Gigabyte B550 Vision D (Thunderbolt 3) + AMD Ryzen 7 3700X + AMD RX 5600 XT

[xtreem.p]

Thunderbolt devices will not reconnect if we do Apple Menu --> Reboot, but they should reconnect every time we do shutdown then press power button to start. Please check if that works.

Tried that, the Apollo when turned on prior to powering on the computer, does not show up. However, power cycling the Apollo while in Finder gets recognized and turned on. The UAD Satellite Firewire is only visible and connected when physically removing and reconnecting the Firewire dongle from the TB3-TB2.

 

[CaseySJ]

@CaseySJ

I'm still testing how the B550 Vision D works with an un-flashed TB3 chip, and the replaced WiFi/BT in the M2_WiFi slot. I'm using Catalina 10.15.7 and public beta Bid Sur with both OC 0.6.1 and OC 0.6.2.

This board is very inconsistent in how it does or doesn't mount my TB3 drive with various combinations of OC and macOS.

For example, in one run with Big Sur public beta and OC 0.6.1:

Power off 10 seconds, power on, startup, NO TB3 mounted. Hot Plug - NO TB3 mounted. Reboot, NO TB3 mounted. Use Apple Sleep - does not sleep and system hangs. Reset button to restart - NO TB3. Shutdown. Startup and TB3 drive is mounted in OC Picker and appears in Finder. Use the Jettison app to unmount and remount. Unmount and unplug drive, then hot plug and the TB3 drive is mounted.

With the public beta Big Sur and OC 0.6.2 - TB3 does not work at all for me. I'm unable to get my external TB3 drive to mount under any conditions. I used the VISION-D-N0-SLEEP EFI file CaseySJ posted on page 1.

With Catalina 10.15.7, and OC 0.6.2, TB3 drive mounting is a mixed bag:

• Once after turning the power off for 10 seconds, then starting, the TB3 drive was displayed in the OC Picker, and was mounted in Finder.

• Usually on a cold or warm boot the TB3 was not mounted. However, selecting "Sleep" from the Apple menu the B550 Vision D would momentarily turn off, then on, then return to the desktop and the TB3 drive was mounted. Selecting "Sleep" again would put the B550 into a powered-off sleep state (no lights on). Hitting a keyboard key would wake the B550 and the TB3 drive remained mounted, and everything was functional. Using the Jettison app the drive could be unmounted and remounted. Generally hot plugging the TB3 drive didn't mount it.

Who would have thought that putting the B550 to sleep would result in mounting a TB3 drive?

Based on my observations, TB3 chip flashing will be required for the B550 Vision D.

Thunderbolt drive arrays are particularly dependent on Thunderbolt Bus. In your earlier post you stated that these drives work reliably on the flashed Z390 Designare. I would recommend doing the same on the B550! The Arcelli CH341a SPI ROM reader/programmer works quite well on this board (and also on the Z390 Designare).

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

In terms of audio stuff, which can be kinda finicky at times, most of my plugins work, Can you elaborate a little more about which ones were giving you problems, thx!

www.tonymacx86.com

 

[CaseySJ]

Tried that, the Apollo when turned on prior to powering on the computer, does not show up. However, power cycling the Apollo while in Finder gets recognized and turned on. The UAD Satellite Firewire is only visible and connected when physically removing and reconnecting the Firewire dongle from the TB3-TB2.

I see. But on Z390 Designare both devices reconnect automatically on reboot and power-up?

 

[CaseySJ]

Okay, here's a new After Effects test project, this time without 600MB of video footage so I can upload directly to the forum. Excuse the ugly art – I had to strip off client branding and change up the color scheme before uploading.

If either of you who've installed After Effects have time, I'd love if you could test the following:

1. Does this file open?
2. If you drag the playhead in the main timeline (the tab named "card_rain"), does it move around smoothly? (The image in the preview window will probably just be a wireframe, that's fine).
3. When you release the playhead, about how long does it take to preview the new frame?
4. If all that works without crashing, can you go to Window > Render Queue and hit Render on the enqueued item? How long does it take? (If the estimate is hours, please just cancel and don't wait around for it)

This is a little bit of a convoluted test, because it's leveraging both CPU- and GPU-intensive functions, and also makes use of the embedded Cinema4D render engine. So there are a lot of points of failure on unsupported systems like these.

But if everything works, it's just about selling me on building a Threadripper Hackintosh.

1 - File opened without issue.
2 - Very smoothly
3 - From as long as 1.5 seconds to just milliseconds.
4 - Elapsed time 3 min 34 seconds.

On the B550 Vision D with a very old AMD R9 380X, I see the following:

• File can be opened
• Playhead can be moved left and right, but the wireframe sequence is not buttery smooth
• There is a problem with render...

 

[jncasey]

On the B550 Vision D with a very old AMD R9 380X, I see the following:

• File can be opened
• Playhead can be moved left and right, but the wireframe sequence is not buttery smooth
• There is a problem with render...

Thanks for testing. Since it's a Cinema4D-related error, I think you're right that your older GPU might be the culprit.

Given that Ploddles had better luck, I'm still encouraged enough to give building my own machine a try.

 

[xtreem.p]

I see. But on Z390 Designare both devices reconnect automatically on reboot and power-up?

Yes.. on my Z390.. all is peachy.. i just power on the Thunderbolt devices prior to booting the computer.I never got hotplug to fully work there though.. but thats not an issue for me since the devices are stationary.

 

[Ploddles]

@jncasey the PugetBench doesn't complete in After Effects Beta.

All runs smoothly for 95% of the run but gets stuck at the Warp Stabalize test and doesn't complete.

I'll try installing the Release Version in my other BS installation and try that.

 

[CaseySJ]

Yes.. on my Z390.. all is peachy.. i just power on the Thunderbolt devices prior to booting the computer.I never got hotplug to fully work there though.. but thats not an issue for me since the devices are stationary.

Have you flashed Thunderbolt firmware before?

 

[xtreem.p]

Have you flashed Thunderbolt firmware before?

Oh no.. too scary for me. But if there is a step by step Youtube video that i can follow, then maybe i will get the courage. Ive seen the one done for AIC, not directly on the motherboard.

 

[jncasey]

@jncasey the PugetBench doesn't complete in After Effects Beta.

All runs smoothly for 95% of the run but gets stuck at the Warp Stabalize test and doesn't complete.

I'll try installing the Release Version in my other BS installation and try that.

Ah, that's too bad. Maybe the Warp Stabilizer plugin isn't Intel-agnostic yet. Don't go out of your way on testing just for me! But if you do manage to test, I'd absolutely love to hear the results.

And FYI, I was just able to render my test project on my main workstation. I got 4 minutes ant 45 seconds, so your result was just about 25% faster off the bat. And I've got a Radeon VII in here. Based on CaseySJ's failed test result, the GPU is definitely a major factor in this render. So if our machines were both running the same GPU, I bet your performance improvement would be even better than 25%.