Maximum number of configured displays may vary – check with your component or system manufacturer for specific model capabilities and supported technologies. This technology dramatically reduces the overall power consumption allowing for energy efficiency. Not all products have all features and full enablement of some capabilities and may require complementary products. SLS “Single Large Surface” functionality requires an identical display resolution on all configured displays. Physically, this card is of a half-height, half-length form factor so it will fit in cases where space is constrained. Uploader: Date Added: 1 March 2012 File Size: 53.75 Mb Operating Systems: Windows NT/2000/XP/2003/2003/7/8/10 MacOS 10/X Downloads: 5413 Price: Free.Free Regsitration Required Additionally, the graphics card’s processing can be used to accelerate software programs compatible with the supported APIs.

ASUS HD6450-SL-2GD3-L Radeon HD 6450 2GB 64-Bit DDR3 PCI Express 2.1 x16 HDCP Ready Low Profile Ready Video Card Manufactured Recertified REFURBISHED This means the product was tested and repaired as required to meet the standards of the refurbisher, which may or may not be the original manufacturer. View full AMD Radeon HD 6450 specs on CNET. AMD Radeon HD 6450 - graphics card - Radeon HD 6450 - 512 MB Specs. Software Included.

AMD Radeon™ HD 6450 Graphics are the most versatile solution for everyday computing. Requires 3D stereo drivers, glasses, and display. Not all features may be supported on all components or systems – check with your component or system manufacturer for specific model capabilities and supported technologies.

Not all features aapphire be supported on all components or systems – check with your component or system manufacturer for specific model capabilities sapphire radeon hd 6450 supported technologies. Enhanced Internet Browser Applications The power of your GPU can now accelerate compatible internet browsers utilizing Direct 2D rendering for a faster and more responsive browsing experience including high quality image rendering and media playback. AMD Radeon™ HD 6450 Graphics Maximum number of configured displays may vary – check with your sapphire radeon hd 6450 or system manufacturer for specific model capabilities and supported technologies.

The ASUS HD 6450 Silent features a unique passive cooling and low profile design so no sound is emitted while operating, making it perfect for use in HTPCs. The ASUS HD 6450 Silent features a unique passive cooling and low profile design so no sound is emitted while operating, making it perfect for use in HTPCs. I got an ASUS EAH6450 silent video card for my recording studio as silence was important. It is an AMD Radeon HD 6450 card. No matter how I install the drivers (from AMD), however, Windows 10 is giving me a max resolution of 1920x1200.

Output protected high bit rate 7. AMD Eyefinity technology works with games that support non-standard aspect ratios, which is required for panning across multiple displays. See any errors on this page? Sapphire Radeon HD Graphics Card L B&H Photo Video Support for six simultaneous displays may require complementary products compatible with DisplayPort 1.

The card is cooled with a passive heatsink radon it won’t add noise to your computer and doesn’t require extra power. Reviews 0 Write a review yydrfwtbuv. Microsoft DirectX 11 Support Get better gaming performance and image quality with 3D visual effects, realistic lighting, and xapphire imagery. Requires 3D stereo drivers, glasses, and display. Not all features may be supported on all components or systems — check with your component or system manufacturer for specific model capabilities and supported technologies. Not all products have all features and full enablement of some capabilities and may sapphire radeon hd 6450 complementary products.

SLS “Single Sapphkre Surface” functionality requires an identical display resolution on all configured displays. Update Unrecognized Zip Code. A list of supported stereoscopic 3D hardware is available at http: AMD App Acceleration is a set of technologies designed to improve video quality and enhance application performance. Be the first to review this item. This technology dramatically reduces the overall power consumption allowing for energy efficiency. Enter new zip code to refresh estimated delivery time.

Asus 6450 Silent Driver

Up sapphire radeon hd 6450 12x multi-sample and super-sample anti-aliasing modes Adaptive anti-aliasing Morphological anti-aliasing MLAA 16x angle independent anisotropic texture filtering bit floating point HDR rendering. Physically, this card is of a half-height, half-length form factor so it will fit in cases where space is constrained. Using raedon discrete graphics card saphpire graphics storage which integrated graphics share with your computer’s RAM so that sapphire radeon hd 6450 can be used for running programs.

