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iM 4,1-14,4 2011 iMac Graphics Card Upgrade

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The first post of this thread is a WikiPost and can be edited by anyone with the appropiate permissions. Your edits will be public.
nikey22 said:
Here is what I did installing a K2100M in one of my 21.5" iMac 2011 machines. This could also apply to other cards and mounting types in efforts to help with heat dissipation. I have done this for several months now running the machine several hrs a day, without issues.

1. Purchase some copper shims with glue on the back:
View attachment 907362

2. Apply these on the back of the card that sits against the black plastic cover:
View attachment 907363

3. Align them the best you can.
View attachment 907364

4. Ready for mounting:
View attachment 907365

5. Fits back into pci-e smoothly, without obstruction:View attachment 907366

6. Flush mounting:
View attachment 907367

I hope this helps anyone doing this for the first time.
Click to expand...
I had a litle problem with my 780m when i bought it, a small condensator was missing, i paied a professional to soldered it. I had some copper pads on rear vram chips, he told me it was best to let it be without nothing...
The card worked, a litle time with copper pads, and for near 2 months works without...never see relevant benifits... It is just a humble option....
Good job, great GPU...
[automerge]1587321699[/automerge]
George Colgrove said:
Thank you!! I unplugged the machine and took a nap. After I woke, I did a option command P R reset of the system. The system did the turn off and turn on - this time with the dong. Still a black screen. Will look at the cables and i will look into the linux boot stick. Again, thank you.
Click to expand...
Sometimes, some conections are not propper made (i know, it happens to me too).
It's not hard to damage a small pin, or a small cable, even the graphic card could be missplaced just a milimmiter...
Deap brearh, smart it over... Before assemble the screen, be carefull, do not Touch nothing on the interior (you can damage a small component, or exposed PSU could damage you!), try to Turn it on to see if the 3 out of 4 test leds works.
 
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Jforte said:
I had a litle problem with my 780m when i bought it, a small condensator was missing, i paied a professional to soldered it. I had some copper pads on rear vram chips, he told me it was best to let it be without nothing...
The card worked, a litle time with copper pads, and for near 2 months works without...never see relevant benifits... It is just a humble option....
Good job, great GPU...
[automerge]1587321699[/automerge]

Sometimes, some conections are not propper made (i know, it happens to me too).
It's not hard to damage a small pin, or a small cable, even the graphic card could be missplaced just a milimmiter...
Deap brearh, smart it over... Before assemble the screen, be carefull, do not Touch nothing on the interior (you can damage a small component, or exposed PSU could damage you!), try to Turn it on to see if the 3 out of 4 test leds works.
Click to expand...
I did a rebuild - again - and I found that the thermal compound I used bled over the side of the GPU chip. It likely caused interference or something. I cleaned the graphics card to be free of compound. Buttoned it back up and it worked. I was able to flash the GPU in Windows 8.1. Then I got High Sierra installed. The new CPU and GPU were recognized properly. The Aircard Bluetooth replacement works perfectly as well.

Thank you very much for your help.
 
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George Colgrove said:
I did a rebuild - again - and I found that the thermal compound I used bled over the side of the GPU chip. It likely caused interference or something. I cleaned the graphics card to be free of compound. Buttoned it back up and it worked. I was able to flash the GPU in Windows 8.1. Then I got High Sierra installed. The new CPU and GPU were recognized properly. The Aircard Bluetooth replacement works perfectly as well.

Thank you very much for your help.
Click to expand...
What WiFi/Bluetooth did you bought?
 
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I did another 27" 2011. This time I promoted:
- 1TB Samsung SSD
- i7 2600 CPU
- GTX780M

Next to install Catalina etc.

I did have black screen all the way, even with secondary display. But Linux USB flash worked like a charm. (xanderon?)
And thanks @Ausdauersportler to courage on flashing. Did not need a tear down and downgrade the cpu.
 
