mbp 15" mid 2015 - akitio node - gtx 1070 mini - pure headache  

Read purge-wrangler more tools section - follow steps for black screen for your config (also solves distortion/lag issues). 

thanks so much, I tried Command Line Swiss knife + I found an app (ResXtreme) to readjust everything. Solved the distorting issues, but now I'm frozen on the login screen (loading) on my main mbp screen. External works perfect though. Any ideas ? 

Thank you so much again

Hi, last update if anyone can help:
no need anymore of hotplugging or rebooting or relogging. Both windows and macos work when booting with the egpu connected.
However on both systems I lose the internal display, on windows it's just a black screen and on macos it's the logging in loading screen that freezes.
Been reading that it may be due to that the internal gpu stops working? Can't find a solution though.
Any help I'd appreciate so much.
thanks guys
Alex

@alex_411411, try:

sudo pmset -a gpuswitch 0

@mac_editor, this is happening every time when using an external monitor to an nVidia card on MaOSX with a dGPU. It's a surprise that this rather easy solition hasn't brought up before. When you have another AMD eGPU the system goes completely havoc and this command doesn help anymore. One solution is not attach the monitor to the nVidia eGPU.

Hi Oliver, thanks for your reply, terminal told me this:

Warning: Idle sleep timings for "Battery Power" may not behave as expected.

- Disk sleep should be non-zero whenever system sleep is non-zero.

Warning: Idle sleep timings for "AC Power" may not behave as expected.

- Disk sleep should be non-zero whenever system sleep is non-zero.

And charging desktop screen frozen at logging in still :/

Posted by: alex_411411

Hi Oliver, thanks for your reply, terminal told me this:

Warning: Idle sleep timings for "Battery Power" may not behave as expected.

- Disk sleep should be non-zero whenever system sleep is non-zero.

Warning: Idle sleep timings for "AC Power" may not behave as expected.

- Disk sleep should be non-zero whenever system sleep is non-zero.

And charging desktop screen frozen at logging in still :/

Are you absolutely sure, you did enter exactly this command? I repeat:

sudo pmset -a gpuswitch 0

It's a Zero, right? It's 10.13.6, isn't it? There is no text reply to this command other than the automatic gpuswitching stops which solves your problem. From the text you are posting it is quite evident you entered something else.

@oliverb the issue doesn’t occur on the 2018 15” MBP with High Sierra (occurs only initially for a few seconds then fixes itself - at least for me). Also that pmset command does not always disable automatic graphics switching (full switching can only be disabled using an nvram option, but that option also disables eGPUs), and does not always solve the problem on all macs unless done properly (as was in automate-eGPU EFI 1.0.4). Also, the solution was brought up a long time ago while @goalque and I discussed this on the old EFI thread.

@alex_411411 your internal screen is locking up most likely because the nvram gpu-power-prefs variable wasn’t set correctly (sometimes it just doesn’t set). Keep running that command per boot until it starts booting normally with the dGPU disabled.

Finally, if you also want your dGPU functional, undo the changes made so far, and follow steps in automate-eGPU EFI post for getting proper acceleration with this configuration.

thanks guys.
the code given by @oliverb keeps giving me the same message I wrote before.
I have an absolute chaos of terminal codes that I don't really know what else to do. I will be formatting and reinstalling high sierra and start from scratch. 
Shall I go directly to automate-egpu EFI ? This will allow me to run both egpu and dgpu (when disconected) + I'll be able to run both screens?
thanks again guys

Posted by: mac_editor

@oliverb the issue doesn’t occur on the 2018 15” MBP with High Sierra (occurs only initially for a few seconds then fixes itself - at least for me).

I have a 2018 15" MBP, High Sierra, and it occurs in my setup always with a monitor attached to an nVidia eGPU. No matter what type of nVidia eGPU. Only once, a GTX1050 didn't do the trouble, funny thing.

Every time only "pmset -a gpuswitch 0" saves the day, which is annyoing because you have reset it when you want to use the dGPU later.

It looks it is time to reinstall HighSierra for me, too..-.