AMD Eyefinity multidisplay technology 1 Native sappbire for sapphire radeon hd 6450 to 3 simultaneous displays Up to 4 displays supported with DisplayPort 1. Get an immersive, high definition audio experience with Blu-ray movies. Not Specified by Manufacturer.

No Longer Available Update Location close. AMD PowerPlay AMD PowerPlay power management technology delivers high performance features when needed and conserves power when the demand on the graphics processor is low. Digital rights management restrictions may apply.

I haven't tried, to be honest, only have AMD 8600GT here. We need a Magic efi file ( look in DonorEfi Folder) that does a lot of nVidia cards like to AMD-CARDS-LIST.txt does. If you can supply such file for nVidia, then the answer is probably yes, It should work with a few extra tweaks ( IMHO) I'll look into it a bit more.

I've obtained some Nvidia ROMS. It looks like they need to be specific to the card. I've found no ID's inside the of the GOP so I can't be sure. If you're wondering where I get my GOPs: They tend to give every ROM of every card they have.

My UEFIRomExtract tool (available from under the dev corner) can extract any GOP there might be in the ROM. NOTE: One of these was prefixed with NVGA part, seek to 0x55 0xAA and remove bytes before it to extract GOP. Thanks for the info, Andy. May take some work. As a side note: I've gone back to the V1 built rom for my HD7750, for now, as the latest versions don't give me the VFCT, and appear to work better. Don't appear to be building the rom properly with later versions. Although disabling CSM in bios works, there are some unusual side effects, probably relating to 'missing' VFCT.

Can you shed some light on how to build rom with VFCT? Edit: I used a different efi, one from a 7750, which also supports a lot of cards, and re-did with V4 and it works. Well, Fast boot don't work, enabling it appears to turn CSM back on, I suspect secure boot comes into play here. VFCT appears with CSM disabled, so it looks good. As regards a Windows Version, we shall see what happens. Edited August 16, 2014 by STLVNUB. Good to see you got it going.

If you want to try this It MAY fix your issues,unzip file and drop it into DonorEfi, edit script with new file name on line 10. Does Fast Boot work for you? It seems my card can't get GOP works by 7750.efi with help of V4. My hack just turns on CSM Support every time after I turn it off. Did I do something wrong? Fast Boot works for me with the 6450.efi one.

I also tried, but it can't works at all. After turning off CSM Support, my system restarted twice and turned CSM Support on itself. Btw, I found two documents which might be useful.

Sorry for my english. I'm spanish and my english is so bad. I finally updated 3 graphic cards to uefi gop in last two days with the information of this forum and others.

I've got some problems to do it, so I'm going to say how I do it. I succesfully updated a sapphire radeon hd6790 1gb ddr5, an asus eah5450 1gb ddr3 and a xfx radeon hd-695x-cddc (radeon hd6950 with 2gb ddr5) Three cards works ok in asrock 990fx extreme4 and asus m5a97 evo r2.0. I have windows 8.1 uefi installation, gpt partition and now i can use ultra fast boot in both motherboards and my updated cards. Well, go to explication: I'm not a macosx user. I use windows and linux normally, but i have a virtual machine with hackinstosh osX Maverick. I started to update my sapphire radeon hd6790. First, we need know if our card is supported in hd6450gopefi, so you need know your device ID.

I use gpu-z to see device ID. You can download from: My hd6790 deviceID is 1002-673e.

Now, you need to download hd6450gopefi.zip that is attached in first post of this thread. Unzip and open HD6450GOP.html. You see the dissambled hd6450gop.efi text. Search in html for your deviceID.

In my case, is the second part of 1002-673e, so i search for 673e in text of dissambled hd6450gop.efi. If you have results, your card is supported by hd6450gop.efi, if not, you need another efi file that include your device. I tryed in my hackinstosh to use amd-uefi-gop-maker version 1,2,3 and 4 with my original bios of 128kb file with that results: Version 1: result a file with gop added but 141kb Version 2: a file with gop added but 184kb Version 3: idem that version 2, but files are not identical with an hexadecimal editor. Version 4: Not works for me. I have an error that I don't remember and file is 0kb.

