[SUCCESS] Gigabyte Designare Z390 (Thunderbolt 3) + i7-9700K + AMD RX 580

[luckyal]

The following applies to everyone:

Just because many of us seem excited -- perhaps even maniacally so -- about activating Thunderbolt Bus it does not mean that this is necessary, wise, or recommended for most users.

In general, if your system is working fine as-is, there is really no need to change it. We know that wanting is different from needing. So please decide for yourself.

As hackers or enthusiasts, we often prioritize want over need. But that's just us.

After seeing all the new activity around Thunderbolt, I was tempted to be lazy and ask whether all hell broke loose after some Clover or a BIOS update. Glad I spent some time reading several hundred pages. It took several days but well worth the time and is a good educational process. Unless something has changed since this post, it seems like this one falls into a "nice to have" category, not necessarily an imperative.

So to conclude: Both of my audio interfaces work UAD Apollo x4 and Slate Digital VRS-8, and can turn devices off and on and they behave normally. Although, the latter gave me many more problems but I have worked those out with the help of @joevt all of which is documented in this thread.

 

[qthegaijin]

To add to my findings: with this modified GA-Z170X-Designare BIOS, I can now run BOTH the Titan Ridge and the Alpine Ridge controllers at the SAME TIME! Before it would default to one or the other depending on what was populated in the PCIe slot. Had to edit the DROM of the TR card to play nice.

 

[canyondust]

@canyondust: I did 3 patches only, this is enough to activate the Thunderbolt Bus, but osy did much more:

(from begin of start of activated partition, our offset is 0x82000)
[osy & me] 0x35: 2727 => 3737
[osy] 0x43: AD => 6D
[osy] 0x7C: BB (we have AB) => FB
[osy & me] 0x81: A0 => 20
[osy] 0xEB: 02 => 03
[osy] 0x102: 01 => 00
[osy] 0x13A: 00 => 01
[osy] 0xB32: 05 (we have 00) => 03
[osy & me] 0xBA0 (we have 0xBA8): FF FF FF FF => 86 80 D3 15 (we have 86 80 77 15, this is our vendor & device id)

I don't have a hotplug with cold boot. With dgsga/Casy SSDT (+ 2x acpi patches) I have Thunderbolt Bus activated on NOT patched firmware, but no device to DSBx-ports was connected. We have to keep testing...

UPD: Did you flashed my BIOS?

Not yet, have been busy, but have been building my active partition compare

 

[jleahy2]

Ah, that dreaded "search" field in IORegistryExplorer. Now you see why I keep harping about not using it, or at least clicking the "x" to the far right of the search bar. No need to flash the firmware.

Anyway, to determine whether and why the Focusrite is using USB, please post the IORegistryExplorer screenshot again, but with the search field emptied.

Ahh, my bad. I wasn't aware of that. Here's an updated screenshot.

I did find it interesting that this audio interface has both an application, and a separate thunderbolt driver. I did some experimenting and discovered that if I leave the thunderbolt driver for the Focusrite installed, but delete the application "Focusrite Control", then the mentions of USB disappear from IOReg.


I'm wondering if perhaps the app is somehow creating/using the USB bus and pushing beyond the 15port limit, causing issues and making the USB system drop out randomly? Thoughts?


I'm also a bit confused - do we still need the XHCI-unsupported.kext installed or not? I have not been running it. I also found that there was a new file in the guide bundle called ''USBWakeFixup.kext" which, for some reason, is causing problems booting 90% of the time, so I've removed it.

 

[CaseySJ]

...
Unless something has changed since this post, it seems like this one falls into a "nice to have" category, not necessarily an imperative.

99% correct. This post lists specific devices that work only when Thunderbolt Bus is enabled, so for owners of those devices it's a need not a want.

So to conclude: Both of my audio interfaces work UAD Apollo x4 and Slate Digital VRS-8, and can turn devices off and on and they behave normally. Although, the latter gave me many more problems but I have worked those out with the help of @joevt all of which is documented in this thread.

Very good -- no need to flash the Thunderbolt firmware.

 

[CaseySJ]

Ahh, my bad. I wasn't aware of that. Here's an updated screenshot.

I did find it interesting that this audio interface has both an application, and a separate thunderbolt driver. I did some experimenting and discovered that if I leave the thunderbolt driver for the Focusrite installed, but delete the application "Focusrite Control", then the mentions of USB disappear from IOReg.


I'm wondering if perhaps the app is somehow creating/using the USB bus and pushing beyond the 15port limit, causing issues and making the USB system drop out randomly? Thoughts?


I'm also a bit confused - do we still need the XHCI-unsupported.kext installed or not? I have not been running it. I also found that there was a new file in the guide bundle called ''USBWakeFixup.kext" which, for some reason, is causing problems booting 90% of the time, so I've removed it.

First the easy question: XHCI-Unsupported is not needed. And if the system works better without USBWakeFixup, then you're doing the right thing by removing it -- but in that case also remove CLOVER/ACPI/patched/SSDT-USBW.aml.

Now the good news:

• Your Thunderbolt setup is correct and working.
• Your Focusrite is connected over Thunderbolt, not USB.
• As you may know, Thunderbolt ports carry at least 3 types of traffic:
  • Thunderbolt traffic
  • USB 2 and USB 3 traffic
  • DisplayPort traffic
• If a device is using Thunderbolt traffic it will appear under DSB1 or DSB4.
• If a device is using USB 2 traffic it will appear under HS08 or HS13 (which we have disabled in order to maintain a limit of 15 USB ports).
• If a device is using USB 3 traffic it will appear under SSP1 or SSP2.

Looking at your screenshot (thank you for emptying the "search" field) we can see that the Focusrite is operating over Thunderbolt at DSB1. There were no devices operating over USB at the time the screenshot was taken (SSP1 and SSP2 are empty).

 

[faithie999]

In my effort to assemble components for the upcoming Gigabyte Z490 Vision D, I'm realizing what others have already realized -- that 650W to 850W fully-modular power supplies are extremely scarce. This harkens back to the crypto mining heyday where GPUs were sold out everywhere and prices were being gouged.

Fortunately I found a Corsair RM850x at a local retailer for a "fairly" normal price.

what is driving the need for a more powerful PSU for the new mobos and cpu hardware?

thanks

 

[luckyal]

99% correct. This post lists specific devices that work only with Thunderbolt Bus enabled so for owners of those devices it's a need not a want.

Very good -- no need to flash the Thunderbolt firmware.

On that note, should Slate Digital VRS-8 be added to the list of working Thunderbolt Audio Interfaces?

A few relevant posts on this subject are:

Post 1
Post 2

 

[CaseySJ]

what is driving the need for a more powerful PSU for the new mobos and cpu hardware?

thanks

Not sure I understand the question. The minimum recommendation from the Vision D owner's manual is 500W, same as Designare Z390. But 500W is pretty bare bones. The most common PSUs (650W, 750W and 850W) are very hard to find. I purchased the 850W PSU because lower wattage ones weren't available.

 

[reduxd]

With Clover 5103 and newer it would be good to try X.M.P. Profile 1 for full 3600 MHz speed. If it fails to boot or fails to remain stable, then drop the speed to 2666 MHz or 2933 MHz.

I was having a sleep issue with my XMP profile set to 1 on some 2x16GB Crucial Ballistix 3200MHz where sometimes my rig wouldn't wake up from sleep, but disabled XMP and that seemed to fix it. I am on OC 0.5.8 though, so just a small heads up.