2006/2007 Mac Pro (1,1/2,1) and OS X El Capitan

[chrisrand]

Hi

This tool should help you https://github.com/timsutton/brigadier

 

[drkheure]

This tool should help you https://github.com/timsutton/brigadier

I had noticed the tool before.
So now gave it a try.
It downloads fine. Bootcamp-031-11269
When i try to run setup as admin, I get boot camp x64 is unsupported on this computer model .
( sounds like apple )
The only drivers I realy want , like bootcamp64, can not be selected to be installed as admin.
It the says, this installation requires elevated privileges. Launch the installer through setup.exe.
Any ideas ?
Before I try things like running the explorer as admin and then double click the packages, should I want to install bootcamp or bootcamp64 ? Or both ?

 

[chrisrand]

I had noticed the tool before.

1. Launch CMD.exe as an administrator. You can do this by right-clicking on it and selecting RUN AS ADMINISTRATOR or left-clicking on it while holding CTRL+SHIFT to do the same.
2. Change to your boot camp installation directory- in my case C:\users\administrator\desktop\bootcamp6\drivers\apple
3. Execute the following command: msiexec /i bootcamp.msi

 

[drkheure]

1. Launch CMD.exe as an administrator. You can do this by right-clicking on it and selecting RUN AS ADMINISTRATOR or left-clicking on it while holding CTRL+SHIFT to do the same.
2. Change to your boot camp installation directory- in my case C:\users\administrator\desktop\bootcamp6\drivers\apple
3. Execute the following command: msiexec /i bootcamp.msi

I tried on both bootcamp and bootcamp64.
bot times I get that I must be running windows7
edit :
I then tried with the installer I downloaded using my macbookpromid2010. This one installed.
I now have the bootcamp control panel, which lets me select how to startup. I saw it install other drivers which are not needed. like the sdcard reader from the macbook. but that does no harm I guess.
Now I have to decide how to put windows 10 on my SSD. I currently boot on that ssd using chimera to get into yosemite and windows7. both off which I will no longer use. Could I give the entire ssd to windows10 ? And partition as guid ?

 

[flyinmac]

I tried on both bootcamp and bootcamp64.
bot times I get that I must be running windows7
edit :
I then tried with the installer I downloaded using my macbookpromid2010. This one installed.
I now have the bootcamp control panel, which lets me select how to startup. I saw it install other drivers which are not needed. like the sdcard reader from the macbook. but that does no harm I guess.
Now I have to decide how to put windows 10 on my SSD. I currently boot on that ssd using chimera to get into yosemite and windows7. both off which I will no longer use. Could I give the entire ssd to windows10 ? And partition as guid ?

Try reading this article

http://techiemusings.typepad.com/te...o-defeat-version-checking-in-bootcampmsi.html

Using Orca, you can delete the version checking in boot camp.

If the above article doesn't get you going, do a search for

Boot camp orca

 

[kunoichidee]

I'm sorry to post the question that might have been answered before, but I'm totally lost after searching and trying....

The situation:

I have a mac pro 1.1
I put it in target disk mode and connected it through firewire to my macbook pro running el capitan.
I swiped the disk clean and made a new clean install of el capitan on the mac pro harddisk.
It rebooted and switched possitions; booted my macbook pro with the hdd of the mac pro with my macbook pro hdd in target disk mode. When I went to switch the boot.efi files I noticed this as I couldn't delete one of the boot.efi files. So I switched again to boot my macbook pro with it's own disk and the mac pro disk in target mode.
I then replaced the boot.efi files on the installation of the mac pro disk.
I then went in to disk utility to heal the disk. all went well.
I ejected it and attempted to start the mac pro up again.

To no avail. it got stuck on a flashing map icon with a question mark and ratling sound.
I then tried to boot in boot chooser and I get the option of Macintosh HD or Recovery of el Capitan.
Either one I select goes to an empty white-ish screen with a different ratling sound.
and it doesn't end.