How i need a file of 128kb lenght for update my card and files are bigger, I investigate and I found that thread: Special attention to this post: I saw in amd-uefi-gop-maker, in file uefirom.command, that script search for a original file of 64kb and, if bigger, cut file to 64kb. So I decide to cut my original 128kb rom with an hex editor to a 64kb rom.

I select from 0 to FFFF and copy to a new file. So i have my original bios of 64kb in new file. From 10000 to 1FFFF is empty in original 128kb, so i don't need it.

I try another time to use amd-uefi-gop-maker version 1,2,3 and 4 with my original bios of 64kb file with that results: Version 1: result a file with gop added and 120kb file. Version 2: file of 120kb.

Version 3: file of 120kb. Version 4: file of 120kb. I saw that 4 versions are 120kb and i need a file of max 128kb, so I'm in good way.

I compare 4 files with hex editor and saw that versions 2, 3 and 4 have minimal difference, but version 1 have more difference. I study uefirom.command and saw that in version 1, we add efi.gop.rom (that is extracted from asus eah6450), to end of original 64kb file, but in version 2, 3 and 4, we use hd6450gop.efi (that is extracted from efi.gop.rom) and efirom to construct the gop amd and then add to the end of original 64kb file. So if we use efi.gop.rom and added to our original 64kb file, we have have UEFI version description added to our moded bios, but if we use hd6450gop.efi, we don't have UEFI version description to our moded bios. This is important for later, so I decide to use version 1 and efi.gop.rom and not use version 2 to 4 for that problem. Well, I try to flash my version 1 moded of 120kb in my sapphire 6790 and works fine. I can boot in ultra fast mode perfectly. Why I have a file of 120kb and not 128kb???

I investigate and saw efi.gop.rom is 56kb. 64kb+56kb=120kb, so the problem is efi.gop.rom lenght. I download original asus eah6450 rom and saw that file length is 120kb too.

I view in hex editor and saw that uefi.gop.rom is extracted from asus eah6450 10000 to 1DFFF. If length is 1FFFF, then we have a rom with 128kb, so i decide to add to efi.gop.rom the 8kb that haven't with empty info in hex editor and i have a efi.gop.64k.rom that i use for now. I attach this file in the post, so you can download, rename as uefi.gop.rom and use in amd-uefi-gop-maker version 1, overwriting 56kb version. I try to make a new rom with my original 64k rom and uefi.gop.64k.rom and now I have a file of 128kb exactly with uefi version description added. I flashed and works fine too.

I used another time, a program for create uefi bios for hd7000 series. You can download from his thread in: Is at end of first post, HD 7XXX Series GOP UEFI Bios Patcher Beta With this program, you can add UEFI gop to any hd 7xxx if you have another rom with uefi gop included. I used this program to do my moded rom for sapphire hd6790 and for xfx 6950 and works fine.

In asus eah5450 i have an error and can't use, but i modify manually with hex editor and works fine too. I explicate that in another post. Now I attach my uefi.gop.64k.rom so you can use if like.

Sorry for that large explication, but i think that can be an interest info for the thread. Thanks, tedascuen. Now, I explicate how I can mod in windows and very easy your bios. First, we need know your deviceID. If you read my previous post, you saw that you need gpu-z. You can download from You need HD6450GOPEFI.zip attached in first post of the thread: You need too a bios with uefi gop added, so I attach my bios created with my previous post You need the HD7XXX UEFI Patch tool Beta that is attached here: You need your bios that you want to mod.

You can download a lot of bios original files from: Now, open gpu-z and see your Device ID In that example, Device ID is 1002-67B1, but it's an example. You have something like 1002-XXXX where XXXX is info that we need. I'm going to mod my xfx hd6950 that is Device ID 1002-6719, so info that we need is 6719, ok? Now unzip HD6450GOPEFI.zip and open HD6450GOP.html You see something like: Press Ctrl+F for search and write your second part of your device ID, in my case, 6719 If you have results, you can continue.

I have 3 results. It seems my card can't get GOP works by 7750.efi with help of V4. My hack just turns on CSM Support every time after I turn it off. Did I do something wrong? Fast Boot works for me with the 6450.efi one. I also tried, but it can't works at all.

