Will my Nvidia Graphics Card work with macOS ? List of Desktop Cards with Native Support

[Edhawk]

The market for refurbished/pre-owned Quadro K600's is still viable. Ebay in the UK has a few of these secondhand cards available for around £20-£25 (including postage). https://www.ebay.co.uk/sch/i.html?_from=R40&_sacat=0&_sop=15&_nkw=quadro+k600&_blrs=spell_check

You just need to watch to see if the card comes with a low profile or a full height bracket. Also these cards don't have a HDMI port (not a bad thing) but this does mean you need to be able to use DisplayPort or DVI connection to your monitor.

These should be ok with a bit of a clean of the fan and some new thermal paste between the cooler plate and GPU chip.

 

[ragnarok0273]

Alright, got me an SSD. Crucial MX500 500GB, got it on sale for $52 from $60 on Newegg.
Supposedly coming May 6th, though I could have paid $20 for delivery by May 3rd.

Here's hoping I don't get the GK106 VRAM leak bug (I have 2 EVGA GTX 650 Ti BOOST 2GB Superclocked Edition cards that I got for free from my uncle)!

If I do get the leak bug, I'll save for a GTX 690 because I like dual-GPU cards and the 690 looks cool.

 

[trs96]

got me an SSD. Crucial MX500 500GB

Good choice. Crucial SSDs hold up well over the longer term.

If I do get the leak bug, I'll save for a GTX 690

I would get a 680 instead. I don't believe that macOS will make use of the dual GPU. Sounds nice but doesn't equate to twice as much performance.

 

[Edhawk]

I have a GTX 690 dual GPU card (sitting on a shelf). First thing you should know is that this card contains two under clocked GTX 680 GPU's.

While both of the 690's GPUs show up in macOS, the OS doesn't actually make use of both GPU's. No SLI in macOS!

Because of this I swapped out my 690 and installed a Quadro K4200 4GB card. The Quadro actually uses the 3.7GB+ of VRAM that is available, unlike the GTX 690 which is limited to 2GB VRAM for each of the under clocked GTX 680 GPU's. So this dual graphics card only has 2GB of the 4GB that should be available.

I was sorely disappointed in my GTX 690. While a decent enough Kepler GPU, it promises a lot more than it provides especially in macOS. Where it seriously underperforms in my opinion.

Windows will show and use both GPU's on the GTX 690, if an Application requests more GPU power, i.e. treats it like an SLI setup. During normal computing it treats it like a single GTX 680.

So I would second trs96's recommendation, and also say go for a GTX 680, as that card will be slightly more powerful than a single GPU from the GTX 690, without the power overhead. It should also be a bit easier to find and hopefully cost less.

A better alternative would be a GTX 780 Ti, which I would say was on a par with the GTX 970 and the GTX 1060 (6GB) card. I own all three and have run comparisons between the three in Windows and macOS High Sierra. The GTX 1060 6GB was another totally underwhelming card, which I wish I had never purchased.

 

[trs96]

Because of this I swapped out my 690 and installed a Quadro K4200 4GB card. The Quadro actually uses the 3.7GB+ of VRAM that is available

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The Quadro K4200 (GK104) is mostly over-looked by hackintosh owners. You can find some good deals on them in the used market. They are no good for gaming or mining so the prices haven't gone sky high lately. You can buy one for $160 plus shipping on Newegg. https://www.newegg.com/nvidia-quadro-k4200-j4f85/p/2VV-000D-00011

For anyone that works in 3D/CAD they are a very good entry level card. You get RX560 performance for a lot less money than you can currently buy a 560 for today. Everyone should remember that the Quadro K4000 is a GK106 gpu so best avoided even though it is Kepler.

Look at what some Ebay sellers are asking for new RX560s. One even claiming it's a good mining card with only 4GB of Vram. You really need at least 8GB of Vram to mine Ethereum these days.

 

[trs96]

Here's an example of a third party Amazon seller jacking up the price of a PNY GT 710 that should only cost about $55. Funny that it ended up right next to the retail priced one you can buy directly from Amazon. These are the exact same cards. Why should one sell for $94 more ? Amazon is limiting them to 1 per customer so that people don't buy them all up and then raise the price nearly $95. When this is happening with the lowly GT 710 you know that things have gotten pretty bad.

 

[ragnarok0273]

Good choice. Crucial SSDs hold up well over the longer term.

I can attest to that - the Crucial M4 128GB that my dad bought in 2010 and has been the Windows boot drive for this since it was built with a Phenom X3 (unlocked to X4) is at 90% life.

I would get a 680 instead. I don't believe that macOS will make use of the dual GPU. Sounds nice but doesn't equate to twice as much performance.

I know macOS can't use the dual-GPU, but when not using my computer (90% of the day) it runs F@H on my GPUs. While they are clocked lower, if a 680 is 100% and a 690 is 2 75%, it comes out to 150%.

Plus I like the idea of having a 690, because, well, (nice).

 

[Edhawk]

When making this choice you should also be aware that the GTX 690 has 3 x DVI and 1 x mDP connections, no HDMI or full DP ports.

As with all GPU's there are exceptions to the norm. Asus created a GTX 690 that has 4GB for each of the two 680 GPU's, but I am pretty sure this model will be hard to find and prohibitively expensive if you do find one for sale - https://www.techpowerup.com/gpu-specs/asus-rog-mars-iii.b85

 

[ragnarok0273]

When making this choice you should also be aware that the GTX 690 has 3 x DVI and 1 x mDP connections, no HDMI or full DP ports.

As with all GPU's there are exceptions to the norm. Asus created a GTX 690 that has 4GB for each of the two 680 GPU's, but I am pretty sure this model will be hard to find and prohibitively expensive if you do find one for sale - https://www.techpowerup.com/gpu-specs/asus-rog-mars-iii.b85

Yep, I've heard of the Mars III, but the case I have is limited in GPU width and the 690 barely fits.

Also yes, I'm aware about the Mini-DP. I have a Mini-DP to HDMI adapter, which will drive monitor #1, and my second GTX 650 Ti BOOST will drive monitor #2.

 

[Edhawk]

Adding a 'Second' physical graphics card defeats the purpose of using the dual 680/GTX 690 card, especially one that is likely to be incompatible with macOS and cause graphics issues! All the EVGA GTX 650 Ti cards use the GK106 chip so your chances of having the problematic memory leak are high with these cards.

That proposed setup may not even work correctly in Windows 10, as it will see the GTX 690 as an SLI setup. Adding a third GPU (GTX 650 Ti), which is not identical to the other two GPU's is likely to cause you more headaches than it is worth. Especially if you plan to drive a display from the 'third' GPU.

Having looked at the specs for the EVGA GTX 650 TI cards, it appears these cards (there are five different EVGA 650 Ti cards) appear to all have 2 x DVI and 1 x mini-HDMI outputs. Do you have two identical models, are they the 1GB or 2GB models?

Having looked at the specs for the GTX 650 Ti cards - https://www.techpowerup.com/gpu-specs/evga-gtx-650-ti-2-gb.b1430; I would say the GTX 690 would be a definite improvement over two GTX 650 Ti cards. Even with just one of the two 680 GPU's working.