Quest for GPU Power Management on GTX 690 and 10.9.4 without getting Kernel Panics

I've been researching around to see what my options are for GPU power management on my GTX 690 but haven't found a successful solution.

As of 10.9.4, my GPU no longer down clocks back to 324 MHz and stays maxed out at 914 MHz when I run just about any app (with dual monitors plugged in I get stuck 914 MHz on both GPUs). Temps are running at around 50-53 C idle at ~23 C ambient in the office. It's within the heat envelope for the card but I don't really like the idea of having it sit around and generate unnecessary heat and wasting power.

So here's what I've tried so far without success:

1. Installed nVidia web drivers for 10.9.4 + CUDA 6. This seemed to work initially but I started getting kernel panics which didn't happen under the stock OS X driver.

2. Tried running web drivers with CUDA uninstalled (had to manually remove it as there was no uninstall script to be found) but kernel panics continued

3. Rolled back to OS X stock driver which eliminated the kernel panics but now I am back to running at 914 MHz

4. Researched into changing the info.plist parameters in AGPM but many posts say it doesnt seem to stop the GPU from staying at the top clock speed.

Any thoughts?

Anyone else have this and get it working?

Anyone?

Am I really the only one with a GTX 690 in their Hackintosh?

I've gone ahead and pulled my GTX 690 and replaced it with my spare Gigabyte Windforce 3 GTX 780. Interestingly enough, my cold boot black screen issue seems to be gone. I am still getting the situation where the GTX 780 will get stuck at max frequency and not down clock back to 324 MHz with the stock Apple driver.

Also, strangely, preview keeps hanging now.

Any thoughts?

[Solved] Quest for GPU Power Management on GTX 690 and 10.9.4 without getting Kernel Panics

The preview issue turned out to be a permissions problem. Easy fix.

I installed the web drivers and now have proper power management with my GTX 780 and no kernel panics so far...



The 780 is the card I am going to keep in this rig. The GTX 690 is going into the cabinet for possible future use in a Windows or Linux box

To summarize my findings, in case anyone else out there is thinking of using a 690, the GTX 690 is NOT recommended for use in a Hackintish system running Mavericks (especially beyond 10.9.2).

(for clarity, this Inno3D GTX 690 card was an nVidia stock reference design with stock nVidia firmware with no vendor enhancements whatsoever. Also, it was a known good card pulled out of a working Windows 7 rig)

The problems I had under OS X included:

- System would freeze randomly - sometimes during boot, sometimes during normal use, sometimes at shutdown. There was no consistent pattern. This started in 10.9.3 with occasional occurrences but became more frequent in 10.9.4. This was a show stopper problem and the catalyst for me to pull the card out of this rig today.

- Black screen at cold boot upon arriving at GUI login (required a warm reboot to get to the GUI login screen - none of the different boot flag options fixed this). Annoying but not a show stopper.

- Card would not down clock back to 324 MHz with the Apple stock driver leaving one or both GPU chips (depending on how many monitors I had plugged in) hovering at maximum clock speeds with heat exceeding 50-53 C with almost no load. This was headache especially with two or more screens attached as both GPUs on the card would be generating unnecessary heat and wasting a lot of power which was totally unacceptable.

- Switching to the nVidia web drivers allowed the card to down clock back to 324 MHz but caused random and frequent kernel panics. I had no choice but to go back to the Apple stock driver to avoid the problem.

Switching out the Inno3D GTX 690 2GB for my spare Gigabyte Windforce 3 GTX 780 3GB (non-Ti version) eliminated all the issues above. My system runs as it should now.

How many monitors are you using?

I have the GTX 580 with dual monitors. With one monitor, the clock can go down all the way to 50Mhz. Once I plugged in the second DVI monitor, it keeps full speed and generates a lot of heat. I have been having this problem since day one and still don't know how to fix it.

Has GTX780 fixed this problem already?

summerayu said:

How many monitors are you using?

I have the GTX 580 with dual monitors. With one monitor, the clock can go down all the way to 50Mhz. Once I plugged in the second DVI monitor, it keeps full speed and generates a lot of heat. I have been having this problem since day one and still don't know how to fix it.

Has GTX780 fixed this problem already?

Click to expand...

No amount of tweaking of plist files worked for me with the stock Apple nVidia driver with the GTX 690 and with two monitors connected both GPUs on the board got stuck at max frequency. With only one monitor attached, only one of the two GPUs would get stuck. The combination of the nVidia web drivers and the 690 made the system kernel panic in addition to the freezes I was already getting so there was no way forward keeping the 690 in my hackintosh rig.

After putting the Gigabyte Windforce 3 GTX 780 (non-Ti version) into the rig and installing the nVidia web drivers for 10.9.4, all the problems immediately went away. I now have a properly running GPU with power management without freezes or kernel panics. Also when I shutdown, I can see the verbose messages instead of just a white screen and the cold boot to black screen issue is gone.

I should note that if you attempt to use Apple's stock drivers in 10.9.4 with a GTX 780, you will still get the frequency stuck at max issue. Use the nVidia web drivers instead.

So For GTX780 with the web driver, it clocks down even with two monitors connected. Is that right?