AMD Radeon VII Mac Mini 2018 or Radeon Pro 575X iMac

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Mr. Ed
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AMD Radeon VII Mac Mini 2018 or Radeon Pro 575X iMac

Post by Mr. Ed » Tue Jun 18, 2019 9:13 am

Hello guys,

I am upgrading my workstation to a Mac Mini 3.0GHz 6-Core i5, with 16GB DDR4 and possibly... eGPU Radeon VII, Vega Pro 64 or an iMac with 3.1GHz 6-core i5 with AMD Radeon 575X. I only use SketchUp and Indigo 4.0 and I definitely want a fast configuration. Can you help me confirm if these GPUs are recommended for fast rendering with Indigo or is there any other better recommendation. Your comments will be greatly appreciated.

Thank you,

Ed

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Oscar J
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Re: AMD Radeon VII Mac Mini 2018 or Radeon Pro 575X iMac

Post by Oscar J » Thu Jun 20, 2019 6:15 am

For rendering, I would definitely recommend an eGPU config over those mid-range graphics crammed into the tight form factor of an iMac. I use an eGPU with my Macbook Pro with Indigo and I'm quite happy with it.

Mr. Ed
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Re: AMD Radeon VII Mac Mini 2018 or Radeon Pro 575X iMac

Post by Mr. Ed » Thu Jun 20, 2019 9:41 am

Hi Oscar,

Thank you for your recommendation. Can you share which GPU or GPU's do you use and which eGPU unit? I tested the iMac with the Radeon Pro 580x and as you said, it proved to be mid-range for the task. With Indigo Bench, 2.107 for the Bedroom and 7.091 Supercar=9.198. When looking at the IndigoBench results, 5.69,17.115=22.805 with the Radeon VII, roughly 2.5 times the performance. For the iMac test using Indigo (not the Bench), the best results came with Open CL, only using the 580x. Not sure if getting the Radeon VII (or any better) with a Razer Core X or something you else you can recommend.

Regards!

Ed

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Oscar J
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Re: AMD Radeon VII Mac Mini 2018 or Radeon Pro 575X iMac

Post by Oscar J » Tue Jun 25, 2019 11:22 am

I can only refer to the Benchmark database for indications of what cards perform well on Mac. Me, I'm using an ancient Radeon HD 7970, though if I was rendering more I'd definitely upgrade.

Mr. Ed
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Re: AMD Radeon VII Mac Mini 2018 or Radeon Pro 575X iMac

Post by Mr. Ed » Tue Jul 09, 2019 11:40 am

Hi Oscar,

I went with the iMac configuration with Radeon 580x (midrange) but went with an eGPU for it with a Vega 64. I got the enclosure, just waiting for the GPU to test it. Not sure if Indigo will detect this as a dual GPU setup or if I have to select one. Hope this solution works nicely, thanks for your feedback on this matter.

Regards,

Ed

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Oscar J
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Re: AMD Radeon VII Mac Mini 2018 or Radeon Pro 575X iMac

Post by Oscar J » Tue Jul 09, 2019 11:41 pm

Mr. Ed wrote:
Tue Jul 09, 2019 11:40 am
Hi Oscar,

I went with the iMac configuration with Radeon 580x (midrange) but went with an eGPU for it with a Vega 64. I got the enclosure, just waiting for the GPU to test it. Not sure if Indigo will detect this as a dual GPU setup or if I have to select one. Hope this solution works nicely, thanks for your feedback on this matter.

Regards,

Ed
You will be able to use both - in my case Indigo lists my eGPU as well as my integrated AMD GPU and Intel Iris Pro graphics.

With that said, it's quite nice to be able to free up your display GPU so you can work effortlessly while rendering in the background.

Mr. Ed
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Re: AMD Radeon VII Mac Mini 2018 or Radeon Pro 575X iMac

Post by Mr. Ed » Wed Jul 10, 2019 3:30 am

Yes, I am experiencing some performance issues since I am using the internal GPU for both things now... not great. Will post back as soon as I test the new configuration with both cards. Thanks Oscar.

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schwungsau
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Re: AMD Radeon VII Mac Mini 2018 or Radeon Pro 575X iMac

Post by schwungsau » Wed Jul 10, 2019 4:55 am

defiantly mac mini with radeon VII will beat the imac by far... the VII has 16GB of memory ! ... with imac you runs pretty fast into memory issues and need switch back to CPU only (half the gpu memory is taken by software and asx anyway)... with mac mini and epgu you use the full 16GB.

you don'y wanna mix slow GPU with fast GPU... keep the interal graphics for dispaly (or it will freeze lag your system) and use only the VII for pure render power.

or better imaxc and the Vii as eGPU

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schwungsau
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Re: AMD Radeon VII Mac Mini 2018 or Radeon Pro 575X iMac

Post by schwungsau » Wed Jul 10, 2019 4:56 am

btw. the get full power on VII etc... you need to wait for upcoming OSX update with lastest drivers..

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Re: AMD Radeon VII Mac Mini 2018 or Radeon Pro 575X iMac

Post by Mr. Ed » Thu Jul 18, 2019 10:11 am

Hey guys,

It was even worse than expected... iMacs 2019 are not yet supported for Razer Core X and when trying to connect the eGPU, the computer crashed, hard, multiple times. Customer support went on to say I should return the enclosure since they do not know when it will be compatible but I think I am going with the Mini and Vega 64 (Radeon VII in a near future) and use it only as a rendering machine. Will keep the iMac for modeling and all other things, it has been very fast with SketchUp and.... cannot return it now :cry:

Thanks for all your comments!

Ed

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schwungsau
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Re: AMD Radeon VII Mac Mini 2018 or Radeon Pro 575X iMac

Post by schwungsau » Fri Jul 19, 2019 4:33 am

maybe you should try a osx certifed box lke the sonnet... customer reports says it works with macos...

you can return the ezaorCoreX box instead...

Mr. Ed
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Re: AMD Radeon VII Mac Mini 2018 or Radeon Pro 575X iMac

Post by Mr. Ed » Sun Jul 21, 2019 2:29 am

Changing the eGPU enclosure sounds nice. I believed using the Razer Core X was good to go after reading many reviews saying it worked great on MacOs but the majority of them considered a Macbook Pro, Air or Mac Mini for their recommendation. For my model though, iMac 2019, I found only 1 setup online https://egpu.io/forums/builds/2019-27-i ... 10-kezeka/ but this guy used Windows in bootcamp, so no MacOs which is my SketchUp and Indigo OS.

There is also the thing with the external display, being a 27” 5K screen setup, going for another with similar specs has not being easy. Before going with the Mini I am going to give the Sonnet a shot, it sure looks compatible with iMacs with the latest OS. I hope to follow up on my setup soon.

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