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

[Ausdauersportler]

Hello everybody,

I’am french, sorry for my very bad english

I have an late 2009 iMac
I put on this Mac a Quadro K4100M
I boot without flashing, no boot menu but Work perfectly
I flash nick22s firmware with windows and the imac won´t start on hight Sierra but work on window.
I have a black screen but when I plug in an external screen I have a boot menu and I can’t have a desktop (see pictures 2,3)
I Also tried uga firmware but it si the same
I am lost
thank you

Check the first post and search for black screen issue!

 

[Ausdauersportler]

buongiorno, ho un imac 21.5 del 2011 e ho acquistato una k610m. Volevo sapere se una volta installato posso tranquillamente utilizzarla senza fare nessun procedimento. Nei vari video e nella discussione ho visto che bisogna flashare la scheda video. Non sono molto pratico in questo. Perderei solo la schermata di avvio e il controllo della luminosita?

English is the languages to use...check the first post for all option how to flash your card.
Most likely it will not work without a new BIOS!

 

[OnawaAfrica]

No MXM-B will really fit into the 21.5 systems as explained on post #1.

yes I know that I just wanted to figure out what Mac he's using since I think he said they have issues all time

 

[doscore]

yes I know that I just wanted to figure out what Mac he's using since I think he said they have issues all time

as above edit man 27".

 

[bielousov.com]

** NVIDIA GeForce GTX780M Mac Edition ROM **
Genuine Native Boot Screen & Brightness Control

View attachment 942195​

There are many members here that have this card now and have been using it with & without Opencore. The previous rom iterations did not initialize the “built-in” iMac LCD screen but instead spoofed it to use the Cinema Display as the internal screen which rendered brightness control non-functional, and forced the use of a bootloader to add the feature back via a kernel extension.


This ROM does not require a 3rd party bootloader like OpenCore.

ROM testing has already been underway for the past few weeks by @Ausdauersportler and @highvoltage12v.

There is an overclock present on the GTX780M from the base rom. I would suggest you to use a 3-pipe heatsink for this GPU. Apply proper thermal pads and appropriate heat dissipating grease like K5pro to the areas that are in contact with the heat sink. Keep mac fans up and running to achieve better control of cooling as well.

Brightness Control Stepping Modifcation

-Turn computer on, hold down Command(⌘)-R
-Choose Utilities > Terminal
-Enter:csrutil disable
-MacOS Catalina: requires you to make root writeable: sudo mount -uw /
-Reboot
-Download and open 'Kext Utility v2.6.6'

-Navigate to S/L/E (System/Library/Extensions)
-Copy "AppleBacklight.kext" to Desktop
-Edit: AppleBacklight.kext/Contents/Info.plist
-Scroll down to: IOKitPersonalities > AppleIntelPanelA > ApplePanels
-There you find several Apple LCD profiles.
-For the iMac 2011 27" machine locate:

<key>F10Ta007</key>
<data>
ABEABgALABQAHAAnADMAPwBOAFwAZwBzAIEAkQClAL8A2wD/
</data>

-Change the <data> section to:
ABEAAgA3AF8AigCzAOsBJAFnAakB1AIJAlQCogL4A00DlgRpBGk=

-Drag your modded kext into Kext Utility, allow it correct permissions
-Applebacklight.kext.bak folder will be created
-Reboot

The above data pattern will allow for a wider span of steppings for the brightness control and utilizes more of the capacity of the HD3000. If you have a different machine, your panel ID can be found by going to System Preferences > Displays > Color > Open Profile > mmod

There will be a separate instruction for Windows 10 users to adjust the RMBrightness scaling accordingly.

Caveats post-install/Bugs:
-16bit resolution glitch of UGA_DRAW_PROTOCOL - temporary solution: activate a sleep cycle and return, this should now clear the issue.