I'm doubting I have the correct boot.efi file now.
Is that possible?
Can someone point me to the correct file?
Also, should the boot.efi file be always named that way or can it also be named boot-grey.efi ?
What about the terminal check after downloading that is talked about?
I always get the answer of terminal: no such directory found....?

Please help.... Thank you all for your great work already, it gives me hope to at least be able to use this beast of a machine again. But I'm totally lost on all information on this forum...

 

[rthpjm]

I'm sorry to post the question that might have been answered before, but I'm totally lost after searching and trying....

The situation:

I have a mac pro 1.1
I put it in target disk mode and connected it through firewire to my macbook pro running el capitan.
I swiped the disk clean and made a new clean install of el capitan on the mac pro harddisk.
It rebooted and switched possitions; booted my macbook pro with the hdd of the mac pro with my macbook pro hdd in target disk mode. When I went to switch the boot.efi files I noticed this as I couldn't delete one of the boot.efi files. So I switched again to boot my macbook pro with it's own disk and the mac pro disk in target mode.
I then replaced the boot.efi files on the installation of the mac pro disk.
I then went in to disk utility to heal the disk. all went well.
I ejected it and attempted to start the mac pro up again.

To no avail. it got stuck on a flashing map icon with a question mark and ratling sound.
I then tried to boot in boot chooser and I get the option of Macintosh HD or Recovery of el Capitan.
Either one I select goes to an empty white-ish screen with a different ratling sound.
and it doesn't end.

I'm doubting I have the correct boot.efi file now.
Is that possible?
Can someone point me to the correct file?
Also, should the boot.efi file be always named that way or can it also be named boot-grey.efi ?
What about the terminal check after downloading that is talked about?
I always get the answer of terminal: no such directory found....?

Please help.... Thank you all for your great work already, it gives me hope to at least be able to use this beast of a machine again. But I'm totally lost on all information on this forum...

Hello kunoichidee,

Go back two pages, read the posts on page 122. They should help you.
When you install using target disk mode form another Mac, you must ensure you replace the correct files for your MacPro disk, and you should also be aware that the Recovery HD will need to be modified too in order to work.

Or you could use the pikify method if your memory capacity is high enough, see page 56, post 1390. The pikify method works well and has the added benefit that it creates both a working MacOS partition and a working Recovery HD....

If you continue to use the target disk mode install method, then I also posted previously a script to fix the Recovery HD. Search this thread for rrhd (recover the Recovery HD). Sorry I can't remember the page, post number...

 

[kunoichidee]

Hello kunoichidee,

Go back two pages, read the posts on page 122. They should help you.
When you install using target disk mode form another Mac, you must ensure you replace the correct files for your MacPro disk, and you should also be aware that the Recovery HD will need to be modified too in order to work.

Or you could use the pikify method if your memory capacity is high enough, see page 56, post 1390. The pikify method works well and has the added benefit that it creates both a working MacOS partition and a working Recovery HD....

If you continue to use the target disk mode install method, then I also posted previously a script to fix the Recovery HD. Search this thread for rrhd (recover the Recovery HD). Sorry I can't remember the page, post number...

Hi rthpjm

Thank you for your reply. I found your information about the recovery HD which worked.
I now have booted into the recovery HD.
But I am warry to just do something... I can't seem to find what to do next.
Do I need to still open Terminal now etc?
What's next? So I don't break what I finally got working now...

Sorry for asking the step by step... almost there!
[doublepost=1480807702][/doublepost]Ok I accidently made me have no access to terminal or anything anymore, so I just rebooted and let it boot in the main hd. And tadaaaa it's working!

THANK YOU SO MUCH EVERYONE! This beast of a machine is back from the dead!

Do I now still need to do anything to prevent future issues?
[doublepost=1480809068][/doublepost]Ok, I do seem to have a problem, or is it just the looks?

