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

[avtor]

FWIW, when I stuck in my second NVMe M2, I totally forgot to make two partitions. I just formatted to APFS and CCC cloned my other OS SSD. When I went to place the proper EFI content to the new NVMe, an EFI folder was already there. Maybe it was created during a previous boot or CCC did a really sweet job, IDK. So, it's an APFS 500GB 970 for the OS and Apps, and an APFS 1TB 970 Pro for the Vienna Symphonic, UVI, and Slate stuff because it's 99% read-only. I had to sacrifice SATA 4 and 5, but I still have 3 HFS+ 860 1TB SSDs and a few more HFS+ in a BMD Multidock II via Thunderbolt. I had some data loss issues on High Sierra on a Mini 6,2 using APFS-formatted SSDs for media. Luckily I had backups to replace the files that the OS didn't actually copy, but just "pretended" to copy. YMMV...

@jiffyslot

I'm not sure if I'm following you correctly - are you suggesting to create 2 partitions instead like in old school rather than add volumes to one partitions for OS and homes?

 

[avtor]

@CaseySJ ,

I'm planning move off High Sierra to Mojave. I do not have any other hardware, so I'm planning to to do it on the same hardware but will be deploying on another set of hard drives. Just wanted to run something by you as I have never done this before as was good enough with inplace upgrades (all the way from Mountain Lion). In general I'm planning to do a fresh install followed by Time Machine restoration. Here is my current disk topology (I have much more disks in place, but for sake of simplicity bringing just the main setup):

SSD1 - High Sierra (CCC'ed to SSD1b)
SSD2 - User Home directories
HDD1 - Time Machines backups

Once in a while (6 moths or so) I make sure that my time machine backups are restorable so I do sort of DR exercise when I restore the whole system into 1 large hard drive using time machine backups just to make sure my backups are functional. Now, because I have 2 SSDs, I always have to do it in 2 steps (Apple does not know how to find user directories if they are NOT on the same hard drive, but are still backed up by Time Machine (!!!!) ):

1. Boot from Recovery partition and Restore from time machine
2. Log in to the ADMIN account, create partition for user directories with the same name as on SSD2 and restore Users directory from Time Machine; Reboot
Note: SSD1 and SS2 are completely disconnected during this procedure

So ... my plan is:

1. Install Mojave on a new SSD3 fresh and after making sure everything works and a full backup is done (CCC at this time ...)
2. Boot from (Mojave) Recovery partition and restore from Time Machine into SSD3 drive:
- At this point I would expect restoration of my apps from High Sierra into Mojave
3. Just like above as ADMIN user create a partition on the new SSD4 drive with the same name as SSD2 drive
4. Restore Users directory from Time Machine
- I should have my Users' homes back at this time
5. Reboot
- I should have a full system back on Mojave at this point

QUESTION:

Do you think it will work?

 

[CaseySJ]

@avtor,

Let me ask this question first: Because 4 SSDs are involved, which ones are 2.5" SSDs and which ones are NVMe M.2 SSDs?

• SSD1: 2.5" or M.2?
• SSD2: 2.5" or M.2?
• SSD3: 2.5" or M.2?
• SSD4: 2.5" or M.2?

 

[avtor]

@avtor,

Let me ask this question first: Because 4 SSDs are involved, which ones are 2.5" SSDs and which ones are NVMe M.2 SSDs?

• SSD1: 2.5" or M.2?
• SSD2: 2.5" or M.2?
• SSD3: 2.5" or M.2?
• SSD4: 2.5" or M.2?

@CaseySJ

All of them are standard 2.5 SSDs. I'm thinking to do an initial deployment on just 2 SSD (or may be 1 SSD and 1 HDD - we will see) to mirror my current setup. If everything works, I should be able to CCC both into one single NVME after thorough Mojave testing. Does that make sense?

I have never worked neither with NVMe nor with APFS and really want to take small steps in order not to mix everything together and be able to roll things back easily if I need to. Also, I did not make a final selection on the NVME, but still can move on and test Mojave. In the end of the day if everything works it will take me may be 15-20 min max to clone (CCC) everything to a single NMVE.

 

[jiffyslot]

@jiffyslot

I'm not sure if I'm following you correctly - are you suggesting to create 2 partitions instead like in old school rather than add volumes to one partitions for OS and homes?

No. The EFI partition created itself when I formatted the SSD.

 

[decibell]

@CaseySJ thank you so much for posting this guide, I've got my build up and running on Catalina beta 2 without issue!

That being said, have you had issues with Thunderbolt devices requiring a dock to work? I've got a Luna Display that used to work perfectly fine with my Gigabyte Titan Ridge PCIE card, but when I switched to the Designare motherboard (without the PCIE card) it doesn't work anymore. It does however work if I have it hooked up to an external thunderbolt 3 dock (cal digit) which is really strange…

Edit: Actually I solved my own problem, turns out it's because of the USB config disabling the HS part of the Thunderbolt parts. I guess Luna Display only works / is recognized as an HS device + Thunderbolt and not only SSP. I simply disabled the top two HS (HS09, etc.) ports and enabled the Thunderbolt ones (HS08, etc.) instead.

Feel free to add this to the Thunderbolt Experiences area

 

[bartrap]

Before giving up on the RX580 DisplayPort, please turn CSM Support back on and then make these 2 changes:
View attachment 413718
Just want to make sure something even worse is not going to cause problems in the future...

Morning Casey ! With CSM enabled the DP of the RX580 is still not working; there are some sub settings on CSM in the BIOS 4.01 of the ASRock Z390 Extreme4 board though I left then at default.

It's a pity the onboard DP gives an abnormal (matte) display once arrived at the desktop; I do not think the UHD630 part or main board is bad, because it gives a perfect picture when in the BIOS or in the Cover boot page... Am trying to find on boards people with the same issues but cannot find it.

Have a great weekend ! Bart

 

[movolans]

Which specific device are you connecting to the front USB-C port? If you connect a simple flash disk, does the same problem occur?

Please also run IORegistryExplorer and select File —> Save As... Then upload that file. If you can do this twice (once before connecting USB-C device and once after) that would be best.

It happens with any USB-C device. Hard drive, flash drives. Doesn't seem to matter. It disables all other USB and never mounts.

I've attached the files from IO. Before and after Does this shed any light on it?

 

[avtor]

No. The EFI partition created itself when I formatted the SSD.

Got it. That's legit for GUID

 

[Gompy]

Hi All,

Thanx for this great manual!
I got my new hackPro working great!

• Gigabyte Designare Z390
• Corsair Vengeance LPX - 64GB. (4x16)
• Intel Core i9 9900K processor
• Samsung 970 Evo Plus 1TB (MacOS drive) (patched to latest firmware)
• Toshiba X300 6TB
• Asrock Phantom Gaming X Radeon RX VEGA 56 8G
• Corsair RM650x PSU
• Fractal Design Meshify S2 Black

I configured as follow:

• iMac Pro (2017)
• iGPU disabled
• 10.14.5

Whats is working:

• Almos all!
  • All USB ports (3x TB3, lots of 3.0/3.1 and 2 2.0)
  • Sleep/wake
  • TB3
• Final Cut Pro etc.
• Dual Ethernet

Two questions:

• I can't get Windows 10 installed... tried with 500GB 970 EVO Plus NVME. placed in upper slow. But windows can't be installed.. fase 2 is not started (copy files..)
• My Vega 56 is getting hot, like 70-75 degrees Celsius. Any fix?

Thanx again!