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

[KennyW]

Hi Guys,

Been following this thread a few months, I think I've read up most of it (although 600 pages is a lot, I hope to have covered the most important posts!), and just like to confirm whether the W7170M is still NOT a fully working card... as per post #4,204, it may seem to work somewhat, but after seeing over the years of posts that the marvelous work on here has gone from quite a few hardware mods and chip flashing to mostly software solutions, be it thru OC or LinuxUSB, I still have a small hope that possibly some more cards could eventually be supported (sometime soon😜)...?

So I bought what was supposed to be a 109-C95847-00C-02*, but, as seems to be common (and curiously this happened from IT card shop, same as from post above), I actually got a 109-C769A1-00B_02 - here is where I am still confused, although I prefer to trust more in the info on this site, and would say that this is not a WX7100, as it seems not to have either the correct BootROM chip, nor the treasured Ellesmore written on the card, so I am wondering whether to bother even trying to install this, or just send it back and get a refund from the shop...

I used to work at an Apple SAT, so am totally used to working inside these machines, and have a good control software wise, enough to understand and follow flashing and hackintosh instructions (have a LattePanda Alpha with a RX vega64 over a x4 PCIe connector🤔, I know, total overkill and will never take full advantage of this card (just had to take advantage of a great deal), but this little home gaming setup started out with a GTX1070 (still a bit of overkill, but came from a mining rig at a really good price), and the (long-term) idea is to have this card in a better hackintosh rig later on, when money permits (did I say looong-term!?!), anyway, works very nicely with OC, and previously with Clover ;-)

So this iMac is my home unit, kind of professional use, my need actually comes from Fusion360 is no longer being updated for High Sierra, so anything I edit on my MBP 2014 (Catalina) I can no longer open on the iMac, quite annoying!! Also, after seeing that could get true 4K thru DP, I could finally take full advantage of a 4K screen I have hooked up but only can drive to 2560x1600🤦‍♂️, if any of the pros here think it is worthwhile to try and get this card working to do some tests, I am willing to help and try out - I am sure I can easily put back the HD6970 if things do not work out, but would like to try this if there is some remote, but reasonable, possiblity of success... these days it seems very difficult to get hold of an AMD card from the list in post #1!!

*these days a 109-C95847-00C-02 seems to be a W7170M in most places on Aliexpress, but not all, and searching for a WX7100 will show cards marked with 109-C769A1-00B_02 as well, so it is getting quite difficult to know what exactly each place is actually selling - and if one searches for 109-C769A1-00B_02, then get W7170M - there seem to be an incredible amount of W7170Ms around even in the WX7100 shops - it would be great if we could use them for our iMacs!!

Cheers!!
Andy

Reading the 1st summary wiki post again and again should answer most of your questions. There is no need to go through the 10 thousands of posts sequentially page by page, many which carry no significant information. Just search thru the thread if you need any information not covered in the 1st post.

I won't recommend spending extravagant sum to upgrade your old iMac, especially the costly marked-up high end GPUs like the WX7100 (>$300). No point putting a Ferrari engine in a Jazz. The low end AMDs like the WX4130 or WX4150 are still a/v in the market. They perform very well if you compare their metal scores with the high end nVidia (the OpenGL score carries much less significance in Catalina or Big Sur). Their heat dissipation is within iMac spec with no need to modify the heat sink. You need an M1 Mac if you really demand such increased processing power for your business use like video editing. Consider that as an investment. Even the cheaper RX480 I used may be overkilled in my opinion for my daily use and gaming though it couldn't be found anywhere now and thus less a choice for you to consider. The good news is that some users have found ways to make the HP versions of WX4130/50 to boot in iMac which broadens your choice if you can solder. The AMD GPUs seem to be a must if you think of running OSX 12 Monterey.

 

[mitesh33]

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

Officially it’s not supported, but I know 32GB will work on mine, something I may do soon. As I’ve got 2 spare RAM slots.
Regarding the CPU upgrade, that’s interesting regarding the i7-880. I may look into that as I always thought it wouldn’t work. Yes the X3480 looks interesting too. Thanks

 

[Nguyen Duc Hieu]

Officially it’s not supported, but I know 32GB will work on mine, something I may do soon. As I’ve got 2 spare RAM slots.
Regarding the CPU upgrade, that’s interesting regarding the i7-880. I may look into that as I always thought it wouldn’t work. Yes the X3480 looks interesting too. Thanks

There are threads to discuss about CPU and RAM upgrade in this forum already.
We don't need you to comment here about that topic.