I checked the specs of the mac, and I am 100% sure it is a quad core, but now it sais:
Dual-Core Intel Xeon 2 x 3 GHz

Anyone have an idea?

 

[drkheure]

Hi rthpjm

I checked the specs of the mac, and I am 100% sure it is a quad core, but now it sais:
Dual-Core Intel Xeon 2 x 3 GHz

Anyone have an idea?

ignore it. I think its a firmware issue. all cores will be used.

 

[rthpjm]

Hi rthpjm

Thank you for your reply. I found your information about the recovery HD which worked.
I now have booted into the recovery HD.
But I am warry to just do something... I can't seem to find what to do next.
Do I need to still open Terminal now etc?
What's next? So I don't break what I finally got working now...

Sorry for asking the step by step... almost there!
[doublepost=1480807702][/doublepost]Ok I accidently made me have no access to terminal or anything anymore, so I just rebooted and let it boot in the main hd. And tadaaaa it's working!

THANK YOU SO MUCH EVERYONE! This beast of a machine is back from the dead!

Do I now still need to do anything to prevent future issues?
[doublepost=1480809068][/doublepost]Ok, I do seem to have a problem, or is it just the looks?

I checked the specs of the mac, and I am 100% sure it is a quad core, but now it sais:
Dual-Core Intel Xeon 2 x 3 GHz

Anyone have an idea?

2 physical Dual core processors = 4 cores
2x2=4

Is that what you mean?

 

[khanam]

Hello khanam,

You will definitely need to upgrade your graphics card. Apple no longer ships drivers for the 7300. You will still boot and see the display, but without a specific driver you don't get graphics acceleration, without acceleration the performance of the user interface is terrible. I have an XFX ATI Radeon HD 5770. It's a nice compromise of performance, price, and "flashability"....

thanks, got it. that one seems to be out of stock new on amazon. i have never bought a used video card and am not sure i want to take that risk. any other suggestions for a video card?
[doublepost=1480867963][/doublepost]

Yes.

I read somewhere a Radeon 7970 is compatible with a Mac Pro 2,1 as well. Is that correct? Also there are so many choices for a Radeon 7970 (or for that matter any video card) that I am confused which one is compatible with my machine. What should i check to ensure compatibility? Thanks

 

[hwojtek]

I read somewhere a Radeon 7970 is compatible with a Mac Pro 2,1 as well. Is that correct?

Yes.

Also there are so many choices for a Radeon 7970 (or for that matter any video card) that I am confused which one is compatible with my machine. What should i check to ensure compatibility? Thanks

I'd just make sure it has a 128kb or larger flash ROM (so you can actually fit the EFI reflash into it). If the card has a switch between an EFI and standard BIOS, you're good to go.

 

[Sko]

I read somewhere a Radeon 7970 is compatible with a Mac Pro 2,1 as well. Is that correct? Also there are so many choices for a Radeon 7970 (or for that matter any video card) that I am confused which one is compatible with my machine. What should i check to ensure compatibility? Thanks

Check this thread here on macrumors. Long story short, the card (7970 or r9 280x, 3 GB) has to have the same port layout as the reference mac edition card (1x DVI, 1x HDMI, 2x miniDP). And stay away from XFX cards.

 

[alienkidmj12]

you lot have probably heard this before, but what do i need to do to go from el capitan 10.11 to 10.11.6
i am being asked to upgrade the os on my mac pro 1,1. i have already patched install image with pikify3.1.v12 installed os and installed all my apps, i have also turned off sip. can anyone provide steps before running the upgrade ?

im also being asked to install el capitan recovery update 1.0

 

[mani girafe]

I WOULD LIKE INSTALL "EL CAPITAN" on my mac pro 1.1>2.1

actually MAVERICK 10.9.5 on SSD / 32 gigas RAM / Ati 4870 1024ram

Must i go to follow https://forums.macrumors.com/threads/2006-2007-mac-pro-1-1-2-1-and-os-x-el-capitan.1890435/page-56

or new procedure to make easily an USB installer ?

which PIKIFY version is good ?