After turning off CSM Support, my system restarted twice and turned CSM Support on itself. Btw, I found two documents which might be useful: I download your first rom and modded with amd hd7xxx uefi patch tool. I search your bios in vga bios collection from techpowerup and download 2 bios that are like yours. One have only 2 difference when i compared files.

Another have 6 difference when i compared. I upload 3 files in a zip and you can try. Asus.HD6850.1024.110616.GOP.rom is your bios modded with uefi Asus.HD6850.1024.110616.GOP2.rom is bios with 2 difference modded with uefi Asus.HD6850.1024.110616.GOP3.rom is bios with 6 difference moddede with uefi Regards, tedascuen. I download your first rom and modded with amd hd7xxx uefi patch tool.

I search your bios in vga bios collection from techpowerup and download 2 bios that are like yours. One have only 2 difference when i compared files. Another have 6 difference when i compared. I upload 3 files in a zip and you can try. Asus.HD6850.1024.110616.GOP.rom is your bios modded with uefi Asus.HD6850.1024.110616.GOP2.rom is bios with 2 difference modded with uefi Asus.HD6850.1024.110616.GOP3.rom is bios with 6 difference moddede with uefi Regards, tedascuen I'm appreciative of your help! I tried ' Asus.HD6850.1024.110616.GOP.rom' and it worked, expect that I still got the graphic issues described in. I'm sure that the rest of two roms would work in the same way.

So it's obviously that the problem is either on my UEFI Bios itself or on the HD6450GOP.efi. Do you have any idea to use on our cards with 'HD7XX UEFI Patch Tool Beta' or STLVNUB's tool? I extracted the gigabyte 6670 GOP binary beginning from 0x10000 and convert the rom to efi with Andy's. I tried to created my rom by the 6670.efi with V4 and flashed it to my EAH6850 with help of ATIFlash successfully, but the UEFI GOP was not working at all.

@STLVNUB I found out that the 6670.efi and 7750.efi don't support my card. (1002-6739) I disassembly the efi files through IDA and couldn't see HD6850's device-id.

Gonna try other GOP roms myself. It means the 6450 rom which Andy provided here is the only UEFI GOP rom working for me so far. Edited August 18, 2014 by shiecldk. I just come back to give you guys a quick report here.

I tried many GOP roms from techpowerup, and these are the roms supporting my card by checking their disassembly efi files: However I still can't get GOP work with the above three roms. And I'm sure I created the roms correctly with both 'HD7XX UEFI Patch Tool Beta' and V4. Now I suspect the gigabyte's 6450 GOP, which Andy introduced here, is just actually an universal rom from the vendor. (Means that it wasn't even optimized for 6450?! Maybe they release the rom just about to catch up their company's deadline. I'm appreciative of your help! I tried ' Asus.HD6850.1024.110616.GOP.rom' and it worked, expect that I still got the graphic issues described in.

Asus Hd 6450 Driver For Mac Windows 10

I'm sure that the rest of two roms would work in the same way. So it's obviously that the problem is either on my UEFI Bios itself or on the HD6450GOP.efi. Do you have any idea to use on our cards with 'HD7XX UEFI Patch Tool Beta' or STLVNUB's tool? I extracted the gigabyte 6670 GOP binary beginning from 0x10000 and convert the rom to efi with Andy's. I tried to created my rom by the 6670.efi with V4 and flashed it to my EAH6850 with help of ATIFlash successfully, but the UEFI GOP was not working at all. @STLVNUB I found out that the 6670.efi and 7750.efi don't support my card.

(1002-6739) I disassembly the efi files through IDA and couldn't see HD6850's device-id. Gonna try other GOP roms myself.

It means the 6450 rom which Andy provided here is the only UEFI GOP rom working for me so far. You are right. You need to dissamble 6670.efi and search for your card (6739). I have ida pro installed, but I don't know what options I need to select when open 6670.efi to dissamble ok.

