I currently have a RX480 in my 5,1 cMP. I have upgraded to Mojave. I have the latest Firmware installed. I was wondering if it is worth it to upgrade to a RX580 for future proofing in Mojave, or should I just stick with the RX480? I do some iMovie editing, a fair amount with Photos, but this is primarily an Xcode machine.
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RX480 v. RX580 for Mojave
- Thread starter usna92
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If you’re doing okay with what you have, then stick with it.
If you NEED an upgrade, your Mac & Apps will let you know.
If you WANT an upgrade, then by all means, do so. However if you’re not pushing the card you have, you likely won’t see a benefit.
The 480 and 580 are the exact same chip just with the 580 rom changing the clock speed to be slightly factory overclocked (due to production tolerances improving the longer a chip is manufactured) so you won't see that much of an improvement (Maybe 7-10% in real world applications). Certainly not enough to justify the cost. The lower clock speed also keeps the power draw on the 480 lower and therefore cooler/quieter. The only AMD cards that would be a performance worthy upgrade to justify the money spent upgrading would be the Vega cards but you'd have to modify the power supply (Pixlas mod or external power supply) to provide enough power. Plus they (Vega cards) still aren't even down to retail prices yet so price/performance ratio is arguable. I'd wait till the 7nm Vega parts to come out before considering an upgrade. Considering your use case scenario those (Vega cards) would likely also not offer much of any improvement except for iMovie.
The way Apple currently verifies the card is by the chipset used (which as stated above they are identical) so it's unlikely that, as long as they support the 580, that they would disable the 480. If they do in the future you can still just flash the 480 to a 580 and it would still work. Although you should modify the rom to keep the lower clock speeds as the 480 was earlier in production and unless you won the silicon library that would be pushing it a bit too hard.
I'm currently using the 480 with similar usage and don't plan on upgrading any time soon. Hope that helps.
The way Apple currently verifies the card is by the chipset used (which as stated above they are identical) so it's unlikely that, as long as they support the 580, that they would disable the 480. If they do in the future you can still just flash the 480 to a 580 and it would still work. Although you should modify the rom to keep the lower clock speeds as the 480 was earlier in production and unless you won the silicon library that would be pushing it a bit too hard.
I'm currently using the 480 with similar usage and don't plan on upgrading any time soon. Hope that helps.
I bet the difference is less than 7-10%
If I downclock my Sapphire PULSE RX580 8GB from 1366MHz to 1243MHz (123MHz difference), then the performance penalty measured ~7%.
https://forums.macrumors.com/threads/sapphire-pulse-rx580-8gb-vbios-study.2133607/
Normal RX580 clock at 1340MHz, and RX480 clock at 1266MHz, the difference is just 74MHz.
7% x 74 / 123 = 4.2%
The real world performance difference may be just 5% (or even less).
And a simple BIOS mod can give me extra 20% performance. I bet the similar mod can be done on the RX480 as well. AMD cards 99% come with way too high voltage. In my own experience, down volt it properly always make the card run faster and cooler.
I'm currently researching a new GPU to use for Mojave. Does that mean I could use the Sapphire Nitro+ instead of the Sapphire Pulse? I understand it has a slightly higher clock rate and better cooling.
Correct, but the biggest downside is that's a 2.2 slot card, which will effectively cost 3 slots to install this single GPU.
If it's a Vega 64 or 1080Ti, may be still worth the extra slot. For just a RX580, IMO, not worth. Especially there are plenty of dual slots RX580 options can work on the cMP.
@h9826790
As I know you are aware that I have issue with my particular RX580 consuming more slot space than I like for my system and forcing me to sacrifice slot 3 in order for my card to work well.
Do you know if the 480 card, or of any other 580 cards that are more slender, and consume a little less space that might let me regain use of my other PCIe slot?
The safest bet should be the RX580 with the reference cooler
I'm a believer in Gigabyte cards because off their, IMHO, good cooler design. Their 580s seems to be a 2 slot design, except for their 580XTR model.
https://www.gigabyte.com/us/Graphics-Card/AMD-Series
Lou
Pretty sure your system had both a 580 and 5770 in it right? That's why you had the 580 in slot 2 right? I'm not sure why you are keeping the 5770. I have been without a boot screen for a good while and haven't really missed it. The 5770 is not really helping your system so i'd just move your 580 to slot 1 and call it a day. If you need the boot screen just keep the 5770 around so you can use it when the time arrises. BTW the 5770 won't work with mojave.
As far as single slot cards go the wx7100 is the same chip as the 480 and 580 just slightly under-clocked. It would not be quite as fast as the rx580 in most consumer applications but it'd be negligible just like the 480 to 580. It costs around $550 right now. The rx460 is another option but is considerably slower than the rx580.
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That sounds cool. Any links?
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Oh sorry, I saw your post on another thread about the rx580 cable and somehow got you confused with the thread starter. The pulse is a two slot card right? The only way it could interfere with slot 3 would be to have it in slot 2. Why don't you have it in slot 1?
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The card is out of published spec. It's 44mm wide, not 40mm as it should be. The fan hub protrudes past the case and rubs a chip on the back of my raid nvme card. I can't put the 580 in slot1 because it will damage the x16 card in slot2, so they have to be inverted. This is a workable solution and even cools better I think, but it blocks access to PCIe slot 3 which I would like to use.
Got
Gotcha, I would agree that the reference card may be your best bet then unless you want to use an all in one cooler.
Actually, some Vega cards are down to MSRP, including the Pulse 56 at Newegg. You might not actually need a power mod with some of them, but it's not a bad idea (some are 180W TDP and have 165W TDP bios as well). 7nm Vega will be expensive workstation cards.
It's kinda crazy. I just checked the prices last week and they were still over msrp. Guess the Nvidia announcement pushed them down. Nice.
I still would wait for the 7nm parts if you are updating from the RX480 unless you are a heavy professional video editor. Those cards from the leaks look to be a sizable step up and should drive the price on this generation down even further.
I still would wait for the 7nm parts if you are updating from the RX480 unless you are a heavy professional video editor. Those cards from the leaks look to be a sizable step up and should drive the price on this generation down even further.
No, the reference RX580 looks like this.
![1496089357000_1339298.jpg]()
it looks the same as a reference rx480.
Do you have any fitment problems with the rx480 in slot1 and the 7101A in Slot2?
I did for a while but since I didn’t use windows, I could not check the video card temps. It never acted like it was overheating. I’ll look for a pic.