 

[fredflinston]

Reading the 1st summary wiki post again and again should answer most of your questions. There is no need to go through the 10 thousands of posts sequentially page by page, many which carry no significant information. Just search thru the thread if you need any information not covered in the 1st post.

Hi Kenny, thanks for the quick reply.. indeed, I have returned many times to the first post, and not sure if over these months (maybe a year or so) have seen some small changes there... and I have created my own workflow note out of all the different posts that I have found possible useful - if/when get around to changing the card I will make my own post with that list ;-)

It's a top-end i7, and really still performs pretty well after 10 years on stuff that uses the CPU more, and even pretty reasonably on games and stuff that use the GPU (2Gb, one of the lucky ones where it hasn't failed!), when compatible - as mentioned, my need is for Fusion360 to work correctly, as I do editing on both my laptop and the iMac, and I believe with a working GPU should last a few more years, so would need AMD going forward as you note ;-)

I hadn't looked for WX4150s (and WX4130 are 2Gb, so didn't even think about that), and seeing there are still 2 shops on Ali, and hopefully they will actually provide the real card instead of a different one like this shop (!), will probably go that route, if there is no way of trying out and possibly getting working this 109-C769A1-00B_02... but was hoping (w/o knowing enough about the hardware level) that maybe this card could be software hacked into working, given all the advances with OCLP, etc, seem to have added over the last year or so - for others this would also be great, as there are a LOT more of these cards on Ali and eBay than the rest of the list - as it seemed to have partial success mentioned in post 4,204... 🤞
Although I wish I'd got the 109-C95847-00C-02, as per the ad title, having to reclaim and send back the card is just a PITA, and from Tenerife is little expensive too...

I shall wait a few days, probably until next week, until some other pros here have chipped in, to decide whether to try installing this card or return and going for a WX4150... ;-)

Cheers!
Andy

 

[internetzel]

Hi Kenny, thanks for the quick reply.. indeed, I have returned many times to the first post, and not sure if over these months (maybe a year or so) have seen some small changes there... and I have created my own workflow note out of all the different posts that I have found possible useful - if/when get around to changing the card I will make my own post with that list ;-)

It's a top-end i7, and really still performs pretty well after 10 years on stuff that uses the CPU more, and even pretty reasonably on games and stuff that use the GPU (2Gb, one of the lucky ones where it hasn't failed!), when compatible - as mentioned, my need is for Fusion360 to work correctly, as I do editing on both my laptop and the iMac, and I believe with a working GPU should last a few more years, so would need AMD going forward as you note ;-)

I hadn't looked for WX4150s (and WX4130 are 2Gb, so didn't even think about that), and seeing there are still 2 shops on Ali, and hopefully they will actually provide the real card instead of a different one like this shop (!), will probably go that route, if there is no way of trying out and possibly getting working this 109-C769A1-00B_02... but was hoping (w/o knowing enough about the hardware level) that maybe this card could be software hacked into working, given all the advances with OCLP, etc, seem to have added over the last year or so - for others this would also be great, as there are a LOT more of these cards on Ali and eBay than the rest of the list - as it seemed to have partial success mentioned in post 4,204... 🤞
Although I wish I'd got the 109-C95847-00C-02, as per the ad title, having to reclaim and send back the card is just a PITA, and from Tenerife is little expensive too...

I shall wait a few days, probably until next week, until some other pros here have chipped in, to decide whether to try installing this card or return and going for a WX4150... ;-)

Cheers!
Andy

I could try to create a VBIOS for the W7170M - but I'd like to first see the VBIOS @jborko received from @Nick [D]vB - in order to not create the very same VBIOS once again, with the same non-usable result.
Bootrom images from both an iMac15,1 and iMac17,1 would be needed as well.

 

[Mischa85]

Thanks for the answers, I've been around for some time and doing this became kind of a routine,so I didn't realise the problem with the core2 as it is the 1st one that came in of it's kind. The 1st post is distilled knowledge and up to date, reading it, I got it to work on external monitor but couldn't get internal. Couldn't boot with opencore either as the mac doesn't react to alt for some reason.

