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Today I bought an 880M video card
I flashed the bios from NIKEY
Works perfectly in iMac 2011 27"
Thanks!
880.png
 
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Do you have any pointers on what to do to get it running. I could use my MacBook as the "other mac" and then give this a whirl. I'm not a Linux or command line type but it's not foreign to me either.

No command line needed. There's a menu that pops up when you boot into grml. I think Network Setup is one of the options. Just go through the menus and choose wifi and choose your wifi network. Once you're connected, you can log into your wifi router and find that Mac's IP address. Then you can SSH into it from another computer. Try it out with a working screen before you do the flashing.
 
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Interesting, my GTX880M card would not even POST on my 2011 iMac. It goes past the POST on the 2010 but I'm having a hard time getting a way to flash it. (the ethernet doesn't work!)
It can't be!
Firmware? I don't think.
Show me a photo of the video card.
 
** hp AMD Radeon HD6770M Mac Edition ROM **

The following is an iMac rom for the Hewlett-Packard AMD Radeon HD6770M 1GB cards.
It will be a replacement to the frequently failing Apple AMD Radeon 6770M 512MB cards.
These cards require hardware modification to make them work properly in the iMac:

Thank you very much, Nick.

My understanding is: If I buy the Dell version of this M5950 card which already has the EFI chip, I just need to flash your vBIOS without worrying about the EFi chip or resistor. Is that correct?
 
It can't be!
Firmware? I don't think.
Show me a photo of the video card.
There are numerous reports on some NVIDIA cards not POSTing on the 12,2 iMac, even reference to those on the initial post here. What happens on mine is that the fans spin up for a second and then the system shuts off.

I didn't even dismount the card from the heat sink when I tried it in the 11,3 iMac and it does POST (to 2 LEDs) but I need to flash it.

It's still connected to the heat sink and I don't feel like taking it apart so the photo is probably less than useful.
 
Thank you very much, Nick.

My understanding is: If I buy the Dell version of this M5950 card which already has the EFI chip, I just need to flash your vBIOS without worrying about the EFi chip or resistor. Is that correct?
I’m pretty sure you need at minimum a 128k chip, I do believe these cards have a 64k chip.


Using the chip from you dead card should work.

 
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I have downloaded the file from the link and when I follow the directions this is what I get and it doesn't matter what usb stick I use or what computer. I have already flashed a handful of computers using this method, but the stick worked before and now nothing. Can someone please help me out.
 

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EDIT: 8/16/20 NEW AGC kexts have been added to change "board-id" to "board-ix" in the AppleGraphicsDevicePolicy binary. This has the same affect as "agdpmod=pikera" from Whatevergreen, this upload is for AMD users.

"instant on" K3100m/k4100m/k5100m/780m etc cards need this kext to fix DisplayPort Output.

I'm uploading a patched AppleGrapahicsControl.kext that is now necessary as of 10.15.4, the symptoms after this update are a blank screen but system sounds are heard when holding down the Escape key, as well a loss of any Displayport output. The cause of this is Apple Clamping down on 3rd party kexts from loading, this mainly affects hackintosh users, but affects us as our iMacs are no longer a supported platform.

What does this patched AppleGraphicsControl.kext do to allow 2009-2011 iMacs to properly boot? We now need our board ID's to be added to the AppleGraphicsDevicePolicy.kext within AppleGraphicsControl.kext, this allows the kext to properly load on boot, before this wasn't necessarily needed. I have so far all known 5 board ID's that are supported on our thread.

iMac12,2(27-inch Mid 2011)Mac-942B59F58194171B
iMac12,1(21.5-inch Mid 2011)Mac-942B5BF58194151B
iMac11,3(27-inch Mid 2010)Mac-F2238BAE
iMac11,2(21.5-inch Mid 2010)Mac-F2238AC8
iMac11,1(27-inch Late 2009)Mac-F2268DAE

Thanks to @Ausdauersportler for the helping/testing for this kext.

How to install when your iMac boots with a Blank screen? (assuming your LCD works just fine)

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

To install this kext
1. unlock your System partition, open terminal enter
Code:
sudo mount -uw /
killall Finder

2. drag the kext on-top of the kext utility icon let it install/timeout with an error.

