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Hello Everyone,

Thank you for sharing your experiences.

I managed to upgrade my iMac 21.5" Mid-2011 from the AMD 6770 to a Quadro K1000M I had the chance to salvage from a busted DELL Precision 4700 workstation laptop.

Replacement process
The replacement was pretty smooth. I removed the old AMD and swap it with the Quadro.
The DELL Quadro had the X-clamp glued on the PCB so I heated it up and pried it out.
Used the original stock X-clamp from the AMD's iMac and it worked just fine.

After re-assembly, I landed on the macOS login screen.
I used my Windows 10 BOOTCAMP partition to flash Nick's beta 3 VBIOS via NVFlash and that went well. I got the boot screen back.
Then went into recovery to disable SIP and upgraded to Catalina 10.15.2 using the Dosdude upgrader.
  • I checked and system information shows my GPU as metal supported.
  • Another big deal for me is smoother HEVC decoding which the old GPU wasn't supporting. This is great.
  • I can also use newer versions of Pages and Keynotes as the latest version on High Sierra can't keep up with the latest one on Catalina I am running on my laptop.
  • I used the app from the AppStore to get some brightness control.
View attachment 890316
View attachment 890317

"Things" to know

The first post at the beginning doesn't cover VRAM cooling very well.
  • I used the thermal pads from the original Quadro heatsink however they are not thick enough. Therefore I am getting some artefact so I will be putting in the next few days some viscous thermal paste instead of the pads.
Also, not related to this thread but I tried to upgrade my i5-2500s to an i7-2600s (same TDP, and the i7 CPU Apple used to offer as an upgrade). However I can't get the motherboard to post so it could be an issue with CPU or an incompatibility.

My next step will be to reinstall a clean OS only on a SSD. My current setup is a custom fusion drive but I want to go 100% SSD.
And apply the K5 Pro thermal paste on the GPU VRAM.

Did anyone figured, on the 21.5" how to keep the VRAM at the back of the GPU board cooled?
I saw some people installing a custom air duck from the HDD Fan but that won't work with the 21.5".
I am thinking of putting small flat heatsink, similar to these Raspberry Pi Ram coolers.

View attachment 890318

Any experiences around?

F

I've used 1mm copper plates, bought them on Aliexpress.
they also work great !
And perhaps smaller than your raspberry pi cooling plate.. ?

Look over many pages back on one of my posts, I posted all pictures and stuff on my mods..
 
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Hello Everyone,

Thank you for sharing your experiences.

I managed to upgrade my iMac 21.5" Mid-2011 from the AMD 6770 to a Quadro K1000M I had the chance to salvage from a busted DELL Precision 4700 workstation laptop.

Replacement process
The replacement was pretty smooth. I removed the old AMD and swap it with the Quadro.
The DELL Quadro had the X-clamp glued on the PCB so I heated it up and pried it out.
Used the original stock X-clamp from the AMD's iMac and it worked just fine.

After re-assembly, I landed on the macOS login screen.
I used my Windows 10 BOOTCAMP partition to flash Nick's beta 3 VBIOS via NVFlash and that went well. I got the boot screen back.
Then went into recovery to disable SIP and upgraded to Catalina 10.15.2 using the Dosdude upgrader.
  • I checked and system information shows my GPU as metal supported.
  • Another big deal for me is smoother HEVC decoding which the old GPU wasn't supporting. This is great.
  • I can also use newer versions of Pages and Keynotes as the latest version on High Sierra can't keep up with the latest one on Catalina I am running on my laptop.
  • I used the app from the AppStore to get some brightness control.
View attachment 890316
View attachment 890317

"Things" to know

The first post at the beginning doesn't cover VRAM cooling very well.
  • I used the thermal pads from the original Quadro heatsink however they are not thick enough. Therefore I am getting some artefact so I will be putting in the next few days some viscous thermal paste instead of the pads.
Also, not related to this thread but I tried to upgrade my i5-2500s to an i7-2600s (same TDP, and the i7 CPU Apple used to offer as an upgrade). However I can't get the motherboard to post so it could be an issue with CPU or an incompatibility.

My next step will be to reinstall a clean OS only on a SSD. My current setup is a custom fusion drive but I want to go 100% SSD.
And apply the K5 Pro thermal paste on the GPU VRAM.

Did anyone figured, on the 21.5" how to keep the VRAM at the back of the GPU board cooled?
I saw some people installing a custom air duck from the HDD Fan but that won't work with the 21.5".
I am thinking of putting small flat heatsink, similar to these Raspberry Pi Ram coolers.

