Nvidia

Last year we learned that Nvidia was set to move forward with its plans to acquire chip designer Arm for an estimated $40 billion. However, after the FTC investigated competition concerns around the deal this year, it has filed a lawsuit to block the acquisition.

NVIDIA on Wednesday announced the next edition of its annual GTC conference, where the company brings together industry professionals to introduce and discuss new technologies. This year, NVIDIA GTC will have Apple’s senior director of AI and ML research Samy Bengio as one of the speakers.

Nvidia announced last fall that it was officially starting the process of acquiring Arm Holdings from SoftBank for $40 billion. In the months since we’ve seen concerns from competitors and the deal hasn’t yet been approved or shut down by regulators. Now Qualcomm has shared that if the sale to Nvidia is blocked, it and others would invest in Arm.

Back in September, Nvidia confirmed that it was going to move forward with the process of acquiring Arm Holdings from SoftBank for $40 billion. However, with regulators around the world looking into the deal, it’s surfaced that Qualcomm has been vocal with authorities about its objection to the acquisition.

Playing Fortnite on an iPhone will soon be possible once more, despite Apple removing it from the App Store and later terminating Epic’s developer account.

It’s being made possible by a move that will interest more than just Fortnite players: GPU maker Nvidia has developed a version of its GeForce cloud gaming service that runs in Safari on iOS …

On its own, the 2018 MacBook Air is a downright terrible gaming machine. Connected to my LG UltraWide 5K2K Display, the MacBook Air averages around 1-2 frames per second in Rocket League, and similarly abysmal scores in Unigine Heaven and Valley benchmarks. That’s no fault of the MacBook Air, as it’s a thin and light portable laptop built around maximizing battery life. In other words, it was never intended to be a gaming machine.

But if you own a MacBook Air and are looking for ways to get more out of your laptop, then an eGPU setup within a Windows Boot Camp environment can go a long way towards making that a reality. Watch our hands-on video walkthrough for the step-by-step details.
Expand
Expanding
Close

NVIDIA is having a strong CES. After announcing powerful new RTX 2000 series GPUs last year, the company took to Las Vegas this week to show off an array of new laptops featuring the accompanying mobile RTX series.

Powerful gaming laptops are getting thinner and increasingly more capable, and these new chips are certainly the best on the market. The only question left is, will we ever see these featured in a Mac?

Expand
Expanding
Close

In a previous video, I showcased a 2018 Mac mini gaming setup using an AMD RX Vega 64 eGPU running Windows 10 via Boot Camp. Would a similar setup work for an Nvidia GeForce RTX 2080 GPU from EVGA? Watch our hands-on video walkthrough for the answer.
Expand
Expanding
Close

Unofficial NVIDIA eGPU support is now a reality for Mac users. It’s all thanks to the developers and researchers that congregate over at eGPU.io, a community for eGPU coverage and support across Mac, Windows, and other platforms.

While not perfect, the results of my testing look very promising. Let me preface this post by saying that NVIDIA eGPU support for macOS is still not officially supported by Apple, and the workaround script used to provide support is still in its alpha stages. Even so, I’ve been impressed by the script’s ease of use, and the performance that I’ve seen thus far.

It means that macOS users can now enjoy eGPU setups with cards from Nvidia’s Pascal lineup, including the GTX 1070, 1080, and venerable 1080 Ti. And it’s not just for Thunderbolt 3 Mac users, either. The script allows Mac owners to work around restrictions that eliminated support for Thunderbolt 2 eGPUs as well, allowing more users to join in on the graphics-accelerated fun. Watch our video for a hands-on look.
Expand
Expanding
Close

If you’re looking to build a Hackintosh that can serve as a competent Windows gaming rig on the side, then a build powered by an Nvidia GPU is a good choice. In our most recent Hackintosh build, we paired an Intel i7 6700k with Nvidia’s fastest gaming GPU, the 1080 Ti.

The results weren’t all that surprising. Performance was good in a macOS environment even when using Nvidia’s beta web drivers. Performance was a lot better, though, in a Windows environment, where Pascal GPUs can really thrive.

