Apple's doesn't want to support Nvidia in macOS

[DrMacintosh]

With the official support of eGPUs in macOS High Sierra Nvidia released "Web Drivers" which added limited support for Nvidia GPUs to function in a macOS environment. Since then though, Apple has not allowed Nvidia to publish new drivers for any of the later versions of macOS, specifically Mojave. 

 

But why have they done this? Well, Apple and Nvidia have a bit of bad blood......

Quote

In 2004, the Apple Cinema Display was delayed and reportedly because of Nvidia's inability to produce the required graphics card, a GeForce 6800 Ultra DDL.

 

Then in October 2008, Apple had to admit that some MacBook Pros had faulty Nvidia processors. Back in July of that year, Nvidia itself had admitted problems though when AppleInsider asked, the company refused to confirm that its chips were causing the MacBook problems.

By this point Nvidia was doing more than straight graphics processing. It was also providing a way for Apple to integrate and connect these GPUs to the rest of the MacBook. This substantially improved the graphics on the MacBooks —and got Nvidia into a legal battle with Intel. A technology lawsuit from Intel claimed that Nvidia's license did not allow it to make such competing, compatible chipsets. The case and an overlapping countersuit wouldn't be resolved until 2011.

 

Around the same time, the iPhone transformed the mobile computing market and meant phones now needed GPUs. Nvidia had been rumored back in 2006 to be what would power Apple's forthcoming product but that was using the Tegra processor which then didn't ship until 2009. 

 

At this time, Nvidia may have then believed that its own patents also applied to the GPUs in mobiles. The company tried to get companies to buy licenses for this technology and in 2013 then went as far as filing patent infringement suits against Qualcomm and Samsung. 

If Nvidia tried getting Apple to pay its license fees then Apple seemingly said no. In 2016, it also said no to putting Nvidia processors in the 15-inch MacBook Pro. Instead, Apple went with AMD GPUs publicly because of performance per watt issues, but the real reason is anybody's guess.

So as you can see, Apple and Nvidia have a long history of poor business interactions, and those aren't even all of them. One of the biggest infractions was that Nvidia refused to admit any fault and provide compensation for failing GPUs inside MacBooks with failing Nvidia GPUs. 

 

Some people have claimed that this decision is Apple being "anticompetitive." However, the way I see it, Nvidia is the one responsible causing the situation they are in and for refusing to play ball. Apple isn't going to do business with a company that (from their perspective) provides an inferior product that costs more. Nvidia made their bed with their poor business practices, and now they have to sleep in it. 

 

Nvidia of course does not believe that they have done anything wrong and believe Apple is unjustified in blocking support for their GPUs. Providing this statement when asked about the status of web drivers for later versions of macOS

Quote

Developers using Macs with NVIDIA graphics cards are reporting that after upgrading from 10.13 to 10.14 (Mojave) they are experiencing rendering regressions and slow performance. 

Apple fully controls drivers for Mac OS. Unfortunately, NVIDIA currently cannot release a driver unless it is approved by Apple. 

Our hardware works on OS 10.13 which supports up to (and including) Pascal.

Nvidia cards have no technological limitations to working on macOS, but internal politics demand that Nvidia cards be out of the picture. 

 

Developers were asked about any insight that they had on the subject:

Quote

What we found was support inside the Spaceship for the idea, but a lack of will to allow Nvidia GPUs. We've spoken with several dozen developers inside Apple, obviously not authorized to speak on behalf of the company, who feel that support for Nvidia's higher-end cards would be welcome, but disallowed quietly at higher levels of the company.

"It's not like we have any real work to do on it, Nvidia has great engineers," said one developer in a sentiment echoed by nearly all of the Apple staff we spoke with. "It's not like Metal 2 can't be moved to Nvidia with great performance. Somebody just doesn't want it there."

One developer went so far as to call it "quiet hostility" between long-time Apple managers and Nvidia.

For sure, somebody at Apple in the upper echelons doesn't want Nvidia support going forward right now. But, even off the record, nobody seemed to have any idea who it is. The impression we got is that it was some kind of passed-down knowledge with the origin of the policy lost to the mists of time, or an unwritten rule like so many in baseball.