I have the same problem with an iMac 10,1 (Core2Duo late 2009). K610m (N15M-Q2-B-A1 GPU, Elpida VRAM) installed and flashed the newest VBIOS from here:

2011 iMac Graphics Card Upgrade

** NVIDIA Quadro K610M Mac edition ROM ** K610M: The chip I used to develop the ROM is: N15M-Q2-B-A1 MXM-A (3.0) bus interface, low powered card at TDP 30W. It is a drop-in fit for the 21.5" iMac and 27” iMac heatsinks. It is based on the GK208 GPU Kepler 2.0 architecture. Metal supported...

forums.macrumors.com

Same problem as everyone who tried installing a different card on one of these iMacs: external screen works, when internal is connected the machine does not boot and screen stays white. I'd be happy to spent some time on fixing this as I have quite some experience on the inner workings of MacOS and it's display drivers. Many have asked for it, but unfortunately none of the VBIOS wizards here shared any of the knowledge required for patching the VBIOS itself. Just a couple of keywords from the likes of @nikey22 would be really helpful.

I know my way around a hex editor. Just give me a couple of breadcrumbs to follow.

 

[Ausdauersportler]

I have the same problem with an iMac 10,1 (Core2Duo late 2009). K610m (N15M-Q2-B-A1 GPU, Elpida VRAM) installed and flashed the newest VBIOS from here:

2011 iMac Graphics Card Upgrade

** NVIDIA Quadro K610M Mac edition ROM ** K610M: The chip I used to develop the ROM is: N15M-Q2-B-A1 MXM-A (3.0) bus interface, low powered card at TDP 30W. It is a drop-in fit for the 21.5" iMac and 27” iMac heatsinks. It is based on the GK208 GPU Kepler 2.0 architecture. Metal supported...

forums.macrumors.com

Same problem as everyone who tried installing a different card on one of these iMacs: external screen works, when internal is connected the machine does not boot and screen stays white. I'd be happy to spent some time on fixing this as I have quite some experience on the inner workings of MacOS and it's display drivers. Many have asked for it, but unfortunately none of the VBIOS wizards here shared any of the knowledge required for patching the VBIOS itself. Just a couple of keywords from the likes of @nikey22 would be really helpful.

I know my way around a hex editor. Just give me a couple of breadcrumbs to follow.

Do the very same @stephle did a year ago. Start from the scratch and read the other easy to find websites about BIOS editing and produce the BIOS you want to have.

With the WX4150 the iMac10,1 was booting properly even with the internal screen connected. It remained black while an external one was working. This was quite expected because all our current BIOS version made to use DP. You can check this when changing an old 4670 from iMac11,2 to iMac10,1 and vice versa. It will not drive the internal LCD unless you change the BIOS versions, too.

You need to find out how to map the output ports somehow. iMac10,1 uses LVDS, the later machines DP - regardless which cable type you find there.

Maybe you find even an old Dell BIOS having already the correct mapping. Maybe somebody finds a Dell Laptop using LVDS internally with Kepler card to start?

I am not a BIOS editor and half of this may be completely wrong

Note: Sounds to me a little insulting to claim others do not share. If the thing is that easy to understand and document we would have already dozens of recipes published.

 

[Ausdauersportler]

Double posting: (iMac11,3 with RX480 mobile and OCLP 0.1.6)

 

[fredflinston]

I could try to create a VBIOS for the W7170M - but I'd like to first see the VBIOS @jborko received from @Nick [D]vB - in order to not create the very same VBIOS once again, with the same non-usable result.
Bootrom images from both an iMac15,1 and iMac17,1 would be needed as well.

I have the iMac 12,2, and I have 3 BootROMs backed up with the ROMtool (I saved for all 3 optional chips, as I haven't yet opened the machine to see which I have), FWIW ;-)
Not sure why will need from iMac 5K 27" 2014 & 2015, or can those machines also be upgraded..? I don't have direct access, but my mates still work at the Apple SAT, so could probably obtain a bootrom for these machines if needed...

Thanks for the interest!

 

[internetzel]

I have the iMac 12,2, and I have 3 BootROMs backed up with the ROMtool (I saved for all 3 optional chips, as I haven't yet opened the machine to see which I have), FWIW ;-)
Not sure why will need from iMac 5K 27" 2014 & 2015, or can those machines also be upgraded..? I don't have direct access, but my mates still work at the Apple SAT, so could probably obtain a bootrom for these machines if needed...

