the problem of the black screen was solved by installing big surs on a new disk with an external monitor, after installation it turned on itself
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iM 4,1-14,4 2011 iMac Graphics Card Upgrade
- Thread starter MichaelDT
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Two hints:
1. Reading is key!
2. You should have checked the very first box of the package installer "Nvidia iMac ...." because your obviously did not have an AMD card, you bought a NVIDIA K1100M. Checking all boxes does not hurt.
3. You can using a terminal and add the patches yourself doing this (after disabling SIP, again):
Code:
sudo /usr/libexec/PlistBuddy -c 'Add :IOKitPersonalities:AppleGraphicsDevicePolicy:ConfigMap:Mac-942B59F58194171B string none' /System/Library/Extensions/AppleGraphicsControl.kext/Contents/PlugIns/AppleGraphicsDevicePolicy.kext/Contents/Info.plist
sudo /usr/libexec/PlistBuddy -c 'Add :IOKitPersonalities:AppleGraphicsDevicePolicy:ConfigMap:Mac-942B5BF58194151B string none' /System/Library/Extensions/AppleGraphicsControl.kext/Contents/PlugIns/AppleGraphicsDevicePolicy.kext/Contents/Info.plist
sudo /usr/libexec/PlistBuddy -c 'Add :IOKitPersonalities:AppleGraphicsDevicePolicy:ConfigMap:Mac-F2268DAE string none' /System/Library/Extensions/AppleGraphicsControl.kext/Contents/PlugIns/AppleGraphicsDevicePolicy.kext/Contents/Info.plist
sudo /usr/libexec/PlistBuddy -c 'Add :IOKitPersonalities:AppleGraphicsDevicePolicy:ConfigMap:Mac-F2238AC8 string none' /System/Library/Extensions/AppleGraphicsControl.kext/Contents/PlugIns/AppleGraphicsDevicePolicy.kext/Contents/Info.plist
sudo /usr/libexec/PlistBuddy -c 'Add :IOKitPersonalities:AppleGraphicsDevicePolicy:ConfigMap:Mac-F2238BAE string none' /System/Library/Extensions/AppleGraphicsControl.kext/Contents/PlugIns/AppleGraphicsDevicePolicy.kext/Contents/Info.plist
sudo touch /System/Library/Extensions/
sudo chmod -Rf 755 /System/Library/Extensions/*
sudo chown -Rf 0:0 /System/Library/Extensions/*
sudo kextcache -i /
sudo reboot
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So you never succeeded to install the patches through the package installer and used the opencore settings of OCLP instead.
Yes, by reading the guides!
Please start reading the first post - we cannot spoon feed you through this. You need OpenCore on the iMac 2011 to solve this and it is part of the OCLP packages.
If you experience this on an older iMac you need to install the Windows boot camp drivers…
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Hello All,
Following on my successful installation of the Dell Green WX4130 2GB (With flashed ROM from first page) into my iMac 11,1 Late 2009 27inch i7. Here are my GeekBench scores, the CPU is going to be on the low side due to the age, however I think the GPU is very impressive. GPU Temp has been very stable (40 - 50 degree temps).
I've been running Big Sur via Open Core v0.1.4 and haven't had any issues to date, it even did the 11.4 update natively without a glitch.
As I mentioned a few posts back the card wasn't cheap £100/$140, and also trying to find the correct one was pretty hard. It's very very quick for it's age and the GPU is better than most new modern Macs, more than adequate for my needs. I might upgrade to 32GB RAM (maybe overkill)
Following on my successful installation of the Dell Green WX4130 2GB (With flashed ROM from first page) into my iMac 11,1 Late 2009 27inch i7. Here are my GeekBench scores, the CPU is going to be on the low side due to the age, however I think the GPU is very impressive. GPU Temp has been very stable (40 - 50 degree temps).
I've been running Big Sur via Open Core v0.1.4 and haven't had any issues to date, it even did the 11.4 update natively without a glitch.
As I mentioned a few posts back the card wasn't cheap £100/$140, and also trying to find the correct one was pretty hard. It's very very quick for it's age and the GPU is better than most new modern Macs, more than adequate for my needs. I might upgrade to 32GB RAM (maybe overkill)
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I thought so too, so I had look at the other GPU's on the GeekBench site, as I didn't believe it, although it's not patch on the crazy expensive gaming cards. It pretty much beats anything in this range that fits this iMac.
It's completely native too, no kexts edits, patching. Other than the OpenCore Legacy Patcher which takes 1 minute to setup or either USB Stick/SD Card or you can install on the main Boot disk.