I personally have no idea who this person could be, it must be some long standing person in a leadership position with either an engineering or software background. Hell, it could be Tim Cook himself, but I doubt we will ever find out who it is. 

 

The authors of this article seem to believe that it would be in Apples best interest to support Nvidia cards for their upcoming Mac Pro, but I don't see why Apple should

Quote

Apple just doesn't allow modern Nvidia GPUs on macOS Mojave, and this is a dramatic change from only six months ago. Given that a new Mac Pro is coming that could support Nvidia cards, and there are already eGPUs that should, it's time that Apple did.

Why should Apple do business with a company that doesn't give them a good deal? And in the context of macOS, what do their cards offer that AMD cards do not?

 

CUDA? Apple would rather people use OpenGL and programs on macOS don't use CUDA acceleration.

Compute performance? HELLO? Radeon VII?

Ray Tracing? You mean the latest scam from Nvidia?

3D Performance? Its not like macOS has an extensive game library to use it on.....

Performance per watt? AMD has been "good enough" for a long time....also Vega 16/20 are amazing graphics solutions that run in 35-45 watt packages. 

 

Simply put AMD offers enough performance and does good business with Apple. They provide reliable cards that do what customers ask of them and they don't go crying to the courts when things get rough. 

 

What do you think? Should Apple allow Nvidia to keep publishing drivers? Should Apple do business with a company that does not respect them? 

 

I personally fully support Apple in this case. AMD is a better company to do business with, and I would rather have their graphics solutions in all Mac computers #BetterRed

 

Spoiler

The Hackintosh community is directly effected by this as well. People who plan to create or covert rigs into Hackintoshes are going to be forced to use AMD Graphics cards if they want a suable experience. Currently you cannot even see your boot screen if you don't have an AMD GPU with flashed firmware. 

Source: https://appleinsider.com/articles/19/01/18/apples-management-doesnt-want-nvidia-support-in-macos-and-thats-a-bad-sign-for-the-mac-pro

[Guest]

Oh that cool ill just install a kext then

[DrMacintosh]

1 minute ago, RorzNZ said:

Oh that cool ill just install a kext then

As said, performance and actual functionality is more sketchy than an etch a sketch

[Guest]

Just now, DrMacintosh said:

As said, performance and actual functionality is more sketchy than an etch a sketch

You'd be surprised what people have gotten to work with MacOS.

[DrMacintosh]

Just now, RorzNZ said:

You'd be surprised what people have gotten to work with MacOS.

Oh I've seen that stuff. Getting it to work is very different from people actually using it. 

[Trik'Stari]

Good to see two completely anti-competitive, absolute shit companies, going at each others throats for the behavior that both actively engage in.

[Trixanity]

Perhaps Apple should throw a couple of billion dollars towards AMD to aid development like they did with display panels. Just saying...

[Trik'Stari]

1 minute ago, Trixanity said:

Perhaps Apple should throw a couple of billion dollars towards AMD to aid development like they did with display panels. Just saying...

Or maybe they could stop being psychotic over what hardware their platform runs on, join the 21st century, and focus solely on software?

[Blademaster91]

4 hours ago, Trik'Stari said:

Or maybe they could stop being psychotic over what hardware their platform runs on, join the 21st century, and focus solely on software?

I completely agree with this, it's Apple so of course not surprising they can blame everyone else for hardware issues.

I'm just pointing it out but no mention of the 2011 15" and 17" macbook pro Radeon GPU failures, which also affected the the 2012-2013 15" retina models,  Apple didn't open a repair program up until 2015. So Apple engages in that behavior too, seems pretty anti competitive and a lack of respect towards their consumers, but I can't blame AMD for that issue.

However it isn't Nvidia's fault that Apple continued to use Nvidia GPUs, and other manufacturers using GPU's from Nvidia didn't have issues. Apple being able to arm twist Nvidia into not providing drivers sucks, especially for the scientific community and rendering  that needs CUDA applications. AMD's performance per watt is good enough and great for compute loads, but another 45 watts into Apple's already hot running throttlebooks doesn't seem good either when they refuse to make a mobile machine suited for professional use.

[Trixanity]

5 minutes ago, Trik'Stari said:

Or maybe they could stop being psychotic over what hardware their platform runs on, join the 21st century, and focus solely on software?