View attachment 890318

Any experiences around?

F
I7 2600s works in my 21.5 Mac 2011 without problems
 
Ok, so i just checked and both k1100m and k2000m sits at an angle with the 3 pipe heatsink from 27" imacs. How would you solve this problem? My idea is to put some small washers onto the 4 screws to lift the card up a little, for example a M2 DIN 125A washer. This would elevate the GPU core from the copper too though, but that can be fixed by using thick thermal paste?
 
There was already an attempt to install a 980m into a imac 2011 on youtube. The internal LCD would not activate. But I believe an external monitor worked for others. There was no chime and the machine kept turning off after boot up.

Apple seems to have a tight collaboration with AMD. They are using them again on their newest iMacs. So the focus should really be on getting their 8Gb Pro lines working in our machines. I believe there are a few here working on it. The backlight issue obviously needs attention first.
 
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can you find the link, because on my source there was no word about that. it worked like the cards presented here. and 980m is not so power hungry and stays cooler.

can we have some opinions from the peeps working on it? I think about what to put in the iMac 2011 I got today.
 
The source I believe was Luke Miani. The Device Control Block headers are different in the 980m layout. Also to further clarify, this was for a 27" iMac that they worked on.

I saw your source for the 980m, @feez98 from the malaysian site; I don't know how he got it to work. The discussion ends quickly without any real information. It was from 2017. Also, he was working on Sierra OS.
Once you upgrade to High Sierra OS, it will stop working as your 880m link explained.
 
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this is the same guy from the lowyat board (1st link above)

you are right, just the external screen was working
 
The tinkering continues! And so do my cries for help.
I've honestly been enjoying the experience, despite the frustrations and set backs.

I'm back on the stock BIOS, no issues.

My CPU fan no longer works. A replacement fan has come and no joy, and I've since checked the fan in different slots. It would seem the motherboard slot is not giving the CPU fan what it needs. MacsFanControl shows both other fans as functional, but 0RPM from the CPU fan. This is by far my biggest issue as I worry about overheating. (SMC/NVRAM resets, replacement fan, macfancontrols - all tried)

27" 3.4GHz i7, WX7100. Operating in Win10 for functionality.

Thanks again for all the hard work in this thread, guys.
 
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The tinkering continues! And so do my cries for help.
I've honestly been enjoying the experience, despite the frustrations and set backs.

I've got two main issues still:
1) Flashing the GPU with any of the WX7100/RX580 compatible BIOS files here cause issues from 'thread stuck in driver bios' to rainbow artifacting. the original Bios works without issues but has clock issues as expected. The issues persist between ATIflash and FlashRom's CH341a. If anyone could shed some light here, that would be very welcome.

2) My CPU fan no longer works. A replacement fan has come and no joy, and I've since checked the fan in different slots. It would seem the motherboard slot is not giving the CPU fan what it needs. MacsFanControl shows both other fans as functional, but 0RPM from the CPU fan. This is by far my biggest issue as I worry about overheating. (SMC/NVRAM resets, replacement fan, macfancontrols - all tried)

27" 3.4GHz i7, WX7100. Operating in Win10 for functionality.

Thanks again for all the hard work in this thread, guys.
Can't suggest anything for the 1 issue, but the second one might be fixable.
Have you checked the physical connector on the mainboard for the CPU fan? You might have bend the pins, I know I did... if one or more pins have snapped you can try to solder a wire to them and connect that to mabey a new socket or directly to the fan.

It's unlikely that the electrical circuit behind the port is broken unless you've (accidentally) put a large current through it from the fan side. Spinning the fan the wrong way whilst connected could do that.
 
is it possible that the 27 2009 iMac is rebooting / crashing because the CPU and GPU upgrade is too much for the power supply? i7 860 with 95W TDP + 770m with 75W TDP, +SSD +2,5 HDD as Fusion, and all that is powered with 310W power supply?

its crashing like randomly, fresh cold start: moving the mouse > crash. no games or even started to heat up. and after that, its working 23h non stop with all you through at it
 
is it possible that the 27 2009 iMac is rebooting / crashing because the CPU and GPU upgrade is too much for the power supply? i7 860 with 95W TDP + 770m with 75W TDP, +SSD +2,5 HDD as Fusion, and all that is powered with 310W power supply?

its crashing like randomly, fresh cold start: moving the mouse > crash. no games or even started to heat up. and after that, its working 23h non stop with all you through at it

have you flashed the vbios of your gtx770m also.. ?
did proper cooling mod also.. ?