I dissamble 6670.efi with idapro 64 bits too and couldn't see your device ID (6739). If you need more efi roms, I found a theread where you can download a file of 25mb 7zipped (under 660mb unzipped) and in the post, you can see in first spoiler, all vBIOSes which includes strings EFI and GOP. It's a hard job, but you can search for that roms, dissamble with ida pro and search for your card. I think that problem is not hd6450.efi, because you add to your first 64k of your original bios rom the gop, at end of first 64k bios, that is empty originally. You only change in first 64k of your original rom a toggle that makes it see a UEFI GOP partition in the bios, like you can see in: and in the next explication that I'm going to post in a moment. So I think that problem is your original bios, not hd6450.efi, because i'm working with your modded v4 bios, that is not checksum corrected and i can't find in techpower a rom identical like yours.

I found that: First, second and number 9 (that are in red) have yours version efi and yours date of compile, but have minimal difference in hex editor that yours, like i say you yesterday. I think that is because you modify voltages or speed or is not checksum ok, like you can see here: So, can you upload your original bios without mod or say me the exact model? Bye, tedascuen.

Well, I'm going to explain how to manually modify your bios with an hex editor. @tedascuen Sorry to make you confused.: The second one in your picture. (Actually the three bios are working in the same way, as I've tried these three ones long time ago before this topic opened.) I found out that V4 can't correct checksum well, so after roms been created by V4 I put them to 'HD7XX UEFI Patch Tool Beta' in order to correct checksum and see if UEFI GOP is active.

That's rom with 2 difference that i say you if i compare with hex editor. This is first difference: Bart.rom is your rom that you upload in post 55 That is normal because is the toggle that make it see a UEFI GOP partition in the bios, 80 is no GOP, 00 is GOP. This is second difference: I think that is not important, because is the end of the EFI bios, first 64k, but i'm not sure if is important.

From 10000 to 1FFFF the roms are obviously different because bart.rom has uefi gop added and the other one not. I finally make a working 5770 rom (Resolution works without black borders, full uefi boot without cms support) but rom works only 1 time.

I can reboot many times without any problem but if shutdown the computer 5770 never comes again until reflash it with original rom. After searching about my rom i found many posts from netkas about MCuC instance in this rom. Maybe that rom needs different modding from others card. Anyone ant idea?

Maybe i found the problem: After reading netkas notes about 5770-5870 and 4xxx roms i note coz MCuC instance must be 2 times in rom. Move the mcuc section (last part of the BIOS) to make room for the EFI. At this stage you can trash the modified myrom.rom that only has one 'MCuC'. Open the original myrom in 0xed. Scroll down to the end, it should show a long string of 'F'. Select a large part of it. Look for 'mcuc' (text search field) and locate the 2nd instance, near the end of ROM.

Note its offset, as indicated at the bottom of the window. It should be 1A000 (hex). You can switch between decimal and hexadecimal by double clicking on the 'dec' or 'hex' text on the bottom left. Upward 'mcuc' is a long string of 'F' where the EFI should be inserted. Put the cursor anywhere in that string.

Switch to insert mode ('edit' menu) and paste. Note the new offset of 'mcuc'.

If the offset hasn't changed, or if you have lost the 2nd instance of mcuc, close the ROM without saving and do these steps again. Save a copy of myrom.rom (with this name) in your home directory. Then redo steps 2a and 2b. If only one instance of mcuc found, you're screwed.

You cannot make a custom ROM with your original BIOS. After that must set the new offset of MCuC on first MCuC instance: If 2 instances are found. Correct the new offset of mcuc in myrom. Say it has changed from 1A000 to 1A200 (if you have pasted a 512-Byte string of Fs).

In 3 Bytes, this new offset is written 01 A2 00. In BIOS code, bytes are written backwards: 00 A2 01. To find where to indicate this offset, locate the first instance of mcuc. 8 Bytes upward (16 chars) you should see the original offset 00 A0 01.

Go to overwrite mode and replace this with the new offset. Save myrom.rom in your home directory. After that must fix checksums and indicator (using fixrom.py). The problem of all that is not enough space exist for 2 MCuC instances and uefi, rom file goes 140kb.

I cropped the last lines of 2 MCuC instance but im not sure if that works. I will checked home and i will report back. If finally that works i will edit your script for 5770 support. UPDATE: UEFI BIOS isnt possible to works on 5770 because 5770 rom not have enough space to keep UEFI. 5770 BIOS: 62.904KB MCuC Table: 22.944KB UEFI: 59.849KB 5770 BIOS SIZE: 128kb UEFI+BIOS+MCuC= 145.697KB (MCuC table is code for GDDR5 Initialization) Edited September 16, 2014 by KonstantinosNks.