2k Videos, games, etc run so smooth, no glitches or anything. I'm very happy so far and again appreciate the efforts of those that made this possible and not to mentioned those who helped me narrow down what card to use.
Don't look down upon the WX4130. The AMD series are the newer MXM cards than the nVidia. Even the low end WX4130 compares favourably with the top end of nVidia ones. The only culprit is that they are difficult to source and don't work in each and every model of iMac 2009-2011.
I am not using OSX or whatever macOS how is called now at all, I hack them for (so many)years just for fun and to gather knowledge.
I am looking for a way to flash from windows or efi shell using batch script for testing various video cards and main firmware hacks, I am coming from hackint0sh "era" if my nick tells you something(cut the 's)...
I have the same card in a 2011 iMac and i got 17234 on geekbench metal. So looks like the CPU might be your bottleneck, as mine runs a newer i7. With an i7-860, i think the max memory is 16gb, no? Here is the product spec from intel, it says 16gb max for 860: https://ark.intel.com/content/www/us/en/ark/compare.html?productIds=48501,48500,41316
Would be interesting to see if you could run i7-880 or the xeon X3480(which supports 32gb ram) and see if that would bump your max ram support, and also improve your metal score(probably not). Its not that expensive on ebay: https://www.ebay.com/itm/384081922956?hash=item596d110b8c:g:bFsAAOSw6bpgbSYy & https://www.ebay.com/itm/324658666855?hash=item4b972a1d67:g:8hoAAOSwrR1guUzk
Edit: i7-880 does work, based on this: https://mac-yak.com/2019/03/19/upgrading-a-2009-imac-cpu/ - and looks like a nice bump in performance based on the benchmark scores. So the question remains for X3480 and 32gb ram
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Mine is a little lower than mitesh33. Core i7-870, 16GB DDR3L (2 x 8GB), HP WX4150 4GB, with Dell Bios. Geekbench recognized it as AMD RX460.
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Thank you. It didn't work right away.
But I found what the problem is. Make sure to remove all other IDs in this file and leave only the ones you specified. The display of my iMac 27 (2010) k1100m was rated as the primary display and the external display as the second. Great job!
Installed opencore, included a brightness control patch.
lacks maximum brightness. Tell me how you can increase the brightness?
Your issue might be the DDR3-L memory, i would try with normal DDR3, that should give the CPU a boost to match mitesh33's results. Or upgrade the CPU as i mentioned above
Your issue might be the DDR3-L memory, i would try with normal DDR3, that should give the CPU a boost to match mitesh33's results. Or upgrade the CPU as i mentioned above
I've got a CPU with higher specs (core i7-870 vs i7-860), but lower benchmark score.
I doubt about getting better score with slightly more powerful CPU. i7-880 and Xeon X3480 are also much rarer and more expensive than i7-870. I'm just happy with the current result.
I improved the brightness max level with Opencore Legacy Patcher version 0.1.2. (imac late 2009)
Later versions may work even better. But 0.1.2 solved my issue of brightness level. So I just stay there.
Need some advice/guidance from the experts here:
My iMac 2011 27" GPU went down in flames a month ago. The usual symptoms with the existing card:
AMD Radeon HD 6970M 2048 MB
I took it to a local shop for them to replace the GPU. They kept it there for 3 weeks, and eventually told me to pick it up. The tech there told me I need to bring it back after 10-14 days of usage so he could flash it. After taking it home, I saw that the machine was still reporting it as the same AMD card. I took it back after 14 days (things were working fine) and after 3 days, he called me up that he had difficulty flashing it, and at this point, I should just pick it up. I asked him what card was installed, and he told me it was NVIDIA Quadro K2100M 2GB. Since he wasn't able to flash it, the mac is still reporting the GPU as the previous AMD Radeon card.
This is way beyond my expertise here, and at this point I'm not sure if I should pursue the GPU flash. Will I be getting any performance upgrades from it? Is there a danger of hosing my whole machine? I rely on this mac heavily (it's my music production machine) so can't afford to break anything.
I realize I paid for a card and installation of the card. Very conflicted, seeing the process seems very complicated and prone to me possibly screwing it up. Any advice is greatly appreciated.
J.
My iMac 2011 27" GPU went down in flames a month ago. The usual symptoms with the existing card:
AMD Radeon HD 6970M 2048 MB
I took it to a local shop for them to replace the GPU. They kept it there for 3 weeks, and eventually told me to pick it up. The tech there told me I need to bring it back after 10-14 days of usage so he could flash it. After taking it home, I saw that the machine was still reporting it as the same AMD card. I took it back after 14 days (things were working fine) and after 3 days, he called me up that he had difficulty flashing it, and at this point, I should just pick it up. I asked him what card was installed, and he told me it was NVIDIA Quadro K2100M 2GB. Since he wasn't able to flash it, the mac is still reporting the GPU as the previous AMD Radeon card.