Important Links:
USB Flashing for SSH @xanderon method <link>
@Curtis Gross – walkthrough video <link>
Heat Sink MOD to grind down the edges <link>
Heat Sink mounting @tgaillar <link>
Kexts for sleep/iGPU (Mojave/Catalina) <link>



More GPU Roms to come... Enjoy!

“There is an overclock present on the GTX780M from the base rom. I would suggest you to use a 3-pipe heatsink for this GPU. Apply proper thermal pads and appropriate heat dissipating grease like K5pro to the areas that are in contact with the heat sink. Keep mac fans up and running to achieve better control of cooling as well.”

Is there a way to disable or tame this overclock in the ROM? The card keeps crashing with this ROM (on the right) with BSOD after 10–15 min of full load. Note: this doesn't happen with the ROM from linux USB (on the left), but I can't see any differences between the two (checked all tabs, everything but the top section looks identical):

In fact both of these ROMs are probably killing the Alienware GPU (see the original bioses clocks for DELL and Alienware on the right), just not sure why 780M_EG2.rom is not crashing as 780M_BR2.rom does:

 

[nikey22]

On Oct 31st, 2020, you mentioned this:

I've got the Alienware 780M about a month ago, plugged it in (with some sanding of the heatsink and only using thermal paste, no pads). It magically worked (no bootloader or brightness obviously), however after about 3 weeks on the morning after somewhat longer than usual gaming night the iMac shut down throwing some blue-ish artifacts on the screen while just browsing and it wouldn't start again (infinite chime loop).

This was based on you using the stock 780M Alienware rom that came with the video card.
So you were actually getting crashes even before you flashed either one of these rom versions.

 

[bielousov.com]

On Oct 31st, 2020, you mentioned this:

This was based on you using the stock 780M Alienware rom that came with the video card.
So you were actually getting crashes even before you flashed either one of these rom versions.

Good point, something might be off with the card, yet it works with one ROM but not the other.
Since then I reapplied thermal paste and thermal pads twice to it, and got rid of SSD RAID that was causing ocasional kernel panics, the system's got more stable.

Anyhow…


SOLVED

Well what I did is I took your ROM and updated with the values from DELL bios using Kepler BIOS Tweaker, namely:
- TDP Base Entry #0 (849.5) -> Entry #6 (771.0)
- 3D Base Entry #0 (849.5) -> Entry #6 (771.0)
- Boost Entry #0 (849.5) -> Entry #4 (797.0)
- Powertable (2) Max mW: 146% (197100) -> 100% (135000)
- Boost Table: Max Table Clock 849.5 -> 797.0
- Boost States: P00 Profile (2) GPC 540.0 -> 135.0

Crossed my fingers and toes, flashed it and… could no longer reproduce the issue after 1 hour with the same conditions.
The in-game performances feels a bit lower, and Valley benchmark catches the frequencies change as well:

Before change:

After lowering frequencies:

Just in case, my update ROM file is attached.

 

[nikey22]

Good work! much more stable timings.
I'll modify the rom on the 780M Mac Edition ROM page with those parameters, usually Nvidia and DELL have more conservative timings and I probably should have gone with those in the first place. I used Nick[D]'s timings b/c at the time, no one complained of them being too aggressive or prone to crashes, but admittedly no one (including myself) gamed on it long enough. Next time, I'll play Astroneer on bootcamp for 3hours instead of 1!

 

[bielousov.com]

Good work! much more stable timings.
I'll modify the rom on the 780M Mac Edition ROM page with those parameters, usually Nvidia and DELL have more conservative timings and I probably should have gone with those in the first place. I used Nick[D]'s timings b/c at the time, no one complained of them being too aggressive or prone to crashes, but admittedly no one (including myself) gamed on it long enough. Next time, I'll play Astroneer on bootcamp for 3hours instead of 1!

