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

[Marche90]

Can you give more detail on the drivers you used? From the dell website or AMD? maybe a screenshot of device manager or something.

I have a 12,1 with a WX4150 and I can't get any drivers working. I've tried Pro, and Adrenaline and for Dell and for HP. Even the the driver Windows tries to automatically install (amd wx pro) causes a crash.

Then I have to go into safe mode and delete the driver.

Thanks.

Controladores y soporte de procesadores y tarjetas gráficas

www.amd.com

Under Windows 10 there's a section that says "AMD Software: PRO Edition on Dell Mobile". Those are the drivers I use. I don't know if this makes a difference, but I have a Xeon processor without Intel integrated graphics.
By the way, are you sure that what is causing your crashes are the AMD drivers? Usually this model crashes because of the Intel iGPU, not the AMD one. You need to disable the install of the Intel GPU drivers.

 

[TaoFx]

Controladores y soporte de procesadores y tarjetas gráficas

www.amd.com

Under Windows 10 there's a section that says "AMD Software: PRO Edition on Dell Mobile". Those are the drivers I use. I don't know if this makes a difference, but I have a Xeon processor without Intel integrated graphics.
By the way, are you sure that what is causing your crashes are the AMD drivers? Usually this model crashes because of the Intel iGPU, not the AMD one. You need to disable the install of the Intel GPU drivers.

I need your help: when i launch a game on Windows with the 4150, the iMac’s shutting down. And the iMac refuses to boot into MacOS High Sierra
What can i do ?

 

[jorges4lu2]

Hi,

Mi 2011 27” iMac just bit the dust!!! The gpu is died even on external monitor. So here is my problem: how can I update the bootrom if I can’t even use an external monitor?

Thanks in advance

 

[TaoFx]

Some news: I tried using another vbios - to no avail - no backlight, however MacOS boots. So I took the opportunity to install Unigine Heaven and it displays 129 degrees Celsius lol…. I think it's bugged huh! However, it didn't crash all the way and don’t felt that warm.

On Unigine Heaven i have around 15fps, 1080P Extreme settings, is it okay ?

 

[Ausdauersportler]

Hi,

Mi 2011 27” iMac just bit the dust!!! The gpu is died even on external monitor. So here is my problem: how can I update the bootrom if I can’t even use an external monitor?

Thanks in advance

Bootrom updates will likely work with replacement GPU cards, too. Just install High Sierra and all updates to get the latest and greatest after the GPU upgrade.

 

[Ausdauersportler]

Some news: I tried using another vbios - to no avail - no backlight, however MacOS boots. So I took the opportunity to install Unigine Heaven and it displays 129 degrees Celsius lol…. I think it's bugged huh! However, it didn't crash all the way and don’t felt that warm.

On Unigine Heaven i have around 15fps, 1080P Extreme settings, is it okay ?

Please, this the the next and last hint to check the first post of this thread. It has a section about GPU performance, too. Do not let us spoon feed you through the complete process.

 

[TaoFx]

Please, this the the next and last hint to check the first post of this thread. It has a section about GPU performance, too. Do not let us spoon feed you through the complete process.

I'm sorry, I'm not very attentive…


Here I still need help because... I tried another vbios (NEBULA, found in another forum), but it seems to be for the HP WX 4150 and not the Dell... so I'm currently stuck on a black screen no matter what! What am I supposed to do? 😓

EDIT : I just saw the rom in question on this forum saying not to install it...because it would brick the graphics card.


This is the end for me, sorry for all the messages today and thanks again for your help, I left my old iMac at my parents and just stayed here for this weekend, I won't have I don't have time to deal with it for a long time.

 

[Ausdauersportler]

I'm sorry, I'm not very attentive…


Here I still need help because... I tried another vbios (NEBULA, found in another forum), but it seems to be for the HP WX 4150 and not the Dell... so I'm currently stuck on a black screen no matter what! What am I supposed to do? 😓

EDIT : I just saw the rom in question on this forum saying not to install it...because it would brick the graphics card.


