Final Cut X - GPU usage when rendering - 5700 XT

[trexjames]

Hello,

I have been trying to find out if my GPU should be utilised when Final Cut X renders, transcodes or exports a project. I have watched the activity monitor and the GPU does not look like it is being used and the processor seems to be doing all the work. However, when I use DaVinci Resolve 16 my GPU is fully utilised when rendering or exporting. If anyone has any information on this it would help a lot. I don't know if Final Cut should be utilising the GPU but it just seems like it should be seeing as DaVinci Resolve and Premiere Pro do.

Thanks in Advance.

 

[slim.jim]

Hello,

I have been trying to find out if my GPU should be utilised when Final Cut X renders, transcodes or exports a project. I have watched the activity monitor and the GPU does not look like it is being used and the processor seems to be doing all the work. However, when I use DaVinci Resolve 16 my GPU is fully utilised when rendering or exporting. If anyone has any information on this it would help a lot. I don't know if Final Cut should be utilising the GPU but it just seems like it should be seeing as DaVinci Resolve and Premiere Pro do.

Thanks in Advance.

I believe Apple products rely more on Intel Quicksync for rendering. If you change your SMBIOS to iMacPro1,1 then it should use the GPU but you might encounter stability issues with macOS and the Navi card.

 

[tedyun]

Diorama just went through this over in CaseySJ's z490 thread.

It is basically juggling between the iGPU and the dGPU and figuring out the best configuration that balances performance and function:

Gigabyte Z490 Vision D (Thunderbolt 3) + i5-10400 + AMD RX 580

Few more questions for my new build: 1. Can I re-enable SIP or will it break anything? 2. Do I re-enable SIP just by changing E7030000 to 00000000 in the NVRam > Add > csr-active-config section? Not sure if I'm supposed to do something else. Dortania's guide mentions something about the...

www.tonymacx86.com

For me, I can enable the iGPU in BIOS which will allow things like QuickLook and Sidecar, but delete the framebuffer, which will disable the mobo HDMI. By deleting the framebuffer, FCP preferentially uses the dGPU to render. With the framebuffer enabled, FCP will use the iGPU to render.

Also, in the latest version of FCP, I believe there is an option to specify which GPU you want to do the rendering?

Reading up on the difference, it seems that videographers are saying the Quicksync produces better quality, although it is slower.

Hello,

I have been trying to find out if my GPU should be utilised when Final Cut X renders, transcodes or exports a project. I have watched the activity monitor and the GPU does not look like it is being used and the processor seems to be doing all the work. However, when I use DaVinci Resolve 16 my GPU is fully utilised when rendering or exporting. If anyone has any information on this it would help a lot. I don't know if Final Cut should be utilising the GPU but it just seems like it should be seeing as DaVinci Resolve and Premiere Pro do.

Thanks in Advance.

 

[qbe]

first check your fcpx preferences, you should have 5700xt selected as gpu

if you dont need faster h264 and prefer quality h264, ignore quicksync. quicksyncs speed is great for temp quality exports. for best quality, export prores out of fcpx and use handbrake.

for most simple, yet powerfull setup of fcpx for performance use imacpro 1,1 smbios, igpu only as headless (with that smbios will be disabled anyway). You will get best acceleration for your amd gpu. I have no idea if that is possible with your hw though

Or try as diorama in above mentioned thread. Casey wasnt able to make it work that way (cannot boot with igfx as primary with monitor connected to amd gpu) and I wasnt able to make my system work as he did (fcpx doesnt start, although i can boot with igfx primary). I guess there is something else diorama did so it works for him. I assume he has best of both worlds.

my measured 15min test export for example (prores)
imacpro 4:15
imac 6:37

note: as slim.jim notes, many ppl have freezes/lookups with 5700xt and macos. many dont, i for one dont and fcpx is my job.

 

[trexjames]

Thank you so much for your replies. I will play around with those options this weekend and post my results here so they can hopefully benefit others.

 

[trexjames]

Sorry for the late response. I tried a variation of setups over the weekend and this is what I found.

I changed the SMBIOS to iMacPro1,1 and enabled iGPU in my motherboards bios. Whilst I did see that my DGPU was utilized more in FCPX I didn’t notice much of a difference in overall reduction of rendering completion times.Whilst I would be happy to stick with this setup the problem is that I dual boot with windows. So the problem comes in that I can’t see which OS I want when switching due to the fact that I have the IGPU set as default in my motherboards bios. If there is a way to be able to see my options in clover on boot up then I would appreciate some feedback.

thanks.

 

[pastrychef]

Sorry for the late response. I tried a variation of setups over the weekend and this is what I found.

I changed the SMBIOS to iMacPro1,1 and enabled iGPU in my motherboards bios. Whilst I did see that my DGPU was utilized more in FCPX I didn’t notice much of a difference in overall reduction of rendering completion times.Whilst I would be happy to stick with this setup the problem is that I dual boot with windows. So the problem comes in that I can’t see which OS I want when switching due to the fact that I have the IGPU set as default in my motherboards bios. If there is a way to be able to see my options in clover on boot up then I would appreciate some feedback.

thanks.

Why not just set your 5700 XT as default?

 

[trexjames]

Why not just set your 5700 XT as default?

Are you talking about setting my 5700 XT as default in FCPX, or in the BIOS?

In the end I have enabled DGPU in the bios and FCPX has by default used the 5700 XT in the preferences.

I was just trying to find the optimal performance for rendering/transcoding by either using the SMBIOS iMacPro1,1 with iGPU enabled in the BIOS vs SMBIOS iMac17,1 with the DGPU enabled in the BIOS.

In the end I didn't seem to notice much difference in performance with FCPX when trying both options. Your responses are appreciated

 

[pastrychef]

Are you talking about setting my 5700 XT as default in FCPX, or in the BIOS?

In the end I have enabled DGPU in the bios and FCPX has by default used the 5700 XT in the preferences.

I was just trying to find the optimal performance for rendering/transcoding by either using the SMBIOS iMacPro1,1 with iGPU enabled in the BIOS vs SMBIOS iMac17,1 with the DGPU enabled in the BIOS.

In the end I didn't seem to notice much difference in performance with FCPX when trying both options. Your responses are appreciated

In BIOS. You said you can't see which OS to boot from because you have IGPU set as default. If you don't have a monitor connected to the motherboard, there's no reason to set IGPU as default.

 

[trexjames]

In BIOS. You said you can't see which OS to boot from because you have IGPU set as default. If you don't have a monitor connected to the motherboard, there's no reason to set IGPU as default.

I completely understand this. The only reason I did try this was because tedyun mentioned that he enabled the IGPU in the BIOS as well as qbe saying that for the best performance use iMacPro1,1 SMBIOS, IGPU only as headless.

Sorry for the confusion.