Cool, thanks, hopefully that'd be helpful to someone.
I guess what I was looking for is what was your source of BIOS, it looks like it was some an overclocked to taste ROM (potentially with active cooling), from here: https://www.techinferno.com/index.php?/files/file/22-nvidia-kepler-gpus-modified-vbios-file-pack/

Some values in the higher Boost Table registers still don't make sense to me, but it doesn't seem that those are used and as long as it is more stable, and native boot / brightness still work (and I verified that they do), that's fine with me. But next time I'm in, I'll be adding some copper and k5.

Oh and you probably need a more challenging benchmark than Astroneer =)
It's been happening for me in Wasteland3 1920x1080 and up, pretty much any settings but perhaps the lowest.
Just compare the system requirements for the two

 

[anton74]

Hello everyone. I am from Russia and I use a translator, forgive me for my bad English.
I bought a Quadro K1100M and the vendor installed VBIOS from Nick [D]. He sent it to me and I installed it.
LOADING SCREEN and dimming (open core) work. But GPU acceleration doesn't work! The MAC OS interface is not fancy, the Ungine Valley benchmark has an average FPS of 3.9 and an overall score of 163.
"VDADecoderChecker" reports that --- VDADecoderCreate failed. error: -12473

Why do you think it doesn't work? What could be the problem?

 

[ChrisCaro]

@nikey22 After flashing my Dell K4100m with K4100m_UGA.rom within windows NVflash, blurring of display immediately occurred. After initial reboot, Windows logo initially appeared and was followed by a black screen. login screen never showed!

I reflashed via ssh using Xanderon linux method with K4100m_BR.rom and all is working again.

Maybe just a bad flash.

Call it heresy, windows 10 on a Mac, but my goal was always DirectX12+macOS living as next door neighbors in harmony

 

[Vaoske]

Hello,

Strange behavior with my iMac2010 27'' nvidia3100M. Randomly black screen error after Big Sur update (1.2.1).
Things I had tried:
- PRAM Reset
- SMC Reset
- latest K3100M_BR.rom
Ne1 Andy idea?

Greets grom The Netherlands,
Vaoske

 

[m0bil]

Good work! much more stable timings.
I'll modify the rom on the 780M Mac Edition ROM page with those parameters, usually Nvidia and DELL have more conservative timings and I probably should have gone with those in the first place. I used Nick[D]'s timings b/c at the time, no one complained of them being too aggressive or prone to crashes, but admittedly no one (including myself) gamed on it long enough. Next time, I'll play Astroneer on bootcamp for 3hours instead of 1!

Out of curiosity, since I see these 780M cards come with Samsung / Elpida / Hynix memory chips, is it possible memory type plays a role on oveclocking and stability??, usually Samsung is more tolerant to overclocking and Elpida not so much...

@bielousov.com do you know which memory chips had your card ?

 

[nikey22]

@m0bil (iMac mid 2010, 21.5", iMac11,2)
Good point! I'm sure they do. Some manufacturers cut cost by using cheaper vram. I've never had issues with Hynix vram, but there are different die-generations that have given us some troubles in the past (-AFR vs. -BFR). I'm starting to see issues with various manufacturers, which is I think why we should start to stick to baseline boost for TDP, mem etc. Samsung vram seems to be able to handle more overclock. The Elpida latency definitions are not even found in all roms! I've had to add them in recently.

@ChrisCaro (iMac mid 2011, 27", iMac12,2)
Good job getting legacy win10 to co-operate; @Ri7 has had good success with the oc vbios. I have it currently on a 2011, very stable running cool @967mhz for GPU, 2200mhz for mem with 0.975v.
Make sure you have:
Bootrom: 87.0.0.0.0
SMC ver: 1.72f2

@anton74 (iMac mid 2010, 21.5", iMac11,2)
I'm not sure you can get QuickSync to work on your CPU. It may not have a built in iGPU.
have a read here: QuickSync, via @highvoltage12v
Make sure you have:
Bootrom: 99.0.0.0.0
SMC ver: 1.64f5

@Vaoske (iMac mid 2010, 27", iMac11,3)
?possibly some interaction with xeon CPU. I have no way to test this on latest BigSur.
Make sure you have:
Bootrom: 99.0.0.0.0
SMC ver: 1.59f2

 

[Miou09]

Check the first post and search for black screen issue!

