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

[Ausdauersportler]

I gave the WX4150 card another try today and can report a success on my 21,5" iMac 2010
Compared with my previous trial I changed following things :
- Assembly of WX4150 on its heatsink using Kapton tape on both sides of GPU (of course not on GPU Die and VRAM)
- First boot on one SSD with only High Sierra installed, so that the lack of bootpicker does not matter. Than selection of Catalina Loader as first boot volume.
Thank you so much to all the contributors of this amazing thread and its famous 1st post ! Using search engine also really helps...
My next step will be to install Big Sur on this machine.

Have you thought of or even tried to use a copper plate instead of this tape as mentioned on post #1?

 

[Reno12]

Have you thought of or even tried to use a copper plate instead of this tape as mentioned on post #1?

Yes the 1mm thick copper plate is also installed inbetween GPU Die and heatsink. That was also the case in my previous attempt. The tape is located on both sides (also under the X bracket). Today I used one external screen. It makes the process much confortable as I could swap SSDs with less effort.

 

[Reno12]

Yes the 1mm thick copper plate is also installed inbetween GPU Die and heatsink. That was also the case in my previous attempt. The tape is located on both sides (also under the X bracket). Today I used one external screen. It makes the process much confortable as I could swap SSDs with less effort.

Here are some pictures

 

[Ausdauersportler]

Yes the 1mm thick copper plate is also installed inbetween GPU Die and heatsink. That was also the case in my previous attempt. The tape is located on both sides (also under the X bracket). Today I used one external screen. It makes the process much confortable as I could swap SSDs with less effort.

During the last year I installed some of these AMD cards so far and I never had to use any tape. I am really interested why this makes a difference at all. Sometimes I used thin Tesa or M3 tape to and some parts of the sink to avoid contact of the square metal parts (mostly coils). But only locally for two of three parts.

Edit:
Ok, looks familiar. But I never used it on the back and much less on the sink.

 

[Reno12]

During the last year I installed some of these AMD cards so far and I never had to use any tape. I am really interested why this makes a difference at all. Sometimes I used thin Tesa or M3 tape to and some parts of the sink to avoid contact of the square metal parts (mostly coils). But only locally for two of three parts.

Well I’m not sure what was key of success today. Maybe my GPU assembly was more precise. As some other members had also experienced success with Kapton I choose to follow the secure way and did the same.

 

[KennyW]

Well I’m not sure what was key of success today. Maybe my GPU assembly was more precise. As some other members had also experienced success with Kapton I choose to follow the secure way and did the same.

Well, I just used thin insulating heat tape under the X-bracelet on the back, in case it matters.
Haven't bothered to test without them 😊
On the VRAM side, just plenty of K5 Pro.
Make sure a tiny gap exist between the board components, especially the solid state coils, and heat sink.

 

[Santa's Little Helper]

How is a vbios even made? Typing 0's and 1's matrix style?

It's basically a spot the difference puzzle, once you have some working examples.

Scooter Software - Home of Beyond Compare

Scooter Software: Home of Beyond Compare

www.scootersoftware.com

You can use a script called GOPupd to easily extract / stitch the EFI sections:

AMD and Nvidia GOP update (No requests, DIY)

I’m not really the guy to run on unlimited supply of patience, so this will be more a mix of tutorial, tool to do the job for you, assistance (“as long as you don’t insist with unlimited/unrelated questions” kind) and ABSOLUTELY NO GUARANTEES. Users should read this again, I am not offering any...

www.win-raid.com

and tools like Kepler BIOS Tweaker to adjust the clocks / power limits:

Kepler BIOS Tweaker v1.27 Download

Kepler BIOS Editor lets you modify the VBIOS of your NVIDIA Kepler-based GeForce graphics card, ie the GeForce GTX 600 Series, like GTX 690, GTX 680,

www.techpowerup.com

I guess reading Nvidia's docs might also be some help:

https://download.nvidia.com/open-gpu-doc/DCB/1/DCB-4.0-Specification.html

NVIDIA BIOS Information Table Specification

Then you just need logic and perseverance, anyone found a link for those..?

 

[gunner451]

@bielousov.com
good to know!
I thought the _BR2 rom was okay, me, @Ausdauersportler and @highvoltage12v have used it for almost 2 yrs now without crashes and since there are plenty of 780Ms around, more people would have spoken up if it was a reproducible issue. Possibly as you've discovered, it is a fringe phenomenon apparent only at extremes of gpu stress. I will put the rom back up. I am doing some additional fine tuning mods to it first, I want to get rid of the SLI code, we don't need it! (I'm sure there were some laptop PCs that were capable of this, wow!). Also, I want to make sure Eplida vram latencies are working well incase anyone has a Eplida based card and I'll double check the Samsung entries.

