Dual GPU, 2012 Mac Pro and Resolve 12.x?

So this seems like a simple enough (borderline noob) question, but my search came up with nothing*. I have a 2012 Mac Pro with a Radeon 5770 driving a basic display as the boot monitor, and a Quadro 4000 running to a grading monitor via displayport as secondary. The Quadro is more powerful, and I want Resolve to use that for processing, but I have no idea how to tell if it actually is. So the question is: do I have this configuration right to maximize performance?

Thanks in advance.


*I also checked out the older configuration guide and am not sure if I have the answer.

Hi,

No you're definitely not setup properly. First of all, you shouldn't be using any GPU for video monitoring. Resolve is not meant to work that way. If you want color accuracy, you need to use a Black Magic video output device (the Decklink Mini Monitor 4K is 195$, you can find the older model that only does HD for around 130$). So that's step one. Step two is to make sure Resolve uses the Quadro card for processing. For that, you need to plug your computer monitor on the Radeon and leave the Quadro with nothing plugged into it. Then go in your Resolve preferences and manually tell Resolve to use CUDA for processing, and manually select you Quadro. Before you do that, you need to install the latest NVIDIA drivers, and most importantly, you need to install the CUDA driver.

The NVIDIA drivers differ depending on which OS you are running (10.11.6 or 10.12.1 or something else..?) MacVidCards keeps a link for every release: http://www.macvidcards.com/drivers.html

The CUDA driver is available here: http://www.nvidia.com/object/mac-driver-archive.html

Happy grading,

Bear in mind that if that's an original Quadro 4000 it's very underpowered for Resolve as it only has 256 old slow CUDA cores with low clock speeds that only just support CUDA 2.0. The card is over 6 years old.

You might want to look into getting a second hand GTX 980 or 980Ti and using that instead

Hi there,

Fahnon, regardless to the previous answers you had, what you want to do is to hook up your 5770 to the grading monitor and leave the quadro alone, then go to preferences video i/o and check that the quadro appears as the computing GPU...

Now, you may want to buy a 980 ti, download cuda + webdriver (2 pref panes that will show up in system preferences) and specify Cuda in preferences.

Bear in mind that if that's an original Quadro 4000 it's very underpowered for Resolve as it only has 256 old slow CUDA cores with low clock speeds that only just support CUDA 2.0. The card is over 6 years old.

You might want to look into getting a second hand GTX 980 or 980Ti and using that instead

Indeed! You won't get much done with the Quadro. Get a 980 4GB or a 980TI 6GB, or at the very least get a 970 4GB. I setup a friend with one of those in an older MacPro and it has pretty decent performance (for the money).

Guys, thanks so much for clearing that up! I'll reconfigure things on my end and look into a better graphics card. Thanks!

Resurrecting this thread because with the release of v14, anyone running an old Quadro 4000 is out of luck. So based on my research and looking at the configuration guide, I think I'll need to grab a GeForce GTX 1080. My questions, that I didn't find an answer to by Googling, are:

-With the release of Mac GeForce drivers this year, do I need to go the Macvidcards route and have the card flashed for use with my Mac? The fact that drivers were released by the manufacturer implies to me that it's now plug and play. I see these cards going for ~$500, which is 30% less expensive than macvidcards $750.

-Are there specific cards that I should avoid if I can just buy an off the shelf 1080?

Be sure you're on Sieraa at least and then install cuda and webdriver pref panes prior, then put your card and that's all (checking what's needed here : http://www.macvidcards.com/drivers.html (now you've used macvidcards... website.
You know of course that you won't have a boot screen hmm ?

Be sure you're on Sieraa at least and then install cuda and webdriver pref panes prior, then put your card and that's all (checking what's needed here : http://www.macvidcards.com/drivers.html (now you've used macvidcards... website.
You know of course that you won't have a boot screen hmm ?

Thanks Sam! That's great news. I didn't know about the boot screen limitation (reminds me of the old flashing old 1,1/2,1 mac pro to get around the 32bit EFI days). I'll just keep my 5770 around in case I have to troubleshoot and need that boot screen.

That's a good idea, I kept a GT120 just for that.
But don't use it, not even for display, a current card will do much better.