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ViDock on new 17"?

N

NeedMoreVideo

macrumors member
Original poster
Hello,

Anyone know if the ViDock 4 will work on the newly released 17" Macbook Pro? The vendor that makes the ViDock has not updated their compatibility chart since before 10.6 came out 🙁

Id really love to ditch my USB video adapters as the tearing and crappy refresh rates drive me up the wall...
 
Vidock & Thunderbolt

I'd love to see the next Vidock support a Thunderbolt connection. Since Thunderbolt can run 4 pcie lanes and the typical expresscard connection is only one lane it should help with the bandwidth bottleneck.
 
Yes, I can confirm that the ViDock 4 works just fine with the Early 2011 Macbook Pro 17".

I currently have it configured with an XFX AMD Radeon 6870 with an additional 2 27" Cinema Displays in addition to the one connected to my Thunderbolt connection.

HD Video (1080p) played through VLC runs without issue on any of the screens.
I have not yet tested any gaming.

Pyrit shows that the 6870, even connected over the slower bus of the ExpressCard Slot is approximately twice the speed of the built-in 6750.

#1: 'OpenCL-Device 'ATI Radeon HD 6750M'': 2167.4 PMKs/s (RTT 2.9)
#2: 'OpenCL-Device 'ATI Radeon BA Prototype'': 5528.8 PMKs/s (RTT 3.0)

These numbers are artificially low compared to the same numbers run under Linux, however that appears to be related to the Python Cal++ module not being well optimized for OS X at this time.

The same test run under Ubuntu 10.10 shows:
#1: 'OpenCL-Device 'ATI Radeon HD 6750M'': 34687.8 PMKs/s (RTT 1.1)
#2: 'OpenCL-Device 'ATI Radeon HD 6870'': 82241.4 PMKs/s (RTT 1.2)

Of note, to connect or disconnect the ViDock, you will need to restart your Mac.
 
projectle, wow thanks for the awesome answer!

Do you think I should go ahead and get a ViDock for my Macbook or should I wait for the Thunderbolt->PCI express box that hwtools is supposedly working on?
 
projectle said:
Yes, I can confirm that the ViDock 4 works just fine with the Early 2011 Macbook Pro 17".

I currently have it configured with an XFX AMD Radeon 6870 with an additional 2 27" Cinema Displays in addition to the one connected to my Thunderbolt connection.

HD Video (1080p) played through VLC runs without issue on any of the screens.
I have not yet tested any gaming.

Pyrit shows that the 6870, even connected over the slower bus of the ExpressCard Slot is approximately twice the speed of the built-in 6750.

#1: 'OpenCL-Device 'ATI Radeon HD 6750M'': 2167.4 PMKs/s (RTT 2.9)
#2: 'OpenCL-Device 'ATI Radeon BA Prototype'': 5528.8 PMKs/s (RTT 3.0)

These numbers are artificially low compared to the same numbers run under Linux, however that appears to be related to the Python Cal++ module not being well optimized for OS X at this time.

The same test run under Ubuntu 10.10 shows:
#1: 'OpenCL-Device 'ATI Radeon HD 6750M'': 34687.8 PMKs/s (RTT 1.1)
#2: 'OpenCL-Device 'ATI Radeon HD 6870'': 82241.4 PMKs/s (RTT 1.2)

Of note, to connect or disconnect the ViDock, you will need to restart your Mac.
Click to expand...

OT: how do you install pyrit with the correct ati driver for HD6750m in ubuntu 10.10? I have tried for three hours.
 
I'll hijack this thread to ask a question...

Will the ViDock4 Plus work on my MacBook Pro 15" Unibody late 2008?

On the support page of their site they state:

"ViDock 3, ViDock 4, and ViDock 4 Plus adapt PCIe cards to an ExpressCard slot. They work with any compliant ExpressCard slot, including the slot in the MacBook Pro. PCIe cards that do not require a large PCIe memory window, such as professional video editing cards and storage controllers, will work with MacBook Pro and ViDock.
However, only MacBook Pro generations 1, 2, and 4 support graphics cards on the PCIe bus provided in its ExpressCard slot. Other generations of MacBook Pro impose limitations on the memory resources allowed to be assigned to PCIe devices in the ExpressCard slot. PCIe graphics cards used in ViDock require more memory resources than are allowed."

So apparently my MacBook Pro 5.1 is not supported...

Is there anyone who successfully used it on a MacBook Pro 15" 5.1?
 
projectle said:
Yes, I can confirm that the ViDock 4 works just fine with the Early 2011 Macbook Pro 17".

I currently have it configured with an XFX AMD Radeon 6870 with an additional 2 27" Cinema Displays in addition to the one connected to my Thunderbolt connection.

HD Video (1080p) played through VLC runs without issue on any of the screens.
I have not yet tested any gaming.

Pyrit shows that the 6870, even connected over the slower bus of the ExpressCard Slot is approximately twice the speed of the built-in 6750.

#1: 'OpenCL-Device 'ATI Radeon HD 6750M'': 2167.4 PMKs/s (RTT 2.9)
#2: 'OpenCL-Device 'ATI Radeon BA Prototype'': 5528.8 PMKs/s (RTT 3.0)

These numbers are artificially low compared to the same numbers run under Linux, however that appears to be related to the Python Cal++ module not being well optimized for OS X at this time.

