Is it too much to ask for a bit of power in a 13-inch laptop? And why, in 2020, must I choose between Mac software and the ability to play some games. In these dark times I wonder: will I ever have it all? And what must I sacrifice to get to that hallowed ground?
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Fortunately there is an answer, and it really boils down to time and dignity. More specifically it means diving head first into the choppy waters of hackintoshing your laptop, then into the even choppier waters of dual booting Windows and macOS. It’s a nightmare, and I wouldn’t recommend it to anyone who loves themselves.
However, I decided to walk the dark and twisted path of hackintosh in pursuit of better performance in Photoshop. Just getting a 2017 MacBook Pro out of our IT department required moderate arm twisting, but its Kaby Lake processor left me pulling my hair out. Plus I was in need of a new personal laptop, so I thought: this is a project I can waste a weekend on.
And waste an entire weekend I did. Two, in fact. See, getting macOS to run on your laptop isn’t like it was back in the good old days where you just download some sketchy software off the internet and get what you get. No: I spent a weekend just trying to find a laptop with the right qualities: a replaceable Wi-Fi card (most new laptops have unsupported Wi-Fi cards soldered right in), and a recent processor but not the newest, because Apple hasn’t used them in real MacBooks yet.
One thing that has always been true is that, at the upper end, it almost always makes more sense to just buy a MacBook Pro. With modern hackintosh you download the seeds and grow the fruit yourself, but for most people just buying the fruit makes more sense. In this strained metaphor the fruit is a nice laptop that runs macOS. You get it.
I was interested in a hackintosh laptop not to save money, but because I love a challenge and wanted something a little more powerful.
Anyway, I was interested in a hackintosh laptop not to save money, but because I love a challenge and wanted something a little more powerful than what Apple offers. As I said above, simply finding a laptop that’s good for macOS these days isn’t easy, so when I found out that there’s a small community of people supporting the early 2019 Razer Blade Stealth, I had to jump in. It should be noted that you can't actually use the dedicated graphics card in macOS for a few complicated reasons, but you can at least dual boot into Windows for that sweet graphics acceleration.
The early 2019 Razer Blade Stealth (henceforth referred to as the Stealth) isn’t the last generation Stealth: it comes with an i7-8565U processor and an Nvidia MX150 graphics card. There is a newer model that uses Intel’s new i7-1065G7 10th generation chip and a GTX 1650 GPU, but this processor isn’t supported by macOS yet. Those new scissor-key 13 inch MacBook Pros may change that, and trust that I will be partaking (eventually.)
But I wanted a faster hackintosh with a dedicated GPU now, so I decided to pick up the older Stealth. I was able to get it up and running macOS Mojave in a weekend, but it wasn’t easy, and I couldn’t have done it without the help of some seriously smart hobbyists out there putting in the real work.
Here's what you need
The macOS part
If this is your first time hackintoshing I’d recommend watching the YouTube video below. There is a lot of ground to cover and it’s helpful to actually watch someone go through the steps, even if this tutorial isn’t specifically geared toward the Stealth.
Then you should look at Stonevil’s GitHub for the early 2019 Razer Blade Advanced, which is a different laptop but close enough that a lot of their tutorial applies. This is what two users on the Tonymacx86 forums adapted for the Stealth, so it’s helpful to see the original work. Just keep Stonevil’s guide open in a tab and refer to it when needed.
Thank you Stonevil, whoever you are.
Finally, visit this post and read the entire thing before asking questions, then look for either NONITS or Elmacci’s EFI folders, which contain all the drivers, ACPI, and config files you need to put on your USB drive to get the system to boot. I’m using some of NONITS files on my 1080p Stealth and almost everything is working swimmingly.
It should be noted that using someone else’s EFI folder, while convenient, presents a few problems. First, as you should have read in the guides above, if your computer and the creator’s differ even slightly (even with as little as a BIOS update), things can get messed up. You should use someone else’s EFI folder to get your computer up and running, then follow the tutorials above to generate your own DSDT and SSDT files. I would also recommend reading all of the sticky threads here.
Actually doing it
At this point you should have followed the tutorials above and created a USB flash drive with the macOS installer of your choice (I’m running Mojave) and installed Clover bootloader and copied over the EFI files from the forums. If any of what I just said seems alien that just means you didn’t read the stuff above. I totally get it, but you’ve got to do it.
Now you’re going to plug your USB drive into one slot and your USB mouse into the other, because the trackpad isn’t going to work during the installation. Then you’re going to power on the Stealth and jam F12 until the boot menu comes up. Choose “UEFI + [your flash drive’s name]” to boot into Clover.
Just format the whole drive as APFS.
Now refer back to the tutorials above to format your SSD and install macOS. With NONITS EFI folder this was extremely straightforward; it basically just worked. One note though: just format your whole drive as APFS, even if you want to dual boot Windows later. Scroll down to the “Windows” section of Stonevil’s GitHub for instructions on dual booting. This really goofed me up, so read carefully.
