Z490 & Z590 - Will Z590 ever have macOS Support ?

[etorix]

The reason I was considering the Rocket Lake level now is because back in 2017, I was on the cusp of many Hacks' widespread success with Coffee Lake CPUs, but I decided to hang back at tried-and-tested Kaby Lake for safety's sake. Yes, the i7-7700 worked perfectly but I felt obsolesced within a few months. Now in 2021, I'd assumed the early buzz about Z590s was similar to the situation when Z370s were being experimented with and quickly adopted.

In 2017 it was only a matter of time before 300-series chipsets were used in real Macs.
In 2021, Apple is engaged into its third platform change to its own custom ARM chips. The bucket has stopped with 10th generation Core and 400-series chipset. Z590 and 11th generation are unlikely to be ever fully supported.
Your best options are either to upgrade some components of your Kaby Lake system to improve its performance, or get a Z490 system and 10th generation system—already "previous generation" but such a system should be fully supported as a Hackintosh (check details before ordering!) and not too far away from Rocket Lake performance.

Unfortunately... I see that CyperpowerPC no longer configures its Intel gaming desktops with anything less than Z590s. So if I want a prebuilt it may already be too late for me to follow the suggestions on this website

Your problem looks more psychological than technical at this point. I'm sure there are other assemblers who could do a Z490 build to specifications—and, if fancy RGB leds are not part of the order, Dell, HP or Lenovo could supply ready-to-hack PCs as well. But if Z490 is "obsolete" by your standards you're stuck because Z590 is not suitable for easy hackintoshing—and by year's end Z690 might not be doable at all.

 

[dehjomz]

The reason I was considering the Rocket Lake level now is because back in 2017, I was on the cusp of many Hacks' widespread success with Coffee Lake CPUs, but I decided to hang back at tried-and-tested Kaby Lake for safety's sake. Yes, the i7-7700 worked perfectly but I felt obsolesced within a few months. Now in 2021, I'd assumed the early buzz about Z590s was similar to the situation when Z370s were being experimented with and quickly adopted.

The situation now is completely different. Back in 2017, Intel was still Apple's CPU supplier, so it was logical to assume that newer Intel chipsets, processors, and iGPUs would eventually get fully supported by macOS. But Apple is transitioning to Apple Silicon, so that assumption no longer holds, unless Intel woos Apple back.

It is very likely that all of the features of z590, z690, etc., will never be fully supported by Apple. In fact in order to boot macOS with Rocket Lake, we need to spoof a CPUID of an older CPU... this is likely to be the case for the foreseeable future. And as Intel transitions to hybrid architectures, it is likely that the x86 macOS thread scheduler will not be as efficient in scheduling threads on the hybrid architectures... as (I believe) it is designed for monolithic x86 cores. It's also not clear how well the existing code for CPU power management will work with hybrid architectures.

It will be interesting to see if and/or how Alder Lake, Raptor Lake, and then Meteor Lake perform in macOS. That being said, Rocket Lake does work just fine with macOS, the only minor issue is that the Xe iGPU doesn't appear to work. Not a big deal for my workflow, but might affect some workflows.

 

[Edhawk]

Your motherboard's specification page - https://www.asus.com/uk/Motherboards-Components/Motherboards/Others/TUF-Z270-MARK-2/techspec/ shows the following internal connectors:



The 14-1 pin TPM connector is highlighted.

Most people don't use TMP connectors on their systems, as it adds another layer of complexity that most don't need. Microsoft are possibly going to change that with Windows 11, as they tighten up Security on their OS. However, all retail Asus, MSI, Gigabyte etc. motherboards have the option to add a TPM connector, even the older ones. Though the older 20-1 pin connectors may not work with Windows 11, as they tend to be version 1.2 not 2.0 which Windows 11 requires, currently.

About the only option missing from your Kaby Lake system is a Thunderbolt header. Which is the only real sign of obsolescence with your current system. If you don't use Thunderbolt devices this is a moot point, unless you plan to use and connect any TB devices in the future.

 

[dehjomz]

Interesting about TPM, I wasn't aware it may be the main stumbling-block for me to run Windows 11 on my setup. In my mobo BIOS Guide the only mention of TPM is per the screenshot attached; no other explanation given but I assume I'd choose the "dTPM" option if I were to get a 2.0 module such as you mention? I think it's set for "PTT" now.

Re obsolescence: no, I hadn't thought my system was outdated until I got a load of Windows 11's (preliminary) CPU qualifications. No inclusion of 7th-gen, at least as Microsoft first revealed, was an eye-opener that couldn't help but make someone blame the age of his excluded setup. We have a dozen PCs at my office that wouldn't qualify, either... but I haven't suggested to my boss that our equipment is obsolete, LOL. Yet.

