CPU Upgrade iMac Mid 2011

[jadehsn]

I decided to give all this a try on my 2011 27" iMac. I installed a 1245 Xeon, K2100M, and an SSD. After install, for some reason, the display doesn't seem to always work. The machine chimes, definitely turns on, and works properly with an external monitor. The internal display I can only get to work after zapping the PRAM. After that, whether after a shut down or restart, the display won't work. I thought it might be the PRAM battery, so replaced that, but no difference. LCD video cable was broken at one point, but I've replaced that as well. The display consistently works only after zapping the PRAM. Subsequent restarts or power ups still chime, fans running, computer beeps if you touch the keyboard and try to do some things, but just a black screen. I tried disconnecting the optical drive, in case it was due to the amount of power being drawn, but that didn't seem to make any difference either.

For what it's worth, the display LED's all turn on after the PRAM reset, but, otherwise, only the first 3 LED's light up.

Any thoughts?

 

[roscho]

I decided to give all this a try on my 2011 27" iMac. I installed a 1245 Xeon, K2100M, and an SSD. After install, for some reason, the display doesn't seem to always work. The machine chimes, definitely turns on, and works properly with an external monitor. The internal display I can only get to work after zapping the PRAM. After that, whether after a shut down or restart, the display won't work. I thought it might be the PRAM battery, so replaced that, but no difference. LCD video cable was broken at one point, but I've replaced that as well. The display consistently works only after zapping the PRAM. Subsequent restarts or power ups still chime, fans running, computer beeps if you touch the keyboard and try to do some things, but just a black screen. I tried disconnecting the optical drive, in case it was due to the amount of power being drawn, but that didn't seem to make any difference either.

For what it's worth, the display LED's all turn on after the PRAM reset, but, otherwise, only the first 3 LED's light up.

Any thoughts?

My guess is, you change too much at once and get stuck with diagnostics right now.
lesson learned: Replace one thing after another.

Most of your problems seem to be GPU related - wrong thread though.
Try booting a linux usb stick with hdd/ sdd disconnected and see either if the display fires up or you could ssh in.

Regards,

roscho

 

[Ausdauersportler]

I decided to give all this a try on my 2011 27" iMac. I installed a 1245 Xeon, K2100M, and an SSD. After install, for some reason, the display doesn't seem to always work. The machine chimes, definitely turns on, and works properly with an external monitor. The internal display I can only get to work after zapping the PRAM. After that, whether after a shut down or restart, the display won't work. I thought it might be the PRAM battery, so replaced that, but no difference. LCD video cable was broken at one point, but I've replaced that as well. The display consistently works only after zapping the PRAM. Subsequent restarts or power ups still chime, fans running, computer beeps if you touch the keyboard and try to do some things, but just a black screen. I tried disconnecting the optical drive, in case it was due to the amount of power being drawn, but that didn't seem to make any difference either.

For what it's worth, the display LED's all turn on after the PRAM reset, but, otherwise, only the first 3 LED's light up.

Any thoughts?

Wrong thread, definitively.

You could face one out of two known issues, the „black screen issue“ or you picked the wrong BIOS for your card. Both solutions can be found by reading through the first link on my signature.

 

[roscho]

As we are back on topic, I wonder if it is possible to inject CPU Microcodes via OpenCore / Clover / DSDT / SSDT - has anyone with more hackintosh experience insight in this?

Another option would be implementing LibreBoot / CoreBoot as OpenCore seems to be a fork of the TianoCore payload. SeaBIOS payload seems to support BSD too...

Some work on Apple HW has already been done:

Flashing coreboot on MacBooks without external programmer by using IFD hack

Libreboot Port to MBP 2,1


Best,

roscho

This hack gives me no rest. Ordered a Pomona SOIC8 Test Clip, some spare MX25L6406E Flash chips and juper wires to connect to my raspberry GPIO.

Hope I won't brick the imac by flashing coreboot...anyway - no risk no fun.
Will report later.

Cheers,

R.

EDIT: does anyone know a solution of soldering 2 Flash chips on a small board with a switch (dual EFI on Mac)?

 

[Nguyen Duc Hieu]

This hack gives me no rest. Ordered a Pomona SOIC8 Test Clip, some spare MX25L6406E Flash chips and juper wires to connect to my raspberry GPIO.

Hope I won't brick the imac by flashing coreboot...anyway - no risk no fun.
Will report later.

Cheers,

R.

EDIT: does anyone know a solution of soldering 2 Flash chips on a small board with a switch (dual EFI on Mac)?

You can study the Ch341a clipper, the set include switch, sockets etc.

Another way is converting the SMC chip to a DIP one, same on the logic board so you can plug-and-play the IC, rather than solder-desolder.