MD5 (pikify3.1.v2.zip) = 80333eda8eecc3094f06d175bdba0a64
MD5 (pikify3.1.v8.zip) = 8ef0cf2b34e9c6751c0f1ac99b40dadc
MD5 (pikify3.1.v12.zip) = 170873c7029f611da798d07647766522

for update 10.11.O to LAST 10.11.6 ? SIP must be disabled ?

THNKS A LOT and SORRY for my English

 

[rthpjm]

I WOULD LIKE INSTALL "EL CAPITAN" on my mac pro 1.1>2.1

actually MAVERICK 10.9.5 on SSD / 32 gigas RAM / Ati 4870 1024ram

Must i go to follow https://forums.macrumors.com/threads/2006-2007-mac-pro-1-1-2-1-and-os-x-el-capitan.1890435/page-56

or new procedure to make easily an USB installer ?

which PIKIFY version is good ?

MD5 (pikify3.1.v2.zip) = 80333eda8eecc3094f06d175bdba0a64
MD5 (pikify3.1.v8.zip) = 8ef0cf2b34e9c6751c0f1ac99b40dadc
MD5 (pikify3.1.v12.zip) = 170873c7029f611da798d07647766522

for update 10.11.O to LAST 10.11.6 ? SIP must be disabled ?

THNKS A LOT and SORRY for my English

Pikify v12 is the most current
It has many additional checks

If you can download from the Mac App Store you will get the most current release 10.11.6

If you must start from 10.11.0, then be aware that the update to 10.11.6 will put the Apple boot.efi files in place. You will need to replace or protect the Pike versions of boot.efi

All the information you need is repeated many times from page 56 onwards....

 

[alienkidmj12]

I installed Boot 64 and have 10.11.6 No problems here.

Why o why did I not use Boot 64 in the past! So simple.

TC

did you go straight from 10.11.0 ?
[doublepost=1481311314][/doublepost]

Pikify v12 is the most current
It has many additional checks

If you can download from the Mac App Store you will get the most current release 10.11.6

If you must start from 10.11.0, then be aware that the update to 10.11.6 will put the Apple boot.efi files in place. You will need to replace or protect the Pike versions of boot.efi

All the information you need is repeated many times from page 56 onwards....

so if i install boot64 it should work, i dont see anyone going from 10.11.0 to 10.11.6

 

[alienkidmj12]

You are completely correct when you wrote "probably not the correct way to install this thing". The pikify.pkg is NOT intended to be run on an existing El Capitan volume.

The pikify3.1 set is used to create installable media, which you then use to install a fresh copy of El Capitan.

pikify.pkg is NOT designed to run on its own, it is designed to run from the Install Assistant. The Install Assistant passes in parameters. If you try to run it on its own those parameters are missing/unknown and therefore the package will not install.

If you are trying to modify an existing El Capitan installation, can I suggest that you re-read through the forum.

Ultimately all that is needed is to overwrite/replace the two boot.efi files.

1. Have the system in a position so that you can overwrite the boot.efi files
   • Boot from a different partition, change the boot.efi files manually
     • • Or
   • Boot from the Recovery partition, disable SIP using csrutil, reboot to your normal partition, change the boot.efi files manually
     • • Or
   • Modify your system to exclude the boot.efi files from SIP, change the boot.efi files manually
     • • Or
   • Modify your system to exclude the boot.efi files from SIP, install one of the automated boot.efi replacement tools

We are aiming to make the end user experience simpler and more Apple-like. Meaning, allow the Apple update mechanisms to do their thing whilst still maintaining the Pike copies of boot.efi. Ultimately allowing us to install updates, have it reboot our system and come straight back up without further manual intervention.

The last one in the list above gets most of us back to the Apple-like goal I mentioned above.