That said, however, I do like to keep current on OS's whether Mac or Windows. I'm happily running BigSur 11.5.1 on my Hack and hope/expect to migrate to Monterey on it this fall. It would be nice to keep up on the Windows side, as well, without having to re-invest in an entirely new system.

Unfortunately... I see that CyperpowerPC no longer configures its Intel gaming desktops with anything less than Z590s. So if I want a prebuilt it may already be too late for me to follow the suggestions on this website

There's a few requirements, theres the CPU generation requirement, TPM requirement and so on. Intel CPUs going back before even Skylake (3rd or 4th gen I believe) have the TPM firmware embedded onto the CPU die by way of PTT as you said. But it's unclear whether Intel 7th gen will be supported... for now it's Intel 8th gen and newer.

I wonder if a bootloader can be written to spoof a CPUID of a supported processor to allow Win 11 to boot/install, kinda like what we have to do for Rocket Lake + macOS?!

 

[CaseySJ]

The official Apple Radeon 6800 and 6900 GPUs…

Apple Introduces New High-End Graphics Options for Mac Pro

Apple today began offering new high-end graphics upgrade options for both the tower and rack versions of the Mac Pro desktop computer. This comes on...

www.macrumors.com

Will a 6700 come next?

 

[buddyjack2]

Your motherboard's specification page - https://www.asus.com/uk/Motherboards-Components/Motherboards/Others/TUF-Z270-MARK-2/techspec/ shows the following internal connectors:

View attachment 526088

The 14-1 pin TPM connector is highlighted.

Most people don't use TMP connectors on their systems, as it adds another layer of complexity that most don't need. Microsoft are possibly going to change that with Windows 11, as they tighten up Security on their OS. However, all retail Asus, MSI, Gigabyte etc. motherboards have the option to add a TPM connector, even the older ones. Though the older 20-1 pin connectors may not work with Windows 11, as they tend to be version 1.2 not 2.0 which Windows 11 requires, currently.

About the only option missing from your Kaby Lake system is a Thunderbolt header. Which is the only real sign of obsolescence with your current system. If you don't use Thunderbolt devices this is a moot point, unless you plan to use and connect any TB devices in the future.

No, I don't have any TB devices so that's not a requirement.

Just to be clear: if Microsoft does relent and decide to support 7th-gen CPUs, all I'd need to buy would be a compatible TPM module and plug it into my mobo (as indicated in the attached screenshot from its user guide)? Wow.

 

[Edhawk]

You might not even need to do that if your Kaby Lake CPU supports the built-in TPM process, which all Skylake CPU's or newer are supposed to contain.

All you need to do is wait for Microsoft to decide how many people they want angry with them, when they draw the final cut off point for Windows 11.

 

[dehjomz]

The official Apple Radeon 6800 and 6900 GPUs…

Apple Introduces New High-End Graphics Options for Mac Pro

Apple today began offering new high-end graphics upgrade options for both the tower and rack versions of the Mac Pro desktop computer. This comes on...

www.macrumors.com

Will a 6700 come next?

That is a lot of horsepower but Mac Pro would be much more attractive with a Epyc Milan or Threadripper 64 core… or even Ice Lake 38 core.

 

[CaseySJ]

That is a lot of horsepower but Mac Pro would be much more attractive with a Epyc Milan or Threadripper 64 core… or even Ice Lake 38 core.

Rumors are pointing to Ice Lake Xeon in the next Mac Pro iteration.

Leaker corroborates Intel Ice Lake Xeon W-3300 CPUs on next-gen Mac Pro - 9to5Mac

According to leaker Yukki_AnS, the next Mac Pro will feature Intel Ice Lake Xeon W-3300 workstation CPUs and will launch in 2022.

9to5mac.com

 

[dehjomz]

Rumors are pointing to Ice Lake Xeon in the next Mac Pro iteration.

Leaker corroborates Intel Ice Lake Xeon W-3300 CPUs on next-gen Mac Pro - 9to5Mac

According to leaker Yukki_AnS, the next Mac Pro will feature Intel Ice Lake Xeon W-3300 workstation CPUs and will launch in 2022.

9to5mac.com

Yeah, people who know they need a Mac Pro will buy one, but it’s like those systems would (in my view) be super attractive with more performant cores than the existing intel options.

It’s clear Apple could sell x86 and ARM systems side by side, no real need to abandon x86. Imagine paying 5000 dollars for one of these new Radeon cards only for Apple to abandon support for x86 in a few years. If intel really comes back with Meteor Lake and beyond, it’s possible Apple won’t completely abandon X86

I’m hearing RDNA3 will be a beast in 2022. Also, Sapphire Rapids is coming with pcie5.0 and ddr5 support. There are also rumors of Thundebolt5 with 80gbps support. These would be good specs for a modular x86 Mac. x86 may not be as power efficient as ARM in the mobile space, but it’s still is a robust ecosystem, and going ARM-only may limit modularity. Will be interesting to see what Apple does in the next 2-3 years.