Relocating the ODD sensor was an excellent tweak per @Ausdauersportler, I use this routinely now on all my tests. I like what you and @Ri7 are doing with the airflow analysis, so much depends on it. I am currently looking into the SMC firmware (very dangerous by the way) to see if there is anything that I can reset the RPMs for the fans to a different threshold. Dangerous because if you mess up the firmware in the SMC, you will have to get another donor board to get back the functionality. You can't simply buy one, they all come unprogrammed. Furthermore the SMC chip will need solder balls via a stencil. The fun never ends!

nikey22,

I just recently bought an 2011 21.5" iMac and moded it with an SSD and am interested in messing around with GPU ROM's, what tools do you use to mod the ROM's with? I've used UEFItool to look at the iMac BIOS but that does not seem to work for the GPU. Any pointers to other resources would also be much appriciated. Thanks

 

[OnawaAfrica]

I gave the WX4150 card another try today and can report a success on my 21,5" iMac 2010
Compared with my previous trial I changed following things :
- Assembly of WX4150 on its heatsink using Kapton tape on both sides of GPU (of course not on GPU Die and VRAM)
- First boot on one SSD with only High Sierra installed, so that the lack of bootpicker does not matter. Than selection of Catalina Loader as first boot volume.
Thank you so much to all the contributors of this amazing thread and its famous 1st post ! Using search engine also really helps...
My next step will be to install Big Sur on this machine.

where did u get the WX4150? been looking for it now for a while. tho am running successfully a K610m it would be nice to have a way stronger gpu

 

[OnawaAfrica]

nikey22,

I just recently bought an 2011 21.5" iMac and moded it with an SSD and am interested in messing around with GPU ROM's, what tools do you use to mod the ROM's with? I've used UEFItool to look at the iMac BIOS but that does not seem to work for the GPU. Any pointers to other resources would also be much appriciated. Thanks

do you want to modify the roms your self? or to flash them?

 

[Reno12]

where did u get the WX4150? been looking for it now for a while. tho am running successfully a K610m it would be nice to have a way stronger gpu

I got it beginning of november last year on ebay for ~190$ ... Seller was lc8723. I have no interest with that shop and cannot garantee any purchase with it.

 

[gunner451]

do you want to modify the roms your self? or to flash them?

yes

 

[OnawaAfrica]

I got it beginning of november last year on ebay for ~190$ ... Seller was lc8723. I have no interest with that shop and cannot garantee any purchase with it.

well am not in your country I'm in Kenya ell let Mme try my luck with those cards from aliexpress

 

[Schprecher]

need very high skilling pps, who know how to dump firmware from SMC chip?

i find the way for iMac 27 late 2009 with not support ++ cards nvidia.

first need to dump smc from mid 2010, and write on to late 2009 logic board,
then replace bootrom from mid 2010, and flash in late 2009.

with this late 2009 imac works fine.

i replace SMC chip from dead motherboard from imac 27 mid 2010 to late 2009,
and flash bootrom from mid 2010.

if just simple flash bootrom from 2010 to 2009, its loosing soundcard.
but if update firmware SMC, its vork with soundcard.

 

[iceman90]

I installed 11.2.1 with BenSova/Patched-Sur, on iMac Mid-2011. Everything works with upgrade Nvidia 780M - vBios 780M_EG2.rom
I don't use OpenCore at the moment.

GitHub - BenSova/Patched-Sur: A simple but powerful patcher for macOS Big Sur.

A simple but powerful patcher for macOS Big Sur. Contribute to BenSova/Patched-Sur development by creating an account on GitHub.

github.com

With 780M_EG2.rom, I don't have the boot screen, but the possibility to select the boot disk (Alt-cmd) and no possibility to adjust the screen brightness (frozen at 100%)

With 780M_BR2.rom and 780M_BR3.rom, I have the boot screen but the brightness is adjustable but the maximum displays 50% of the screen brightness.

Is there a hardware modification to do ?
I'm using a 780M card from Dell.

everything is described in the post with rom

 

[mperaltaoz]

Reporting a successfull install of Big Sur on my mid 2010 iMac 21.5".

I could't get it to work with the iMac OpenCoreLegacyPatcher or the MicropatcherAutomator (the former installed ok but it didn't have brightness control, and the latter also installed well but it didn't have wifi).
So I tried with the iMac Micropatcher yesterday and, after some problems during the install, it finally worked!

Sharing a few problems I had for other's benefit:
- The installer hanged at 13 minutes to complete and it stayed there for hours (like 3+ hrs). I got tired of it, turned the iMac off, SMC/VRAM reset, started again.
- The second time everything went well, but in step 15) of the install instructions (patch-kexts.sh and configure-opencore.sh), I noticed that configure-opencore.sh didn't detect my iMac as 11,2 and used a standard config.plist intead (i.e. not applying the specific kexts for my configuration).
- Big Sur worked ok (including WiFi and brightness control), but the screen was dim.
- After trying a few other thngs unsuccessfully, I finally harcoded "iMac 11,2" in the part of configure-opencore.sh where the hardware detection is done. That fixed the problem... the script applied all the right configutations, brightness control works perfect, and the screen is not dim anymore.

Hope this helps others.

 

[mperaltaoz]

I just noticed there's been some changes in the iMac Micropatcher in the last few hours... it looks like config-opencore.sh is not in step 15) anymore?

 

[Ausdauersportler]

Reporting a successfull install of Big Sur on my mid 2010 iMac 21.5".

