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

[jleahy2]

Well - I'm sad to say, the EFI folder I was trying hasn't stopped my issue. I hit another USB dropout tonight with it, so it's clear that did nothing for it. Ableton Push II controller was plugged in, but not turned on, so ... I'm thinking it didn't have anything to do with it. So, keyboard, mouse, and the bluetooth card were the only USB devices in use. Sad, but not unexpected.

 

[CaseySJ]

Well - I'm sad to say, the EFI folder I was trying hasn't stopped my issue. I hit another USB dropout tonight with it, so it's clear that did nothing for it. Ableton Push II controller was plugged in, but not turned on, so ... I'm thinking it didn't have anything to do with it. So, keyboard, mouse, and the bluetooth card were the only USB devices in use. Sad, but not unexpected.

If only Keyboard, Mouse, and Bluetooth were active, what application was in use when the USB dropout occurred? What were the symptoms (i.e. the meaning of "dropout")?

 

[jleahy2]

If only Keyboard, Mouse, and Bluetooth were active, what application was in use when the USB dropout occurred? What were the symptoms (i.e. the meaning of "dropout")?

Bluetooth wasn't actually turned on. It's connected to the mobo header, but literally turned off on OSX. I only turn it on when I need to use airdrop. So, technically, all that was connected was really the keyboard and mouse.

Ableton Live 10 was open. OSX Mail was likely open in the background. Chrome *may* have been open in the background (I'm not sure - I don't remember. It may not have been). That's it.

I was working on a project in Ableton, I had the mouse button held down and was adjusting a parameter when all of a sudden, the virtual knob just stopped moving. I could see the cursor on the screen, but..it was unresponsive. Keyboard & mouse were completely unresponsive/dead - even hitting capslock did nothing (no green light). Graphics/screen continued to update as I could see the meters/eq on Ableton working fine, and sound kept playing. I had to perform a soft-reset to get USB to work again.

 

[Giskard]

Good questions:

• The three long slots are physically x16, x8, and x4.
• But there are only 16 PCIe lanes from those slots to the CPU.
• So the 3 long slots operate like this:
  • If only Slot 1 is used, it operates in x16
  • If only Slot 2 is used, it operates in x8
  • If Slots 1 and 2 are used, each operates in x8 (for total of 16 lanes)
  • If Slots 1, 2, and 3 are all used, they operate in x8, x4, x4 (for total of 16 lanes; see screenshot below)
  • But if Slot 3 is routed to PCH via BIOS (PCIE x4 Switch below), then the 3 slots operate in x8, x8, x4 (16 lanes from CPU, 4 lanes from PCH)
• The x1 slots are routed to PCH.
• The two M.2 slots are always running at x4 each, also routed to PCH.

---

From the Manual:
View attachment 477723

Thanks Casey, so the M2's don't share bandwidth with the x1 slots?

 

[Giskard]

Both M.2 slots are connected by four lanes to the chipset, which in turn has four lanes to the CPU. Unless you're hammering both SSDs simultaneously (which is unlikely if you've got separate OS installs on each) then you won't see any noticeable performance degradation.

If you had external SSDs and a 10GbE NIC connected to your Thunderbolt 3 ports (also connected to chipset) processing a heavy workload and were also working your M.2 SSD hard, then you'd probably notice a difference.

Even so, it's not something I would fret about. If you really want to not worry about PCI-E lanes, you really should be buying an HEDT platform like Intel X-series or Threadripper.

Thanks for the info. I think there are boards that would let me breathe easier but X series is an issue for me with some of the 32bit software I still need to run. On balance I think I'm probably just being overcautious

 

[kellymac12]

Bluetooth wasn't actually turned on. It's connected to the mobo header, but literally turned off on OSX. I only turn it on when I need to use airdrop. So, technically, all that was connected was really the keyboard and mouse.

Ableton Live 10 was open. OSX Mail was likely open in the background. Chrome *may* have been open in the background (I'm not sure - I don't remember. It may not have been). That's it.

I was working on a project in Ableton, I had the mouse button held down and was adjusting a parameter when all of a sudden, the virtual knob just stopped moving. I could see the cursor on the screen, but..it was unresponsive. Keyboard & mouse were completely unresponsive/dead - even hitting capslock did nothing (no green light). Graphics/screen continued to update as I could see the meters/eq on Ableton working fine, and sound kept playing. I had to perform a soft-reset to get USB to work again.

That's my experience, except I lose audio as well... What port is your audio interface connected to, and via what bus (USB/TB)?

 

[ziggenpuss]

That's my experience, except I lose audio as well... What port is your audio interface connected to, and via what bus (USB/TB)?

My audio (UAD/Flashed TB/SSP2) runs whilst in 'freeze mode' and GUI graphics still move if they were already doing so, ie: Ableton onscreen fader levels bouncing up and down with the music.
However video will freeze - which led me down the whole Vega route. The boot arg was a WEG one I think of just
-igfxnohdmi but it isn't working for me due to a current NVRAM issue with OC. There was another way that I read and that was removing the kext?

 

[kellymac12]

My audio (UAD/Flashed TB/SSP2) runs whilst in 'freeze mode' and GUI graphics still move if they were already doing so, ie: Ableton onscreen fader levels bouncing up and down with the music.
However video will freeze - which led me down the whole Vega route. The boot arg was a WEG one I think of just
-igfxnohdmi but it isn't working for me due to a current NVRAM issue with OC. There was another way that I read and that was removing the kext?

And the UAD is a TB device, rather than USB3.x, right? That would absolutely fit with what @CaseySJ has described. Have you managed to disable Displayport audio, @ziggenpuss?

 

[skittlebrau]

Thanks Casey, so the M2's don't share bandwidth with the x1 slots?

The M.2 slots share the same four chipset lanes as the PCI-E 1x slots, so they do share bandwidth.

Intel's consumer boards have 20 CPU lanes. 16 are directly connected to the CPU and 4 are for the PCH. All your peripherals on the chipset inclusive of gigabit ethernet, SATA controllers, USB etc. are routed through the chipset, so your M.2 SSDs actually share bandwidth with quite a lot of devices.

That's why AMD's decision with the AM4 platform to dedicate 4x CPU lanes to the first M.2 slot (24 lanes total, as opposed to Intel's 20) results in better performance.

 

[CaseySJ]

Thanks Casey, so the M2's don't share bandwidth with the x1 slots?

Correct. If x1 slots shared bandwidth with M.2, that would be mentioned in the manual.

I say this because on the Z490 Vision D, the third M.2 slot shares bandwidth with the third long PCIe slot. The manual clearly indicates that.

But on Z390 Designare, there are only two M.2 slots and they only “steal” bandwidth from SATA ports.

Note that this does not contradict @skittlebrau’s reply above because the PCH has its own 24 PCIe lanes separate from the CPU. The x1 slots, SATA ports, Thunderbolt, USB, and M.2 are routed to the PCH.

The PCH is connected to the CPU via 4 PCIe lanes.