System specs
- Intel NUC8i7BEH
- G.Skill 16GB (2 x 8GB) Ripjaws, DDR4 2400MHz
- A-Data 1TB A2000 NVMe PCIe SSD
- Crucial 1TB MX500
eGPU hardware
- Asus XG Station Pro
- EVGA GeForce GTX 1070 SC GAMING 8GB
Installation steps
- Installed Windows 10 Home and updated all drivers to latest versions
- Plugged in the TB cable and powered on the eGPU
- Wait for Windows to detect the eGPU
- Install latest nVidia drivers
- Switch monitor to use input from eGPU
- Disable iGPU from Device Manager (to get remove of second display in Windows)
- It works
Hardware pictures
- I'll add these once I have 5+ posts
Benchmarks
| Name | GeForce GTX 1070 |
|---|---|
| Compute Capability | 6.1 |
| Clock Rate | 1797 MHz |
| PCI Location | 0:7:0 |
| Multiprocessors | 15 |
| Threads Per Multiproc. | 2048 |
| Warp Size | 32 |
| Regs Per Block | 65536 |
| Threads Per Block | 1024 |
| Threads Dimensions | 1024 x 1024 x 64 |
| Grid Dimensions | 2147483647 x 65535 x 65535 |
| Watchdog Enabled | Yes |
| Integrated GPU | No |
| Concurrent Kernels | Yes |
| Compute Mode | Default |
| Stream Priorities | Yes |
Memory Information
| Total Global | 8192 MiB |
|---|---|
| Bus Width | 256 bits |
| Clock Rate | 4004 MHz |
| Error Correction | No |
| L2 Cache Size | 48 KiB |
| Shared Per Block | 48 KiB |
| Pitch | 2048 MiB |
| Total Constant | 64 KiB |
| Texture Alignment | 512 B |
| Texture 1D Size | 131072 |
| Texture 2D Size | 131072 x 65536 |
| Texture 3D Size | 16384 x 16384 x 16384 |
| GPU Overlap | Yes |
| Map Host Memory | Yes |
| Unified Addressing | Yes |
| Async Engine | No |
Performance Information
| Memory Copy | |
|---|---|
| Host Pinned to Device | 2210.32 MiB/s |
| Host Pageable to Device | 1724.76 MiB/s |
| Device to Host Pinned | 2621.04 MiB/s |
| Device to Host Pageable | 2134.67 MiB/s |
| Device to Device | 87.6942 GiB/s |
| GPU Core Performance | |
| Single-precision Float | 5886.47 Gflop/s |
| Double-precision Float | 184.282 Gflop/s |
| 64-bit Integer | 414.73 Giop/s |
| 32-bit Integer | 1895.7 Giop/s |
| 24-bit Integer | 1447.78 Giop/s |
Comments
- 0dB works as advertised, this is also otherwise pretty cool and quiet enclosure.
- Coil whine: there's coil whine and it's pretty loud with otherwise silent setup. It seems that this is a common issue with XG Station Pro, most likely due to the external PSU. I used the same graphics card in mini-ITX setup before this and there was no coil whine. I'll see what can be done about this. Maybe slight undervolt or overvolt can help.
- Windows sleep doesn't work properly, I need to look into this. NUC goes to sleep and then wakes up almost immediately.
NUC8i7BEH + Asus XG Station Pro + EVGA GeForce GTX 1070 SC GAMING 8GB
2018 Intel NUC8i7BEH [8th,4C,U] + GTX 1070 @ 32Gbps-TB3 (ASUS XG Station Pro) + Win10 [build link]
One option for fixing the sleep situation would be to use the iGPU for desktop and only power up the eGPU when gaming. That would of course mean running two cables to the display and some display management. But this would also somewhat mitigate the coil whine issue, since it's not so audible when gaming.
NUC8i7BEH + Asus XG Station Pro + EVGA GeForce GTX 1070 SC GAMING 8GB
2018 Intel NUC8i7BEH [8th,4C,U] + GTX 1070 @ 32Gbps-TB3 (ASUS XG Station Pro) + Win10 [build link]
@cthulhu Have you tried loopback mode performance? I have a similar NUC build that have the HDMI cable always connected to my TV. Whenever I need to use the eGPU, I simply power it on and through Nvidia Optimus the GTX 1060 eGPU can accelerate the TV through iGPU-connected HDMI cable. I also have the NUC in sleep mode daily with eGPU connected and never experienced immediate wakeup issue.
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2021 Gigabyte Z590i Vision D [11th,6C] + RTX 3060 Ti @ 32Gbps-TB4 (Gigabyte Gaming Box) + Win11 [build link]
That was a very good tip! I tested the loopback mode performance today and it's surprisingly good compared to attaching the display directly to the eGPU. This seems like agood solution.
Here are some benchmarks:
Unigine Valley Benchmark 1.0
Settings
| Render: | Direct3D11 |
| Mode: | 1920x1080 8xAA fullscreen |
| Preset |
Extreme HD
|
Direct eGPU connection
| FPS: | 76.0 |
| Score: | 3178 |
| Min FPS: | 26.8 |
| Max FPS: | 142.5 |
Loopback through iGPU
| FPS: | 75.3 |
| Score: | 3151 |
| Min FPS: | 18.7 |
| Max FPS: | 143.0 |
iGPU only
| FPS: | 10.0 |
| Score: | 419 |
| Min FPS: | 5.5 |
| Max FPS: | 19.3 |
NUC8i7BEH + Asus XG Station Pro + EVGA GeForce GTX 1070 SC GAMING 8GB
2018 Intel NUC8i7BEH [8th,4C,U] + GTX 1070 @ 32Gbps-TB3 (ASUS XG Station Pro) + Win10 [build link]
@cthulhu Glad to hear the loopback performance is good.
LinkedIn | Youtube | Instagram
• external graphics card builds
• best laptops for external GPU
• eGPU enclosure buyer's guide
2021 Gigabyte Z590i Vision D [11th,6C] + RTX 3060 Ti @ 32Gbps-TB4 (Gigabyte Gaming Box) + Win11 [build link]