- Joined
- Mar 9, 2017
- Messages
- 62
- Motherboard
- Asus Rampage V5 Edition 10 X99
- CPU
- i7-6950X
- Graphics
- GTX 1080 Ti
Hi, I wanted to create a current 2018 thread for other Hackintosh users who combine these two hardware devices and/or other similar UAD sound card configurations, and also for those Hackintosh builders who also want to do so. I wanted to share my best and stable system settings and reach out to others who may have found better BIOS/System tweaks to ensure the UAD thunderbolt card will boot seamlessly every time (if that's yet possible in 2018) and run stably.
My configuration (95% stable ) is a powerful Audio/visual Media Power horse for hi-end Audio Mixing and 4k Video Editing and Post-Production built around an ASUS Rampage V Extreme motherboard with a 6850k 3.6Ghz 6-Core processor overclocked to 4Ghz, 64GB Ram overclocked at 3000, Samsung 960 EVO NVMe M.2 SSD as system disk with a Samsung EVO 850 SSD as it's clone drive.
The ASUS Rampage V has a thunderbolt header port so the ASUS EX 3 connected easily into the PCI-EX8-2 port with the header cable connected to the header port, and I use a Startechcom Thunderbolt 3 to Thunderbolt adapter to connect to my Apollo Quad sound card.
UPDATE SEPTEMBER 2018
After some research I have moved my card to the PCI EX16/EX8-3 Port and it has proven to be now 100% stable in this port.
KGP's "The Perfect Custo-mac Pro guide" is I believe still one of the best detailed and clearest guides to date for building stable and powerful production systems with many of the x99 motherboards like mine and brings together great info for getting the M.2 drives working on a hackintosh as well as solving many of the other common desires and problems associated with stable Hackintoshes running OS Sierra/High Sierra
https://www.tonymacx86.com/threads/...ill-tridentz-aorus-gtx-1080-ti-xtreme.211621/
To get thunderbolt working as a post-install operation I first needed to confirm the ASUS EX 3 card would work in Windows and I setup BIOS for the card in the following way:
A. BIOS/ADVANCED/Intel(R) Thunderbolt
Intel Thunderbolt Technology ON
Security Level UNIQUE ID
AIC Location Group CPU0 NB PCIE Slot
AI Location (Select appropriate slot where card is installed. In my case NB PCIE X16/X8_3
Thunderbolt PCIe Cache-line Size 32
UPDATE SEPTEMBER 2018
The ASUS EX III card comes with an install software disk but I recommend installing the software files manually to ensure it will be found in Windows. This guide explains in detail the process
https://www.overclock.net/forum/6-i...tall-asus-thunderbolt-3-card-asus-x99-mb.html
Note: While I do recommend manually installing all relevant setup files up to the most updated versions that recommended in this guide, I do not recommend installing the firmware update at all. This in many cases will lead to an unstable installation of the card and my system has now been 100% stable since August 2018 without this firmware update.
B. Reboot and Windows 10 should now find the thunderbolt card in Device Manager.
Most importantly though, your newly installed Thunderbolt software should now recognise your card, as explained in the above attached overclock.net guide.
C. Current UAD Apollo software only works with the Windows 10 Anniversary update so I updated Windows 10 to this before continuing. After installed the Universal Audio driver software for the Apollo 8 Quad and rebooting, Windows 10 should then find the sound interface when it is turned on.
OS SIERRA installation
A. I disconnected both my Thunderbolt EX 3 and Black Magic Graphics card before installing OS Sierra. Once the system booted fine without the USB Clover flash disk I installed driver software for both cards.
NOTE: For those who have already installed OS Sierra and are having trouble getting the thunderbolt card to activate then you would need to go back to Windows anyway and confirm it all works there first, then go forward into OS Sierra.
B. in Bios I re enabled the Thunderbolt settings with the following changes
BIOS/ADVANCED/Intel(R) Thunderbolt
Intel Thunderbolt Technology ON
Security Level LEGACY
AIC Location Group CPU0 NB PCIE Slot
AI Location (Select appropriate slot where card is installed. In my case NB PCIE X16/X8_3
Thunderbolt PCIe Cache-line Size 128
UPDATE SEPTEMBER 2018
Previously these settings were not sufficient enough to maintain stability of the EX III card and the UAD Apolloin OS Sierra and I was having a lot of trouble in booting, often needing to reboot my system a number of times when the Apollo was connected. These additional Asus x99 BIOS settings allow OS Sierra and High Sierra to load first time every time with the Apollo card turned on or off and so far I have maintained rock solid stability which is a miracle considering that so many other users are reporting no end of trouble with the ASUS EX III card.
BIOS/BOOT
Fast boot DISABLED (an obvious necessity to get clover to boot an OS system)
Int 19 Trap Response POSTPONED
Above 4G Decoding ENABLED
C. The thunderbolt card and the UAD Apollo will now function in OS Sierra as long as the Apollo is connected and powered before booting the OS. While OS doesn't recognise the thunderbolt driver in About this Mac / System Report / Thunderbolt, the audio drivers for the Apollo are recognised as "Universal Audio Apollo" in About this Mac / System Report / Audio and the Software will pick up the device so all should be good to go.
This procedure ensures that the Apollo sound card is 100% stable on my system.
UPDATE SEPTEMBER 2018
Occasionally it happens that the Apollo will miraculously stop showing up in a mac system after it has been working without problems. The best way to resolve this problem is to go back to the Windows 10 system disk to see if the ports of the EX III card are showing up in the Thunderbolt software and the Apollo card's software also recognises the Apollo and. If not then the EX III card will need to be reinstalled. I would advise going back to this guide and following they're process for uninstalling the ASUS thunderbolt software and drivers (but leave the UAD software in place)
https://www.overclock.net/forum/6-i...tall-asus-thunderbolt-3-card-asus-x99-mb.html
It's important to also follow they're order of processes for disconnecting the EX III card and then re-installing the drivers in the correct sequence (I still wouldn't recommend don't install the firmware update though).
When the card then re-shows itself in windows it should re-show itself in OS Sierra or High Sierra and remain stable with the correct Bios settings.
Please share your thoughts and experiences and if I can assist Noobs with their similar setups then I will try. I'm especially keen to hear if others have achieved successful 100% system boots every time with these two hardware devices and what different BIOS settings they use to achieve this.
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