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

[Marsupio]

Hummm received my CH341A programmer yesterday. I tried to flash my K2100M (Dell M4800 from vendor / not verified however / is there a way to verify the origin ?) today. A pure nightmare. The clip does not clip at all. Was obliged to hold/press it manually.

Was confused also by programming softwares (the post #1 orientates towards a Virtualbox/Ubuntu method which I found surprising). Finally have done the flash directly on my Macbook Pro with brew/flashrom. I used this video :

View attached files :

K2100M front
K2100M back
Dump old vBIOS (terminal)
Flash new vBIOS (terminal)
Verify (again) new vBIOS (terminal)

Could you confirm me that it is looking good ?

 

[M1kentosh]

Hi!

I assume you are running really the 10.11.6 El Capitan version. The only hint I found in this thread is this note made by @Nick [D]vB. Probably you face a problem which may only go away if you migrate to more recent MacOS version.

Normally you can write the startup disk choice to the NVRAM using the system preferences. If you constantly have to zap the NVRAM there is no such choice left over.
[automerge]1588359591[/automerge]

No!

The default startup disk in system preferences is MacOs.
I will try to update MacOS to a more recent version and write whether it helped or not. Thank you for help!

 

[Ausdauersportler]

The default startup disk in system preferences is MacOs.
I will try to update MacOS to a more recent version and write whether it helped or not. Thank you for help!

Give High Sierra a try, it is the last supported one and apply all updates and patches to get the firmware of your machine up to date. This is important for the future. Later you may experiment with Mojave or Catalina. I have two 2011 systems running Catalina with a 780m perfectly fine.

 

[Ausdauersportler]

Lost in Space:

For some days @jborko and me tried to get a WX7100 running in two different mid 2011 27" models in two different European countries checking out all the available VBIOS options.

I simply not wanted to start up in a 2011 model. Fans turned spinning for a split second and that was it.

Surprisingly I got the card slowly (core frequency was locked on 300 MHz) running in one late 2009 27" system the latest version of Catalina 10.15.4. Since it was not my mission to check this card out on the 2009 I did no further tests with different operating system versions and different VBIOS options there.

If somebody is interested to get this card for a 2009/2010 system @jborko will happily answer. Otherwise the card will be returned to China.

Two pictures of the card will be added, device ID was ????, the serial is 109-C95847-00C-02.

Wish I could have better news.

 

[erihp]

Hummm received my CH341A programmer yesterday. I tried to flash my K2100M (Dell M4800 from vendor / not verified however / is there a way to verify the origin ?) today. A pure nightmare. The clip does not clip at all. Was obliged to hold/press it manually.

Was confused also by programming softwares (the post #1 orientates towards a Virtualbox/Ubuntu method which I found surprising). Finally have done the flash directly on my Macbook Pro with brew/flashrom. I used this video :

View attached files :

K2100M front
K2100M back
Dump old vBIOS (terminal)
Flash new vBIOS (terminal)
Verify (again) new vBIOS (terminal)

Could you confirm me that it is looking good ?

I had the same problem with my clip. Unfortunately I was not able to get it to clip successfully, so I am going to remove the eeprom and program it manually. I noticed the bare chip also does not quite fit into the legs of the spring adapter for the programmer. So more manual soldering work.

looking at your pics I think you are good, looks to be as expected.

One thing you could have done to go further would have been to write out the before and after, and run then run a diffs against the images. The verify step effectively does this for you, So you should be good!

Let us know how it goes buttoning the system up!

 

[Marsupio]

I had the same problem with my clip. Unfortunately I was not able to get it to clip successfully, so I am going to remove the eeprom and program it manually. I noticed the bare chip also does not quite fit into the legs of the spring adapter for the programmer. So more manual soldering work.

looking at your pics I think you are good, looks to be as expected.

One thing you could have done to go further would have been to write out the before and after, and run then run a diffs against the images. The verify step effectively does this for you, So you should be good!

Let us know how it goes buttoning the system up!

Ok I will try the "diff". The card is still not mounted so worth doing it (in case of...).

 

[rc3105]

Download: iMac OpenCore Loader.dmg

FEATURES:

...

INSTALLATION:

Restore the image to an SD card or USB stick, I do not recommend installing to a non-removable drive. If using an AMD card show hidden files and extract the AMD config.plist file inside the /EFI/OC/ folder. Set the "Catalina Loader" drive as the default boot disk in system preferences or by using Ctrl+Enter from the Apple boot-picker. If you have problems booting delete any Lilu or Whatevergreen kexts from S/L/E, to disable OpenCore just remove the drive and do an NVRAM reset.

Has anybody seen this OpenCore error?

An sd card with the OpenCore Loader.dmg written to it boots fine in a 27" 2011 12,2 with a K1100m.

Booting a 27" 2009 11,1 with a K1100m fails with this error. Yes I've used cntrl-enter to set the sd card as initial boot and the startupmanager has the ssd as startup disk. The ssd boots directly into HighSierra just fine.

OCB: OcScanForBootEntries failure - Not Found
Halting on critical error


fEFInd - Booting OS

Starting OpenCore.efi
Using load options ''
OCS: No schema for Boot at 0 index!
OCS: No schema for BootApple at 7 index!

 

[highvoltage12v]

Has anybody seen this OpenCore error?

An sd card with the OpenCore Loader.dmg written to it boots fine in a 27" 2011 12,2 with a K1100m.