I finally make a working 5770 rom (Resolution works without black borders, full uefi boot without cms support) but rom works only 1 time. I can reboot many times without any problem but if shutdown the computer 5770 never comes again until reflash it with original rom. After searching about my rom i found many posts from netkas about MCuC instance in this rom.

Maybe that rom needs different modding from others card. Anyone ant idea? Maybe i found the problem: After reading netkas notes about 5770-5870 and 4xxx roms i note coz MCuC instance must be 2 times in rom.

Move the mcuc section (last part of the BIOS) to make room for the EFI. At this stage you can trash the modified myrom.rom that only has one 'MCuC'. Open the original myrom in 0xed. Scroll down to the end, it should show a long string of 'F'. Select a large part of it. Look for 'mcuc' (text search field) and locate the 2nd instance, near the end of ROM. Note its offset, as indicated at the bottom of the window.

It should be 1A000 (hex). You can switch between decimal and hexadecimal by double clicking on the 'dec' or 'hex' text on the bottom left. Upward 'mcuc' is a long string of 'F' where the EFI should be inserted. Put the cursor anywhere in that string. Switch to insert mode ('edit' menu) and paste.

Note the new offset of 'mcuc'. If the offset hasn't changed, or if you have lost the 2nd instance of mcuc, close the ROM without saving and do these steps again. Save a copy of myrom.rom (with this name) in your home directory. Then redo steps 2a and 2b. If only one instance of mcuc found, you're screwed.

You cannot make a custom ROM with your original BIOS. After that must set the new offset of MCuC on first MCuC instance: If 2 instances are found.

Correct the new offset of mcuc in myrom. Say it has changed from 1A000 to 1A200 (if you have pasted a 512-Byte string of Fs).

In 3 Bytes, this new offset is written 01 A2 00. In BIOS code, bytes are written backwards: 00 A2 01. To find where to indicate this offset, locate the first instance of mcuc. 8 Bytes upward (16 chars) you should see the original offset 00 A0 01.

Go to overwrite mode and replace this with the new offset. Save myrom.rom in your home directory. After that must fix checksums and indicator (using fixrom.py). The problem of all that is not enough space exist for 2 MCuC instances and uefi, rom file goes 140kb. I cropped the last lines of 2 MCuC instance but im not sure if that works. I will checked home and i will report back. If finally that works i will edit your script for 5770 support.

How did you get rid of the black borders? Hi, Im glad to be a part of this forum. Just signed up 20 mins ago. I have an old macpro 2008 fully loaded using yosemite 10.10.5. I would not like to touch that OSX version but been curious with mojave on hackintosh PC.

I also have a low/mid range gaming windows PC. My specs for my W7/10 dual boot (same SSD) windows PS are as follows: Motherboard: Asus P8B75-V Intel i7 3770k 8GB DDR3 1600mhz RAM Antec HCG 620W PSU Asus GTX 560 DC Corsair Force GT 120GB SSD Built everything in mid 2012. Will these hardware lets me install Mojave? If not, whats the max OSX i can install?

Then worst case, will i be able to install atleast yosemite 10.10? I dont mind if i get Nullcpupowermanagement and not be able to use my bios C1 packages and sleep or any intel speedstep as i dont use them anyways in my windows OS. I just need it to work smoothly with MB audio built-in, wifi, ethernet, Usb port 2.0 and 3.0. Im not a gamer but likes to use Logic pro X.

Was thinking of using the W10 partition for the hackintosh OSX but if possible, i could use a 64GB USB 3.0 thumbdrive. Thanks in advance. PREFACE I’ve used a 2015 15” MBP as my main system since it was released. I do photo and video editing in the Adobe suite regularly and have been eyeballing the performance of the latest MBP models. I’m on the road all the time, so a laptop is basically my only option. After the whole mess with the CPU VRM hardware flaws being made apparent by the poor power management profile shipped at release with the 2018 i9 MBP I’ve been more weary of the hardware design of MacBooks. That’s before I account for losing all USB-A ports, losing the SD card slot (‽), losing reliability and tactility of the keyboard, and losing the ESC key to the touchbar; if I compare the 2018 MBP to my current 2015.