The same test run under Ubuntu 10.10 shows:
#1: 'OpenCL-Device 'ATI Radeon HD 6750M'': 34687.8 PMKs/s (RTT 1.1)
#2: 'OpenCL-Device 'ATI Radeon HD 6870'': 82241.4 PMKs/s (RTT 1.2)

Of note, to connect or disconnect the ViDock, you will need to restart your Mac.
Click to expand...

Is it possible to only connect the monitors by the vidock and not the thunderbolt port when using OSX? I'm wondering if the internal video card just idles and the external one takes over. This would definitely lower the heat the MBP is generating when using external monitors.
 
does it really work?

@projectle

did you ever played a game with your MBP2011 and the vidock4?
i am reading that a video cart that needs to push 265mb windows will not get that in this combination. you could make me a happy man confirming if it also really works!!

😎
 
mccs said:
@projectle

did you ever played a game with your MBP2011 and the vidock4?
i am reading that a video cart that needs to push 265mb windows will not get that in this combination. you could make me a happy man confirming if it also really works!!

😎
Click to expand...

i can confirm it is workign too.
it appears that they lifted the memory assign restriction on the new macbook pro's 2011 based on propably they implemented thunderdbolt and intel required all compliant to the specs..

so i will post later what i have tested and now..
for now i have a vidock 4+ with a macbook pro 17 early 2011 and i have connected 3 screens on it on the egpu and i have successfullt run eyefinity also in windows..

will post some game stats later also.

MCCS.nl
 
mccs said:
i can confirm it is workign too.
it appears that they lifted the memory assign restriction on the new macbook pro's 2011 based on propably they implemented thunderdbolt and intel required all compliant to the specs..

so i will post later what i have tested and now..
for now i have a vidock 4+ with a macbook pro 17 early 2011 and i have connected 3 screens on it on the egpu and i have successfullt run eyefinity also in windows..

will post some game stats later also.

MCCS.nl
Click to expand...

I'm wondering, does that mean this will work with the Early 2011 13" MBP? That would be a real treat since we are stuck with the Intel HD Graphics Card.
 
c3tr4 said:
I'm wondering, does that mean this will work with the Early 2011 13" MBP? That would be a real treat since we are stuck with the Intel HD Graphics Card.
Click to expand...

no.the 13" has no expresscard slot. however, if they come out with a thunderbolt adapter.. then it should work. i see no reason why it shouldn't.
 
Wait for the Sonnet ECHO Express - http://www.sonnettech.com/news/nab2011/ , that is what i am waiting for, it is the only known product with Thunderbilt to PCIe expansion, dont know if VIdock will come with a TB compatible product. With TB we could get 80% of total performance of total performance of a desktop card in most games. ThunderBolt is the biggest reason i am buying the MBP, I was getting tired of lugging around my Alienware.
 
hawk1410 said:
Wait for the Sonnet ECHO Express - http://www.sonnettech.com/news/nab2011/ , that is what i am waiting for, it is the only known product with Thunderbilt to PCIe expansion, dont know if VIdock will come with a TB compatible product. With TB we could get 80% of total performance of total performance of a desktop card in most games. ThunderBolt is the biggest reason i am buying the MBP, I was getting tired of lugging around my Alienware.
Click to expand...

Wow, this is amazing and exactly why I bought the new MBP w/Thunderbolt. Now it will be possible to upgrade video cards through the next couple years and stay up to date without having to trade in the entire Laptop.

Excited! :apple:
 
Configuration ?

@ projectle

Is there a configuration you must do to see the egpu ?

My card is all plugged but I can not see it (driver maybe?)

Thanks
 
ViDock has confirmed that they are working on a dock that supports thunderbolt and usb 3.0 for the near future. They are looking at a Q2 or Q3 release in 2012. I believe they said they were still waiting for a thunderbolt kit though which is the current holdup.
 
Hey guys, so I have gotten the Sonnet Echo (thunderbolt adapter) to work with a Vidock 4+ and macbook pro 2011 13inch under Windows 7. The TB does work as a PCI-e lane.

Could anyone tell me how they set up their Vidock with macbook pro 17inch? It is essentially the same idea since both are pci-e. I mostly need to know which drivers to install, if there is an order of which to plug in components...

Any help would be greatly appreciated 🙂
 
I do not have a ViDock to try this with, but I've done a bunch of research on the subject, and since nobody else has answered yet I'll tell you what I've found.

In order to use the ViDock under Windows (on Mac Hardware) the drivers for the specific video card being used need to be installed and all the hardware needs to be turned on and plugged in before the Mac is powered up into bootcamp mode.

As far as I know there is no hotplug support for video devices under Windows with the exception of a few odd USB (non-3d) video cards, so don't try unplugging it unless the machine is all the way off.

With Mac OS, things are much more tricky... I've seen a few devs that tell me that we will need a TB aware driver for the video cards before it will work, and since those drivers don't exist yet we don't have any way of using it.

If and when those drivers exist it is likely that we will be limited to the graphics cards that apple ships drivers for, meaning the MacPro video cards...
 
Well Nvidia just released new drivers for the mac pro and people are saying that the drivers make my card work OOB. The problem is that when I try to install the drivers, it won't let me because I don't have a mac pro. Is there any way to in a way "trick" os x into thinking you have a mac pro? If possible, I would think tony x86 would have a guide...
 
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