I think you really needed to follow the step-by-step instructions of post #1391. The "launch daemon" installer is the attachment at the bottom of that post (or CapitanPikeFix which does effectively the same thing can be found at post #1253.)

how to i check if CapitanPikeFix is running ?
[doublepost=1481315861][/doublepost]installed the captainpike tool, went straight from el cap 10.11.0 to 10.11.6 no problems found.

dave

 

[mani girafe]

Pikify v12 is the most current
It has many additional checks

If you can download from the Mac App Store you will get the most current release 10.11.6

If you must start from 10.11.0, then be aware that the update to 10.11.6 will put the Apple boot.efi files in place. You will need to replace or protect the Pike versions of boot.efi

All the information you need is repeated many times from page 56 onwards....

i dont know if i begin with CAPITAN 10.11.16 , i dl Installer CApitan but how can i found the version number in package ?

ONE MORE QUESTION :

I am in 2.1 EFI by TIAGO MAVERICK , if i make install , the system stay in 2.1 or will be 3.1 ?

 

[hwojtek]

i dont know if i begin with CAPITAN 10.11.16 , i dl Installer CApitan but how can i found the version number in package ?

App Store download is always of the current (or last) version. If you downloaded today, you have 10.11.6.

ONE MORE QUESTION :
I am in 2.1 EFI by TIAGO MAVERICK , if i make install , the system stay in 2.1 or will be 3.1 ?

How do you expect the OS X to upgrade the hardware in your computer? It is a 2,1 and it always will be.

 

[mani girafe]

App Store download is always of the current (or last) version. If you downloaded today, you have 10.11.6.

I launch APP STORE and he say : EL CAPITAN is not available

Somebody have a link for download ?

THANKS

 

[hwojtek]

I launch APP STORE and he say : EL CAPITAN is not available

Did you ever download it before?

 

[pedramdehghani]

Hi
Thanks for your instruction, but i faced a problem during installation, i have iMAC Pro v1 , when installation process going on, Hardware utility show in screen and i have 4 options: reinstall, help, HDD configuration and recovery, what i have to do? if i select reinstall , it takes 3 hours to download addisional components from apple.

Appreciate to help.

The race is on.

Who's the first to get OS X version 10.11 El Capitan booting perfectly on a 2006/2007 Mac Pro (1,1/2,1)?

UPDATE: Only one day later, 666sheep did it first!

This first post has now been updated with recent summarized information.


Simply looking to download the Piker-Alpha macosxbootloader for El Capitan? Links:

• El Capitan branch of the Piker-Alpha bootloader - still in active development
  
• rthpjm's Pikify installer script and accompanying files can build a pre-patched OS X El Capitan installer with the Piker-Alpha bootloader for the 2006/2007 Mac Pro
• MacVidCard's guide for installing El Capitan to a 2006/2007 Mac Pro using a second El Capitan-supported Mac

________________________________________________________________

If you have OS X El Capitan up and running on your 2006/2007 Mac Pro with Pike's boot loader, you should consider disabling "Install OS X updates" and "Install system data files and security updates" in System Preferences > App Store so that OS X doesn't automatically install any future updates that may overwrite Pike's boot.efi.
________________________________________________________________

If you find Pike's boot loader valuable in keeping your 2006/2007 Mac up-to-date, please consider simply thanking him via a comment on his blog, as he's done a lot of work without asking for anything in return or benefiting from this project. Thanks Pike!


How can these Macs run El Capitan?

Apple does not support OS X El Capitan on the original 2006/2007 Mac Pro and 2006 Xserve. These 64-bit Mac Pros and Xserves have EFI32 firmware and can't natively boot OS X El Capitan "out-of-the-box", but are easily capable of running it with a different boot loader. Once a new boot loader is used to launch the native 64-bit El Capitan kernel, OS X 10.11 boots and works normally exactly as it does on a 2008 Mac Pro or newer with EFI64 firmware.