Given these flaws, I have been researching the performance situation comparing the 2018 MBP to the X1 Extreme, XPS 15 9570, and the Razer Blade 15 2018. These are essentially the only options for a road warrior that needs a high quality panel and the best CPU and GPU that can be crammed into around 4lbs (1.8kg). I used to use a ThinkPad T42p and loved it when it was new. So fast forward to now and the release of the ThinkPad X1 Extreme. It’s a truly tempting machine for an artist, given that the 4K UHD version offers just about the best color gamut available on any laptop panel. I get back the USB-A ports, get one of the fastest SD slots on any laptop, and get one of the best laptop keyboards on the market. That’s before even considering power management and modularity.

I’ve been dabbling in learning Machine Learning, so a system with an nVidia GPU (CUDA) is a bonus on that front as well. For me the best color reproduction on a high resolution display panel was most important. The X1 Extreme has that, so I’ve ordered one.

I got it with the fastest i7, base SSD and memory, and have separately purchased two 1TB Samsung 970 Pro M.2 SSDs and 2x16GB DDR4-3200MHz memory (just in case it’s possible to overclock the memory on the X1 Extreme). I got the system for $2,100 from Lenovo USA, and the SSDs ($390 x 2) and memory ($330) from Amazon US for a total of $3200. These are easy to install on the X1 Extreme as the bottom cover is easily removed to reveal the M.2 and SODIMM slots. To compare, the 2018 MBP with the fastest i7, 32GB memory, and 2TB SSD is $4400. So I can save $1200 and get a faster system (on all counts) with a better panel and better connectivity by going with the X1 Extreme.

The only thing I’m compromising is losing the big beautiful haptic touchpad and a bit more refined hardware aesthetic. Though, to be honest, I’ve kept a big thick dual-layer Tech21 case on my 2015 MBP. So I’ll actually be going down in volume and weight by moving to the more rugged ThinkPad.

I think I can live without the touchpad. Oh, by the way, the 4K UHD panel of the X1 Extreme has touch and decent pen support! Another bonus vs. Though I keep a 12.9” iPad Pro around for my pen work and can’t imagine using a laptop similarly. It’s still nice to have a laptop screen actually respond when I go poke at it accidentally after switching back and forth between laptop and iPad. TOPIC So I want macOS with proper discrete GPU support on a 2018 MacBook class laptop.

That’s not possible on a pure Hackintosh as things stand, but via a macOS virtual machine it looks like it could work with what looks like some relatively bleeding edge support of PCIe UEFI passthrough. People have been doing this on Linux hosts to Windows VMs with some great success recently: And it looks like that’s coming for macOS VMs as well: The X1 Extreme, XPS 15 9570, and Razer Blade 15 (2018) are essentially direct competition to the 2018 15” MBP. I would really like to see these three systems get some nicely fleshed out guides for getting maxed out compatibility and performance in macOS running in a VM for these systems. When I get my X1 Extreme I’ll start working on it for that one. I will post updates here.

I hope to inspire others with the other two systems (or looking to get them) to do similarly. 15” MACBOOK CLASS LAPTOP COMPARISON I chose the X1 Extreme largely because of the excellent 4K UHD HDR panel (100% of 2D AdobeRGB and 85.5% of 3D AdobeRGB, basically unparalleled), good mix of thermal performance and noise management, and overall ruggedness and connectivity. If I were a gamer I would go with the Razer 15, but the fast low-gamut 1080p panel just doesn’t work for my purposes. If I were most concerned with aesthetics or battery life (97Wh battery for it vs 80Wh for X1E) I would go with the XPS 15. I am aware that the second 2018 refresh of the MBP is coming Nov 14, with the new AMD Radeon Pro Vega 16 and Vega 20 GPUs, and it looks like the latter might offer up to a 60% performance boost over the Radeon 560X. Maybe it has even given Apple enough time to update the CPU VRM along the way.

