[Teardown] Late 2020 Mac mini: Apple Silicon M1, Thunderbolt 4, USB4, PCIe 4.0  

Posted by: @joey_roman

Posted by: @craftsman

Posted by: @joey_roman

So all that is missing to use an eGPU are drivers?

 

I am able to play non AAA games just fine on the MacBook Pro M1.  But it cannot even remotely handle my 38" monitor.  Would be in heaven if I could connect an eGPU.

I have it connected to a 49 inch 4K display and the interface speed is better than the 5700 XT, especially video playback. Rendering in Media Encoder is another story, but not too bad.

Oh, I just meant gaming on my 38” is a no go lol. Everything else works fine. If I want to play games I just use the native Mac screen and 1650x1050 resolution. 

Resolution is too high on that 38" even for a discrete GPU.

Posted by: @ikir

Posted by: @joey_roman

Posted by: @craftsman

Posted by: @joey_roman

So all that is missing to use an eGPU are drivers?

 

I am able to play non AAA games just fine on the MacBook Pro M1.  But it cannot even remotely handle my 38" monitor.  Would be in heaven if I could connect an eGPU.

I have it connected to a 49 inch 4K display and the interface speed is better than the 5700 XT, especially video playback. Rendering in Media Encoder is another story, but not too bad.

Oh, I just meant gaming on my 38” is a no go lol. Everything else works fine. If I want to play games I just use the native Mac screen and 1650x1050 resolution. 

Resolution is too high on that 38" even for a discrete GPU.

No problem gaming at 4K with a discrete GPU (I have tested 5700 XT and 2080 Super) on such a display. I've also tested them both as eGPU, there's about 15% loss but playable.

Unless you mean a laptop discrete GPU, in that case you are correct. Only the top mobile RTX cards can manage it, but Macs don't have those.

@craftsman

Yes I mean mobile / Mac mini. We all are comparing notebooks and low-end Macs and Apple Silicon is already impressive, GPU performance too. But you can't expect to play in 4K with first generation, low-end solutions especially when most games are incredibly demanding on 4K resolution even with high-end GPUs like 5700 XT.

it is an impressive start... we will see if eGPU support is coming and which performance will M1X bring!

I have the same mini and a Sonnet eGFX Breakaway box with a Radeon 580. Far cheaper than Apple's offer, also silent, but upgradable. The whole thing is running very close to a Mac mini M1 8GB under Cinebench. Go figure!

@mac_editor, in your picture at 
https://egpu.io/forums/desktop-computing/teardown-late-2020-mac-mini-apple-silicon-m1-thunderbolt-4-usb4-pcie-4/#post-89551

and in @itsage's picture at
https://egpu.io/forums/which-gear-should-i-buy/apple-event-first-arm-macs-10-11-what-will-this-mean-for-egpu-users/paged/18/#post-89528

link width says x16, but link width in a Thunderbolt enclosure is always x4. Do these GPUs have a built-in PCIe switch? Or is Big Sur on M1 Macs defaulting to capability value instead of status value for GPUs?

@itsage's picture doesn't show Link Speed.

You have to check ioreg for PCIe switches (or use pcitree.sh at https://gist.github.com/joevt/e3cd4ff08aae06279134969c98ca3ab7 but that can't work without an update to pciutils for M1 Macs... maybe replace AppleACPIPlatformExpert with AppleARMPE or create a new DirectHW.kext...)

Some M1 Mac performance info not discussed:

People have found that the USB controllers have less than optimal performance (≈200 MB/s slower than expected) so 760 MB/s directly from the M1 USB-C port. You should be able to get the full performance (≈980 MB/s) from a USB 3.1 gen 2 port (that is not powered by an ASMedia ASM1142) of a Thunderbolt 3 dock.

Great article! This makes me feel better about being issued a M1 for work.