Just software? Are you really saying Apple should kill their entire product stack? 

[DrMacintosh]

6 minutes ago, Blademaster91 said:

AMD's performance per watt is "good enough" but another 45 watts into Apple's already hot running throttlebooks doesn't seem good either when they refuse to make a mobile machine suited for professional use.

As opposed to the same wattage (or more) from an Nvidia Card? Also these Vega chips have actually improved thermal performance and the CPUs not longer throttle below base clocks. 

[Trik'Stari]

12 minutes ago, Trixanity said:

Just software? Are you really saying Apple should kill their entire product stack? 

Considering how overpriced and badly overdesigned most of their products are (from a purely hardware standpoint)?

 

Absolutely.

[DrMacintosh]

1 minute ago, Trik'Stari said:

Considering how overpriced and badly overdesigned most of their products are (from a purely hardware standpoint)?

 

Absolutely.

Every investor of any stock ever, just laughed at your face. 

[suicidalfranco]

defending a corporation that don't want to let the users of it's product use product from an another corporation because they can't accept that most of the things they design have flaws

How low have we fall to deem this sort of behaviour acceptable

> No. Apple should not have a say on what people want to run with their machines

> Apple wouldn't even do the bulk of the work in the development of the driver other than signing it

> would it be acceptable that one day out of nowhere Apple decides to partner up with Nikon and stop Cannon camera from being recognised by iMovie/Photos/FC/Aperture? Cause this is the kind of bullshit we are going towards

 

If Apple doesn't want to use Nvidia dGPU in their Macbooks, fine, that's their decision and up to them want they want to put inside of their laptop, just like it's their own decision to put powerful CPU with anaemic cooling solution.

Blocking people form using external hardware because BS reasons is wrong in every sense.

[Blademaster91]

3 hours ago, DrMacintosh said:

As opposed to the same wattage (or more) from an Nvidia Card? Also these Vega chips have actually improved thermal performance and the CPUs not longer throttle below base clocks. 

Apple shouldn't be blocking the use of Nvidia cards though, it would be a better business interest to not tell people to go away and buy or build Windows or Linux PC's if people need to work with CUDA or RT.

And the Vega20 in the macbook pro has improved thermal performance because AMD makes a cut down a Vega chip to fit Apple's specs,and the CPU's still don't perform at higher clocks because of the cooling used but Apple tried to blame Intel for it.

3 hours ago, DrMacintosh said:

Every investor of any stock ever, just laughed at your face. 

And thats the problem with Apple, they care more about their investors than their customers.

[DrMacintosh]

3 minutes ago, Blademaster91 said:

And thats the problem with Apple, they care more about their investors than their customers

That’s how any successful company operates. Investors own and control everything. Nothing happenes without investor approval. 

[Arika]

this is like school yard fighting.

 

"remember back in 4th grade when you gave me a wedgie? well you're not allowed to play with us anymore"

[Bouzoo]

49 minutes ago, Trik'Stari said:

Good to see two completely anti-competitive, absolute shit companies, going at each others throats for the behavior that both actively engage in.

Don't miss Qualcomm vs Apple or Qualcomm vs the rest of the world. 

[Mihle]

A company that want to control almost everything they do (Apple) don't fit to work together with a cocky company that want to control almost everything they do  (Nvidia).

 

Either one of them have to let the other take most control or they both have to back down and work together. With Nvidia and Apple, neither of them want to.

 

AMD is the person that will let someone else take control as long as it benefits them enough. AMD aren't as demanding. If they have to to get the deal, they are willing to go down to a price that has lower profit than Nvidia would, because they aren't as cocky.

[GoldenLag]

2 minutes ago, Mihle said:

AMD is the person that will let someone else take control as long as it benefits them enough. AMD aren't as demanding. If they have to to get the deal, they are willing to go down to a price that has lower profit than Nvidia would, because they aren't as cocky.

Its mostly related to the fact that AMD is probably the most money hungry company of the three

[D13H4RD]

Apple and NVIDIA

 

Throw Qualcomm in the mix and how we have the dynamic trio.

[Master Disaster]

1 hour ago, DrMacintosh said:

With the official support of eGPUs in macOS High Sierra Nvidia released "Web Drivers" which added limited support for Nvidia GPUs to function in a macOS environment. Since then though, Apple has not allowed Nvidia to publish new drivers for any of the later versions of macOS, specifically Mojave. 

