Enable GPU Mercury Engine on Premiere CS6 and AE CS6 for GTX 660Ti (and other Nvidia cards)

[iamnicos]

Hi all,

I just found the solution for enabling GPU acceleration under Premiere Pro CS6 and AE CS6 running a GTX 660 Ti under 10.8.2 using latest CUDA and NVIDIA drivers.

NOTE :

This method will work with most Nvidia cards as long as they are supported by OSX and you found a way to get the appropriate drivers.
Just replace the card name with yours.

For 6xxx cards on 10.8.2 use latest CUDA and Nvidia drivers, or not... and let us know how did it work...

It should also work for ATI cards. But then the text document to modify will be opencl_supported_cards.txt instead of cuda_supported_cards.txt


System tested on :

Gigabyte Z77X-UP5-TH
GTX 660 Ti
10.8.2
Adobe Creative Suite 6


What problem does it solved ?


After installing 10.8.0 with Unibeast and Multibeast method, my GTX 660 Ti was recognize OOTB in the system profiler but i had no OpenCL.

I updated to 10.8.2 (and disabled VD-t and virtualisation in BIOS to be able to boot) and OpenCl was activated.

I installed Adobe CS6 and discovered that both Premiere Pro and AE couldn't use my GPU for rendering, although my card was seen in the softwares and system profiler.

I installed both latest CUDA and Nvidia drivers for 10.8.2, but still no GPU acceleration on my editing suite !

After some research, I found the solution. This is what I am sharing today.



It is not an hackintosh related problem in fact but just a basic OSX/Adobe related problem.


This post is based on this extraordinary good article made for Abode CS suite user called "Video Cards for Adobe Premiere CS6, CS5.5 and CS5" posted here :
http://www.studio1productions.com/Articles/PremiereCS5.htm

The procedure I am reporting here can be found on page 3, under "Instructions for Mac Users" :
http://www.studio1productions.com/Articles/PremiereCS5-faq.htm


I just tweaked the command line to fit CS6 and corrected some path that were wrong in terminal command sections. I also tried to make the text and the actions clearer for everyone. Please ask questions if you need.


So here is the what to do


1) Install Premiere CS6 / AE CS6 or the whole Suite.

2) Install the latest CUDA drivers for Mountain Lion

2) Once installed, go to System Preferences / CUDA and accept the update (If there is one, in my case no).

3) Intall the latest Nvidia Drivers. (You can try without, I didn't)

4) Go to the spotlight, type TERMINAL, press enter.

5) Now on the terminal type:

/Applications/Adobe\ Premiere\ Pro\ CS6/Adobe\ Premiere\ Pro\ CS6.app/Contents/GPUSniffer.app/Contents/MacOS/GPUSniffer

-
The path for your installation of CS6 might be different if you moved it. To type in yours use this "grammar" tools :

/ means "in the folder"
\ imeans there is a space between two words
-

6) You get an output with the names of your card and other stuffs


If it says at the bottom that CUDA devices have been found and you can see your card, you are lucky and you can use this capability.


7) Copy the name of your graphic car as it is written in the Cuda menu under "name" . It should be GeForce GTX 660 Ti


8) Do not close the terminal (well, you can always open it again...)


9) Now let’s add your card to the list of supported cards.


10) On the terminal and type :

sudo nano /Applications/Adobe\ Premiere\ Pro\ CS6/Adobe\ Premiere\ Pro\ CS6.app/Contents/cuda_supported_cards.txt

A new window appears with the officially Nvidia supported cards,

should be

GeForce GTX 285
Quadro CX
Quadro FX 4800
Quadro 4000

-
If not, you didn't open the file and the path is wrong. Maybe you didn't correctly copy/paste the command line ? Maybe your Premiere CS6 folder is somewhere else ?
-

Here, simply type in the name of the video card that you got from following step 7 just above.

You can jump a line after the GTX 285 and put it there for instance...

GeForce GTX 285
GeForce GTX 660 Ti
Quadro CX
Quadro FX 4800
Quadro 4000


11) Now Press CTRL + X

ANSWER "Y" (stands for YES, I want to save the file)

It ENTER to overwrite the file.


-
If there is a write error, you are not in the file... and the command to got there was wrong
-


19. If everything is correct, type in Exit at the command prompt.


20. To ckeck if that worked, do step 10. again and be sure your card's name is in there.



Now startup Adobe Premiere and open or create a Project.


