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

[highvoltage12v]

ok sorry for my misunderstanding so what are the other benefits to modify the bootrom?

By the way...
I've just plug a external monitor via DP to VGA without rebooting
- on the first thunderbolt socket (near the rj45) no image...
- next thunderbolt socket I get a image
- when I plug the monitor on the first socket through a HDD enclosure I get a image...

Never noticed that with the stock GPU!??

So with all our Nvidia/AMD replacement MXM cards only one thunderbolt port output will display an image, seems like a Hardware limitation to MXM cards that aren't apple? This Thunderbolt port is always the one closest to the FireWire800 port. So if I understand your last message you are able to get an image from usually non working port if routed through a Thunderbolt HDD enclosure?

So Having your BootRom modified allows for your swapped MXM card to almost be 100% native i give it a 95% as close to original as Possible. You DO get your Boot screen back (just on an External monitor, internal has no Backlight on EFI screens) unlike the GOP ROMs where you are stuck with OpenCore to work. You will always have working backlight control without OpenCore and the Backlight Stepping on the EG2 cards without any Kext mods needed.

 

[highvoltage12v]

Hi guys! I have the following problem. After flashing BIOS on my GTX 770 appeared boot mode and the video card works perfectly on High Sierra. I decided to install OS Catalina using the dosdude1 method, after installing the system, my video card does not turn on when loading the OS, there is no boot mode and it does not work in the system (black screen, but when I press the keys, I hear sounds). BUT, if I hold down the "Option" key when turning on the iMac, the boot menu will appear and the video card will turn on! Can someone faced such a problem? I don't really want to turn on iMac every time with the "Option"key pressed. Thanks!

This is the exact definition of the problems in my AppleGraphicsControl.kext that my posted mentions. Also you are probably going to want your iMac to wake from sleep, so look for that guide as well.
Do a Command-F/CTRL-F on page one for Highvoltage12v it's there.

 

[highvoltage12v]

ok sorry for my misunderstanding so what are the other benefits to modify the bootrom?

By the way...
I've just plug a external monitor via DP to VGA without rebooting
- on the first thunderbolt socket (near the rj45) no image...
- next thunderbolt socket I get a image
- when I plug the monitor on the first socket through a HDD enclosure I get a image...

Never noticed that with the stock GPU!??

Yes using my Thunderbolt 2 Elgato I have 3 functioning Display again. I checked this years ago before any EFI ROM cards and it didn't work. So somewhere along the progress of EFI cards; Display output through Thunderbolt Hubs is working again.

will check a @nikey22 Nvidia VBIOS to see if they support 3 Displays through a ThunderBolt Hub as well.

All these years I kept my Elgato Thunderbolt 2 Dock connected to my iMac for USB 3.0 Support, this makes it even better.

No, it's not working with my K4100M, it recognizes the Display but never puts out a signal to the Display. It's also constantly doing a Display initialization/the usual flashing of the internal Display, So Nvidia cards face either a Display Table issue in the VBIOS or a hardware limitation.

 

[racegen]

I will start a 3rd time asking for help because I don’t know what to do right now.
I patched all the kexts including AppleGraphicsControl for Catalina. iMac is booting with OC NVIDIA config.plist and I can see the boot screen and that the backlight lowers. I can see the login screen.

After some seconds the screen is going black. No possibility to get in on.
Is this really an issue of AppleGraphicsControl or maybe a hardware defect or something else? Without OC the machine is running on full backlight without any problems. Got Anyone any tips what to do?

 

[highvoltage12v]

I will start a 3rd time asking for help because I don’t know what to do right now.
I patched all the kexts including AppleGraphicsControl for Catalina. iMac is booting with OC NVIDIA config.plist and I can see the boot screen and that the backlight lowers. I can see the login screen.

After some seconds the screen is going black. No possibility to get in on.
Is this really an issue of AppleGraphicsControl or maybe a hardware defect or something else? Without OC the machine is running on full backlight without any problems. Got Anyone any tips what to do?

Did you install any duplicate kexts to System/Library/Extensions? Maybe you have a set of duplicate kexts causing this issue like Lilu/whatevergreen installed to S/L/E and then openCore is also loading these kexts. Open OpenCore Configurator with the config.plist and uncheck (lilu/WEG) some kexts. Also boot Mac OS without OpenCore and click "obtained from" until it brings "unknown" kexts to the top. I'll attach mine for example.

 

[racegen]

Did you install any duplicate kexts to System/Library/Extensions? Maybe you have a set of duplicate kexts causing this issue like Lilu/whatevergreen installed to S/L/E and then openCore is also loading these kexts. Open OpenCore Configurator with the config.plist and uncheck (lilu/WEG) some kexts. Also boot Mac OS without OpenCore and click "obtained from" until it brings "unknown" kexts to the top. I'll attach mine for example.

Thank you for the quick reply. Attached the screenshot from Mac OS without OpenCore.

For replacing the kexts I have done the following:
I replaced Lilu / WEG on Catalina Loader with the newest versions from Github.
I deleted Lilu / WEG from your package HD3000 because Catalina Loader will load it.
So I would say that I did not installed duplicate kexts in S/L/E.