Managed to do the EFI automate and it worked good after my reinstall high Sierra 10.13.6.
However I am dealing now with lag, super slow. External display is working with the egpu and internal with the dgpu, so far so good, but tried detections and purge-nvda to solve the issue with no result. Also tried changing main displays, and hot-plugging at different moments, not working. I know I'm getting closer to the final result but it's my third day straight with this now :(.
Hope @oliverb, @mac_editor or anyone else can help me I'd be so thankful guys.
thanks
Alex

@alex_411411, since a few days, I am having a lot of problems, too, with my nVidia eGPUs in High Sierra. My Kepler cards, which are natively supported, don't work at all with MacOS drivers. With nVidia Webdrivers they work, but the lag is horrible, similar to your report.

I have just reinstalled High Sierra, it hasn't helped. My other Notebook with Mojave works fine (Only Kepler cards work there).

@mac_editor, is something known for having changed in High Sierra? @itsage, any more reports about trouble in High Sierra with nVidia cards?

Hi @oliverb any news? Have been trying to find info but didn't find at all.
The current status is:
- both screens working (external with egpu, internal dgpu), but incredibly slow, very very laggy.
I found people complaining about the same with a similar setup but didn't find answer, and also found people with similar config that didn't have that problem. I am really lost right now.
Thanks
Alex

@mac_editor, I need your help.

My nVidia cards stopped working correctly on my 15-inch MBP 2018 in High Sierra after months using it. It doesn't matter if I use @goalque EFI Loader or your purge-wrangler to enable nVidia cards:

Those are the symptoms:
1) When I boot with the eGPU plugged in, the internal screen stays black or distorted, anyway unusable.
2) When I hot-plug the eGPU during login, the external display works, but anything related to the internal display slows down the system until stalling.
3) When I hot-plug the eGPU after login, the external display stays black until logout, where I can login on the external display, but then I will have the issues of 2)

Still works:  Hot-plugging without an external monitor attached to the eGPU. Then I can use OpenCL and set-eGPU.sh on the internal display.

It looks to me as a muxing problem with the AMD dGPU. This explains, why it works without external monitor attached to the eGPU. No muxing.
I had this issue before, but could always solve it with "pmset -a gpuswitch 0" which just doesn't work anymore.
Reinstallation of High Sierra hasn't changed anything.

It's unlikely a problem with the enclosure/GPUs because on my 13" MBP 2015 and Mojave things still work well.

I don't exactly understand your tip under purge-wrangler's Tool section about the blackscreen/distortion section for nVidia cards. How can disable the muxing?

Thanks a lot of some advice!

It happens a couple of days ago

@oliverb Reset pmset settings first:

pmset restoredefaults

Reset NVRAM + SMC. Disable SIP. Retry eGPU solutions. Apply workarounds for black screens if needed. Disabling muxing would disable eGPUs. You can disable your AMD dGPU completely using the Command Line Swiss Knife (this would theoretically set mux to iGPU permanently until NVRAM is reset or commands undone).

hi @oliverb and @mac_editor . 
just here to say I make it work!
Right now I'm on both displays, external with egpu and internal with dgpu.
All I have to do is: boot without egpu connected with my EFI sd card, log in, once i'm at the desktop hotplug egpu, log out, and then log in again. that's it (primary display is external display).

If it may help someone else, I don't know which step it was, but the last things I did:
- update high sierra 10.13.6, to latest security package, now version 17G5019 (a new one from january, I did not have it installed yet because i reinstalled os yesterday)
- updated new nvidia drivers from here  https://www.insanelymac.com/forum/topic/324195-nvidia-web-driver-updates-for-macos-high-sierra-update-january-24-2019/ , I had the .105 version, installed now the .118 (newest)
- went through automate-egpu EFI again and tried it over again and *IMPORTANT* updated config.plist 

<key>MuxSetting</key>

<integer>1</integer>
Hope it can help someone. Thank you all for your help and this amazing tutorials, I will be reporting further in a few days/weeks if everything is still working.
I am now going to reward your amazing job. thanks guys.
Alex

just found out I can reboot also with egpu connected, with no need of logging in / out and hotplugging and it's working. i'm so happy!

@alex_411411, thank you very much!

It was actually the "MuxSetting = 1" which is absolutely mandatory! I did change this to "0" some time ago (for completely other reasons), but it won't work that way.