Background:

OS X 10.6 Snow Leopard was the first OS X version with optional support for a 64-bit kernel, allowing booting either with a 32-bit or 64-bit kernel. However, Apple did not support booting the 64-bit kernel in Macs that shipped with EFI32 firmware, even if they had 64-bit processors capable of running the 64-bit kernel. When Apple dropped the 32-bit kernel entirely from OS X, starting with OS X 10.8 Mountain Lion, EFI32 Macs no longer had an Apple-supported mechanism to boot newer OS X versions.

The last version of OS X officially supported by Apple on the original 2006 Mac Pro MA356LL/A (MacPro1,1), 2007 Mac Pro (8-core) MA1186/A (MacPro2,1) and Xserve (Late 2006) MA409LL/A (Xserve1,1) models was OS X 10.7 Lion, and then only when booted with a 32-bit kernel due to their EFI32 firmware. However, these Macs were the most powerful and upgradable EFI32 models and have a 64-bit architecture, so the user community has been keeping them running with 64-bit kernels and newer OS X releases using a variety of methods.


The Piker-Alpha bootloader can be used to boot OS X 10.11 El Capitan on unsupported Mac Pro models:

This approach, using a fork of boot.efi boot loader that thunks EFI64 calls from the 64-bit OS X kernel to the EFI32 firmware.

Additional information about Pike's boot.efi is available at Pike's blog, Universum. There are two variations available, one with a legacy light grey background/dark grey Apple logo boot screen boot.efi that blends with the native EFI32 pre-boot screen (2008-2012 Mac Pro-style), and a new black background/white Apple logo boot screen boot.efi (2013 Mac Pro-style).

The simplest method to boot El Capitan on these Macs is the "pikify" createpikeinstallmedia script to create a pre-patched El Capitan installer with the El Capitan branch of the Piker-Alpha bootloader. This directly allows an El Capitan installer to run to be run to completion on a 2006/2007 Mac Pro.

Another alternative install on a 2006/2007 Mac Pro is to use a second El Capitan-supported Mac and install El Capitan to the 2006/2007 Mac Pro's drive. This may be done either by attaching the 2006/2007 Mac Pro's drive as an external drive by placing the 2006/2007 Mac Pro in target disk mode or otherwise mounting the 2006/2007 Mac Pro's drive to an El Capitan-supported Mac.

This alternative approach still requires installation of the Piker-Alpha bootloader before it can be successfully booted on a 2006/2007 Mac Pro. After installation, copy Pike's EFI32 boot.efi to that drive's /usr/standalone/i386 and /System/Library/CoreServices/ directories overwriting the stock Apple EFI64 boot.efi. That drive should now be bootable on a 2006/2007 Mac Pro, although sometimes it still may need to be blessed in the 2006/2007 Mac Pro.

Disabling System Integrity Protection (SIP) may be required to replace the boot.efi in-place.

Alternatively, there's also an approach in the boot.efi development thread to exclude these files from SIP, but it has shown mixed results.

While this method is preferred because it's a native EFI boot, there is real risk that installing future El Capitan updates could overwrite Pike's EFI32 boot.efi if Apple were to update the stock EFI64 boot.efi. This has already happened in the few previous OS X El Capitan updates. When this happens, the system would no longer be natively bootable on a 2006/2007 Mac Pro until it had Apple's stock boot.efi re-replaced with Pike's boot.efi again. A simple approach to help protect against this is CaptainPikeFix, a launch daemon that re-copies the EFI32 boot.efi to proper locations at shutdown, but this approach requires disabling SIP.


Support for Handoff in El Capitan to allow AirDrop, Continuity and Instant Hotspot with iOS devices:

The original Airport Extreme (802.11a/b/g/draft-n Wi-Fi) and Bluetooth 2.0+EDR options from Apple don't support Handoff. Several vendors, including MacVidCards, sell new add-on hardware kits to retrofit older Mac Pros with 802.11ac Wi-Fi and Bluetooth 4.0 LE that work in 2006/2007 Mac Pros to allow Handoff. There have been reports of needing to sign out of iCloud and then sign in again after replacing WiFi and Bluetooth hardware to enable Handoff.

