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Apple approves driver that lets Nvidia eGPUs work with Arm Macs

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Re: Apple approves driver that lets Nvidia eGPUs work with Arm Macs

#161
post #36

Idk why this doesn't link to the original source instead of this proxy source: https://x.com/__tinygrad__/status/2039213719155310736

Probably because you can't actually read anything more than the initial post without getting a login-wall: "Join X now to read replies on this post." (Not to mention "X" is a trash site now)

I don't go there unless I'm looking for something specific but I've found adding cancel at the end helps

https://xcancel.com/__tinygrad__/status/2039213719155310736

Re: Apple approves driver that lets Nvidia eGPUs work with Arm Macs

#162

I followed the instructions link and read the scripts...although the TinyGPU app is not in source form on GitHub, this looks to me like the GPU is passed into the Linux VM underneath to use the real driver and then somehow passed back out to the Mac (which might be what the TinyGrad team actually got approved). Or I could have totally misunderstood the role of Docker in this.

[dead]

Re: Apple approves driver that lets Nvidia eGPUs work with Arm Macs

#163

I followed the instructions link and read the scripts...although the TinyGPU app is not in source form on GitHub, this looks to me like the GPU is passed into the Linux VM underneath to use the real driver and then somehow passed back out to the Mac (which might be what the TinyGrad team actually got approved). Or I could have totally misunderstood the role of Docker in this.

[dead]

Re: Apple approves driver that lets Nvidia eGPUs work with Arm Macs

#164
post #71

Why does Apple need to make the drivers in a walled garden? Atleast they should support major device categories with official drivers.

Doesn't Apple support the major standard device categories: NVMe, XHCI, AHCI, and such, like most operating systems do? The challenges are all for hardware that needs a vendor-specific driver instead of conforming to a standard driver interface (which doesn't always exist). Lots of those can be supported with userspace drivers, which can be supplied by third parties instead of needing to be written by Apple.

> NVMe

Using proprietary connectors.

> XHCI

Not on Lightning.

> AHCI

How exactly would Apple not support AHCI?

Re: Apple approves driver that lets Nvidia eGPUs work with Arm Macs

#165
post #93

A good technical project, but honestly useless in like 90% of scenarios. You want to use an NVidia GPU for LLM ? just buy a basic PC on second hand (the GPU is the primary cost anyway), you want to use Mac for good amount of VRAM ? Buy a Mac. With this proposed solution you have an half-backed system, the GPU is limited by the Thunderbolt port and you don’t have access to all of NVidia tool and library, and on other…

Chicken/egg. NVidia tooling is lacking surely in part because the hardware wasn’t usable on macOS until now. Now that it’s usable that might change.

Nvidia GPUs were usable on Intel Macs, but compatibility got worse over time, and Apple stopped making a Mac Pro with regular PCIe slots in 2013. People then got hopeful about eGPUs, but they have their own caveats on top of macOS only fully working with AMD cards. So I've gotten numb to any news about Mac + GPU. The answer was always to just get a non-Apple PC with PCIe slots instead of giving yourself hoops to jump through.

Re: Apple approves driver that lets Nvidia eGPUs work with Arm Macs

#166
post #48
post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The government doesn’t care? They’re a minority of the market? The vast majority of their computers didn’t have slots to put Nvidia GPUs in, and now none of them do?

They said eGPU

eGPUs are kind of a joke. People would be way more likely to use dedicated GPUs with Macs if they had PCIe slots.

Re: Apple approves driver that lets Nvidia eGPUs work with Arm Macs

#167
post #85

I don't know how Apple has evaded regulatory scrutiny for their refusal to sign Nvidia's eGPU drivers since 2018.

Isn't all you have to do disable SIP?

Yeah I'm pretty sure Nvidia just doesn't care to make Mac drivers. For years there was no SIP, Apple sold the Mac Pro which could take Nvidia GPUs, but you basically couldn't use Nvidia because of how bad and outdated the drivers were. I had a GTX 650 in my Mac Pro for a while, it was borderline unusable.

Re: Apple approves driver that lets Nvidia eGPUs work with Arm Macs

#168
post #48

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They said eGPU

eGPUs are kind of a joke. People would be way more likely to use dedicated GPUs with Macs if they had PCIe slots.

What exactly is the difference between an internal PCIe slot and Oculink or Thunderbolt from an electrical and functional perspective?

Re: Apple approves driver that lets Nvidia eGPUs work with Arm Macs

#169
post #66

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't think any of what you're describing are legal "monopolies". I don't have a single Apple product in my life but I'm fairly sure there's nothing I'm prevented from doing because of that.

And back in the "Microsoft has a monopoly on IE6" ruling's days, I did not use Windows or Internet Explorer, and I was not prevented from doing anything because of that. Netscape Navigator on Linux worked fine. Sure, I occasionally hit sites that were broken and only worked in IE, but I also right now frequently hit apps that are "macOS only" (like when Claude Cowork released, or a ton of other YC company's apps). Mi…

The issue was never "Microsoft has a monopoly on IE6". That's obviously nonsense.

The monopoly that Microsoft held was the home computer operating system market, first through DOS, then later through Windows. Holding a monopoly like that isn't illegal unto itself. What they were actually found guilty of was unfairly leveraging their monopoly on the OS market to gain the upper hand in a different market (the browser market). The subsequent range of issues we had with IE6 (compatibility, security, etc) was a result of Microsoft succeeding in achieving a monopoly on the browser market through illicit means.

Likewise, "Apple has a monopoly on the App Store" is just the same amount of nonsense. What you could argue is that Apple has a monopoly on the home computer market, or the mobile phone market, and that the way they integrate the App Store should be considered illegal leveraging of that monopoly, but that argument simply doesn't hold water — Microsoft's monopoly on the OS market at the time was pretty much incontrovertible, you simply couldn't walk into a shop and buy a computer running something else (except maybe a Mac at a more specialised place). Today, just about any shop you walk into that sells computers will probably have devices for sale running three different OSes (macOS, Windows, ChromeOS). Any phone place will have iPhones and Android devices, and probably a few more niche options. Actual market share percentage is nowhere near the high 90s that Microsoft saw in its heyday. At most, Apple is the biggest individual competitor in the market, but I don't think it hold an outright majority in any specific product class.

Mind you, I think that there is a good argument to be made that the Apple/Google duopoly on mobile devices does deserve scrutiny, but that's a very different kettle of fish.

Re: Apple approves driver that lets Nvidia eGPUs work with Arm Macs

#170
post #117

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Apple has not, to my knowledge, required OEMs to bundle Safari with macOS alongside threats to withhold macOS if they don’t comply expressly to put Firefox out of business. But hey, maybe some weird shit happened during the clone years that I’m not privy to.

Apple requires Developers to use AppStore with their App alongside threats to withhold their App if they don’t comply. Just an example… and yes, I know the EU ruling but it’s still fitting.

The crucially important subtlety here is that Apple requiring developers to use the App Store doesn't leverage an existing monopoly (like what Microsoft had with Windows).

Compare the games console market. Nintendo is allowed to say you have to go through them to sell games for the Switch, ditto Microsoft with the Xbox. Sony doing the same thing with the Playstation is exactly equivalent, but they're approaching the sort of market dominance where it might soon be illegal for them (and them alone) to do that in some markets.

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