Thanks for the interest!

Only those iMacs have the Apple EFI driver and VBIOS for the Radeon R9 GPUs in the boot rom. That's what we would need in order to get working GPU power management.

 

[internetzel]

With the WX4150 the iMac10,1 was booting properly even with the internal screen connected. It remained black while an external one was working. This was quite expected because all our current BIOS version made to use DP. You can check this when changing an old 4670 from iMac11,2 to iMac10,1 and vice versa. It will not drive the internal LCD unless you change the BIOS versions, too.

Would be interesting for me to get those two 4670 VBIOSes, so I could see the differences and might be able to tell whether it's a hardware or a software issue.

At least the VBIOS documentation of the Polaris based cards (WX41x0, WX7100, RX460, RX480, RX560, RX580) indicates that an eDP to LVDS converter is not any longer integrated into the GPU die itself and hence has to be provided externally. And some earlier GPU series seem to have had such a converter.

 

[fredflinston]

Only those iMacs have the Apple EFI driver and VBIOS for the Radeon R9 GPUs in the boot rom. That's what we would need in order to get working GPU power management.

OK, I will ask my workmate if he can do this favour.. it will obviously depend when these units come in for service when he will be able to make a backup of these BootROM ;-)
When I have for all 3 units, I will advise again

 

[LegoNickD]

With extreme dedication, the logic board replacement could be accomplished but both the cost and effort might be prohibitive. You also need to align the different external ports on the chasis. Better save the money and energy perhaps for an actual iMac 2011 if you can find a cheap one, or even the M1 Macmini.

The doubling of the SATA speed doesn't have any discernible performance gain if you have been using SSD in place of the HD. While you can't add Thunderbolt to iMac 2010, you can perform a USB 3 hack as I do:

USB 3 + Wifi ac + BT4.2 for iMac 27" mid 2010

There has been a thread on USB 3 for iMac 2009 and one on USB 3 for iMac 2011. The miniPCIe slot for wifi/BT is utilised to provide USB 3 connection at the expense of wifi and BT, which have to be changed to external dongles. Thus, I explore a similar idea from those threads to install USB 3 in...

forums.macrumors.com

However, no PCIe USB 3 is bootable. They are good only for file transfer and backup but meet my need.

I do want to try this, but don't want to drill out the side of my iMac. All the low profile risers you had linked aren't available anymore though. I can't put the usb card in the CD bay since I want to put the iBoff board there when it eventually comes out so thats not an option for me anyways. Maybe I'll get one of those shelves that attach to the iMac stand and put the riser and usb card there, but I can't figure out a way to keep the airport card inside the iMac and do that

 

[terabay]

I'm sharing Nikey22's new vbios for MSI GTX 870M gpu.

So far so good except for the horizontal lines at the right edge of the screen. (I've found a workaround for this issue from this thread and it's fixed quickly.)

The following is the spec of MSI 870M GPU. (It has 3G memory but it's shown as 6G above.)

NVIDIA Firmware Update Utility (Version 5.414.0)
Simplified Version For OEM Only
Adapter: GeForce GTX 870M (10DE,1199,1462,1106) H:--:NRM S:00,B:01,D:00,F:00

Identifying EEPROM...
EEPROM ID (C2,2012) : MX MX25L2005 2.7-3.6V 2048Kx1S, page
Reading adapter firmware image...
IFR Data Size : 1084 bytes
IFR CRC32 : ED3783C7
IFR Image Size : 1536 bytes
IFR Image CRC32 : 72B987C6
IFR Subsystem ID : 1462-1106
Image Size : 95232 bytes
Version : 80.04.F7.00.06
~CRC32 : B068A7E6
Image Hash : 688E5AA7A3EF639B72852C3ADD349A00
OEM String : NVIDIA
Vendor Name : NVIDIA Corporation
Product Name : GK104 Board - 20530003
Product Revision : Chip Rev
Device Name(s) : GeForce GTX 870M
Board ID : E137
PCI ID : 10DE-1199
Subsystem ID : 1462-1106
Hierarchy ID : Normal Board
Chip SKU : 650-0
Project : 2053-0003
CDP : N/A
Build Date : 03/21/14
Modification Date : 04/09/14
UEFI Support : No
UEFI Version : N/A
UEFI Variant Id : N/A ( Unknown )
UEFI Signer(s) : Unsigned
InfoROM Version : N/A
InfoROM Backup Exist : NO
License Placeholder : Absent
GPU Mode : N/A
Sign-On Message : GK104 P2053 SKU 003 VGA BIOS (HWDIAG).