3. Open terminal and enter "sudo reboot" skipping this step may leave your iMac hanging at the desktop (A Catalina issue)


Make sure to unzip the kext to a new folder, so there aren't any "1" or "2"... at the end of the AppleGraphicsControl.kext filename. Remember the is replacing the System Kext in System/Library/Extensions and must be done using Kext Utility linked here http://cvad-mac.narod.ru/index/0-4.

is there already something for BigSur here?
 
I have downloaded the file from the link and when I follow the directions this is what I get and it doesn't matter what usb stick I use or what computer. I have already flashed a handful of computers using this method, but the stick worked before and now nothing. Can someone please help me out.
I had a similar issue when my stick was formatted to NTFS... Make sure it is fat32 and try again.
 
No command line needed. There's a menu that pops up when you boot into grml. I think Network Setup is one of the options. Just go through the menus and choose wifi and choose your wifi network. Once you're connected, you can log into your wifi router and find that Mac's IP address. Then you can SSH into it from another computer. Try it out with a working screen before you do the flashing.
Tried that last night and for some reason it's not starting the WiFi (that I know works as MacOS is using it right now)

there are a bunch of settings where I took the default, perhaps there is one of those that I need to change?
 
Thank you very much, Nick.

My understanding is: If I buy the Dell version of this M5950 card which already has the EFI chip, I just need to flash your vBIOS without worrying about the EFi chip or resistor. Is that correct?
Dell red pcb vbios storage chip capacity is 64kb, need to replace 128kb or replace with a larger capacity. I am replacing the k610m like storage chip 256kb capacity. There is no problem using it.
 

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Got the WiFi working, was using the wrong password.... duh.

Now on to disassembly and another attempt at the GTX880M.
My 880M video card works fine!!!
Sleep works without OPENKORE.
Brightness adjustment works without OPENKORE.
The temperature at high load is a maximum of 56 degrees!!!
 
Well, after all that I suspect that the card is defective.

I was able to get the WiFi working. For those interested in the sequence of commands I'll put them at the end of this post.

I then installed the GTX880 into the iMac and booted the GRML stick. I was able to successfully log in via ssh, see the GTX880 card, save the original BIOS, load the 880M bios from this thread and then I put the display into the system.

I can see the boot picker but the screen is scrambled. The system tries to boot but when it switches to turn the GPU on it crashes and reboots. Again putting the old Radeon 5750 back into the system and all is fine. (see photo)

so like I said all for naught. So close but no cigar....



Steps to doing WiFi on the GRML stick

boot the GMRL stick, wait about 2 minutes (there is a 15-second wait to boot and another minute or so of booting) It helps to have your SSID for your network to have a unique first letter in all that can be seen by the Mac. For example, mine is named Jackson and that's the only one that starts with J. If you don't you're going to have to actually boot this on something else and figure out which letter corresponds to your network.

now do the following:

e (without enter, this gets into netconfig)
1<enter> (this selects the WiFi adapter)
<enter> (set up wireless)
<enter> (scan for networks)
"first letter of your network SSID" then <enter>
<enter> (enable WPA for security if you have it, most do)
"your security passcode" followed by <enter>
<enter> (default params)
<enter> (default params)
<enter> (default params)
<enter> (no VLAN)
<enter> (enable DHCP)
N <enter> (don't store for boot, doesn't work anyway)
right-arrow <enter> (quit and start WiFi)

you should then be able to log in via SSH

It helps if you have a working system where you can watch what is happening when you do this to practice but I realize some don't have that luxury when they are trying to revive sysems with bad GPUs.
 

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Update: About the "race condition" which became apparent with Big Sur 11.3+

Story:

This Apple bug causes the boot or reboot hanging on systems lacking a special Intel CPU instruction. In general all system older than the Apple 2011 Intel Sandy Bridge systems have been affected.

Affected Systems and macOS versions:

This Bug also affects the iMac11.x family (Late 2009 and Mid 2010 system) used on this thread to replace the GPU. It happens with all macOS versions later than Big Sur 11.2.3 and includes all Monterey Beta versions published so far.

News:

This Bug has fixed by the SurPlus OpenCore patch. The patch has been included into the latest nightly build of OCLP 0.3.0. To use it just migrate to this OCLP or edit the config.plist manually as described on the SurPlus thread. In case you edit manually do not forget to disable the latebloom extension and delete the boot-args needed by this workaround.

