nVidia GPUs and the infamous lag issue, Why is that happening?

[Cyberdevs]

Let's cross reference the facts and settings and find out why we have the lags with the nVidia web drivers and why some other people don't have the lags.

I have an EVGA 1070 SuperClocked GPU which is working pretty well under macOS Sierra and up to macOS 10.13.2 the last macOS update and the nVidia web driver didn't go so well.

 

So far I tried all the following options but nothing seems to work:

 

1. Used only clover's on the fly patch for the board-id to avoid the black screen issue

2. Used Lilu and nVidiaGraphicsFixUp

3. Used only AGDPFix without any other patches or kexts

4. Activated the iGPU

5. used ACPI patches to change the PEG0 to GFX0

6. Used iMacPro SMBIOS without any patches or kext

 

Nothing seems to work so far except for the patched version of the 104 or 106 web driver which has the lags but it's way better than the last drivers.

 

To all people with no lags:

 

Please share your EFI folders if you can.

 

(Please remove the serial number, MLB, UUID and all the private stuff from your config.plist and also remove "themes" and "Apple" Folder before posting it)

 

and please share your hardware specs with the firmware version (BIOS/UEFI version) 

 

Thank you all

 

You can test the following sites to see wether you have the lags or not:

 

http://madebyevan.com/webgl-water/ (thanks to @maerten)

 

or

 

http://www.bongiovi..../webgl/blossom/ (thanks to @TheBloke)

[Guest]

I have no lags in my normal usage I see a lag with site posted by @maerten (OpenGL waterpool)

[Cyberdevs]

I have the lags there as well:

http://madebyevan.com/webgl-water/

 

the original post can be found at: http://www.insanelymac.com/forum/topic/332311-partial-success-but-with-random-graphics-lags-video-included-coffeelake-1080-ti/?p=2583883

I have no lags in my normal usage I see a lag with site posted by @maerten (OpenGL waterpool)

Have you ever performed a ROM update on your GPU? or you are just using it with the stock ROM?

[Guest]

Look @my signature

I have no an Extreme 1080ti..but a "flashed one" :)

 

I have the lags there as well:

http://madebyevan.com/webgl-water/

 

the original post can be found at: http://www.insanelymac.com/forum/topic/332311-partial-success-but-with-random-graphics-lags-video-included-coffeelake-1080-ti/?p=2583883

Have you ever performed a ROM update on your GPU? or you are just using it with the stock ROM?

[SavageAUS]

I have a gtx 960 and also experience the lags with the .157 Nvidia driver on 10.13.3 and .4 beta's.

 

I have also tried the following.

 

1. Used only clover's on the fly patch for the board-id to avoid the black screen issue

2. Used Lilu and nVidiaGraphicsFixUp

3. Used only AGDPFix without any other patches or kexts

4. Used iMacPro SMBIOS without any patches or kext (still using with older driver with no lags)

 

Sent from my SM-G930F using Tapatalk

[MICKHAEL]

maybe we need to grab some firmware from macvidcards? or thats just efi patched?

[Guest]

why?

 

maybe we need to grab some firmware from macvidcards? or thats just efi patched?

i mean in a hack a patched gfx for a real mac do not have a pratical use I think 

or not?

[MICKHAEL]

why?

 

i mean in a hack a patched gfx for a real mac do not have a pratical use I think 

or not?

i don't know what to say)) that was just an idea) I didn't say smart idea)) i just know that it's something between osx and nvidia drivers

[Guest]

In the past to have a patched GFX allowed to a real Mac to see booting stage before desktop (otherwise black screen till when gfx driver was enabled to login window)

[Cyberdevs]

maybe we need to grab some firmware from macvidcards? or thats just efi patched?

I don't think that's possible, they don't post their ROMs online the offer a service to flash your GPU with the Mac compatible ROM.

 

Besides I don't think it would be much use if you use a flashed GPU for Mac in a PC.

[Asgorath]

Per the other thread, you might want to try taking this discussion to the official NVIDIA forums:

 

https://forums.geforce.com/default/board/132/geforce-apple-gpus

 

as NVIDIA is known to respond to discussions there.  If nothing else, it'll be very clear to them that this is an issue that is affecting a lot of people.

[Cyberdevs]

Per the other thread, you might want to try taking this discussion to the official NVIDIA forums:

 

https://forums.geforce.com/default/board/132/geforce-apple-gpus

 

as NVIDIA is known to respond to discussions there.  If nothing else, it'll be very clear to them that this is an issue that is affecting a lot of people.

You are right and perhaps we should contact nVidia about the issue.

 

But the thing is I'm just curious to know why this issue is present on some hacks while others have no issue and that's beside the fact that nVidia isn't doing well in producing the proper web drivers for their GPUs.

 

Not only hacks are affected, from what I see even Macs with a nVidia GPU are affected as well.