This is the end for me, sorry for all the messages today and thanks again for your help, I left my old iMac at my parents and just stayed here for this weekend, I won't have I don't have time to deal with it for a long time.

Get a CH341A clip and flash the vBIOS found here on the thread. Another solution is to short two of the vBIOS chip pins on power on, this way you avoid loading the vBIOS which causes the whole POST to hang. If you hear the chime the iMac will boot into the Linux UBS key and you can reflash the card. You need to short the two middle pins of the chip on the top side (chip is located on the top right back side, as far as I remember).

Clip flashing is more easy…but the short trick works usually on the third or fourth attempt. You can also solder some wires to the two pins and short them during the power button pressing phase until you here the boot chime.

 

[StreamVersus]

Hi, i want to ask about 880m vBIOS, today i want install windows, all works normal, until i install nvidia drivers, second monitor stops working(main lcd broken, connector ripped off). And i have a question, can it be because of vBIOS, or its drivers issue?

 

[torsapbro]

Hi.I have 4 GB rx470, its vbios has 256 KB, here the firmware has 512 KB.How do I flash vbios?I was extracting the firmware in macos.Help me/

 

[Ausdauersportler]

Hi.I have 4 GB rx470, its vbios has 256 KB, here the firmware has 512 KB.How do I flash vbios?I was extracting the firmware in macos.Help me/

Will most likely not work at all, but you could strip the remaining 256kb from the files found here.

You should (in a first step) read the first post, extract the current vBIOS and post it here.

And please post some pictures of the card, too.

 

[dorninko]

Search this page, Common Hardware Issues. Basically, the system gets throttled down to its lowest limits because of a sensor missing.

Hi Guys, just wanted to report back: Yes it was a hardware issue. I changed the logic board (got one really cheap) and now everything works fine.

 

[torsapbro]

Thank you for the answer/ vbios rx470 4gb.

 

[Stefanox2410]

hello everyone, i am going to put a k2100 on my imac 27 2011 i7 had a hd6970 and high sierra. I burn a lot music with various logic and plugins, if I put catalina on, could the use of cpu increase and slow down performance? a thousand thanks

 

[Stefanox2410]

All of your questions have been answered in the post you quoted.
Why do you need to ask and wait for our confirmation?

you know I'd rather be sure
why did you waste time giving me such a dull answer instead of reassuring me?

 

[fluffyredlobster]

I posted a couple of weeks ago looking for confirmation on whether or not a WX4150 would specifically restore hardware video acceleration on a K2100M equipped 21.5" 2011 on Monterey.

Well, I decided to give take the change and give it a go. The card arrived from China yesterday and it works great Hackintool reports VDA "Fully Supported", AppleTV purchases now work and Moonlight no longer complains about lacking hardware accelerated decode. Hopefully this info helps anyone else who had the same uncertainty.

My iMac lives to fight another day (or more specifically another macOS release)

Thanks to all helping to keep these machines alive, especially Ausdauersportler for his patience and everyone making and testing the VBIOSes and OCLP.

Cheers!

 

[Ramoncio]

Hi guys, I have been reading this forum for a couple of months, thanks for your great work reviving old iMacs!!
A good friend gave me his old 27" A1312 iMac, as he had problems and got a new one.
It had a 1Gb Radeon HD 6970, but there was a problem with it. It couldn't install even High Sierra, it ended with a white screen, even couldn't enter internet recovery - same white screen (of death).
I tried OCLP 4.11 but I could only end MacOS installs when I tried using SMBIOS (minimal) spoof, and GPU acceleration wasn't working. But after installing root patches I always got a black screen, even in recovery mode. Nvram commands to swith iGPU an dGPU didn't do anything. It would be nice to have a script to uninstall root patches in single user or recovery mode, it would have saved me many reinstalls/clones.
I booted it fine with a custom made WinPESE ISO in an Easy2boot USB, so I could partition it and have a first try at Windows. I installed Windows 10 and everything was ok until I tried to install GPU drivers, I got a black screen. Other than that it worked pretty well in Windows, I could even watch 1080p youtube videos, but Kodi was a no-go.
Linux isos also booted, but just in safe graphics mode, otherwise I got a black screen.