Installed the package from you for Sleep and AppleGraphicsControl.
And used OC 0.5.9 with NVIDIA config.plist to start with OC.

Some minutes ago I could boot with OC and backlight control. This time I could use the iMac for 2 minutes but then the screen went black...

 

[iceman90]

You should read the first post. You are missing important kexts.

Sorry mate, I don't know English and I have to read and write to you using an online translator. This is difficult and the quality of translation is not always good.

This is the exact definition of the problems in my AppleGraphicsControl.kext that my posted mentions. Also you are probably going to want your iMac to wake from sleep, so look for that guide as well.
Do a Command-F/CTRL-F on page one for Highvoltage12v it's there.

thank you very much, I will search

 

[iceman90]

To install this kext unlock your System partition using Hackintool, drag the kext on-top of the kext utility icon let it install/timeout with an error. Open terminal and enter "sudo reboot" skipping this step may leave your iMac hanging at the desktop (A Catalina issue)

How to install:
When booting you need to Hold Alt/Option to bring up the AppleBootPicker, then select the Catalina partition. Since the iMac's Screen is on when using AppleBootPicker the Macs screen will remain on the entire boot process allowing you to log in and then proceed to install the Patched AppleGraphicsControl Kext.

can you write in simple language how and what to do? With the help of a translator, I get porridge and I can not understand the meaning, thank you!

 

[herrdude]

can you write in simple language how and what to do? With the help of a translator, I get porridge and I can not understand the meaning, thank you!

What language do you speak? Maybe someone can help you through private messages.

 

[iceman90]

What language do you speak? Maybe someone can help you through private messages.

Russia, Polish, Ukrain

 

[Ausdauersportler]

Wow, I have returned to some incredible devel


I will update the survey and spreadsheet today. Seems I have missed quite a bit in the last few weeks - it has been a crazy few months over here in the states with COVID.

EDIT: To avoid clutter on the Valley chart, I've duplicated the survey but instead of requesting Valley scores, it only requests the Geekbench 5 Metal score. The new survey is available here: https://forms.gle/UQEDqMs5coKGCUzWA

I'll port over the existing results real quick.

EDIT 2: The results spreadsheet for Geekbench 5 Metal is now available here.

Great!

We should start to measure performance based on metal tests, we made this move to change the graphics card because we wanted exactly this metal support.

You can drop all original ATI Apple Card, these have no metal support at all and you may just add the cards @nikey made a BIOS for, namely the 880M and 870M...

 

[Ausdauersportler]

Hi guys! I have the following problem. After flashing BIOS on my GTX 770 appeared boot mode and the video card works perfectly on High Sierra. I decided to install OS Catalina using the dosdude1 method, after installing the system, my video card does not turn on when loading the OS, there is no boot mode and it does not work in the system (black screen, but when I press the keys, I hear sounds). BUT, if I hold down the "Option" key when turning on the iMac, the boot menu will appear and the video card will turn on! Can someone faced such a problem? I don't really want to turn on iMac every time with the "Option"key pressed. Thanks!

Post #1, go directly there, to not take 4000 USD, and search for "black screen" issue - guys can you please start to read the docs before posting the very same question again, and again, and ....

 

[jfdez82]

Hi Guys,
I wanted to Thank you all for the amazing work. I was wondering if you guys can help me, I got an Nvidia Quadro K4100M, I did the flash and fix the backlight everything seems to be working fine. I plugged my Apple Cinema Display but is not working is there a way to fix it?

 

[Ausdauersportler]

Hi Guys,
I wanted to Thank you all for the amazing work. I was wondering if you guys can help me, I got an Nvidia Quadro K4100M, I did the flash and fix the backlight everything seems to be working fine. I plugged my Apple Cinema Display but is not working is there a way to fix it?

There is only one port working after GPU change - which - by the way - has been documented on the first page and first post...

 

[Terros]

WX7100 owners,

Do these stickers represent anything when buying a WX7100? I see on the front of the card printed on the PCB them having the 00C_02 but not sure about these back stickers?

@Ausdauersportler you in Aussie?

 

[YvonK]

WX7100 owners,

Do these stickers represent anything when buying a WX7100? I see on the front of the card printed on the PCB them having the 00C_02 but not sure about these back stickers?

@Ausdauersportler you in Aussie?

Sorry no idea.

 

[Ausdauersportler]

WX7100 owners,

Do these stickers represent anything when buying a WX7100? I see on the front of the card printed on the PCB them having the 00C_02 but not sure about these back stickers?

@Ausdauersportler you in Aussie?

Looks like the Dell replacement/spare part number....which seems to be correct. @Nick [D]vB made in the past a post naming this number.

Try translate.google.com to with "Ausdauersportler" - you will be surprised.

 

[highvoltage12v]

Hi Guys,
I wanted to Thank you all for the amazing work. I was wondering if you guys can help me, I got an Nvidia Quadro K4100M, I did the flash and fix the backlight everything seems to be working fine. I plugged my Apple Cinema Display but is not working is there a way to fix it?

