It's a small detail but the K4100m isn't working out of the box (which implies you can just plug it directly into the iMac without changing the ROM). More precisely, it is working without the use of OpenCore.
Got a tip for us?
Let us know
Become a MacRumors Supporter for $50/year with no ads, ability to filter front page stories, and private forums.
iM 4,1-14,4 2011 iMac Graphics Card Upgrade
- Thread starter MichaelDT
- WikiPost WikiPost
- Start date
- Sort by reaction score
- Status
There are mixed opinions on this and I did ask around. I do have thermal conductive tape and copper plates lying here but I didnt put them on in the end with any of the previous GPU’s. And a bit reading further on cooling VRAM chips, its a mixed bag, high-end desktop graphics cards benefit from it but with regular use/speed of the cards we’re using it doesnt really have an impact.
Ofc it is always better to apply cooling to heat generating parts. However the VRMs produce a lot more heat so you could say that when cooling any other component next to the GPU itself it would be these
if anyone is desperate and wants to buy my graphics card for a small amount plus postage from portugal, you'd have to tell me how to get it out of the machine.
Hi there,
Benefited by this thread and after tried three graphics cards(WX7100, RX560 and WX4170), I finally get my 27" iMac booted with WX4170.
I flashed the WX4170 graphics card by a CH341A programmer with vBIOS provided by this thread.
There are two main problems with my iMac:
1. Black screen during boot:
The first boot after installing my WX4170 graphics card is a totally black screen that scared me. I can ssh to my iMac and share screen to my iMac by MBP, too. I find out that after connecting to an external display then the black screen of internal display will suddenly light up.
Knowing that I have to install AppleGraphicsControl.kext, I follow the instructions in this thread but I still can not get the AppleBootPicker showing up by holding the alt/option key at boot.
Is it correct that I get this error message during installing AppleGraphicsControl.kext?
2. No sound:
I can hear the loud boot chime but after booting to High Sierra, there is no internal sound output from my iMac. Can anyone give me a hint?
Due to that I can not get the AppleBootPicker to work I did not try the OpenCore yet.
Benefited by this thread and after tried three graphics cards(WX7100, RX560 and WX4170), I finally get my 27" iMac booted with WX4170.
I flashed the WX4170 graphics card by a CH341A programmer with vBIOS provided by this thread.
There are two main problems with my iMac:
1. Black screen during boot:
The first boot after installing my WX4170 graphics card is a totally black screen that scared me. I can ssh to my iMac and share screen to my iMac by MBP, too. I find out that after connecting to an external display then the black screen of internal display will suddenly light up.
Knowing that I have to install AppleGraphicsControl.kext, I follow the instructions in this thread but I still can not get the AppleBootPicker showing up by holding the alt/option key at boot.
Is it correct that I get this error message during installing AppleGraphicsControl.kext?
2. No sound:
I can hear the loud boot chime but after booting to High Sierra, there is no internal sound output from my iMac. Can anyone give me a hint?
Due to that I can not get the AppleBootPicker to work I did not try the OpenCore yet.
Attachments
So, you did not read the docs, too.
There is no native boot picker with AMD cards and GOP BIOS. Use OpenCore following the guides we made and probably use the WX4150 rom from the table in post #1, it offers better performance.
You need OpenCore to get a non native boot picker, HEVC and H.264, and much more.
Error message: Try to find out how to disable SIP on High Sierra, first.
Last edited:
There is an EG2 60W ROM that can can be used for the WX4170M cards, it will give you a boot screen but on the External Display Through displayPort. However it's not for the Novice user, you must dump your system ROM using ROMTool and add 2 modules (UUIDParser.ffs and CoreEG2.ffs) to the System ROM using UEFI Tool. Then the edited ROM needs to be flashed back to the iMac's logic board using the CH341A. Some users have damaged their logic board doing this. But I have done it, it's a tedious task, but I'm crazy enough to accomplish it.
Also for your Black screen issue. You need to install a patched AppleGraphicsControl.kext on page 1. To get your Mac to successfully boot, you need to make your iMac boot the High Sierra installer again and change the startup disk to the OpenCore loader.
Thanks for your input, I will try to find out how to disable SIP.
There is an EG2 60W ROM that can can be used for the WX4170M cards, it will give you a boot screen but on the External Display Through displayPort. However it's not for the Novice user, you must dump your system ROM using ROMTool and add 2 modules (UUIDParser.ffs and CoreEG2.ffs) to the System ROM using UEFI Tool. Then the edited ROM needs to be flashed back to the iMac's logic board using the CH341A. Some users have damaged their logic board doing this. But I have done it, it's a tedious task, but I'm crazy enough to accomplish it.
Also for your Black screen issue. You need to install a patched AppleGraphicsControl.kext on page 1. To get your Mac to successfully boot, you need to make your iMac boot the High Sierra installer again and change the startup disk to the OpenCore loader.
Got it! I will try to reinstall AppleGraphicsControl.kext after I can disable SIP first.
Thanks!