 

[fredflinston]

OK, I will ask my workmate if he can do this favour.. it will obviously depend when these units come in for service when he will be able to make a backup of these BootROM ;-)
When I have for all 3 units, I will advise again

@internetzel
Have 2 of the 3 so far (mine and the 17,1), mine with the ROMtool, the other with the eficheck terminal command...
We also found this, which may or may not be useful:

FREE BIOS EFI Firmware BIN files for Apple MacBook's Air, Pro, iMac - fxServis Novi Pazar

Profesionalni servis za sve Apple (iPhone, iPad, iWatch, Macbook, iMac) uredjaje.

fxservis.info

There is no way it seems to contact for the password! 🤔 🙄

If you wish I can send what I have via PM..? or better in this thread?

 

[Ausdauersportler]

@internetzel
Have 2 of the 3 so far (mine and the 17,1), mine with the ROMtool, the other with the eficheck terminal command...
We also found this, which may or may not be useful:

FREE BIOS EFI Firmware BIN files for Apple MacBook's Air, Pro, iMac - fxServis Novi Pazar

Profesionalni servis za sve Apple (iPhone, iPad, iWatch, Macbook, iMac) uredjaje.

fxservis.info

There is no way it seems to contact for the password! 🤔 🙄

If you wish I can send what I have via PM..? or better in this thread?

Use a PM!!

 

[internetzel]

@internetzel
Have 2 of the 3 so far (mine and the 17,1), mine with the ROMtool, the other with the eficheck terminal command...
We also found this, which may or may not be useful:

FREE BIOS EFI Firmware BIN files for Apple MacBook's Air, Pro, iMac - fxServis Novi Pazar

Profesionalni servis za sve Apple (iPhone, iPad, iWatch, Macbook, iMac) uredjaje.

fxservis.info

There is no way it seems to contact for the password! 🤔 🙄

If you wish I can send what I have via PM..? or better in this thread?

That's something already! I don't need the bootrom of your iMac, but the original VBIOS of the W7170M would be useful. The 15,1 bootrom might still be better as the older the bootrom the more compatible the drivers possibly are with our old machines.
However, most important would be to get the VBIOS @jborko tested with his W7170M.

 

[nikey22]

@terabay
Congratulations on getting this to work in a 21.5" iMac.

The 870M is an example of a MXM-B 3.0 card which normally is not meant to work in a 21.5" machine!
Others have tried this with variable results and occasional panics, @highvoltage12v . It could be why you are getting some horizontal artifact lines on the display.

There are a few things to consider:

1. The power supply maybe insufficient to drive the card compared to the 27" computers.
2. Heat-sink attachment on GPU chip itself is possible, but not for GPU memory chips. Unfortunately, the only heatsink capable of fitting in the 21.5" frame is the one that comes with it originally intended for the MXM-A cards.
3. Nvidia GPUs of this class generate lots of heat, you should keep ODD fan at higher speeds.
4. The most important consideration is that the MXM-B card will NOT fit over the HDD. Most people have an SSD now, so this helps, but still - you must "bend" the bottom right HDD holder away from the card (photo attached, red circle). Be careful, it could break very easily! If you don't do this, it will prevent card from sitting flush with the logic board and put some extra tension that can damage it in long term or even cause an intermittent short.

Enjoy!

 

[G3llings]

Hey everyone! So I got a second 27 inch iMac with i7 2600 and a failing 6970 for $125. He also threw in the 2600k that he tried to diagnose it with, so it was a steal. I have flashed the 780m using @xanderon usb ssh method with the 780M_WINFIX.rom. I have a boot menu, and it works great in Big Sur but when I go to install Windows everything works smoothly until I install the Nvidia web driver. After that the screen goes black. I'm wondering if this is a known issue, and if the 780m_br3.rom fixes this?

 

[terabay]

@terabay
Congratulations on getting this to work in a 21.5" iMac.

The 870M is an example of a MXM-B 3.0 card which normally is not meant to work in a 21.5" machine!
Others have tried this with variable results and occasional panics, @highvoltage12v . It could be why you are getting some horizontal artifact lines on the display.

