac Pro, there is no other way to enable it with a Mac Pro 5,1.

Btw, only 2019 Mac Pro supports native AMD hardware acceleration from factory.

 

[SnakeMan77]

So, you have to upgrade your Mac Pro, there is no other way to enable it with a Mac Pro 5,1.

Btw, only 2019 Mac Pro supports native AMD hardware acceleration from factory.

That's where I'm confused. And again -- I'm sorry. I hate to be the ignorant guy about these things, but this is a first for me. When you say "upgrade" my Mac, I assume you're talking about the video card? Also, my machine is not hacked -- it's ordinary.

I hate that I know so little about this. I feel stupid even having to ask, let alone needing clarification.

Is there no way to get this machine to do what I need to do without hacking it, Kexting it, etc?

 

[tsialex]

That's where I'm confused. And again -- I'm sorry. I hate to be the ignorant guy about these things, but this is a first for me. When you say "upgrade" my Mac, I assume you're talking about the video card? Also, my machine is not hacked -- it's ordinary.

I hate that I know so little about this. I feel stupid even having to ask, let alone needing clarification.

Is there no way to get this machine to do what I need to do without hacking it, Kexting it, etc?

Upgrade as in replace your Mac Pro 5,1 (mid-2010/mid-2012) with a new Mac Pro 7,1 (2019 Mac Pro). If you can't do it, you have to follow the steps that I linked you before.

One or the other, no alternative in between.

It's complicated for someone that don't have the knowledge, but it's not something impossible and you can always pay someone that knows the topic to do it for you.

 

[SnakeMan77]

Is doing the steps mentioned in the article doable if my machine isn’t a Hacintosh? Is it dangerous to stability? Thanks again.

 

[tsialex]

Is doing the steps mentioned in the article doable if my machine isn’t a Hacintosh? Is it dangerous to stability? Thanks again.

This is the Mac Pro forum, that instructions are tailored for a MP5,1 - don't even work with a hackintosh.

If it's done correctly, you won't have stability problems.

 

[SnakeMan77]

This is the Mac Pro forum, that instructions are tailored for a MP5,1 - don't even work with a hackintosh.

If it's done correctly, you won't have stability problems.

Thanks again. I appreciate your help.