I decided to get a native Nvidia GTX card following this great thread, and I bought a cheap 21,5" iMac A1211 that came with a GTX 860M installed with Nikey22 rom. Native boot screen worked, but it had problems, intermittent horizontal lines at the right side of the screen, and I couldn't install drivers. I installed that card in my 27" and it worked really great with full acceleration in High Sierra, Big Sur, Windows 10 and Linux, and the black lines problem was totally gone. I guess that card wasn't good for the smaller power supply and 2 heatpipe (and also smaller) heatsink of the 21,5" model. Meanwhile I have reballed the HD 6970 in the oven (10 minutes at 200ºC), but haven't tried it yet, as probably won't work properly in the 21,5" iMac. I might give it a quick try soon.
Now I have a couple of questions:
Is there a MXM-A card with lower TDP that supports metal in the 21,5" imac or all metal models are MXM-B? Maybe I can adapt a 3 heatpipe bigger heatsink in the 21,5"?
The GTX 860M works really great, but I have noticed the internal card temperature sensor doesn't work in MacOS (tried in HS and BS), but it works just fine in Windows 10 Macs Fan Control and HWINFO64. Can this be fixed in MacOS?
Thanks again for your great work, keep rollin!

EDIT: I think the WX4150 MXM-A with 45W TDP will work, I'll search for one.
Also the Quadro K2100M is MXM-A, and it works as @fluffyredlobster just reported.

 

[fluffyredlobster]

Hi guys, I have been reading this forum for a couple of months, thanks for your great work reviving old iMacs!!
A good friend gave me his old 27" A1312 iMac, as he had problems and got a new one.
It had a 1Gb Radeon HD 6970, but there was a problem with it. It couldn't install even High Sierra, it ended with a white screen, even couldn't enter internet recovery - same white screen (of death).
I tried OCLP 4.11 but I could only end MacOS installs when I tried using SMBIOS (minimal) spoof, and GPU acceleration wasn't working. But after installing root patches I always got a black screen, even in recovery mode. Nvram commands to swith iGPU an dGPU didn't do anything. It would be nice to have a script to uninstall root patches in single user or recovery mode, it would have saved me many reinstalls/clones.
I booted it fine with a custom made WinPESE ISO in an Easy2boot USB, so I could partition it and have a first try at Windows. I installed Windows 10 and everything was ok until I tried to install GPU drivers, I got a black screen. Other than that it worked pretty well in Windows, I could even watch 1080p youtube videos, but Kodi was a no-go.
Linux isos also booted, but just in safe graphics mode, otherwise I got a black screen.

I decided to get a native Nvidia GTX card following this great thread, and I bought a cheap 21,5" iMac A1211 that came with a GTX 860M installed with Nikey22 rom. Native boot screen worked, but it had problems, intermittent horizontal lines at the right side of the screen, and I couldn't install drivers. I installed that card in my 27" and it worked really great with full acceleration in High Sierra, Big Sur, Windows 10 and Linux, and the black lines problem was totally gone. I guess that card wasn't good for the smaller power supply and 2 heatpipe (and also smaller) heatsink of the 21,5" model. Meanwhile I have reballed the HD 6970 in the oven (10 minutes at 200ºC), but haven't tried it yet, as probably won't work properly in the 21,5" iMac. I might give it a quick try soon.
Now I have a couple of questions:
Is there a MXM-A card with lower TDP that supports metal in the 21,5" imac or all metal models are MXM-B? Maybe I can adapt a 3 heatpipe bigger heatsink in the 21,5"?
The GTX 860M works really great, but I have noticed the internal card temperature sensor doesn't work in MacOS (tried in HS and BS), but it works just fine in Windows 10 Macs Fan Control and HWINFO64. Can this be fixed in MacOS?
Thanks again for your great work, keep rollin!

