Asus Z690 ProArt Creator WiFi (Thunderbolt 4) + i7-12700K + AMD RX 6800 XT

[dehjomz]

Hi Dehjomz. It's this one, which says it's Intel Alpine Ridge LP. I just opened the enclosure and it says that it's a JHL6240 chipset.

OWC Envoy Express

The world's first Thunderbolt certified, bus-powered, 'add your own drive' enclosure for NVMe SSDs. Supports up to 1553 MB/s real world performance.

www.owc.com

I see this note from CaseySJ from the guide "Older Thunderbolt devices such as Thunderbolt 2 and those with an Alpine Ridge JHL6240 controller may not hot plug, but they should work when connected before boot."

I might give your Envoy PRO FX a shot. I got the Envoy Express because reviews said it played well with the M1 MBP while some complained the Acasis would detach when it slept. I see a review on Amazon that says "swapped out the included drive for a 980 pro very easily [on the PRO FX] and I’m getting fantastic speeds (3000 read/3000 right on average)".

Seems like a winner to me. Thanks for your help.

Yeah I also have a jhl6240 device (a cable matters 10 Gbs NIC) that doesn’t hot plug with Maple Ridge. It works just fine with my M1 Max (I use it every day) and older Intel Titan Ridge from z490 tho, so the problem is maple ridge.

The Envoy Pro FX works well… I hope you like it. I have used the Acasis mainly with my Z690 Formula machine (I use Western Digital…not Samsung PCIe4 drives with macOS) and the results have been excellent. Good luck!

 

[gandem]

Hi Dehjomz. It's this one, which says it's Intel Alpine Ridge LP. I just opened the enclosure and it says that it's a JHL6240 chipset.

OWC Envoy Express

The world's first Thunderbolt certified, bus-powered, 'add your own drive' enclosure for NVMe SSDs. Supports up to 1553 MB/s real world performance.

www.owc.com

Yup, I have the Envoy Express, no hot plug, but otherwise works. I followed the advice from @dehjomz and went with the Acasis TBU401 enclosure. Works perfectly across real Macs and the Z690 Pro Art. No regrets.

 

[jmjak]

Many many thanks to @CaseySJ for this incredibly thorough build tread. I’ve made it through all 223 pages and have a lot of notes! Thanks also to @dehjomz and @gandem for their contributions. I’ve certainly learned a lot about Thunderbolt in general and this board in particular.

I’ve been able to acquire all the hardware for reasonable prices (actually pretty close to what I just paid for an M2 MacBook Air) and am ready to start the build. First thing is to remove existing wifi card and insert the BCM94360NG module on the motherboard.

@rolotrealanis mentioned in post #1,762 that they were able to easily remove the I/O shield. I’m looking at it and a little confused on how to remove the fancy plastic cover and the backplate. I see some little black screws on the back of the motherboard that seem to line up with the I/O shield. Did you unscrew those or did you just pop off the plastic cover and backplate?

 

[CaseySJ]

...

@rolotrealanis mentioned in post #1,762 that they were able to easily remove the I/O shield. I’m looking at it and a little confused on how to remove the fancy plastic cover and the backplate. I see some little black screws on the back of the motherboard that seem to line up with the I/O shield. Did you unscrew those or did you just pop off the plastic cover and backplate?

There are a number of small screws on the back side that hold the plastic cover in place. As you remove the first few and jiggle the plastic cover, you'll discover which remaining screws need to be removed.

 

[dmdacc]

Hi CaseySJ, I'm using Z690 ProArt with 13700K (macOS 12.6.1). The motherboard BIOS Version is 2103 2022/10/19, which support 13th Gen CPU. My problem is all the USB Ports may accidentally failed to response (including USB 2.0 Device), I have to force shutdown. The USB recovered after boot. Do you know what could cause this happen(almost once a week)?

 

[fabiol76]

Hi all, I have the build with Z690 ProArt and 12700K up and running since March.

