Frequent GPU crashes on 5K iMac (late 2014) and VW 2018

[acttheatre]

Hey friends, our main workstation is experiencing frequent hard crashes (brings the whole system down) while using larger drawings in Vectorworks 2018 and Mojave 10.14.6.   The machine is a 5K iMac, 4GB gpu, 32GB RAM.  We are about to upgrade to VW 2020 and Catalina but I'm wondering if the crashing will follow the new version.  VW has never been terribly stable on the Mac and I'm wondering if it is even worth doing the 2020 upgrade?

 

I can see in the Console logs that the GPU is the thing falling over and crashing, what other testing can we do to narrow down the cause?

[jcogdell]

What type of GPU is it and how old are the drivers for the GPU?

Also how big are the VWX files?

 

 

[acttheatre]

The files range from 20MB to 160MB.

 

We only use the Apple-provided drivers.  So whatever is installed with Mojave:

 

 

AMD Radeon R9 M295X:

 

  Chipset Model: AMD Radeon R9 M295X

  Type: GPU

  Bus: PCIe

  PCIe Lane Width: x16

  VRAM (Total): 4 GB

  Vendor: AMD (0x1002)

  Device ID: 0x6938

  Revision ID: 0x0000

  ROM Revision: 113-C773AA-731

  VBIOS Version: 113-C773A1-014

  EFI Driver Version: 01.00.731

  Metal: Supported, feature set macOS GPUFamily2 v1

  Displays:

Display:

  Resolution: 5120 x 2880 (5K/UHD+ - Ultra High Definition Plus)

  UI Looks like: 2560 x 1440 @ 60 Hz

  Framebuffer Depth: 24-Bit Color (ARGB8888)

  Main Display: Yes

  Automatically Adjust Brightness: No

[zoomer]

I think your iMac is well within Specs.

 

 

So if there is no Problem to find on the software side,

not very likely, but there could be something hardware related too.

I think your iMac is up to 6 years old (?)

I could imagine that meanwhile there came some dust in the fan(s)

and the thermal paste may be dried.

In that case the cooling would be limited and that could lead to

GPU problems when it gets too hot.

 

But you should be able to notice that when the fan runs noticeably

faster than you were used to when it was new, even with low loads.

(Like my mother's 2006 white plastic iMac ?)

And it is worth to check temps under load with an App that can read

temperatures, like iStat Pro.

If that would be the case it may be worth to order the suitable iFixit Kit

to open and clean up the case. Maybe even upgrade some RAM and SSD.

Edited February 18, 2020 by zoomer