Booting a 27" 2009 11,1 with a K1100m fails with this error. Yes I've used cntrl-enter to set the sd card as initial boot and the startupmanager has the ssd as startup disk. The ssd boots directly into HighSierra just fine.

OCB: OcScanForBootEntries failure - Not Found
Halting on critical error


fEFInd - Booting OS

Starting OpenCore.efi
Using load options ''
OCS: No schema for Boot at 0 index!
OCS: No schema for BootApple at 7 index!

That was an error in the early betas... What was done to fix this was go to to system profiler and set your startup drive to Open Core Disk.

 

[rc3105]

Tried that already. As well as pram and smc resets.

This error is with the currently posted OpenCore Loader.dmg and the sd card works fine on another machine. wth???

 

[periergos]

Heat is not an issue with the 21.5", but the 27" display on full brightness gets really hot. Even a 5% reduction does the trick to cool it down. I think its possible that with the original gpu the 27" imac doesn't run at max brightness, only around 95%(even if you set it to the max in MacOS), because i don't remember getting it this hot before even if i was at max brightness.

at full backlight blast what is the temp on your lcd proximity? I my imac with k2000m it gets 50 degrees celsius very soon!

 

[Pascal Baillargeau]

Installing DCH drivers may require completely uninstalling the normal drivers first.
View attachment 911155

Here my registry entries. You can search for the right path to your active graphics driver manually or use DispRegEdit.exe to open the registry editor in the correct location. Take care to enter hex 0x320 or decimal 800 - at least that is working for me.
View attachment 911156

I put in windows registry:

EnableControlBrightness=0x00000001
RMBrightnessControlFlags=0x00000320
Restart Windows.

Brightness control is active for GTX780M on Windows 10, booting with or without Opencore. Using standard drivers. Thanks.

 

[fabienpascal]

Installing DCH drivers may require completely uninstalling the normal drivers first.
View attachment 911155

Here my registry entries. You can search for the right path to your active graphics driver manually or use DispRegEdit.exe to open the registry editor in the correct location. Take care to enter hex 0x320 or decimal 800 - at least that is working for me.
View attachment 911156

I installed on a clean win install but let me try again.

 

[ich558]

Hi, is there any guide for the whole thing about open core to get brightness control?

 

[fabienpascal]

I put in windows registry:

EnableControlBrightness=0x00000001
RMBrightnessControlFlags=0x00000320
Restart Windows.

Brightness control is active for GTX780M on Windows 10, booting with or without Opencore. Thanks.

It works.
Thank you. The error weas that my RMBrightnessControlFlags was equal to 0x0000800. After a reboot, it did the trick with the standard drivers. This is perfect. Thank you again.

 

[fabienpascal]

Hi, is there any guide for the whole thing about open core to get brightness control?

Yes, you can see the link to the right post on the first page.
[automerge]1588419014[/automerge]

I put in windows registry:

EnableControlBrightness=0x00000001
RMBrightnessControlFlags=0x00000320
Restart Windows.

Brightness control is active for GTX780M on Windows 10, booting with or without Opencore. Using standard drivers. Thanks.

Sorry to ask more questions.
Did the audio work for you out of the box booting UEFI via OpenCore? It doesn’t for me. I still had to apply the DSDT patch to the registry to get the audio properly recognised.

 

[ich558]

Yes, you can see the link to the right post on the first page.

of course thanks

 

[herrdude]

Ah man, I can't believe it. I was reinstalling my LCD when the third pin from the right on the display power socket broke. Now, the LCD won't start up. My micro soldering skills are non-existent. Does anyone know what this pin does? I am wondering if I can somehow MacGyver this. Any help will be appreciated!

 

[overshoot]

Ah man, I can't believe it. I was reinstalling my LCD when the third pin from the right on the display power socket broke. Now, the LCD won't start up. My micro soldering skills are non-existent. Does anyone know what this pin does? I am wondering if I can somehow MacGyver this. Any help will be appreciated!

Take some pictures of the mess and we'll tell you

 

[fabienpascal]

Yes, you can see the link to the right post on the first page.
[automerge]1588419014[/automerge]

Sorry to ask more questions.
Did the audio work for you out of the box booting UEFI via OpenCore? It doesn’t for me. I still had to apply the DSDT patch to the registry to get the audio properly recognised.

Ignore that one. I never enabled DSDT in the OpenCore Configurator. It’s done now!

 

[ich558]

After setting up Open Core with the guide from @herrdude brightness control workes but after every start i get this message. I also startet with ctrl+enter

 

[herrdude]

Take some pictures of the mess and we'll tell you

I am running it headless right now. Here is a pic:

 

[rc3105]

Found a 27inch mid2011 iMac at a bargain price because the GPU is broken. Excluding other possible hardware problems, will my AMD Radeon HD 6770M (removed from my 21inch mid2011 iMac) work and make this device workable again until I source a newer GPU?

Yep that'll work nicely and run cool.

 

[Ausdauersportler]

I am running it headless right now. Here is a pic:
View attachment 911392

There is more gone than the 3rd pin, a little ?coil? I.9000 is missing, too. I assume it means inductivity and it is a coil?

 

[Pascal Baillargeau]

After setting up Open Core with the guide from @herrdude brightness control workes but after every start i get this message. I also startet with ctrl+enter

you are booting opencore from opencore

 

[ich558]

you are booting opencore from opencore

Okay. what can i do?
i have the sd card installed and ctrl boot from this