Since I upgraded to Ventura few weeks ago, I have a strange issue with my Magic Trackpad. At every login, I need to first connect the Trackpad with cable in order to use it. After, if I disconnect the cable, it works well. If I don't connect the cable at login the trackpad doesn't connect automatically, and, if I user another mouse to connect manually, it works. I use a Trust BT dongle, and I have the configuration like this post. How can I solve?

 

[Azimuth1]

Hi CaseySJ, I'm using Z690 ProArt with 13700K (macOS 12.6.1). The motherboard BIOS Version is 2103 2022/10/19, which support 13th Gen CPU. My problem is all the USB Ports may accidentally failed to response (including USB 2.0 Device), I have to force shutdown. The USB recovered after boot. Do you know what could cause this happen(almost once a week)?

Just a curiosity: is this happening also under Windows?

 

[dmdacc]

just a curiosity: is this happening also under Windows?

Using windows less than 10h since build finished, haven't seen it.

 

[Azimuth1]

I believe I experienced the same issue. Here’s a quick suggestion that may or may not help:

• Add boot argument ixgbe=0
• Shutdown and flip power switch on PSU to off for 10 seconds (yes this is necessary)
• Then power up and check sleep behavior again with cable connected

Thanks @CaseySJ !
sometimes it works, and sometimes it doesn't.

But I guess there is something else that can randomly prevent the system go to sleep correctly:

2022-11-29 17:48:48 +0100
Assertion status system-wide:
   BackgroundTask                 0
   ApplePushServiceTask           0
   UserIsActive                   1
   PreventUserIdleDisplaySleep    0
   PreventSystemSleep             0
   ExternalMedia                  0
   PreventUserIdleSystemSleep     1
   NetworkClientActive            0
Listed by owning process:
   pid 503(sharingd): [0x000064fa000180f0] 00:00:53 PreventUserIdleSystemSleep named: "Handoff"
   pid 170(WindowServer): [0x000063ea00098032] 00:00:00 UserIsActive named: "com.apple.iohideventsystem.queue.tickle serviceID:1000058f6 name:AppleHIDKeyboardEve product:Apple Keyboard eventType:3"
    Timeout will fire in 600 secs Action=TimeoutActionRelease
Kernel Assertions: 0xc=USB,BT-HID
   id=622  level=255 0x4=USB creat=29/11/22, 17:54 description=com.apple.usb.externaldevice.14600000 owner=USB2.0 Hub
   id=624  level=255 0x4=USB creat=29/11/22, 17:58 description=com.apple.usb.externaldevice.14620000 owner=Keyboard Hub
   id=626  level=255 0x8=BT-HID creat=29/11/22, 17:46 description=com.apple.driver.IOBluetoothHIDDriver owner=BNBMouseDevice
Idle sleep preventers: IODisplayWrangler

and also:

log show --style syslog | fgrep "Wake reason"
2022-11-29 17:41:21.485303+0100  localhost kernel[0]: (AppleACPIPlatform) AppleACPIPlatformPower Wake reason: ?
2022-11-29 17:41:21.485303+0100  localhost kernel[0]: (AppleACPIPlatform) AppleACPIPlatformPower Wake reason: ?
2022-11-29 17:42:31.500198+0100  localhost kernel[0]: (AppleACPIPlatform) AppleACPIPlatformPower Wake reason: XDCI CNVW
2022-11-29 17:42:31.500198+0100  localhost kernel[0]: (AppleACPIPlatform) AppleACPIPlatformPower Wake reason: XDCI CNVW

what do you think?

 

[CaseySJ]

...

@rolotrealanis mentioned in post #1,762 that they were able to easily remove the I/O shield. I’m looking at it and a little confused on how to remove the fancy plastic cover and the backplate. I see some little black screws on the back of the motherboard that seem to line up with the I/O shield. Did you unscrew those or did you just pop off the plastic cover and backplate?

Hello @jmjak

Just to follow-up: Were you able to remove the I/O shield?