This is way beyond my expertise here, and at this point I'm not sure if I should pursue the GPU flash. Will I be getting any performance upgrades from it? Is there a danger of hosing my whole machine? I rely on this mac heavily (it's my music production machine) so can't afford to break anything.
I realize I paid for a card and installation of the card. Very conflicted, seeing the process seems very complicated and prone to me possibly screwing it up. Any advice is greatly appreciated.
J.
A nice story. But when the system is reporting an AMD 6970M card you will have still this card installed. We have no BIOS here to report a different GPU type.
You can take a look at the first post, download the Linux Flash Utility and just save the current BIOS following the guides.
If doing this for some reason the nvflash_linux tools is able to read the BIOS from your card then you have really an NVIDIA card installed (long story short: nvidia software will only flash and read nvidia cards, no ATI/AMD cards and vice versa).
The tool will tell you which card is has found. In case it does not work try the amdvb_flash tool.
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Appreciate the reply. I seem to be having issues running this utility, nvflash_linux. Getting a "cannot execute binary file" message. I wanted to run the --verify to see what it returns. I'm running this on High Sierra (10.13.16)
It is called nvflash_linux for a reason: it is a linux binary - go back to the first post, search for the FAQ->How to flash, and download the Linux image, store it onto an USB Stick, boot it and using the tools following the documentation within the post.
There is not macOS video BIOS flash utility.
I think the issue here is that the nvflash program is meant for Linux, not macOS. I've never tried using nvflash while running macOS, and there may be a way to get it working this way.... typically, almost everyone here uses the GRML Linux USB method described in the first post to flash their GPUs. I'd recommend making a bootable GRML flash drive, and trying again while running Linux. I think there are some videos on YouTube explaining how to use GRML to flash your GPU as well. (Beware that most YouTube videos are terribly outdated, so the best information usually comes from the first post on this forum.)
I would advise that you flash your GPU because doing so will allow it to function as if it was a natively supported part (i.e. all of the features such as brightness control and the boot screen function).
What's unclear to me here is whether or not the repair shop actually sent you home with the 6970M or with the K2100M. Your computer should not report that the 6970M is installed (under system report) if that is not actually the case. If you are able to confirm that the K2100M is physically installed inside your computer, then I would definitely try to flash it, as the iMac will work better this way. There is relatively little that could be physically messed up by flashing the GPU, as this is a software-based process. Before flashing, it is important to back up the pre-existing ROM code from your GPU so that if things go poorly, you'll be able to revert to the beginning. Having a backup of the GPU (and your computer's hard drive for good measure) will really reduce the dangers of irreparably damaging your computer. The computer is very unlikely to physically break as a result of this process. The main risk is that the GPU flash fails (in a freak event) and that you need to reflash it blind --this procedure is well described in the documentation on page one. If you're unsure about anything, I'd recommend reading through the documentation and taking notes or consulting someone with more computer experience (or asking about it here). Good luck!
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Ah, got it. Thanks for your patience. I'm def proving my newbie status here. Got the USB stick setup as a Linux boot with all the goods preloaded. In terms of me "verifying" if there is indeed a nVidia card installed, do I just run nvflash_linux with a specific parameter?
How to say this??? It seems like you might have been taken for a ride. I say this because the HD6970 is a known defective card. Full-stop. I am not sure what your objective is but you need to choose one of the cards in the first post. Then you can do some interesting stuff. With the HD6970 you are a dead man walking.
There is some thing misunderstood here. Below is my understanding (speculation) from your description.
1. Your iMac's GPU is dead. You took it to the shop.
2. The shop returned the iMac to you, with a working GPU (AMD). It's clearly that he had replaced the dead GPU with a working one, or revived it to usable level.
3. You took your iMac to the shop the 2nd time. The shop tried to flash the card K2100m, but failed.
4. You took your iMac home, thinking that there is a K2100m inside. (as the underlined sentence state). But whether the K2100m was inside your iMac is a big question here.
5. It's clearly not so, because the card inside is still AMD HD6970m. The machine is still working, with normal boot screen and all. And you have read the info from "About this Mac" that the GPU is HD6970m.
6. Now you are trying to (1) flash an modified ROM for K2100m to the HD 6970; and attempt to do that (2) within Mac OS environment?
How can it be possible?