There has been a report of an OEM Bluetooth 2.0+EDR card causing a conflict with USB devices. If you experience issues with the built-in USB ports under El Capitan, you may also consider removing or upgrading your Bluetooth card.

In El Capitan, both Phone Calling and SMS from OS X with an iPhone work with a 2006/2007 Mac Pro and are not dependent on OS X Handoff support.


Unsupported original legacy graphics cards vs. 64-bit-kernel-supported graphics cards vs. Metal-supported graphics cards:

El Capitan does not include 64-bit kernel extension device drivers for the original NVIDIA GeForce 7300 GT, ATI Radeon X1900 XT, and NVIDIA Quadro FX 4500 PCIe graphics cards that shipped with these Mac Pros, nor the ATI Radeon X1300 that shipped with the Xserve (Late 2006), so they do not work properly in El Capitan. These graphics cards display issues such as a very sluggish GUI with no QE/CI support, no framebuffer support (for DVD Player, Geekbench and other programs), graphics artifacts, mouse tearing, inability to change resolutions, bad refresh rates, and other system instabilities. If you need normal graphics support in El Capitan, you will need a newer PCIe graphics card, with popular options being the Apple ATI Radeon HD 5770 Graphics Upgrade Kit for Mac Pro, SAPPHIRE HD 7950 3GB GDDR5 MAC Edition, or many different options of stock and Mac-"flashed" PC cards.

Many, but not all, modern stock non-flashed PC graphics cards with AMD (for OpenCL/OpenGL support) or Nvidia chipsets (for CUDA/OpenCL/OpenGL support) work "plug and play" with El Capitan in 2006/2007 Mac Pros, although the display will remain off until after the OS X Desktop initializes. This means you won't see anything during the boot process.

Compatible properly-Mac-flashed PC cards offer two benefits over stock non-flashed PC cards: allowing a normal boot screen just like a Mac-specific graphics card, and better compatibility in OS X with the card's capabilities/performance/ports. Most, but not all, Mac-flashed ATI/AMD cards have EBC firmware that work in all PCIe-based 2006-2012 Mac Pro models with either EFI32 or EFI64. All newer Mac-flashed Nvidia cards have EFI64 firmware and will act like non-flashed PC cards with no boot screens in EFI32-based 2006/2007 Mac Pros, except for older Mac-flashed Nvidia GeForce 8800 GT/9800 GT/GT 120 cards with EFI32 firmware.

Lastly, El Capitan has added a new graphics API called Metal that allows for much faster access to graphics card hardware. Note that only the most recent AMD (HD 7xxx "Tahiti" or newer) or Nvidia chipset (GeForce 6xx "Kepler" or newer) graphics cards fully and properly support Metal in a 2006/2007 Mac Pro.

• Good, but without Metal API support: The least expensive El Capitan-compatible recommended graphics card that can provide boot screens in any 2006-2012 Mac Pro is a properly-Mac-flashed Nvidia GeForce GT 120, which was Apple's branding for the Nvidia GeForce 9500 GT. MacVidCards has a promotion on the EFI32 dual-DVI and DVI/DisplayPort version of this card with 256MB for readers of this thread for $70 USD.
• Better, adding Metal support: Other more powerful graphics cards that can provide boot screens and Metal API support in a 2006/2007 Mac Pro are AMD Tahiti-based such as a properly Mac-flashed AMD Radeon R9 280/AMD Radeon HD 7950 (similar memory architecture and clocks as the AMD FirePro D500 available on the 2013 Mac Pro but with more cores) or better yet a properly Mac-flashed AMD Radeon HD 7970 (with the same GPU as the AMD FirePro D700) based on EBC firmware modified by MacVidCards.
• Best: Currently, the highest-performing graphics card that can provide boot screens and Metal support in a 2006/2007 Mac Pro is a properly-Mac-flashed AMD Radeon R9 280X 3GB/AMD Radeon HD 7970 GHz Edition (~10-15% faster clocks from the AMD Radeon 7970). This does not include the 6GB version of the R9 280X which has issues when flashed for a Mac Pro. MacVidCards sells a fully Mac Pro-ready AMD R9 280X 3GB card and also offers flashing services for customer-supplied cards.
• Note that if for some reason you still need to boot OS X Lion or early Mountain Lion versions that all AMD Tahiti-based cards (7950/7970 and R9 280/280X) are only properly supported by OS X 10.8.3 or higher, although there are OS X 10.7.5-10.8.2 AMD Tahiti graphics card device driver kernel extensions that may work in a 2006/2007 Mac Pro when used with tiamo's boot loader.