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Jforte said:
What WiFi/Bluetooth did you bought?
Click to expand...
Most likely the BCM94360CD. There is a very good thread here: https://forums.macrumors.com/threads/imac-mid-2011-bluetooth-4-0-internal-upgrade.1780242/

The challenge, at least for me, is getting the adapter. I live near the American border and usually can get stuff shipped in 1-2 days to an address on the American side and then drive down to pick it up. But now, it has to be shipped here, usually from China, which is a good month. :mad:
 
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George Colgrove said:
I bought this card.

www.amazon.com

OSXWiFi for iMac9,1 - iMac11,2 - iMac12,1 - iMac12,2 - Handoff and Continuity - Broadcom BCM94360CD - 802.11 A/B/G/N/AC with Bluetooth 4.0 OS X Yosemite 10.10+

OSXWiFi for iMac9,1 - iMac11,2 - iMac12,1 - iMac12,2 - Handoff and Continuity - Broadcom BCM94360CD - 802.11 A/B/G/N/AC with Bluetooth 4.0 OS X Yosemite 10.10+
www.amazon.com
Click to expand...
I bought this One... It didn't arrive yet...
Screenshot_2020-04-20-15-43-28-010_com.ebay.mobile.jpg
 
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Ausdauersportler said:
You should have checked the thread mentioned above. The BCM9436CD is 30 USD from China, you need an adapter, too. Including cable you have to invest 40 USD/Euro and some time to solder cables...
Click to expand...
Well, i bought this about a month ago...
The store selling these are local388. From them, this doesn't need soldering, it is plug and play. I know, this is much more expensive, but my goal is not the cheapest or to get proffit selling...
 
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With Sandy bridge and a NVIDIA or AMD card with metal support, does anyone can use streaming services natively on safari?
 
Jforte said:
With Sandy bridge and a NVIDIA or AMD card with metal support, does anyone can use streaming services natively on safari?
Click to expand...
For my setup and for Netflix, with safari,
With amd WX7100 it do not works, with nvidia 780M, too.
In Chrome, Netflix works in the two platforms, it's related to Safari and Apple, not the graphic cards.
 
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nikey22 said:
Here is what I did installing a K2100M in one of my 21.5" iMac 2011 machines. This could also apply to other cards and mounting types in efforts to help with heat dissipation. I have done this for several months now running the machine several hrs a day, without issues.
Click to expand...

Hi, This thread is massive! I recall looking at it a long time ago: I had some graphics card issues years ago, redid thermal paste, all was well, and I promptly put it out of my mind... until a week ago when the glitches started again (little coloured squares flickering about, and I've had some crashes). I have ordered a K2100M, but wanted to confirm if the copper shims are needed for a 2011 27" iMac, same as the 21.5"? Are they a must? I am simply trying to get them ordered (and the right thickness) so they will arrive at about the same time.

Thanks.
 
dnarna said:
Hi, This thread is massive! I recall looking at it a long time ago: I had some graphics card issues years ago, redid thermal paste, all was well, and I promptly put it out of my mind... until a week ago when the glitches started again (little coloured squares flickering about, and I've had some crashes). I have ordered a K2100M, but wanted to confirm if the copper shims are needed for a 2011 27" iMac, same as the 21.5"? Are they a must? I am simply trying to get them ordered (and the right thickness) so they will arrive at about the same time.

Thanks.
Click to expand...
I do not want to start a holy war here, but I believe you do not need the copper plates on the VRAM. The K2100M draws approximately 50W, will not be overclocked and should be fine with the normal K5 pro/Artic MX-4 or whatever is the most recent product.
To back this up one should measure the thermal conditions with and without these plates and compare it. Lately I just tend to do the paste thing better to have better thermal flow into the heat sink. This is likely the queens way....
 
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Hello. Today I upgraded iMac Mid-2011 27" to a Nvidia Quadro K2100M (2GB, MXM-A).
  • Started with the Post #1 on this thread. Thanks!
  • Did the mods to the x-bracket, and everything went perfectly. Did a power up and got only the first 2 LEDs on the MLB (as expected).
  • Then used the USB boot method from @xanderon and the VBIOS from @Nick [D]vB . Thank you!! All worked perfectly and now I have 3 LEDs on the MLB.
  • But that's it. Still a black screen. I connected the LCD and peeking inside while running a still only have 3 LEDs. I checked all the cables, all good.
  • Note I was running High Sierra 10.13.3.
  • I saw the note in Post #1 about some Sierra folks still having a black screen, so jumped to post #601 from @inano but how do I perform this if I can't even get to safe mode?
Am I missing something obvious? It's been a long day. Thanks!
 