Check the first post and search for black screen issue!

Hello,

thank you very much for pointing me on the right track.
I usually read the information well, but I skipped over this one.
it was applegraphicscontrol.kext
however i can't find it for bigsur.
does it exist?
thanks again for all you do

 

[Ri7]

@m0bil
Good point! I'm sure they do. Some manufacturers cut cost by using cheaper vram. I've never had issues with Hynix vram, but there are different die-generations that have given us some troubles in the past (-AFR vs. -BFR). I'm starting to see issues with various manufacturers, which is I think why we should start to stick to baseline boost for TDP, mem etc. Samsung vram seems to be able to handle more overclock. The Elpida latency definitions are not even found in all roms.

@ChrisCaro
Good job getting legacy win10 to co-operate; @Ri7 has had good success with the oc vbios. I have it currently on a 2011, very stable running cool.
Make sure you have:
Bootrom: 87.0.0.0.0
SMC ver: 1.72f2

@anton74
I'm not sure you can get QuickSync to work on your CPU. It may not have a built in iGPU.
have a read here: QuickSync, via @highvoltage12v
Make sure you have:
Bootrom: 99.0.0.0.0
SMC ver: 1.64f5

@Vaoske
?possibly some interaction with xeon CPU. I have no way to test this on latest BigSur.
Make sure you have:
Bootrom: 99.0.0.0.0
SMC ver: 1.59f2

Yes!
I've been playing around with clocks and voltages in a K4100m of my 2011 iMac for a while.

Without any cooling mod or upgrade, the most stable and safe combination of clocks/voltages was 967mhz for GPU and 2200mhz for memories with 0,975v. Testing for more than 6 hours, no problems, no overheating at all.
Anything above this values exceeded system total heat dissipation capabilities (2500rpm ODD fan)

With 3800rpm ODD fan "mod" (actually disconnecting sensor cable), I'm running with 1032mhz GPU and 2400mhz memories with 0,9875v. More than 6 hours of gaming/testing and zero issues. This is my setup now, never reaches 70°C at all. I did a 6 hours stress test of Valley in Catalina as well.

I am using K5-Pro on memories and Thermal Grizzly on GPU, ODD in place (tape on disc opening), i7-2600 (95w tdp), two SSD and 33/34°C ambient temperature. No physical modifications.

For information only: the absolute maximum clocks that I achieved was 1045,5mhz/2448mhz@1,000v but it runs only 10/15 minutes until crash, even with 3800rpm or high voltage.

The fact is: I really do learn everyday in this topic!

 

[Ausdauersportler]

Hello,

thank you very much for pointing me on the right track.
I usually read the information well, but I skipped over this one.
it was applegraphicscontrol.kext
however i can't find it for bigsur.
does it exist?
thanks again for all you do

It is included in all my forks of the available patcher versions, take a look into the first post, too. No need to install it separately.

 

[Miou09]

It is included in all my forks of the available patcher versions, take a look into the first post, too. No need to install it separately.

ok I must have made a mistake then because I have the same black screen with bigsur while I installed your micropatcher fork
I have no wifi and no sound

 

[Ausdauersportler]

ok I must have made a mistake then because I have the same black screen with bigsur while I installed your micropatcher fork
I have no wifi and no sound

Than you did not patch the system at all.

 

[Miou09]

Than you did not patch the system at all.

I erased my score, I start from the beginning.
which patch / method do you advise me?
IMac 27late2009 quadro K4100M
Thanks

 

[Ausdauersportler]

I erased my score, I start from the beginning.
which patch / method do you advise me?
IMac 27late2009 quadro K4100M
Thanks

I would advice reading the online docs coming which each Big Sur patcher and following its line by line and step by step - patching is included but does not happen automatically!