[Guest]

Hi all

today I have had some sparetime.. I have patched and tested all drivers produced from High Sierra from 10.13.0 to 10.13.3 in my spare beta 10.13.4 beta 2 update 1 disk

 

I have had alway success to install patched driver (with old 10.13.0 and 10.13.1 I have old reboot iogconsoleuser boot loop message solved forcing also NVDA_drv=1 in boot option (with also nvidiaweb enabled)

 

But I can't with some drivers test WEBGL link posted by cyberdevs &maerten (black screen instead waterpool inside html page..

 

then I tested also (try to test) 10.12.6 webdriver

In this case I am not able to patch and install because they need some work for install and post install script I think

 

Any of you could try to modify web driver fo old Sierra 10.12.6 (it needs to modify where drivers are installed like L/E instead S/L/E)

I would like to try if this can solve the only lag I have in that OpenGL page

 

For me all drivers for 10.13.x are working in the same way for performance

 

 

[Asgorath]

You are right and perhaps we should contact nVidia about the issue.

 

But the thing is I'm just curious to know why this issue is present on some hacks while others have no issue and that's beside the fact that nVidia isn't doing well in producing the proper web drivers for their GPUs.

 

Not only hacks are affected, from what I see even Macs with a nVidia GPU are affected as well.

 

There are many explanations, here are two examples:

 

1) NVIDIA is incompetent and the macOS driver team is 2 guys working in a basement with no support.

 

2) NVIDIA hasn't been able to reproduce these issues in their testing.

 

You said it yourself, some Hackintoshes aren't affected, so perhaps NVIDIA only has systems in that category?  What's your definition of "proper web drivers" exactly?  Do we really have to assume that there is incompetence or malice on their part?

 

I don't know what the issue is, because my system has been running perfectly fine in the applications I use on a regular basis.  Clearly, there are many people who are having issues, so there's definitely something going wrong.  Posting in a venue where NVIDIA can work with you seems like a really good idea, in any case.

[Cyberdevs]

There are many explanations, here are two examples:

 

1) NVIDIA is incompetent and the macOS driver team is 2 guys working in a basement with no support.

 

2) NVIDIA hasn't been able to reproduce these issues in their testing.

 

You said it yourself, some Hackintoshes aren't affected, so perhaps NVIDIA only has systems in that category?  What's your definition of "proper web drivers" exactly?  Do we really have to assume that there is incompetence or malice on their part?

 

I don't know what the issue is, because my system has been running perfectly fine in the applications I use on a regular basis.  Clearly, there are many people who are having issues, so there's definitely something going wrong.  Posting in a venue where NVIDIA can work with you seems like a really good idea, in any case.

Well my guess is that nVidia doesn't have the proper documentation on Metal support (may be that's Apple's fault) and the web drivers aren't fully optimized for using metal architecture that's why we have the lags in the macOS's UI and other apple developed software. (this is just my personal assumption not a fact or anything)

 

With each major update apple tends to improve the stability and performance of the macOS by changing/fine tuning so many things and that's where nVidia can't keep up with those changes.

[Cyberdevs]

so far the best (and the only) answer that I have received from posting the issue at nvidia forum is a to "get a pc" to solve the issue with the web drivers.

 

Why didn't I think of that! I wonder!

[ReddestDream]

Well my guess is that nVidia doesn't have the proper documentation on Metal support (may be that's Apple's fault) and the web drivers aren't fully optimized for using metal architecture that's why we have the lags in the macOS's UI and other apple developed software. (this is just my personal assumption not a fact or anything)

 

With each major update apple tends to improve the stability and performance of the macOS by changing/fine tuning so many things and that's where nVidia can't keep up with those changes.

 

May also have to do with 10.13.4's improved eGPU support and Nvidia's attempt to improve things on their end in preparation. But the fact that real macs are also having issues with this driver suggests to me that this driver is just flawed and this is a "bad release," but Nvidia doesn't really see a point in fixing it until 10.13.4 actually drops . . .

[Cyberdevs]

May also have to do with 10.13.4's improved eGPU support and Nvidia's attempt to improve things on their end in preparation. But the fact that real macs are also having issues with this driver suggests to me that this driver is just flawed and this is a "bad release," but Nvidia doesn't really see a point in fixing it until 10.13.4 actually drops . . .

Well it doesn't make sense, releasing a {censored} product and just dropping all further support because of some future update or the next the release, how long is it gonna take? 

 

When the 10.13.4 is gonna be released? Next month, two months?

[ReddestDream]

Well it doesn't make sense, releasing a {censored} product and just dropping all further support because of some future update or the next the release, who long is it gonna take? 

 

When the 10.13.4 is gonna be released? Next month, two months?

 

Considering how small the user base is and how easily Apple can break things, it probably does make sense to just wait. ;p

 

AFAIK, 10.13.4 is in second beta. And there's some pressure to release sooner rather than later since it fixes the Indian text bug on the Mac side.