Now that macOS is installed you’re almost there! So exciting, right? Now all that’s left to do is install Clover on your boot drive and migrate that EFI folder onto your SSD so that you don’t have to rely on your USB drive anymore. Once you do that you’ll be able to boot into macOS like normal.
There are a few things left to do. You should disable hibernation, per Stonevil’s guide, and then you need to generate new serials and board numbers for your Stealth so that you’re not using the same ones as NONITS.
Notes from my experience with the Stealth
At this point I have my Stealth running macOS Mojave pretty well. I decided to get this Sabrent 1TB drive and the Dell DW1560 Wi-Fi card listed above, though I’m still waiting for the latter to come in the mail. In the meantime I’m using a USB Wi-Fi adapter (like this one), and you should know that it’s not great and I wouldn’t recommend it because it can interfere with sleep. Also, on past versions of macOS you needed to have an internal Wi-Fi card to get iMessage up and running, as well as proper system definitions. Since I’m an Android boy now this doesn’t apply to me, but good luck.
One other thing I’ve noticed is that, in order to get the laptop to run in 25 watt mode (which for me means 2x faster video encoding, among other things) I have to be plugged into the original Stealth charger. Using a real MacBook Pro charger only gives me 15 watts.
That’s it! If you’ve made it this far, congratulations, you’ve got a really cool laptop that runs macOS now. There will probably be things that don’t work perfectly, but for me that’s half the fun.
To use an eGPU, a Mac with an Intel processor is required.
An eGPU can give your Mac additional graphics performance for professional apps, 3D gaming, VR content creation, and more.
eGPUs are supported by any Mac with an Intel processor and Thunderbolt 3 ports1 running macOS High Sierra 10.13.4 or later. Learn how to update the software on your Mac.
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An eGPU lets you do all this on your Mac:
- Accelerate apps that use Metal, OpenGL, and OpenCL
- Connect additional external monitors and displays
- Use virtual reality headsets plugged into the eGPU
- Charge your MacBook Pro while using the eGPU
- Use an eGPU with your MacBook Pro while its built-in display is closed
- Connect an eGPU while a user is logged in
- Connect more than one eGPU using the multiple Thunderbolt 3 (USB-C) ports on your Mac2
- Use the menu bar item to safely disconnect the eGPU
- View the activity levels of built-in and external GPUs (Open Activity Monitor, then choose Window > GPU History.)
eGPU support in apps
eGPU support in macOS High Sierra 10.13.4 and later is designed to accelerate Metal, OpenGL, and OpenCL apps that benefit from a powerful eGPU. Not all apps support eGPU acceleration; check with the app's developer to learn more.3
In general, an eGPU can accelerate performance in these types of apps:
- Pro apps designed to utilize multiple GPUs
- 3D games, when an external monitor is attached directly to the eGPU
- VR apps, when the VR headset is attached directly to the eGPU
- Pro apps and 3D games that accelerate the built-in display of iMac, iMac Pro, MacBook Air, and MacBook Pro (This capability must be enabled by the app's developer.)
You can configure applications to use an eGPU with one of the following methods.
Use the Prefer External GPU option
Starting with macOS Mojave 10.14, you can turn on Prefer External GPU in a specific app's Get Info panel in the Finder. This option lets the eGPU accelerate apps on any display connected to the Mac—including displays built in to iMac, iMac Pro, MacBook Air, and MacBook Pro:
- Quit the app if it's open.
- Select the app in the Finder. Most apps are in your Applications folder. If you open the app from an alias or launcher, Control-click the app's icon and choose Show Original from the pop-up menu. Then select the original app.
- Press Command-I to show the app's info window.
- Select the checkbox next to Prefer External GPU.
- Open the app to use it with the eGPU.
You won't see this option if an eGPU isn't connected, if your Mac isn't running macOS Mojave or later, or if the app self-manages its GPU selection. Some apps, such as Final Cut Pro, directly choose which graphics processors are used and will ignore the Prefer External GPU checkbox.
Set an external eGPU-connected display as the primary display
If you have an external display connected to your eGPU, you can choose it as the primary display for all apps. Since apps default to the GPU associated with the primary display, this option works with a variety of apps:
- Quit any open apps that you want the eGPU to accelerate on the primary display.
- Choose Apple menu > System Preferences. Select Displays, then select the Arrangement tab.
- Drag the white menu bar to the box that represents the display that's attached to the eGPU.
- Open the apps that you want to use with the eGPU.
If you disconnect the eGPU, your Mac defaults back to the internal graphics processors that drives the built-in display. When the eGPU is re-attached, it automatically sets the external display as the primary display.
About macOS GPU drivers
Mac hardware and GPU software drivers have always been deeply integrated into the system. This design fuels the visually rich and graphical macOS experience as well as many deeper platform compute and graphics features. These include accelerating the user interface, providing support for advanced display features, rendering 3D graphics for pro software and games, processing photos and videos, driving powerful GPU compute features, and accelerating machine learning tasks. This deep integration also enables optimal battery life while providing for greater system performance and stability.