There are a few things to consider:

1. The power supply maybe insufficient to drive the card compared to the 27" computers.
2. Heat-sink attachment on GPU chip itself is possible, but not for GPU memory chips. Unfortunately, the only heatsink capable of fitting in the 21.5" frame is the one that comes with it originally intended for the MXM-A cards.
3. Nvidia GPUs of this class generate lots of heat, you should keep ODD fan at higher speeds.
4. The most important consideration is that the MXM-B card will NOT fit over the HDD. Most people have an SSD now, so this helps, but still - you must "bend" the bottom right HDD holder away from the card (photo attached, red circle). Be careful, it could break very easily! If you don't do this, it will prevent card from sitting flush with the logic board and put some extra tension that can damage it in long term or even cause an intermittent short.

View attachment 1790365

Enjoy!

Hi Nikey22,

Thanks for your advice!
Since I've done the upgrade for my 27" iMac with 780M before and knew the limitations of 21.5" with MXM-B card, I did it very carefully like bending the HDD holder, etc. before finishing the installation at 21.5".
I'm not sure if the power is not enough but the temp sensor at the GPU heatsink does not show overheating or high temp yet.

The issue (horizontal lines at the right edge of the screen) goes away when it goes to sleep for a few seconds and wake up.
later I can move it to 27" iMac and test further again. Thank you again.

 

[terabay]

Hey everyone! So I got a second 27 inch iMac with i7 2600 and a failing 6970 for $125. He also threw in the 2600k that he tried to diagnose it with, so it was a steal. I have flashed the 780m using @xanderon usb ssh method with the 780M_WINFIX.rom. I have a boot menu, and it works great in Big Sur but when I go to install Windows everything works smoothly until I install the Nvidia web driver. After that the screen goes black. I'm wondering if this is a known issue, and if the 780m_br3.rom fixes this?

If the windows 10 was installed as MBR method, I saw Nikey22's Vbios showed such issue. You can install Windows 10 as UEFI method again or you can change one more time its vbios with Nick's vbios which is compatible with MBR windows 10.

 

[G3llings]

If the windows 10 was installed as MBR method, I saw Nikey22's Vbios showed such issue. You can install Windows 10 as UEFI method again or you can change one more time its vbios with Nick's vbios which is compatible with MBR windows 10.

Thanks, but it is installed as UEFI. I read a post on here which said that mbr would actually work where UEFI causes the black screen, but then I wouldn't be able to boot using OpenCore (EFI only). I just read that disabling the igpu may help, but I copied the nvidia driver to a USB and installed from there with internet disabled, so it shouldn't have installed an igpu driver. I think 780m_br3.rom belongs to nikey22 and I may have to try that tomorrow.

Edit: I just reread and maybe we are saying the same thing. It sounds like I need Nikey22's vbios since I'm running UEFI, and I must have Nick's (I'm running 780m_winfix, not sure who it actually belongs to) which is compatable with MBR. Is Nick's also compatable with UEFI, or just MBR?

 

[terabay]

Thanks, but it is installed as UEFI. I read a post on here which said that mbr would actually work where UEFI causes the black screen, but then I wouldn't be able to boot using OpenCore (EFI only). I just read that disabling the igpu may help, but I copied the nvidia driver to a USB and installed from there with internet disabled, so it shouldn't have installed an igpu driver. I think 780m_br3.rom belongs to nikey22 and I may have to try that tomorrow.

Edit: I just reread and maybe we are saying the same thing. It sounds like I need Nikey22's vbios since I'm running UEFI, and I must have Nick's (I'm running 780m_winfix, not sure who it actually belongs to) which is compatable with MBR. Is Nick's also compatable with UEFI, or just MBR?

Oh, right. 780m_winfix is for MBR installation. So you can try Nikey22's vbios.

 

[G3llings]

Oh, right. 780m_winfix is for MBR installation. So you can try Nikey22's vbios.

Well... I just flashed Nikey22's ROM and same thing, black screen after installing the Nvidia web driver.

 

[terabay]

Well... I just flashed Nikey22's ROM and same thing, black screen after installing the Nvidia web driver.

Sorry to hear that. We dont really need the Nvidia latest driver to detect it from windows 10. Normally Bootcamp drivers will install the drivers. What happens before installing it?