Note: First post has been updated. I am just the messenger here. All credits go to @Syncretic!
 
Hello.
Last Saturday, I installed a K3100M video card in my iMac 27" 2010 and installed Big Sur on it. For installation, I used OLCP version 2.5. I still have a flash drive with the copied High Sierra. The problem is that the screen backlight control does not work. At the same time, if I boot from a "clean" High Sierra flash drive, then in High Sierra the control of the screen backlight works, and if I boot from the same flash drive via Open Clover, it does not work. Please help me to understand the situation and fix the screen backlight control! What information do I need to provide for this?
 
I tried it all, the backlight lights up on the screen, but there are no images on the screen
How did you install Big Sur? (was it via OCLP or via another patcher?).

And was the OCLP installed after or before the GPU was installed? (the vBIOS for the K1000M will only work in conjunction with OCLP; if this is the case you may have to rebuild your OCLP install, ensure your config.plist has "boot-arg agdpmod=vit9696", ensure no legacy video card patches have been applied, etc)
 
Hello.
Last Saturday, I installed a K3100M video card in my iMac 27" 2010 and installed Big Sur on it. For installation, I used OLCP version 2.5. I still have a flash drive with the copied High Sierra. The problem is that the screen backlight control does not work. At the same time, if I boot from a "clean" High Sierra flash drive, then in High Sierra the control of the screen backlight works, and if I boot from the same flash drive via Open Clover, it does not work. Please help me to understand the situation and fix the screen backlight control! What information do I need to provide for this?
OK, so from what you've said.

- you have an external USB with HS (which backlight is OK in)
- Mac's internal drive has Big Sur and OpenCore on it (not sure what you mean by 'Open Clover', unless you mean that you've used Clover to mount the EFI), in which the backlight doesn't work.

This could be that your Big Sur installation needs the patch linked here: https://forums.macrumors.com/thread....1596614/page-322?post=28702210#post-28702210
 
Thanks boss. Installed iMac Sleep Patch and now sleep/brightness working beautifully on 10.15.6.
Hi,

I've the same issue with Sleep Mode and Wake up on Catalina with Nvidia K3100M.

Do you have the link to the iMac Sleep Patch ?

Many thanks

Regards
Memoli
 
OK, so from what you've said.

- you have an external USB with HS (which backlight is OK in)
- Mac's internal drive has Big Sur and OpenCore on it (not sure what you mean by 'Open Clover', unless you mean that you've used Clover to mount the EFI), in which the backlight doesn't work.

This could be that your Big Sur installation needs the patch linked here: https://forums.macrumors.com/thread....1596614/page-322?post=28702210#post-28702210
Let‘s stick with things we certainly know and let us not start on this thread helping with assumptions.

There is a difference between a not working backlight and missing backlight control. I still do not know what the real problem is.

Patches are not needed with OCLP on Big Sur other than the ones included into OCLP itself (Kepler patches on Monterey Beta7+ and WiFi patches on Monterey in general).

There is no entry in the boot-args like agdpmod=vit9696, this particular setting has been included into the DeviceProperties Section of the GPU. It is only there to avoid the black screen issue on boot and enable the mini DP port for a second external display. And it will be only there if OCLP finds a Kepler GPU in the iMac while running and installing OpenCore.

Yes, so you need to install OpenCore through OCLP after installing the NVIDIA card unless you are using the patcher settings to force a metal Kepler GPU choice.

You both could spend some time reading the first post and the OCLP docs to get a better understanding.
 
Hi,

I've the same issue with Sleep Mode and Wake up on Catalina with Nvidia K3100M.

Do you have the link to the iMac Sleep Patch ?

Many thanks

Regards
Memoli
The first post of this thread is considered to be the documention of most former and all recent achievements and developments. Just check it out.
 
Hi,

I've the same issue with Sleep Mode and Wake up on Catalina with Nvidia K3100M.

Do you have the link to the iMac Sleep Patch ?

Many thanks

Regards
Memoli
A link is provided in post 1 of this thread.

Hint: Upgrade your Mac/installing Catalina Dosdude/Catalina unsupported
 
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