Apple develops, integrates, and supports macOS GPU drivers to ensure there are consistent GPU capabilities across all Mac products, including rich APIs like Metal, Core Animation, Core Image, and Core ML. In order to deliver the best possible customer experience, GPU drivers need to be engineered, integrated, tested, and delivered with each version of macOS. Aftermarket GPU drivers delivered by third parties are not compatible with macOS.
The GPU drivers delivered with macOS are also designed to enable a high quality, high performance experience when using an eGPU, as described in the list of recommended eGPU chassis and graphics card configurations below. Because of this deep system integration, only graphics cards that use the same GPU architecture as those built into Mac products are supported in macOS.
Supported eGPU configurations
It's important to use an eGPU with a recommended graphics card and Thunderbolt 3 chassis. If you use an eGPU to also charge your MacBook Pro, the eGPU's chassis needs to provide enough power to run the graphics card and charge the computer. Check with the manufacturer of the chassis to find out if it provides enough power for your MacBook Pro.
Recommended graphics cards, along with chassis that can power them sufficiently, are listed below.
Thunderbolt 3 all-in-one eGPU products
These products contain a powerful built-in GPU and supply sufficient power to charge your MacBook Pro.
Recommended Thunderbolt 3 all-in-one eGPUs:
- Blackmagic eGPU and Blackmagic eGPU Pro4
- Gigabyte RX 580 Gaming Box4
- Sonnet Radeon RX 570 eGFX Breakaway Puck
- Sonnet Radeon RX 560 eGFX Breakaway Puck5
AMD Radeon RX 470, RX 480, RX 570, RX 580, and Radeon Pro WX 7100
These graphics cards are based on the AMD Polaris architecture. Recommended graphics cards include the Sapphire Pulse series and the AMD WX series.
Recommended Thunderbolt 3 chassis for these graphics cards:
- OWC Mercury Helios FX4
- PowerColor Devil Box
- Sapphire Gear Box
- Sonnet eGFX Breakaway Box 350W
- Sonnet eGFX Breakaway Box 550W4
- Sonnet eGFX Breakaway Box 650W4
- Razer Core X4
- PowerColor Game Station4
- HP Omen4
- Akitio Node6
AMD Radeon RX Vega 56
These graphics cards are based on the AMD Vega 56 architecture. Recommended graphics cards include the Sapphire Vega 56.
Recommended Thunderbolt 3 chassis for these graphics cards:
- OWC Mercury Helios FX4
- PowerColor Devil Box
- Sonnet eGFX Breakaway Box 550W4
- Sonnet eGFX Breakaway Box 650W4
- Razer Core X4
- PowerColor Game Station4
AMD Radeon RX Vega 64, Vega Frontier Edition Air, and Radeon Pro WX 9100
These graphics cards are based on the AMD Vega 64 architecture. Recommended graphics cards include the Sapphire Vega 64, AMD Frontier Edition air-cooled, and AMD Radeon Pro WX 9100.
Recommended Thunderbolt 3 chassis for these graphics cards:
- Sonnet eGFX Breakaway Box 650W4
- Razer Core X4
AMD Radeon RX 5700, 5700 XT, and 5700 XT 50th Anniversary
If you've installed macOS Catalina 10.15.1 or later, you can use these graphics cards that are based on the AMD Navi RDNA architecture. Recommended graphics cards include the AMD Radeon RX 5700, AMD Radeon RX 5700 XT, and AMD Radeon RX 5700 XT 50th Anniversary.
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Recommended Thunderbolt 3 chassis for these graphics cards:
- Sonnet eGFX Breakaway Box 650W4
- Razer Core X4
Learn more
- Learn how to choose your GPU in Final Cut Pro 10.4.7 or later.
- To ensure the best eGPU performance, use the Thunderbolt 3 cable that came with your eGPU or an Apple Thunderbolt 3 (USB-C) cable. Also make sure that the cable is connected directly to a Thunderbolt 3 port on your Mac, not daisy-chained through another Thunderbolt device or hub.
- If you have questions about Thunderbolt 3 chassis or graphics cards, or about third-party app support and compatibility, contact the hardware or software provider.
- Software developers can learn more about programming their apps to take advantage of macOS eGPU support.
1. If you have a Mac mini (2018) with FileVault turned on, make sure to connect your primary display directly to Mac mini during startup. After you log in and see the macOS Desktop, you can unplug the display from Mac mini and connect it to your eGPU.
2. If you're using a 13-inch MacBook Pro from 2016 or 2017, always plug eGPUs and other high-performance devices into the left-hand ports for maximum data throughput.
3. macOS High Sierra 10.13.4 and later don't support eGPUs in Windows using Boot Camp or when your Mac is in macOS Recovery or installing system updates.
4. These chassis provide at least 85 watts of charging power, making them ideal for use with 15-inch MacBook Pro models.
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5. Playback of HDCP-protected content from iTunes and some streaming services is not supported on displays attached to Radeon 560-based eGPUs. You can play this content on the built-in display on MacBook Pro, MacBook Air, and iMac.
6. If you use Akitio Node with a Mac notebook, you might need to connect your Mac to its power adapter to ensure proper charging.