You still need to install AppleGraphicsControl.kext to fix DisplayPort/thunderbolt output.

 

[SubDriver]

Here's some snapshots from Catalina 10.15.6, in idle, with a WX7100. iMac 2011 27''.

@Pascal Baillargeau - Thanks for the images. It looks like your temperatures are being managed below what I am seeing on mine. What app are you using to show the temperature, clock speeds, and power draw of the WX7100 as your last image shows?

I will be replacing the PolarisBoost kext later as @Ausdauersportler suggests and I will report back with results.

 

[SubDriver]

Looks like the Dell replacement/spare part number....which seems to be correct. @Nick [D]vB made in the past a post naming this number.

Try translate.google.com to with "Ausdauersportler" - you will be surprised.

I agree with @Ausdauersportler on this. The "CN-0308VY" term on this sticker was very useful in my searching for a WX7100 on Google and to help verify it was truly a WX7100 card and not something else. My card has a sticker on the back as well, but the second line of text on my sticker is different (see the image on my post #7393). My card is the -00D type on the front side of the PCB so we know both the -00C and -00D cards can work as stated in post #1. They just aren't really easy to find sometimes...

 

[KeigoMoriyama]

We have a two value logic and I ask you again: How to prove that something is broken?
Regarding your bad installation problem please try to read the docs available on post #1 and use the search button to look up pictures yourself.

thanks for taking time to reply, and sorry if I`m not getting your question. I don`t know how to prove that something is broken more than try different combinations. I would like to check if the gpu got shorted in some way but i don`T know how to check it.

for the installation part i will try to check on post 1

 

[NOTNlCE]

Great!

We should start to measure performance based on metal tests, we made this move to change the graphics card because we wanted exactly this metal support.

You can drop all original ATI Apple Card, these have no metal support at all and you may just add the cards @nikey made a BIOS for, namely the 880M and 870M...

Very good, changes have been made and should show now. I made the card list order the same as the first post, for simplicity's sake.

 

[Ausdauersportler]

thanks for taking time to reply, and sorry if I`m not getting your question. I don`t know how to prove that something is broken more than try different combinations. I would like to check if the gpu got shorted in some way but i don`T know how to check it.

for the installation part i will try to check on post 1

You already know what to do and you ask your question nevertheless. Nobody can prove (in a forum thread) that a part is not working. This is - by the way - not the hardware repair thread. You can try different combinations with different iMacs, but even then you have two common parts, the sink and the graphics card installed on it.
Checking if there is a short can by done - surprise - only by you by visual examination. This becomes spoon feeding, again. Sorry, but I guess you have to do some home work on your own!

And do not ask how to prove that you do not have a short on the card....

 

[KeigoMoriyama]

You already know what to do and you ask your question nevertheless. Nobody can prove (in a forum thread) that a part is not working. This is - by the way - not the hardware repair thread. You can try different combinations with different iMacs, but even then you have two common parts, the sink and the graphics card installed on it.
Checking if there is a short can by done - surprise - only by you by visual examination. This becomes spoon feeding, again. Sorry, but I guess you have to do some home work on your own!

And do not ask how to prove that you do not have a short on the card....

thanks for your answer and sorry if my questions could cause some bad feeling, was not in my intention.

 

[RRPC]

I agree with @Ausdauersportler on this. The "CN-0308VY" term on this sticker was very useful in my searching for a WX7100 on Google and to help verify it was truly a WX7100 card and not something else. My card has a sticker on the back as well, but the second line of text on my sticker is different (see the image on my post #7393). My card is the -00D type on the front side of the PCB so we know both the -00C and -00D cards can work as stated in post #1. They just aren't really easy to find sometimes...

that is some intresting, do we know all failed installed cards, and if thay had the "CN-0308VY" QR code sticker? might be to look in trough.

I'm still wondering what the main reason is why some cards fail, and some are working In the imac. but working in Dell laptops just fine. or in a imac 2009 but really slow.
my best shot is a electrical circuit that is not obviously.

I even try to ask information about the cards via AMD.
Fist thing that the guy said. When I explained him about placing the cards in imac's.
"Our card is not designed to work in a iMac, what do you want to do" 😅
besides that, and i can understands his statment. i mean.
its like fitting a Ferrari engin in trough a Fiat 500(new model)
never made for it. so help you'r self. (he must have thought)

but what was realy odd, He simply wouldn't or couldn't explain me the core difference between 00C and 00D cards.
He even mix it up with the famous non working card. So at that point ending up with nothing much.
en let it be.


today i will get my card, ill hope. not sure when i putting it in.
will report where i bought my card if it works. ( i bought from the same seller as badbiscuit)
as i dont want to be that guy, "...he said its works.. but mine dos't "

thanks for your answer and sorry if my questions could cause some bad feeling, was not in my intention.

its not that you have a bad question, its about you found that the card behave with a other heatsink better.
(2 LED's with short, 1 LED with long heatsink.)
so probly you have a short, aka some part is connect to a other part that shouln't to be connected. so Short circuit.
so do a inspection. in the #1 post there is a example.