I dont know how much wattage the 2011 iMac PSU gives, but I think it's the same PSU as the 2009-2010 27" models.

GTX780M with core i7 works fine on 2011's anyway, so I think there is no power problem here..
I would say dont put in a mxm card that uses more than about 95-100 Watt TDP of power, and you will be fine..
 
For those asking, the problem with the newer NVIDIA cards is that they lack the port mapping for the LVDS internal display. This is not an issue with Radeon since we can patch the framebuffer on the fly for needed ports or modify it in VBIOS. Additionally, cards 900 series + higher are Maxwell/Pascal and would require web drivers, which don't run nearly as well as the baked in drivers nor do they have support after High Sierra.
 
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I was able to upgrade my iMAC from HD to DELL GTX780N however I can not see the boot screen. Anyone did a bios update for that card under High Sierra? Maybe it is not possible or worth to do it? I wanted to upgrade my OS to Mojave at least. Thank you for your answer in advance...
 

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I was able to upgrade my iMAC from HD to DELL GTX780N however I can not see the boot screen. Anyone did a bios update for that card under High Sierra? Maybe it is not possible or worth to do it? I wanted to upgrade my OS to Mojave at least. Thank you for your answer in advance...

You can only flash it from Windows using nvflash, or with a soic clip if you remove the card. After that, you will have boot screen(if you hold down option during startup).
 
You can only flash it from Windows using nvflash, or with a soic clip if you remove the card. After that, you will have boot screen(if you hold down option during startup).
Thank you for the answer and explanations. I have noticed now that brightness control is not working so the display runs at the full "speed". There should be some PWM controller with duty cycle control somewhere...but maybe that GTX is not supporting it..but maybe also this is a known issue....
 
Can't suggest anything for the 1 issue, but the second one might be fixable.
Have you checked the physical connector on the mainboard for the CPU fan? You might have bend the pins, I know I did... if one or more pins have snapped you can try to solder a wire to them and connect that to mabey a new socket or directly to the fan.

It's unlikely that the electrical circuit behind the port is broken unless you've (accidentally) put a large current through it from the fan side. Spinning the fan the wrong way whilst connected could do that.

Thanks for the response, Hijglander.
The pins are still all there, and they do connect into the male part, so I don’t think that’s my issue. I am really starting to think it’s probably an issue on the motherboard/female end.
 
anyone having issues with the k1000m not waking up the display after sleep? im running the flashed v3 bios one a 2011 21.5" imac on mojave, and when it gots to sleep mode the display doesnt wake back up and i have to power cycle it, any suggestions?

thx
 
anyone having issues with the k1000m not waking up the display after sleep? im running the flashed v3 bios one a 2011 21.5" imac on mojave, and when it gots to sleep mode the display doesnt wake back up and i have to power cycle it, any suggestions?

thx

Are your Sandy Bridge power management kexts from post 1 installed correctly? I had something similar before I installed them - display tried to sleep because I left it idle for too long and then had to power cycle.
 
anyone having issues with the k1000m not waking up the display after sleep? im running the flashed v3 bios one a 2011 21.5" imac on mojave, and when it gots to sleep mode the display doesnt wake back up and i have to power cycle it, any suggestions?

thx

install sanybridge kexts, see first wiki post.
This will fix sleep problems.. ! 😉😜
[automerge]1580036954[/automerge]
Thank you for the answer and explanations. I have noticed now that brightness control is not working so the display runs at the full "speed". There should be some PWM controller with duty cycle control somewhere...but maybe that GTX is not supporting it..but maybe also this is a known issue....

perhaps someday brightness control will be fixed, with a new vbios beta.
For now you can use software slider apps, or the dosdude1 dying light module..
as far as I know, also progress is being made using opencore bootloader to give full brightness control.
I dont know how this works yet, and have not tested opencore myself yet..
 
who is working active on the new "features" like backlight control, di you need closed beta tester?
 
who is working active on the new "features" like backlight control, di you need closed beta tester?

perhaps Nick..
but I guess everyone is welcome to help with his project or create his ien vbios version and share.. it 😜
 
I'm new here but was able to successfully (mostly) upgrade a mid 2011 imac with a 2600S and Quadro k2100m using the great resources here! My one question is if the VRAM size in the Graphics description in "About this Mac" baked into the ROM or is it dynamically populated? I was expecting to have a 2GB VRAM 2100, but it shows as a 1GB. I am trying to figure out if I received a 1GB card or if I flashed the 1GB ROM (I didn't see any VRAM size versions). Thanks!
 
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