But I still have to enter "sudo pmset -a gpuswitch 0" like I always did in the last months (when using nVidia eGPU). If I don't do it, the the internal display goes black the moment that system wants to switch the internal display to the dGPU. This way it keeps using the iGPU and every thing is fine.

@mac_editor this may be interesting for you, too.

Of course, and this is not even comparable, with an AMD eGPU, you got absolutely no problems whatsoever. For MacOSX an AMD eGPU is the far better choice. I have a Sonnet Breakaway Puck RX570 and when I plug it, it works. It's very reliable.

@oliverb @mac_editor
latest thing I found out. This may be of your interest also.

It is working because I'm turning off the M370x, and then the internal display is using the intel iris 1586mb. This allows me to use the egpu with the external display. As soon as I turn on the dgpu again with:

 7) sudo pmset -a gpuswitch 2
8) sudo pmset -a gpuswitch 1

it starts lagging a lot. I can do it within the terminal with no need of rebooting or booting / hotplugging or whatsoever. Changing that 1 to a 0 again, will activate the dgpu and everything will start lagging again.

Posted by: alex_411411

@oliverb @mac_editor
latest thing I found out. This may be of your interest also.

It is working because I'm turning off the M370x, and then the internal display is using the intel iris 1586mb. This allows me to use the egpu with the external display. As soon as I turn on the dgpu again with:

 7) sudo pmset -a gpuswitch 2
8) sudo pmset -a gpuswitch 1

it starts lagging a lot. I can do it within the terminal with no need of rebooting or booting / hotplugging or whatsoever. Changing that 1 to a 0 again, will activate the dgpu and everything will start lagging again.

Correctly, this command "sudo pmset -a gpuswitch 0" is absolutely mandatory. I experience the same effects when I use "1" or "2" (default), lagging and internal-display-goes-black. That's why I told you this command in the first hand. You have to check later when you want to use the dGPU (and you need it e.g. for an external display directly plugged to the notebook), you must reset it.

I absolutely cannot reproduce @mac_editor's statements, it wasn't necessary. He may perhaps use additional other switches and tricks. It may be that our problems come original from @goalque's EFI bootloader, I am not sure. I have learned that the effects of this bootloader lasts sometimes a couple of reboots. It can be very confusing.

To be honest, using an nVidia eGPU in MacOSX is a bad thing. Apple wants you to use AMD and so there are lot of issues made by Apple if you use an nVidia eGPU.

@oliverb MuxSetting=1 is the same as the gpu-power-prefs command. So there’s no difference. The effect may last two successive boots. For NVIDIA + 2018 15” MBP I didn’t use any special tricks IIRC.

Wanted to reopen this with a few new things.
Current status: 
- mbp mid 2015, egpu gtx 1070 mini, ext display connected to egpu

Windows working only on external display, macos working on both screens, BUT dgpu and egpu simultanously make everything laggy and unusable. I have gpuswitch via terminal and turn off dgpu in order to use egpu. If i want to connect an external hdmi directly to the mbp i have to gpuswitch again.

I have been reading about daemons and automatic processes to avoid this, but have not found info here or anyone talking about this. This could make this process faster doesnt it? Anyone knows anything? Would love to know.

@alex_411411 Your setup is very similar to mine, although I don't have a 4k monitor and use GTX 1060, you can take a look at https://egpu.io/forums/mac-setup/script-enable-egpu-on-tb1-2-macs-on-macos-10-13-4/paged/32/#post-52544 to see how my setup went through. I don't have the need to use the (disturbing!) dGPU, so YMMV.

My macOS setup allows me to work on Unity editors with a sustainable numer of vertices (>1mil), run the Valley benchmark smoothly, and play SC2 at highest settings (not sure about other softwares).

The macOS turns out to be much more stable than my bootcamp (win10) setup which frequently shows the black screen out of the blue in heavy load that forces me to restart.

hi @quangquach ! thanks for your reply!
I was looking a bit, and what I see is that the real problem here is the external monitor. The crash/lag comes because it seems that I can't use eGpu on external and gpu on internal simultanously. If I'd only use one, there wouldn't be a problem, and it would be flawless as yours :).  However I can't seem to be fixing this nor finding any help about that.
Thanks!
Alex