Note also that the 2006/2007 Mac Pro has PCIe 1.1 expansion slots, with the bottom double-wide slot capable of being configured to use a maximum 2.5 GT/s link speed when configured as a x16 lane graphics slot. El Capitan's Expansion Slot Utility, located in /System/Library/Core Services, supports the 2006-2007 Mac Pro to configure the number of lanes available in each slot. PCIe 2.0/3.0 cards that can run at 5.0 GT/s link speed in 2008-2012 Mac Pros can work in 2006/2007 Mac Pros, but only with a PCIe 1.1 maximum 2.5 GT/s link speed.

None of these options are officially supported in these Mac Pros by AMD, Apple, or Nvidia, but can work with the Piker-Alpha boot loader.


iMessage/FaceTime note:

Regardless of approach used, some users cannot initially login to iMessage or FaceTime using their Apple ID from their Mac Pro after installing El Capitan as a security precaution. When trying to login, they receive an iMessage Registration validation code. The solution is to contact Apple support, provide the Mac Pro's serial number, explain that El Capitan was installed and that iMessage isn't working and provide the validation code. Apple then unblocks the Mac Pro, allowing iMessage and FaceTime login immediately and in the future without other issues.

 

[maukku]

Succesfully upgraded my 1.1-server from Yosemite to El Capitan by using my MBP and attaching the boot disk of MP as external drive. After copying the boot.efi and plugging the SSD back to the 1.1, it booted the new OS just fine.

The machine has a old PC Radeon HD4650, which I had managed to get fully working under some previous Yosemite version, but after some later update broke it, it has been sitting idle as I had no extreme need for it and no interest to fix the required kexts.

The problem is, that as I run the machine headless, I have to access it trough SSH or VNC. When I updated to latest El Capitan version (10.11.6) and installed a couple of other updates, VNC stopped working. Connecting to machine works (from windows or mac), but after selecting my user account in the login screen and entering my password, the view freezes for a moment and then just returns to initial login view with all user accounts listed.

To diagnose the issue, I checked system.log, and found out that every time I try to login via VNC, I get some (or quite much really) error output about graphics. Could it be that after some update, a proper GPU acceleration is needed to run the VNC-desktop? SSH, file sharing and other server features work just fine, but maintaining a os x-server via command line is just not very handy.

Does anyone have experiences of similar VNC-problems, or generally about getting HD 4650 to work under 10.11.6? Google found some pre-patched kexts, but they were for 10.11.5 and didn't work. I also checked that vanilla kexts provided by Apple already contain the required device-id (0x9498) for this specific card so I can't figure out why it is not auto-detected.

Also there is the SIP. What mechanism is the one that re-activates it? As it has to be disabled via recovery mode, where I can't boot due to missing GPU, every time I need to disable it to tinker with kexts I have to attach my boot drive to my MBP, boot to recovery with it and do the disabling, which is quite annoying. And after a while it is again re-enabled

 

[joeberk]

Anyone successfully install the El Cap security update that came out in the last few days?