If you’re interested in building a Hackintosh solely for video editing, however, then an Nvidia-powered GPU option might not be the best choice. Sure, Nvidia GPUs with their CUDA cores are generally superior for editing in an Adobe workflow, but if you’re building a Hackintosh machine solely for video editing, chances are you’re interested in running Final Cut Pro X.

Expand
Expanding
Close

Mantiz’s Venus is an upcoming eGPU box and docking station for Thunderbolt 3-enabled laptops like the 2016 MacBook Pro. The Taiwanese-based company is working on bringing two eGPU boxes to market — the eccentric-looking Saturn, and the more subdued-looking Venus.

The friendly folks at Mantiz agreed to send over a Venus eGPU/docking station, allowing me to take it for a quick test drive when paired together with my 13-inch 2016 MacBook Pro. Featuring an all-aluminum outer shell with classic Mac Pro cheese grater-inspired perforated design, the Venus is one of the more attractive eGPU solutions that I’ve seen thus far. Have a look at our hands on video walkthrough inside for more details.
Expand
Expanding
Close

As we reported earlier this morning, Nvidia has released its long-awaited Pascal beta drivers for the Mac. These drivers make it possible to use graphics cards from the company’s popular 10-series lineup, which include the GeForce GTX 1080 Ti, among other hardware.

This release has major implications for legacy Mac Pro, Hackintosh, and eGPU users. It means that we can now use the latest Nvidia hardware to drive our machines graphically. It means taking a relatively underpowered computer like the 13-inch 2016 MacBook Pro, and running games at high settings with respectable frame rates.

We plan on testing out the beta drivers more extensively in the future, but for quick testing purposes, we decided to try powering our 13-inch MacBook Pro with the Pascal-based GTX 1050 Ti. What we found was an encouraging sneak peek at the potential of eGPU setups on the Mac.
Expand
Expanding
Close

Nvidia has made good on its promise to release Pascal drivers for the Mac. This makes it possible to drive macOS with 10-series cards like the popular Geforce GTX 1080, or the newly released Titan Xp.

Up until now, users wishing to use modern Nvidia GPUs on a Mac were forced to use last-gen Maxwell-based hardware, such as the GTX 980 Ti and other 9-series cards. With the release of the Pascal drivers, more options have been opened up for eGPU users, legacy Mac Pro users, and Hackintosh users wishing to utilize the latest and greatest in GPU technology.
Expand
Expanding
Close

I’m currently in the process of building a new Hackintosh rig for 2017, so imagine how surprised and happy I was to hear that Nvidia is working on beta drivers for its GPUs with the latest Pascal architecture. Up until today, I had just settled on being relegated to a Radeon RX 480, or a Maxwell-era Nvidia card.

Not having Pascal drivers for the Mac certainly didn’t diminish the Hackintosh community, but it was significantly limiting in both options and creativity.

With today’s announcement, the Hackintosh just got exponentially more appealing. Nvidia’s announcement is positive for a variety of reasons: there’s the prospect of using an eGPU setup with a MacBook Pro, along with future prospects of Nvidia cards powering future Mac Pro hardware.

But on the immediate horizon, the announcement is most promising for Hackintosh builders. With this in mind, I wanted to share the build that I’m currently working on in this first part of a multi part series.
Expand
Expanding
Close

Big news on the GPU front today for Mac users. Along with the announcement of its new ridiculously powerful Titan Xp GPU, Nvidia announced that new beta Pascal drivers are coming next week for the Mac.

This is great news for eGPU users and for those interested in building a Hackintosh. It also bodes well for the future of the upcoming modular Mac Pro.
Expand
Expanding
Close

Gaming on Macs has never been a primary use case, but for the few who do want to use their Macs for gaming — whether on the desktop or on a Macbook — there have never been great options. However, at CES 2017, NVIDIA has revealed that it’s game streaming service, GeForce Now, is headed to the platform.

Expand
Expanding
Close