Should I upgrade my gfx card before I make the jump from HS to Mojave?

[cubedweller]

Hello! I'm currently running 10.13.3 and the system is more or less stable. Occasionally, however, I'll get the lockstate error (which I believe is related to my graphics card and/or nvidia web drivers). This happens maybe once every month or two. This error doesn't cause a complete reboot (it's more similar to a springboard crash in iOS if you're familiar). Similarly, on very infrequent wakes from sleep the audio won't come back online. This happens maybe once a month or so.

So my questions are: (1) should I replace my gfx card with a RX 580? (2) should I just do a clean install of Mojave (I have two SSDs) instead of upgrading as I've upgraded my current build from years and years ago (so the errors could be legacy issues from these upgrades, i.e,. Mavericks, El Cap, Sierra, HS, etc.)?

 

[Khaibit]

At the moment, there are no Nvidia web drivers for Mojave (and the 9xx series isn't natively supported), so you'll want to wait either way. That being said, given the issues you've had, and how much some things have changed since the Mavericks days (especially with regards to Clover and EFI drivers), it may be a good idea to do a clean re-install once those drivers are out. That way you can make sure you don't have anything old that you don't need (The NvidiaGraphicsFixup kext for example is now outdated, merged into WhateverGreen), and make sure that each aspect is addressed in the latest fashion (like the latest way to describe your USB port setup and disable ports so you're under the 15 port limit).

 

[cubedweller]

At the moment, there are no Nvidia web drivers for Mojave (and the 9xx series isn't natively supported), so you'll want to wait either way. That being said, given the issues you've had, and how much some things have changed since the Mavericks days (especially with regards to Clover and EFI drivers), it may be a good idea to do a clean re-install once those drivers are out. That way you can make sure you don't have anything old that you don't need (The NvidiaGraphicsFixup kext for example is now outdated, merged into WhateverGreen), and make sure that each aspect is addressed in the latest fashion (like the latest way to describe your USB port setup and disable ports so you're under the 15 port limit).

Thanks! I had similar thoughts as well. I'm thinking a clean install is the way to go -- I am a little scared as I haven't done a clean install of macOS in YEARS. Clover + Apple Store upgrading has worked perfectly for all these years but I think it's about time.

Ultimately, irrespective of the nvidia web drivers, do you think the RX580 is the way to go? I've been itching to upgrade something in my rig for a long time but can't decide on which upgrades to make...

 

[Khaibit]

The big advantage that the 560 or 580 will give you is native support, as Apple has been pretty much all-AMD for graphics for a while now -- they're similar enough to GPUs that Apple actually uses in real Macs (the Radeon Pro line) that you don't need to worry about waiting for drivers after an OS update, and will only need at most a couple Clover tweaks to get everything working 100%. So it does simplify things somewhat, but that 960 will still do just fine (once the updated web drivers are available).