This could make the performance picture more comparable for the 1050 Ti based X1E and XPS 15. I believe the 1070 Ti based Razer 15 will still win out though. Still, if you compare the fan and heat pipe solution put into the X1E vs the MBP the MBP just looks wimpy in comparison. MBP has smaller fans, less venting, and only one (smaller, thinner) heatpipe.

It’s also more difficult to access if you want to put a better thermal paste or liquid metal on it. Put simply, the thermal hardware on the MBP is basically the same design for the last 3 years and it can’t keep up with the hex-core processors. So even with the Volta 20 GPU making the MBP competitive again on the graphics end, the MBP will still be falling short on the CPU performance plane. This is before we even look at tuning options. Getting into tuning, it’s possible to improve thermal performance of all the laptops in this class by around 15-20% by using either a best in class thermal paste like Thermal Grizzly Kryonaut or (if you’re willing to deal with all the caveats that come with using a conductive fluid that permeates other metals) a liquid metal interface like Thermal Grizzly Conductonaut. The liquid metal gives you the best possible conducting interface, and the paste is more forgiving and easier to apply. Further, it is often possible to stably undervolt the Coffee Lake i7/i9 available in this class of systems to further improve performance, thermals, and power consumption (generally another 10+%).

Apple has deliberately made it impossible to undervolt the CPU on the MBP! This has been true since the first Skylake CPUs a few years ago. You used to be able to use a program called Volta to undervolt your CPU on macOS. This is a huge peeve for me and, combined with the general power and thermal underdevelopment, is one of the main reasons I want to get a competitor’s hardware. As a primer, the default voltage of modern CPUs is typically set conservatively high for the sake of production efficiency. With the current generation Coffee Lake CPUs it is commonly possible to set the CPU voltage about 100 to 150mv lower safely. This allows the CPU to run cooler and consume less power. For laptops which are thermally limited (basically everything in this new 6-core 14nm era), this also translates into better performance.

It’s a tweak that actually improves reliability of your CPU. So it’s just stupid that Apple has deliberately made this impossible. Shame on them, someone else take my money. Wrapping up, my biggest quibbles with the X1E (before actually getting it) are that the 4K panel’s responsiveness is about the slowest I’ve seen on a modern panel, and it’s just really not suitable for gaming. There’s also what I consider an annoyingly high level of backlight corner bleed that I’m sure will be distracting during blackboxed video viewing. Hopefully these two issues will be fixed in next year’s iteration.

FOOTNOTES MacBook i9 Thermal / VRM (below-baseline throttling/thrashing) Issue: This was mitigated with software that works around the poor hardware design, but the system would still ultimately perform better if the CPU VRM were redesigned. Non Mac systems with the similar CPUs don’t have this issue and get better sustained performance. MacBook Nov 2018 Refresh with Radeon Vega 16 and Vega 20: MacBook Class Laptop Reviews: Lenovo ThinkPad X1 Extreme, 4K: Dell XPS 15 9570, 4K: Razer Blade 15 2018, 1070 Ti FHD 144Hz: Best Undervolting Guide (keywords: ThrottleStop, Intel XTU): Undervolting Coffee Lake i7/i9 (2018 MacBook class CPU): Replacing Thermal Paste with Liquid Metal on 2018 MBP:.

And follow up: Replacing Thermal Paste with Kryonaut on X1E: Replacing Thermal Paste and Undervolting X1 Carbon: Replacing Thermal Paste and Undervolting XPS 15 9570: Possibly over-conservative BIOS update for thermal throttling on X1E: High Sierra (10.13) drivers only for now: nVidia “waiting for Apple’s approval” for Mojave (10.14) macOS driver web release: Breadcrumb Links (other things I found researching this):. I currently have High Sierra running on my Hackintosh, which I installed using MacPwn. Now, there is an update on the App Store about Mojave.

When I clicked download, it didn't download any large file that it did with earlier installations. I am guessing it's a web installer? Anyway, can I upgrade directly using the installer (I have not started the download as there is no point if I can't) or can I upgrade using the MacPwn Mojave installer? Or is my only option is to do a clean installation of Mojave?

Nothing worked. We’ve done two things that have fixed our issues: a Promise 6-bay RAID with OMC Toshiba 4TB drives and a 2018 Mac Mini just running Mojave with an i7 processor and 16GB RAM.