GTX 1060 6GB Mini & i5-5250u over Thunderbolt 2

[RyanLovesJosh 0]

I'm currently planning on buying an egpu with thunderbolt 2 and hook it up on my iMac. So, will an i5-5250u bottleneck a Zotac GTX 1060 6gb Mini over Thunderbolt 2? If so will at least play games such as Overwatch, League of legends, Vampyr and Fortnite at 60 fps medium settings or lower?

[+DevTech 1,377]

eGPUs have been around for a long time but are not very common.

 

Alienware and Razer have been two of the leaders.

 

1. the exact model of eGPU box will be important

 

2. not sure what MacOS will do with it and what sort of device driver it needs

 

3. not sure if you can boot Windows and get a device driver that way

 

4. the world has moved on to Thunderbolt 3 so support might be an issue

 

Anyways, enter your system specs here:

 

https://egpu.io/build-guides/

 

[RyanLovesJosh 0]

20 minutes ago, DevTech said:

eGPUs have been around for a long time but are not very common.

 

Alienware and Razer have been two of the leaders.

 

1. the exact model of eGPU box will be important

 

2. not sure what MacOS will do with it and what sort of device driver it needs

 

3. not sure if you can boot Windows and get a device driver that way

 

4. the world has moved on to Thunderbolt 3 so support might be an issue

 

Anyways, enter your system specs here:

 

https://egpu.io/build-guides/

 

I forgot to say that i'm using bootcamp for it, my bad.

[+DevTech 1,377]

https://appleinsider.com/articles/18/04/11/egpu-support-for-nvidia-gpu-plus-thunderbolt-and-thunderbolt-2-connections-arrive-with-pair-of-hacks

 

 

https://www.reddit.com/r/eGPU/comments/67scy9/limitations_vs_cost_on_thunderbolt_2_macbook_pro/

 

"Here's what I've gathered:

Akitio Node > BizonBox

1080ti is overkill for my system. 1050/1060/1070 are much cheaper and still good.

I'll spend about $1000 less with those two bullet points.

Will probably have to go with Windows and Bootcamp simply to have more titles, and they will run better.

4K max settings is totally unrealistic. But high settings at 1080p could be possible depending on game"

 

 

https://egpu.io/forums/which-gear-should-i-buy/macos-what-egpu-should-i-get-for-my-2014-15-inch-macbook-pro-thunderbolt-2/

 

 

"You can use a TB3 enclosure with the Apple TB3 -> TB2 adapter.  Many more options if you go with TB3 enclosures.  Stick with supported AMD cards in macOS if you want reliability and hot plug/unplug ability. 

I'm using an Akitio Thunder2 modified with a Dell power supply and a RX570 Sapphire ITX model and it works great in macOS.  I also have to leave the cover off of the Thunder 2 because the power connector is too tall on the RX570. In the end, it's a reliable eGPU setup that doesn't take up much space but also isn't aesthetically pleasing. It also doesn't work in Win 10 Boot Camp (error 12 nightmare)."

 

 

"I'm using a Sonnet eGPU 550, and would definitely recommend it. You also need an Apple TB2 to TB3 adaptor, and a thunderbolt 2 cable to connect the mac to the adaptor. (Note: you could get a 350, 550 or 650 - depends on what GPU you want to go for, and whether you need more power. There's a PDF on Sonnet's website showing which GPUs are compatible with which box.)

On the graphic card side, definitely go for AMD. I had to go with Nvidia, because I needed CUDA, and got a 1080TI. Which is great (and the drivers have been fine!) except that Apple don't really support Nvidia eGPUs at all, and if I use 10.13.4 or later I have many issues (this is with an iMac, you might be more lucky... but you might hit similar trouble with the next update or the one after). Put it this way: the software I use has recently changed a bit and AMD is becoming a viable option, so I'm swapping that 1080TI for a Vega 56  

Apple have a page listing supported configurations here:  https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT208544

Note that TB2 is not supported, so you will need to install patches to get it working. But with a supported config, it's a whole lot easier."

 

Conclusion:

 

Apple is stupid old Apple as usual and if you want it to work well on a Mac, NVIDIA will be a uphill battle with each software update as Apple tries to much things up so only their own stupid thinking is ever possible.

 

1. Just getting anything to work at all will seem like a minor miracle.

 

2. then considering throughput available over the anemic TB 2, the CPU is unlikely to be the bottleneck

 

 

[+DevTech 1,377]

3 minutes ago, RyanLovesJosh said:

I forgot to say that i'm using bootcamp for it, my bad.

- solves the proper running of the games themselves issue

 

- now you need Windows drivers for every piece of hardware

 

- TB 2 is still going to be more of a bottleneck than the CPU

 

[RyanLovesJosh 0]

Just now, DevTech said:

- solves the proper running of the games themselves issue

 

- now you need Windows drivers for every piece of hardware

 

- TB 2 is still going to be more of a bottleneck than the CPU

 

Will using a tb3 adapter to a tb2 adapter be better? or should i just stick to the Akitio Thunder 2?

[+DevTech 1,377]

7 minutes ago, RyanLovesJosh said:

Will using a tb3 adapter to a tb2 adapter be better? or should i just stick to the Akitio Thunder 2?

All the people with a lot of experience are practically shouting to use the TB3  eGPU boxes and then get an adapter.

 

That also means that if you ever buy a laptop with TB3, you are good to go...

 

On CPU, your i5 underperforms an ancient first gen i7-920 desktop and nothing like a current gen i7 which are compared here:

 

https://www.cpubenchmark.net/compare/Intel-i5-5250U-vs-Intel-i7-920-vs-Intel-i7-8700K/2478vs834vs3098

 

A i7 920 is going to starve a 1070 on PCIe x 16 but it's workable.

 

Your choice of 1060 is perhaps optimistic to feed properly at TB 3 speeds but 3D is not just about the the interface.

 

Your best strategy is to keep the frame rate as low as possible, the resolution as low as you can tolerate, but crank up all the GPU features to max since that happens on the GPU side of things.

 

[Mindovermaster 1,645]

6 hours ago, DevTech said:

Alienware and Razer have been two of the leaders.

 

Actually, ASUS has been on the floor as well. But yeah, not common.