Its probably been asked a dozen times , however ill ask again , i,am older but tech savvy , but the old eyes aren't what they used to be , why if theres so many of these things around does someone not make a ready to plug in card pre flashed , plug and play card ? , surely they would sell well , i know for a lot half the fun is experimenting , but i just don't have the time or eyesight these days, i for one would buy 3 as i have 3 machines that need them
Nick (author of many of the ROMs here) does sell pre-flashed cards on eBay UK from time to time. Not cheap though, but may be worthwhile for you.
i would love a link if you have one , i have spent weeks googling / looking
[automerge]1595751933[/automerge]
Just a thought for the ones who are trying this and loose the boot loaders , some time back i was playing with an Imac 7.1 , trying to duelboot ubuntu , i came across a program called reFLt , i wonder if anyone has tried this on the GPU upgrade ? it would have to installed on mac before the upgrade though i imagine
Unfortunately @Nick [D]vB 's offers on eBay ran out last week and I cannot see new ones. The only thing I can do right now is posting his eBay seller link here, follow him and wait. He has not been online here since end of May. So writing a personal message would not help, really.
If you study the fist post you will see that we published there recently the fact, that you can have a "non native boot screen" using the OpenCore boot loader - which contains well hidden in the depth the refind boot loader - with every card working somehow in the iMac. Of course it is not the same look and feel as pressing alt/option on boot. This method is used per default with every new AMD card on our list back on post #1.
Last edited:
Well thanks . but the ebay link is worth jack , its in another language
Well thanks! Are you serious with this? The offer was made using the English language and the sellers link is shown there. Just log into eBay using your password and press follow or ask the eBay tech support how to use eBay.
[automerge]1595755719[/automerge]
spoon feeder
Has anybody here the original Apple BIOS of the 2010 ATI Radeon HD 5750 card available to post it in a private message. Got such a card containing for an unknown reason a non Apple branded BIOS.
EDIT:
Thanks, I got it. Found out that only the 2011 6xxx series cards contain an Apple brand string.
EDIT:
Thanks, I got it. Found out that only the 2011 6xxx series cards contain an Apple brand string.
Last edited:
Thanks once again guys!
This time special thanks to @nikey22 for the K4100M rom and @highvoltage12v for the AppleBrightnessControl.kext tutorial.
It was a painless upgrade from the K2100M to this HP K4100M. The actual hardware exchange was done in 30 minutes flat getting the hang of that by now.
After that I used the Linux USB stick method to flash the rom.
Left out the OC USB stick and it booted straight into my Catalina install. Modifying the according kext for correct brightness levels and presto!
Edit: one little addition, when I was using OC I used @herrdude's great explanation to have the boot sequence as seamless as possible. That does cause a delay now obviously after taking out the USB stick; the bootpicker is looking for the USB stick for the first 15 seconds before giving up and then booting from the SSD. Pressing ALT at startup and keeping the CTRL button pressed when selecting the SSD turns this around again (it will now pick the SSD immediately).
This time special thanks to @nikey22 for the K4100M rom and @highvoltage12v for the AppleBrightnessControl.kext tutorial.
It was a painless upgrade from the K2100M to this HP K4100M. The actual hardware exchange was done in 30 minutes flat
getting the hang of that by now.After that I used the Linux USB stick method to flash the rom.
Left out the OC USB stick and it booted straight into my Catalina install. Modifying the according kext for correct brightness levels and presto!
Edit: one little addition, when I was using OC I used @herrdude's great explanation to have the boot sequence as seamless as possible. That does cause a delay now obviously after taking out the USB stick; the bootpicker is looking for the USB stick for the first 15 seconds before giving up and then booting from the SSD. Pressing ALT at startup and keeping the CTRL button pressed when selecting the SSD turns this around again (it will now pick the SSD immediately).
Last edited:
Bonjour,
I tried to get the best OpenCore configuration, I'm behind a better score under the GeekBench Metal test, I wanted your opinion, so I'm sharing my latest OpenCore configuration if it helps, with the latest pre-release.
Have a nice day.
I tried to get the best OpenCore configuration, I'm behind a better score under the GeekBench Metal test, I wanted your opinion, so I'm sharing my latest OpenCore configuration if it helps, with the latest pre-release.
Have a nice day.
With the K4100M (it's arriving tomorrow), do I have to do anything else besides flash the rom to get proper working brightness levels and all that or I just flash it and that's it?
This is the value I have seen with this benchmark and this card, too. It does not change really when using different OC versions but it changes heavily just during several runs in the very same machine. Do not waste too much time into optimizations of such artificial benchmarks.
Probably we could add some Geekbench values to the performance table...
[automerge]1595775072[/automerge]
Scroll back and search the AppleBacklightFix post @highvoltage12v made recently. You have to install it.
And you have to modify the heat sink, otherwise you will not experience any brightness at all!
Last edited:
Bonjour,
@Ausdauersportler, thank you for your answer.
Not to mention Benchmark, stability level or other (I don't have any idea as an example) it can be interesting to have a good OpenCore configuration, right? 👍 😊
@Ausdauersportler, thank you for your answer.
Not to mention Benchmark, stability level or other (I don't have any idea as an example) it can be interesting to have a good OpenCore configuration, right? 👍 😊
Re,
The best possible (e.g. faster startup, no crashes due to bad configuration, machine speed not degraded, etc.).
I was asking for advice, who knows what good it'll do?
The best possible (e.g. faster startup, no crashes due to bad configuration, machine speed not degraded, etc.).
I was asking for advice, who knows what good it'll do?
On the heatsink, yeah, forgot to type that. I have the K5 and such coming as well. I was referring to software so it sounds like there is a little fix that I have to do in addition to flashing the firmware. Thanks for the pointer on the kext I need to install. Will post back with results once I get there.