AnthonyFlorida said:
Hello. Today I upgraded iMac Mid-2011 27" to a Nvidia Quadro K2100M (2GB, MXM-A).
  • Started with the Post #1 on this thread. Thanks!
  • Did the mods to the x-bracket, and everything went perfectly. Did a power up and got only the first 2 LEDs on the MLB (as expected).
  • Then used the USB boot method from @xanderon and the VBIOS from @Nick [D]vB . Thank you!! All worked perfectly and now I have 3 LEDs on the MLB.
  • But that's it. Still a black screen. I connected the LCD and peeking inside while running a still only have 3 LEDs. I checked all the cables, all good.
  • Note I was running High Sierra 10.13.3.
  • I saw the note in Post #1 about some Sierra folks still having a black screen, so jumped to post #601 from @inano but how do I perform this if I can't even get to safe mode?
Am I missing something obvious? It's been a long day. Thanks!
Click to expand...
Did you use opencore?
 
AnthonyFlorida said:
Hello. Today I upgraded iMac Mid-2011 27" to a Nvidia Quadro K2100M (2GB, MXM-A).
  • Started with the Post #1 on this thread. Thanks!
  • Did the mods to the x-bracket, and everything went perfectly. Did a power up and got only the first 2 LEDs on the MLB (as expected).
  • Then used the USB boot method from @xanderon and the VBIOS from @Nick [D]vB . Thank you!! All worked perfectly and now I have 3 LEDs on the MLB.
  • But that's it. Still a black screen. I connected the LCD and peeking inside while running a still only have 3 LEDs. I checked all the cables, all good.
  • Note I was running High Sierra 10.13.3.
  • I saw the note in Post #1 about some Sierra folks still having a black screen, so jumped to post #601 from @inano but how do I perform this if I can't even get to safe mode?
Am I missing something obvious? It's been a long day. Thanks!
Click to expand...
With an Apple Keyboard hold "ALT/Option" after the chime. Also do you have a mini Displayport monitor you can plug in?
 
highvoltage12v said:
With an Apple Keyboard hold "ALT/Option" after the chime. Also do you have a mini Displayport monitor you can plug in?
Click to expand...

Indeed, tried many boot options, both Apple wireless and Windows wired keyboards, no luck. Also connected another 27" iMac Late 2012 in target display mode, no luck.

Since that 4th LED on MLB won't come on, it's as if the LCD is dead. So unlikely, as I am very gentle when I disconnect and reconnect cables. Could have broken the display connector on the MLB. Visual inspection, all is fine.
 
Hi everyone !
So basically someone gave me an old iMac 2010 (2389) that had a faulty gpu..
I managed to do the bake trick on the gpu to get it to work properly again.
Swapped the HDD for an SSD, and reinstalled macOS High Sierra on it, then added 8Go of RAM to the 4Go already in.
So far so good but :
1) I'm afraid that the gpu becomes faulty again
2) I'd like to upgrade the machine to be able to edit some 4K footage I have with FCPX

From what I understood by searching on this thread, the best components for my machine would be an i7-870s and a GTX 770M.
That's where I'd like a confirmation please, what's the best CPU choice for this particular machine and use of mine ?

Thanks !!
 
highvoltage12v said:
Yes, I'm learning two different versions of the kext need to be released one for Nvidia owners and one for AMD owners, simply adding the iMac Pro board ID to the kext will break it for the other user that does not use the iMac Pro board ID. I have updated the files on post #3,271 to reflect this issue. Thanks for bringing this up.
Click to expand...

seems I spoke too soon

now if I let it sleep it is frozen trying to wake, then reboots, gives 3 beeps (i always thought this was ram but ram passes efi asd. i’ve also read it could be incompatible os) then I have to smc reset to get it to boot where I'm greeted with Problem Report for System Sleep Wake

I've also attached the part of pmset log from time of sleep/wake/reboot

any thoughts apprecieated
 

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after swapping to a flashed gpu I would reinstall a clean OS and before that do PRAM, SMC and all resets possible.
you have basically a new setup and I would take that as a reason to make a really fresh iMac out of it.

just my 2 cents. after installation of a clean install I would straight go to stress test the hardware, do RAM checks with memtest, burn in stress tests for CPU, GPU, HDD etc. during that you also can already adjust fan speeds.

after this you are ready to go to migrate from a (previously) time machine or copy paste your needed files and be happy and sure that from now on your machine is bullet proof.
 