EDIT: I think the
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WX4150 MXM-A with 45W TDP might work, I'll search for one.

Do you mean A1311 for the 21.5”?

The first post has a full list of all the metal compatible MXM-A cards. AFAIK all the MXM-A cards are relatively low TDP. I have good experience in a A1311 21.5 with both a K2100M and WX4150 (see post right above yours). Neither needed any mods to the 2 pipe heat sink. K2100M needs root patch (easy with OCLP) and doesn’t support hardware video encode/decode. WX4150 doesn’t need root patch and does support hardware video encode / decode - but will probably cost you more and you need to be careful with the exact model you get as some need extra steps in the A1311. All is thoroughly described in the first post which helped me massively so definitely go through that!

 

[Ramoncio]

Do you mean A1311 for the 21.5”?

The first post has a full list of all the metal compatible MXM-A cards. AFAIK all the MXM-A cards are relatively low TDP. I have good experience in a A1311 21.5 with both a K2100M and WX4150 (see post right above yours). Neither needed any mods to the 2 pipe heat sink. K2100M needs root patch (easy with OCLP) and doesn’t support hardware video encode/decode. WX4150 doesn’t need root patch and does support hardware video encode / decode - but will probably cost you more and you need to be careful with the exact model you get as some need extra steps in the A1311. All is thoroughly described in the first post which helped me massively so definitely go through that!

I read the first post at least a couple of times, but couldn't find which cards were MXM-A, suitable for the 21,5" model.
Now I have been searching for each ATI model pictures and also saw your post.

 

[Ausdauersportler]

I read the first post at least a couple of times, but couldn't find which cards were MXM-A, suitable for the 21,5" model.
Now I have been searching for each ATI model pictures and also saw your post.

Carefully read the tables of the cards (NVIDIA, AMD GCN4, AMD GCN1-3) on the first post, again. Check every column there…

 

[Ramoncio]

Carefully read the tables of the cards (NVIDIA, AMD GCN4, AMD GCN1-3) on the first post, again. Check every column there…

i see, thanks for the tip, I totally missed that column.

 

[Ausdauersportler]

Thank you for the answer/ vbios rx470 4gb.

Here you have two RX470/RX480 GOP vBIOS versions.

The RX470 version is based on your own original vBIOS adapted to enable the internal LCD (LCD enabled, GOP added, PowerPlay modified, too).

The RX480 version is the very same version I am currently using here on my own RX480 card with a 512KB BIOS chip, I have deleted the remaining empty 256KB.

Please try both versions and report back. You will need OpenCore (OCLP) to get an emulated boot picker to show up. Which iMac model are you using currently?

 

[torsapbro]

Here you have two RX470/RX480 GOP vBIOS versions.

The RX470 version is based on your own original vBIOS adapted to enable the internal LCD (LCD enabled, GOP added, PowerPlay modified, too).

The RX480 version is the very same version I am currently using here on my own RX480 card with a 512KB BIOS chip, I have deleted the remaining empty 256KB.

Please try both versions and report back. You will need OpenCore (OCLP) to get an emulated boot picker to show up. Which iMac model are you using currently?

Thank you.I have an imac 27 2011 .I flashed the bios from the rx480, which is presented here, and I did not light up further than 1 LED.

 

[Ausdauersportler]

Thank you.I have an imac 27 2011 .I flashed the bios from the rx480, which is presented here, and I did not light up further than 1 LED.

Try the RX470 version.

Did you flash the card using the Linux tool while installed in this particular iMac?
Do you hear a chime when you power on the system right now?

 

[torsapbro]

Flashed in Mac os.There was no sound signal.Only one LED was on and that was it.