I could't get it to work with the iMac OpenCoreLegacyPatcher or the MicropatcherAutomator (the former installed ok but it didn't have brightness control, and the latter also installed well but it didn't have wifi).
So I tried with the iMac Micropatcher yesterday and, after some problems during the install, it finally worked!

Sharing a few problems I had for other's benefit:
- The installer hanged at 13 minutes to complete and it stayed there for hours (like 3+ hrs). I got tired of it, turned the iMac off, SMC/VRAM reset, started again.
- The second time everything went well, but in step 15) of the install instructions (patch-kexts.sh and configure-opencore.sh), I noticed that configure-opencore.sh didn't detect my iMac as 11,2 and used a standard config.plist intead (i.e. not applying the specific kexts for my configuration).
- Big Sur worked ok (including WiFi and brightness control), but the screen was dim.
- After trying a few other thngs unsuccessfully, I finally harcoded "iMac 11,2" in the part of configure-opencore.sh where the hardware detection is done. That fixed the problem... the script applied all the right configutations, brightness control works perfect, and the screen is not dim anymore.

Hope this helps others.

This is fine and confusing at the same time

The config-opencore.sh does not patch or apply kexts or do other changes to your Big Sur installation. It just tries to find out your iMac GPU type and selects a fitting OpenCore config.plist.

Even if you hardcode the iMac12,1 into the config-opencore.sh it will not change the outcome since the selection is based on the GPU type, only.

Please run /usr/sbin/system_profiler SPDisplaysDataType | fgrep "Device ID" | awk '{print $3}' on the command line in terminal app the check your GPU type and repost the result here...should be 0x12b9

 

[mperaltaoz]

Spot on: 0x12b9

 

[internetzel]

need very high skilling pps, who know how to dump firmware from SMC chip?

i find the way for iMac 27 late 2009 with not support ++ cards nvidia.

first need to dump smc from mid 2010, and write on to late 2009 logic board,
then replace bootrom from mid 2010, and flash in late 2009.

with this late 2009 imac works fine.

i replace SMC chip from dead motherboard from imac 27 mid 2010 to late 2009,
and flash bootrom from mid 2010.

if just simple flash bootrom from 2010 to 2009, its loosing soundcard.
but if update firmware SMC, its vork with soundcard.

You can actually flash the SMC firmware at an EFI shell by extracting the smcflasher.efi and the *.smc file corresponding to a 2010 iMac from some High Sierra updater. Searching the web will reveal how to use smcflasher.efi .

But I guess you could also flash an older 2010 EFI bootrom to the 2009 and have some High Sierra updater update your EFI and SMC firmware to the latest versions.

 

[mperaltaoz]

@Ausdauersportler, I see you've changed a few things in the iMac Micropatcher after I did all this stuff... should I reinstall or re-apply patch-kexts.sh?

 

[Ausdauersportler]

Spot on: 0x12b9

So the script config-opencore.sh should print at the end these three lines:

Verbose boot disabled, NVIDIA GPU selected
Unmounting EFI volume (if this fails, just eject in Finder afterward).
install-opencore finished.

 

[Ausdauersportler]

@Ausdauersportler, I see you've changed a few things in the iMac Micropatcher after I did all this stuff... should I reinstall or re-apply patch-kexts.sh?

No, let it be!

All changes are planned to get around the final config-opencore.sh call - which does not work right now and I stopped development some days ago because of real life work

 

[mperaltaoz]

So the script config-opencore.sh should print at the end these three lines:

Verbose boot disabled, NVIDIA GPU selected
Unmounting EFI volume (if this fails, just eject in Finder afterward).
install-opencore finished.

The first time around (when it didn't detect iMac11,2 and assumed generic config.plist, the script applied this entry in the final "if statement"

echo 'Verbose boot disabled, no iMac specific metal GPU selected'
cp -f opencore/CONFIG/config_OTHER_BigSur.plist /Volumes/EFI/EFI/OC/config.plist

The second time (after hardcoding iMac11,2), I'm pretty sure it applied this one:
echo 'Verbose boot disabled, NVIDIA GPU selected'
cp -f opencore/CONFIG/config_NVIDIA_BigSur.plist /Volumes/EFI/EFI/OC/config.plist

Makes sense?

 

[Ausdauersportler]

The first time around (when it didn't detect iMac11,2 and assumed generic config.plist, the script applied this entry in the final "if statement"

echo 'Verbose boot disabled, no iMac specific metal GPU selected'
cp -f opencore/CONFIG/config_OTHER_BigSur.plist /Volumes/EFI/EFI/OC/config.plist

The second time (after hardcoding iMac11,2), I'm pretty sure it applied this one:
echo 'Verbose boot disabled, NVIDIA GPU selected'
cp -f opencore/CONFIG/config_NVIDIA_BigSur.plist /Volumes/EFI/EFI/OC/config.plist

Makes sense?

No!

The complete if statement just checks the GPU type, not the iMac model. The model clause in front is just there for further developments - in case I would have to support more than the iMac11.x and 12x family and to cross check off if a user sets a GPU type on the command line.