 

But why have they done this? Well, Apple and Nvidia have a bit of bad blood......

So as you can see, Apple and Nvidia have a long history of poor business interactions, and those aren't even all of them. One of the biggest infractions was that Nvidia refused to admit any fault and provide compensation for failing GPUs inside MacBooks with failing Nvidia GPUs. 

 

Some people have claimed that this decision is Apple being "anticompetitive." However, the way I see it, Nvidia is the one responsible causing the situation they are in and for refusing to play ball. Apple isn't going to do business with a company that (from their perspective) provides an inferior product that costs more. Nvidia made their bed with their poor business practices, and now they have to sleep in it. 

 

Nvidia of course does not believe that they have done anything wrong and believe Apple is unjustified in blocking support for their GPUs. Providing this statement when asked about the status of web drivers for later versions of macOS

Nvidia cards have no technological limitations to working on macOS, but internal politics demand that Nvidia cards be out of the picture. 

 

Developers were asked about any insight that they had on the subject:

I personally have no idea who this person could be, it must be some long standing person in a leadership position with either an engineering or software background. Hell, it could be Tim Cook himself, but I doubt we will ever find out who it is. 

 

The authors of this article seem to believe that it would be in Apples best interest to support Nvidia cards for their upcoming Mac Pro, but I don't see why Apple should

Why should Apple do business with a company that doesn't give them a good deal? And in the context of macOS, what do their cards offer that AMD cards do not?

 

CUDA? Apple would rather people use OpenGL and programs on macOS don't use CUDA acceleration.

Compute performance? HELLO? Radeon VII?

Ray Tracing? You mean the latest scam from Nvidia?

3D Performance? Its not like macOS has an extensive game library to use it on.....

Performance per watt? AMD has been "good enough" for a long time....also Vega 16/20 are amazing graphics solutions that run in 35-45 watt packages. 

 

Simply put AMD offers enough performance and does good business with Apple. They provide reliable cards that do what customers ask of them and they don't go crying to the courts when things get rough. 

 

What do you think? Should Apple allow Nvidia to keep publishing drivers? Should Apple do business with a company that does not respect them? 

 

I personally fully support Apple in this case. AMD is a better company to do business with, and I would rather have their graphics solutions in all Mac computers #BetterRed

 

  Reveal hidden contents

The Hackintosh community is directly effected by this as well. People who plan to create or covert rigs into Hackintoshes are going to be forced to use AMD Graphics cards if they want a suable experience. Currently you cannot even see your boot screen if you don't have an AMD GPU with flashed firmware. 

Source: https://appleinsider.com/articles/19/01/18/apples-management-doesnt-want-nvidia-support-in-macos-and-thats-a-bad-sign-for-the-mac-pro

Hate to break it to ya but this happens every time an OS upgrade happens, it's usually between 4 to 6 months before we get an Nvidia Web Update (Sierra was on 10.12.2 before we got an Nvidia driver) but they always come despite my regular hackintosh forum exploding with users declaring it's not happening.

 

My hack partition is stuck on 10.13.3 right now anyway because the AMD kernel for Mohave isn't fully finished and even once it is I'm running an Nvidia GPU.

[COTG]

1 hour ago, GoldenLag said:

Its mostly related to the fact that AMD is probably the most money hungry company of the three

oof buddy

[GoldenLag]

1 minute ago, COTG said:

oof buddy

What you mean "oof"

 

Out of three companies where 2 have lots of money and one is in debt. Who is more hungry for cash?

 

There is a difference between being hungry and greedy

[Ashley MLP Fangirl]

personally i'm against this. not everyone has the money to just go buy another gpu when their nvidia card worked on the previous OS. 

 

i don't support nvidia. i think they are an awful company but i do support people who are on a "budget" in the sense that they cannot spend another $500 on a new GPU after already having bought a Mac, some kind of external gpu enclosure and an expensive Nvidia gpu. 

 

IMO nvidia should be able to release drivers for it's older cards so that people who already own them can still use them. if they wanted to do this they should have banned nvidia for releasing drivers for any new cards that come out. not supporting older cards can be a big financial issue for some people...