Then at the top of the screen select Project, then select Project Setting and select General


Look under Rendering at the top of the window, it will say:


Renderer: Mercury Playback Engine GPU Accelerated (CUDA)


If it says -- Renderer: Mercury Playback Engine Software Only.

Simply change it for Mercury Playback Engine GPU Accelerated and you are done.

-
If you can not change to the GPU mode, chances are you did not follow steps 6 to 9 or you didn't type in the name of the video card correctly.
-

Adobe After Effects CS6

You can also do the same for AE using this command line

sudo nano /Applications/Adobe\ After\ Effects\ CS6/Adobe\ After\ Effects\ CS6.app/Contents/raytracer_supported_cards.txt

It will activate GPU for ray tracing, but that is it.

Note:* Save this script, because if Adobe comes out with a new update for Premiere, you will need to do the unlock again.



Et voilà !

Nicos

 

[dtrvndrn]

Very nice guide but simply removing cuda_supported_cards.txt works as well (CS5.5)

 

[iamnicos]

Very nice guide but simply removing cuda_supported_cards.txt works as well (CS5.5)

And skipping all the fun of writing command lines in the terminal ?....


Indeed, I just tested and you're absolutely right.


I guess I'm old school.


Cheers !

 

[senorfuego]

I can't seem to get the Cuda drivers to install. I have 10.8.2, Z77X-UP5 TH, 3.5 Ghz Core i7 with GTX 660ti and whenever I try to install Nvidia Drivers 304.00.05f02 Web Release I get an "Unsupported Sytem - This computer will not support GeForce or Quadro Mac OS X Edition cards." My system identifier is iMac 12,2. Do I need to have the system identifier set to something else? Or is there another way to make it work?

 

[apple_core]

Try making your system identifier a 'Mac Pro' with either '3,1', '4,1' or '5,1' as the model designator. I've read that that has worked for others.

 

[rancherpete]

I just completed my build with GeForce GTX 680 card and ran all of the latest Nvidia drivers for Mountain Lion 10.8.2. I also did that patch where you add your GPU to your txt file via terminal. Now CUDA does show up in Premiere Pro but I cannot play any video whatsoever within Premiere Pro. I can play video with VLC but not PPro.

Has anyone experienced this or do you know of a solution? I feel like I'm so close as I have everything working very well other than this one issue, but this is a biggie because its whole reason why I built this machine: Video Editing.

I did try deleting the cuda_supported _cards.txt file as mentioned below but that did not seem to make any difference either.

Any thoughts on this?

 

[kaybe54]

Im running CS5 and after several hours of trying to get the mercury playback to show up in PP, I finally did but now I'm where you are ...It won't play the video. I hope someone has the solution for this. This is one the main reasons I built this. Anyone??

 

[rancherpete]

I was hoping that you were going to be the cavalry coming to save me! I can't tell you how many times I have reloaded all of this stuff in various configurations hoping for a better outcome. Still nothing, and nobody has respond to my numerous posts begging for a resolution to this. I am sick about it. I bought all of this stuff based upon the Tonymac recommendations and it will not run the software that I built it for. I actually broke down and ordered the 64 bit Windows 7 Pro this afternoon and will just have to use this machine to edit video in Windows. This after buying CS6 for Mac just recently... and now I have to buy it again for PC? Yikes. I can't believe I'm even saying this as I have been on Macs for so long but my old 2006 Mac Pro is 32 bit and I thought that this would be the sensible alternative to buying a 5-6 thousand dollar Mac. Now I'm stuck with this, out $2,200 and still need to buy that Mac. The hit just keep on coming.

 

[kaybe54]

Man, I can relate to everything you just said ! I've been going back and forth about this build since the summer so i finally did it and now I'm stuck. I thought this would be the best decision since my 08 Imac wasn't cutting it. I can tell I've got a fast machine from the little bit of playing around but if the software won't work...what good is it? I can't keep upgrading my 1500.00 dollar software everytime they come out with new updates. If and when we get this working...CS7 will be out.I think you're right ...it seems to never end.

 

[kaybe54]

I meant to ask...How much to switch to CS6 for windows. I know I would have to pay for the CS5 to CS6 upgrade,which by the way ....will cost over half of what it cost me to build this hackintosh!! but what is the cost to switch to windows? I can't believe I'm even considering that! I've already spent more money than I should have. I may have to go that route if I keep having problems. I'm guessing everything will run in windows?