Switching up to Apple Silicon with PCIe

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rna

rna

Well-known member
Joined
Nov 20, 2015
Messages
51
So to keep up with the latest Dolby Atmos delivery that Ventura can do, It is time to ditch my trusty Mac Pro Mid 2010 and jump to a Mac book M1 Pro.
My RME Raydat is a force to be reckoned with so I decided to look into PCIe thunderbolt cases.
I thought I would share what I found with the Sonnet Tech products.
 
I had made some attempts to use open core legacy patcher to get the 5,1to Ventura but it did not end well. It could not recognise my RX580 and the old original card made it unusable. So I believe Mojave is the most stable OS for these 5,1's
I found Montaray worked quick well but would occasionally hang and need a reboot.
 
I still have my 5,1 w/64 gigs of RAM running Catalina with DosDude1's patch...I installed a Titan Ridge Thunderbolt card (which I had to flash first) and it runs pretty flawlessly up to ProTools 2022.10 and whatever version of Logic stopped on Catalina...

But I did move to a Mac Mini M1 in 2020 with on 8 gigs of RAM and it outperformed the 5,1 by nearly 15-20%...and once I made the shift to Native Silicone apps its even more stable.

I recently upgraded to a Mac Pro M2 14" laptop with 16 Gigs Ram and it outperforms the M1 by probably 10-15% (in non-scientific real world stuff).

I do miss the days of adding in your own hardware and drives and tweaking the machine...but these M-series appliance have some serious mojo under the hood, I have not regretted it except for Avid dragging their ass on Silicon Native compatibility, but in Rosetta everything runs fine.

I'm not really a big Logic guy, it doesn't ever feel professional to me, but it is a solid DAW in Silicone...and Dolby Atmos mostly...

My Atmos Suite works fine in rosetta though.

I did originally get an OWC dock, the apple "Let f the customer by not giving them ports" nonsense requires further investment...I have looked at the Sonnets because I have a few UAD PCIe2 cards that would be nice to not toss away...since I have about 80% of every UAD plugin...(I have recently added the Softube stuff particularly because I picked upa console 1 and I was pretty shocked at useful and quicker that device makes things...and it runs about 75% of my UAD plugins so win/win)
 
Just some additional anecdata about RME support for M1 - I've been running two ancient FF800s in parallel via two dongles and it's been working flawlessly with a macbook air and ventura. Reaper has been fussier than the hardware/fimware, which is surprising.
 
From what I've gathered RME has the best support/drivers in Audio...I have yet to hear negative things about their tech developments except perhaps bus architecture changes which is an industry moving target anyway...

At some point I need to switch over to RME and forget all the mess of Apogee and Antelope and UAD...except I'm way over-committed to those guys at this point...thousands of $ in hardware and software...

Lynx has always been quite stable as well...just not as Mac friendly.
 
I worked out I have had my Raydat 14 years!! And I know it is supported with the Sonnettech stuff it seems to never end.
 
rna said:
I had made some attempts to use open core legacy patcher to get the 5,1to Ventura but it did not end well. It could not recognise my RX580 and the old original card made it unusable. So I believe Mojave is the most stable OS for these 5,1's
I found Montaray worked quick well but would occasionally hang and need a reboot.
Click to expand...
You can’t use Mojave with M1’s or M2’s. Best bet is Monterey with newer mac’s.
rna said:
So to keep up with the latest Dolby Atmos delivery that Ventura can do, It is time to ditch my trusty Mac Pro Mid 2010 and jump to a Mac book M1 Pro.
My RME Raydat is a force to be reckoned with so I decided to look into PCIe thunderbolt cases.
I thought I would share what I found with the Sonnet Tech products.
Click to expand...

I’ve had a sonnet echo 3 for my protools hdx and UA octo card for years.
It’s very solid.
I just updated it from thunderbolt 2 to thunderbolt 3 for my new m2 max MacBook Pro.
..
 
We transitioned to Apple Silicon.

Stable Setup running Monterey 12.6.8 and the Protools 2023.06.0 under Rosetta and Native.

Mac Studio 32GB

Used Sonnet Echo 3 rack mount PCI chassis, Thunderbolt 2 version, TB3 isn't necessary for PT HDX or UAD cards.
(Changed cooling fans for quieter units)

Protools HDX PCIe card.

OWC Accelsior 1M2 M.2 SSD to PCIe 4.0 Adapter Card - for additional hard drive.

Inateck 4 port USB3 - PCIe card.

Apple TB3 to TB2 adapter cable. Apple# MMEL2ZM/A

USB-C dock for additional HDMI and Ethernet.
https://cpc.farnell.com/akasa/ak-cbca22-18bk/hub-usb-c-5-in-1/dp/CS33749?
 
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Well the echo express SE1 works like a dream although I had best results using pro tools 2023..3.
Although this version can not see a couple of my plugins as I work analog it does not make much difference.
But I can run a full session at 32 sample buffer!!


In preparation for the change I also replaced all the TOS link connectors on the RME Raydat!
 
Beware of noisy fans in enclosures, alot of ”pro audio” equipment has noisy fans. But as stated earlier you can check up on the specs of the fan an replace it for a noctua or similar quality for a small price.
 
I have a M1 Macbook pro and recently tried to use my UAD Quad card in a 2nd hand thunderbolt enclosure. To my huge surprise it installed flawlessly and without any problem. I haven't tried it under load yet. I was utterly surprised that it went so well, I had to replace and shelf the card some years ago because it didn't work with my then new AMD based PC.

Here in Berlin these chassis appear relatively often on the second hand market because film people don't need them any more.
 
Michael Tibes said:
I have a M1 Macbook pro and recently tried to use my UAD Quad card in a 2nd hand thunderbolt enclosure. To my huge surprise it installed flawlessly and without any problem. I haven't tried it under load yet. I was utterly surprised that it went so well, I had to replace and shelf the card some years ago because it didn't work with my then new AMD based PC.

Here in Berlin these chassis appear relatively often on the second hand market because film people don't need them any more.
Click to expand...
What make / model of enclosure is it?
 
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Quick heads up for M1 Mac Mini owners: the M1 only supports one monitor via Thunderbolt. You can run two monitors (via HDMI & USB-C or TB) but only one can be TB. This limitation is lifted in the M2
 

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