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nekton1 said:
Sadly the eBay source has sold out now. Good buy at $38.
Click to expand...

nekton, I believe I bought the same card from the same seller.
I was glad to see your post before mine arrived, thinking my flash process would go smoothly...

But, when I attempted to flash with nv_flash in linux (thanks xanderon!) the card is detected as a GTX 660. I was curious if you have the original romdump from the card you got.

Here is mine:

Code: 
root@grml /lib/live/mount/medium/flash # ./nvflash_linux --save ~/original.rom
NVIDIA Firmware Update Utility (Version 5.414.0)
Simplified Version For OEM Only
Adapter: GeForce GTX 660      (10DE,11C0,103C,1028) H:--:NRM  S:00,B:01,D:00,F:00
Identifying EEPROM...
EEPROM ID (C2,2012) : MX MX25L2005 2.7-3.6V 2048Kx1S, page
Reading adapter firmware image...
IFR Data Size         : 1208 bytes
IFR CRC32             : CD017A7B
IFR Image Size        : 1536 bytes
IFR Image CRC32       : BFC5E754
IFR Subsystem ID      : 103C-1028
Image Size            : 173056 bytes
Version               : 80.06.75.00.07
~CRC32                : 1B5F5EB2
Image Hash            : E64D92E5A4EE39F6C2EBCD56F4D39120
Subsystem ID          : 103C-1028
Hierarchy ID          : Normal Board
Chip SKU              : 975-0
Project               : 2039-0503
CDP                   : N/A
Build Date            : 09/30/13
Modification Date     : 10/23/13
UEFI Support          : Yes
UEFI Version          : 0x10026 (Sep 13 2013 @ 16871300 )
UEFI Variant Id       : 0x0000000000000104 ( GK1xx  MXM )
UEFI Signer(s)        : Microsoft Corporation UEFI CA 2011
InfoROM Version       : N/A
InfoROM Backup Exist  : NO
License Placeholder   : Absent
GPU Mode              : N/A
Saving of image completed.

And when I try to flash:

Code: 
root@grml /lib/live/mount/medium/flash # ./nvflash_linux -6 Quadro_Beta1.2/K2100.rom
NVIDIA Firmware Update Utility (Version 5.414.0)
Simplified Version For OEM Only
Checking for matches between display adapter(s) and image(s)...
Adapter: GeForce GTX 660      (10DE,11C0,103C,1028) H:--:NRM  S:00,B:01,D:00,F:00
WARNING: None of the firmware image compatible PCI Device ID's
match the PCI Device ID of the adapter.
  Adapter PCI Device ID:        11C0
  Firmware image PCI Device ID: 11FC
WARNING: Firmware image PCI Subsystem ID (1028.15CC)
  does not match adapter PCI Subsystem ID (103C.1028).
NOTE: Exception caught.
Nothing changed!
ERROR: GPU mismatch

However, when I run strings on the romdump, I see the following:

Code: 
NVGI
K7400
VIDEO
IBM VGA Compatible
Z10/23/13
JPMIDl
3GK106 P2039 SKU 503 VGA BIOS
Version 80.06.75.00.07
Copyright (C) 1996-2013 NVIDIA Corp.
GK106 Board - 20390503
Chip Rev  
PCIR
NPDE
V+V7VgV
Y+VE
T|U]
kT'T
09/30/13

I'm wondering if your card identified itself the same way.

If so, perhaps you didn't see this issue flashing because you simply overwrote the rom with the programmer directly vs using nv_flash?

Or maybe I just got a bunk card?
 
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