 

https://www.macrumors.com/2018/02/15/telugu-crashing-bug-fixed-ios-11-3-macos-10-13-4/

[Cyberdevs]

Considering how small the user base is and how easily Apple can break things, it probably does make sense to just wait. ;p

 

AFAIK, 10.13.4 is in second beta. And there's some pressure to release sooner rather than later since it fixes the Indian text bug on the Mac side.

 

https://www.macrumors.com/2018/02/15/telugu-crashing-bug-fixed-ios-11-3-macos-10-13-4/

Well according to this article Apple is going to release the 10.13.4 in about 40 days or so. But yet that's a long time to deal with a laggy system and if that's the case I might jus swap my GPUs on my rigs, the lag is really annoying and I'm not able to perform my day to day tasks properly.

[MaLd0n]

for me only 104 work normal with all smbios, the new drivers i have very much lag

 

I use iMac16,2 smbios and 104 and work as expected

[Cyberdevs]

Today I also tested the 106 and it seems to be performing ok on my rig but I still have some minor lags.

 

Specially in the following site:

http://madebyevan.com/webgl-water

 

 

Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

[TheBloke]

Hi all
 
I am on 10.13.3 with a 980Ti, and I was noticing disappointing performance - for example, skipped frames in a 1080P YouTube video, and stuttering scrolling when I scrolled fast through a Chrome page.
 
Today I was told about this script on Github:  https://github.com/Benjamin-Dobell/nvidia-update
 
From the description:

 

This script installs the best (not necessarily the latest) official nVidia web drivers for your system.

 

Specifically, it does the following:

- Checks for official driver updates for your version of macOS.

- Cross-references against a list of blacklisted drivers, that it'll avoid installing (by default).

- Properly uninstalls old drivers.

- Downloads and installs the latest non-blacklisted drivers.

- On-the-fly patches driver packages so they can be installed on your version of macOS (if necessary).

- Patches drivers that you've already installed, if they no longer match your macOS version i.e. post macOS update. 

 
 
I ran the script and it downgraded my drivers from 378.10.10.10.25.156 to .106 (same as cyberdevs has just tried.)

 

Since then, I think things are improved.  I watched a few videos and couldn't see any skipped frames.  I've scrolled very fast through some Chrome pages and it seems smooth.
 
It's too early to say 100% it's fixed, but it definitely seems improved.  I also got 1% higher Compute benchmarks in GeekBench4 (both OpenCL and Metal), although this is close enough to be within margin of error.
 
Anyway, I would recommend trying this script if you have problems.  You can always revert back to latest NVidia drivers using the NVidia Preference Pane if it doesn't work out.

Today I also tested the 106 and it seems to be performing ok on my rig but I still have some minor lags.

Specially in the following site:
http://madebyevan.com/webgl-water
 

 

Thanks, I just tried that site also on 106, and on Chrome it was mostly fine.  Occasionally I could tell it had skipped/lagged.  It was almost like there was a 'flash', like it had gone black for a fraction of a second.

 

Then I tried it in Firefox and it was slightly worse - the 'flash' happened a little more often.

 

But at least in Chrome I may not have noticed it if I hadn't been looking for it, and I'm sure it's much better than it would have been on 156 given that even a 1080P YouTube video would regularly stutter in that mess of a driver.

[Cyberdevs]

Hi all

Hi there,

 

Thanks for the update

 

We all (I mean the ones with the lag issue) have to use web drivers that were released prior to the 156 or 157.

 

I have tested the 104 and 106 and both work almost ok, but the lags are still there from time to time.

 

The thing is that I really would like to know why on some systems the web drivers work flawlessly and why on others we have the lags.

 

--

 

To all people with no lags:

 

Please share your EFI folders if you can.

(remove the serial number, MLB, UUID and all the private stuff from your config.plist and also remove "themes" and "Apple" Folder before posting it)

and please share your hardware specs with the firmware version (BIOS/UEFI version) 

 

Thank you all

[TheBloke]

This WebGL demo has quite noticeable lag/stuttering in both Chrome and Firefox, even with 106 drivers:  http://www.bongiovi.tw/experiments/webgl/blossom/

 

Again, it is worse in Firefox, where I can quite often see the flying leaves slow down for 0.25-0.5 seconds.

 

However, in Safari it is perfect.  No lag, stuttering or slowdown.  Even when I increase numParticles, speed and range to maximum and rotate the animation as it plays.  And even in Full Screen.

 

So tests using web browsers could be impacted by which browser - and Apple Safari is working better (not surprising since they have full access to the APIs and OS!)

 

I think it might be helpful if we had an objective test to run, so then for people who report "no lag" can also run it and we can compare how it runs for them?  Otherwise it can sometimes be the case that some people really notice lag, others do not.   But if we had objective confirmation, it might make comparing specs/EFI/etc more helpful.

 

Does anyone know of a good, free non-browser application to test GPU rendering and performance?    Games could work, especially with an FPS counter, but unless they are free not everyone could run and test them.   There's GeekBench but this just gives an overall number - really it needs to be an app that renders something in 3D, which can be watched for lag and also check an FPS counter.