SOLVED
So, the problem was not the Mantiz Saturn Pro II or the WD19TB, but the Dell Vostro 15 7000. For whatever reason, it was significantly underperforming when connected to the eGPU. It also underperformed when I benchmarked it with a Thunderbolt 3 NVME External SSD. I am not sure why, whether it was bad drivers or firmware, or if the PCH was overheating (I had already applied thermal pads to it). None the less, I would personally not choose this laptop for an eGPU specifici application. Otherwise, the laptop itself was excellent.
For reasons unknown to me, my Mantiz Saturn Pro II performs significantly better when daisy-chained through my Dell WD19TB Thunderbolt 3 Dock.
Connected directly to laptop:
Daisy chained through WD19TB:
AIDA64 shows a massive 55% increase in memory read speed when daisy chained, and Unigine Heaven's performance increase ranges from as little as 9.8% to a significant 17.6%.
This seems to be counter intuitive to what I expected to happen, and what other people have experienced when daisy chaining eGPU's. I would love to hear from anyone who has any idea why I am seeing these results!
I dunno if it applies to your setup but my system was having a shit ton of instability issues if I ran usb and thunderbolt at the same time which killed the performance of my 2080ti. I also got it fixed by daisy chaining everything (egpu and all usb) through one port through a thunderbolt hub.
@mangowuzhere, Yeah, I also saw stability increase when all my peripherals were attached to the Dell dock, and none were in the Mantiz.
I am currently testing it with my NUC8I5BEH to see if the issue is with my laptop.
@boltoway, This is an interesting scenario with a dynamic bandwidth throughput on the Dell Vostro 7500. I wonder if it's related to the NVM firmware on the laptop TB3 controller. Can you download and install HWiNFO64 and share a screenshot of the expanded PCI Express Root where the TB3 port connects?
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2020 13" MacBook Pro [10th,4C,G] + RX 6700 XT @ 32Gbps-TB3 (CM MasterCase EG200) + Win10 1903 [build link]
Huh, odd. Whats the laptop model? Can anyone else try this with their setup? I'd be interested in knowing if this is reproducable across all eGPU's.
Laptop: Razer Blade Advanced 15" w/ GTX 2060, i7 8750H, 16GB RAM
eGPU: Razer Core x Chroma w/ 2080ti
@itsage, I am starting to believe it is more to do with the Vostro itself than the eGPU. Running the Mantiz directly to my NUC8I5BEH I scored much higher on Unigine Heaven than I did with the Vostro 15 7000. When running the Mantiz to the NUC through the WD19TB, I saw a small performance reduction, in line with what has previously been experienced with Daisy Chaining.
NUC + Mantiz eGPU direct:
NUC + Mantiz via WD19TB:
The NUC performs better in both scenarios and loses a very small amount of performance while Daisy Chained.
HWiNFO64: (The Mantiz was not attached at the time of this screenshot, but the WD19TB was. I am going to pick up a Razer Core X next week to see how it goes daisy chained with a higher end GPU).
@lycid 2020 Dell Vostro 15 7000 (7500).
@itsage, So I managed to pick up a Razer Core X and GTX 2070 Super today. It is getting late, so I only quickly benchmarked it, but the performance is far lower than I expected. This is daisy chained to the Dell WD19TB.
@boltoway, Best eGPU performance is with direct Thunderbolt 3 connection rather than daisy-chaining to a TB3. I'm not sure why your Vostro 15 7000 (7500) is limiting the eGPU enclosure at 20Gbps when it's connected to the TB3 port directly. Check the BIOS or contact Dell support if they have any insights.
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• external graphics card builds
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2020 13" MacBook Pro [10th,4C,G] + RX 6700 XT @ 32Gbps-TB3 (CM MasterCase EG200) + Win10 1903 [build link]
@itsage I have done some further testing, and the Vostro is performing far worse than it should be, and is also plagued by extreme freezing (30+ seconds and black screening). This is rather unfortuanate, as I was extremely happy with the laptop otherwise.
Vostro + RTX 2070 Super + Razer Core X:
NUC8I5BEH + RTX 2070 Super + Razer Core X:
The results match the original post; the Vostro performs similarly when daisy-chained through the WD19TB or when directly connected, but also is bested by a much lower-performance NUC.
Also, one thing I did notice with the Vostro is in the Cuda-Z performance tab, where the host to device and device to host speed would fluctuate dynamically from over 2000mbps to under 1000. Is this abnormal behaviour? The NUC is very consistent in CUDA-Z with the reported transfer speeds.
@boltoway, The CUDA-Z Performance tab readout should be consistent. The fluctuations you observed in the Vostro explains the freezing behaviors. Have you checked the PCH temps?
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• external graphics card builds
• best laptops for external GPU
• eGPU enclosure buyer's guide
2020 13" MacBook Pro [10th,4C,G] + RX 6700 XT @ 32Gbps-TB3 (CM MasterCase EG200) + Win10 1903 [build link]