 

[bielousov.com]

Cool, thanks, hopefully that'd be helpful to someone.
I guess what I was looking for is what was your source of BIOS, it looks like it was some an overclocked to taste ROM (potentially with active cooling), from here: https://www.techinferno.com/index.php?/files/file/22-nvidia-kepler-gpus-modified-vbios-file-pack/

Some values in the higher Boost Table registers still don't make sense to me, but it doesn't seem that those are used and as long as it is more stable, and native boot / brightness still work (and I verified that they do), that's fine with me. But next time I'm in, I'll be adding some copper and k5.

Oh and you probably need a more challenging benchmark than Astroneer =)
It's been happening for me in Wasteland3 1920x1080 and up, pretty much any settings but perhaps the lowest.
Just compare the system requirements for the two

I'm still a bit curious what makes the DE.AD.00.BE.EF ROM so special that it didn't have the same stability issues even though the frequencies appear to be the same.

 

[bielousov.com]

Yes!
I've been playing around with clocks and voltages in a K4100m of my 2011 iMac for a while.

Without any cooling mod or upgrade, the most stable and safe combination of clocks/voltages was 967mhz for GPU and 2200mhz for memories with 0,975v. Testing for more than 6 hours, no problems, no overheating at all.
Anything above this values exceeded system total heat dissipation capabilities (2500rpm ODD fan)

With 3800rpm ODD fan "mod" (actually disconnecting sensor cable), I'm running with 1032mhz GPU and 2400mhz memories with 0,9875v. More than 6 hours of gaming/testing and zero issues. This is my setup now, never reaches 70°C at all. I did a 6 hours stress test of Valley in Catalina as well.

I am using K5-Pro on memories and Thermal Grizzly on GPU, ODD in place (tape on disc opening), i7-2600 (95w tdp), two SSD and 33/34°C ambient temperature. No physical modifications.

For information only: the absolute maximum clocks that I achieved was 1045,5mhz/2448mhz@1,000v but it runs only 10/15 minutes until crash, even with 3800rpm or high voltage.

The fact is: I really do learn everyday in this topic!

Nice. Do you have an empty ODD bay? See, I have an HDD there with some chassis from MBP that pretty much blocks most of the the airflow to the heatsink. But looking forward to do the 3800rpm fan mod and clearing the airflow.

See photo attached, even though there is some space between the HDD and back wall, I'd better move it all the way to the right and turn 90°.

 

[bielousov.com]

Out of curiosity, since I see these 780M cards come with Samsung / Elpida / Hynix memory chips, is it possible memory type plays a role on oveclocking and stability??, usually Samsung is more tolerant to overclocking and Elpida not so much...

@bielousov.com do you know which memory chips had your card ?

This is the one I have:

DELL Nvidia GeForce GTX 780M 4GB DDR5 MXM 3.0 Type B for Alienware | eBay

Find many great new & used options and get the best deals for DELL Nvidia GeForce GTX 780M 4GB DDR5 MXM 3.0 Type B for Alienware at the best online prices at eBay! Free shipping for many products!

www.ebay.ca

Appears to be Samsung. I did not confirm with the actual card received though.

Updated: I opened the iMac once again and it is NOT Samsung, but some Skhynix in fact.

 

[Ri7]

Nice. Do you have an empty ODD bay? See, I have an HDD there with some chassis from MBP that pretty much blocks most of the the airflow to the heatsink. But looking forward to do the 3800rpm fan mod and clearing the airflow.

No, my ODD is there.
My two SSDs is glued together in original HDD bay

After several tests I realized that Apple did a very great job about air flow inside iMac...
Without ODD, air pressure is low and temperature at GPU heatsink is always 3 degrees higher.

So I put back my ODD (doesn't work at all) only to get correct airflow.