Make SMD to DIP Adapters

Make SMD to DIP Adapters: Recently I had started to experiment with I2C communications, so I bought a bunch of IC's for learning how to use the I2C bus. The ICs were taken directly from Microchip, since they offered a board that has a bunch of stuff on it, however this board…

www.instructables.com

 

[Nguyen Duc Hieu]

Parts:

2.54mm Dual-in-Line Socket SMT (H=3.0 L=7.4) China Manufacturers Suppliers Factory Exporter

China 2.54mm Dual-in-Line Socket SMT (H=3.0 L=7.4) with High-Quality, Leading 2.54mm Dual-in-Line Socket SMT (H=3.0 L=7.4) Manufacturers & Suppliers, find 2.54mm Dual-in-Line Socket SMT (H=3.0 L=7.4) Factory Exporter.

www.antenk.com

New 50pcs SOP8 SO8 SOIC8 TSSOP8 TO DIP8 adapter to DIP + Pin Header | eBay

Double Sided SMD SOP8 SO8 SOIC8 and TSSOP8 to DIP Adapters.

www.ebay.com

 

[roscho]

You can study the Ch341a clipper, the set include switch, sockets etc.

Another way is converting the SMC chip to a DIP one, same on the logic board so you can plug-and-play the IC, rather than solder-desolder.

Make SMD to DIP Adapters

Make SMD to DIP Adapters: Recently I had started to experiment with I2C communications, so I bought a bunch of IC's for learning how to use the I2C bus. The ICs were taken directly from Microchip, since they offered a board that has a bunch of stuff on it, however this board…

www.instructables.com

Thanks for the links and thoughts!

Soldering and desoldering isn't absolutely necessary though due to the test clip.

Meanwhile I found SOIC-8 to DIP/DIL adaptors by myself, thinking more of a breadboard solution though. Maybe switching between two SOIC-8 adaptors on a breadboard can be realized with jumpers. As in ancient times on dual BIOS boards. Dual BIOS iMac (Apple / OpenCore) ;-)

 

[Nguyen Duc Hieu]

Maybe switching between two SOIC-8 adaptors on a breadboard can be realized with jumpers. As in ancient times on dual BIOS boards. Dual BIOS iMac (Apple / OpenCore) ;-)

Why bother with jumpers? Once you have them on the breadboard, adding one 8-pin DIP switch is much easier.

DIP Switch - 8 Position | COM-08034 | SparkFun

 

[roscho]

Why bother with jumpers? Once you have them on the breadboard, adding one 8-pin DIP switch is much easier.

DIP Switch - 8 Position | COM-08034 | SparkFun

2x

2x

1x

+ Jumper wires, a Breadboard, and a raspberry pi with Linux, right?

Thus flashing / reading / switching can be tested via Linux.

Do we have enough space for a EEPROM "daughter board" next to the original EEPROM position on the iMacs logic board? My iMac is closed right now 😎

 

[roscho]

Interesting logic board layout of the A1312 (EMC2429).

Next to U6100 (MX25L6406EM2I) there are blank solder mounts U5100 and J5100.

Googling a bit it seems that U6100 (LPC+SPI CONN Port80,serial) can hold a SPI ROM JTAG connector like the MacBooks of that era. On the MacBooks it can be used for flashing the SPI ROM.

J5100 can be equipped with a "NC7SB3157P6X", a similar named Fairchild part identifies as IC, Low-Voltage SPDT Analog Switch (SOT23, 0.65mm pitch). A simple analogue switch though. Have yet to find out what exactly it is switching...

Those 3 parts seem to be interconnected.

Comparing schematics, it seems that this SPI Flash circuitry is virtually unaltered during the A1312 ERA.

Im just wondering if one could solder a second Flash Chip in somewhere there.

Very interesting...lets see how this can be used

 

[StephN999]

Hope I won't brick the imac by flashing coreboot...anyway - no risk no fun.
Will report later.

Bonjour,

Already tested, we can fortunately go back to the original firmware.

to come back with the last posts, I remind you that the tracks (not sure of the translation of this word) on the motherboard are very fragile, that's what happened on my 2 other motherboards.

So some people are going to test for the Ivy Bridge with these projects?
I've reached the end of my skills on this subject, and we have a dedicated topic.

Have a nice day.

 

[roscho]

Bonjour,

Already tested, we can fortunately go back to the original firmware.

to come back with the last posts, I remind you that the tracks (not sure of the translation of this word) on the motherboard are very fragile, that's what happened on my 2 other motherboards.

So some people are going to test for the Ivy Bridge with these projects?
I've reached the end of my skills on this subject, and we have a dedicated topic.

Have a nice day.

Salut StephN999,


What did you mean with "CoreBoot KO"?

How did you build CoreBoot without Linux? Any error messages during Build?
Did flashing work? How did you flash without Linux - Test clip?
What exactly was the performance after flashing?

Best regards,

roscho

EDIT: Yes, installing my IvyBridge Xeon E3-1275LV2 ist the aim of installing coreboot. So right thread, maybe. Didn't notice the other thread anyway, thanks for the hint. Should I switch over? Installing Coreboot is not really a firmware mod, but an installation of an alternate (free) firmware...

 

[StephN999]

Bonsoir,

Sorry the usual KO (from boxing) when I can't do it and as it's the opposite of OK... (bref pardon tout ça 😂)

I did my best under Linux (Ubuntu), but I'm limited by my skills on that side.

And yes, I know it's an alternative, originally to avoid using Intel ME it seems to me.

Flashage via CH341A.

For the details I would be more comfortable explaining it in French, it's getting heavy for me to use translators, who sometimes change meanings or don't understand my expressions.

No harm for the other thread but it's true that it corresponds more to the EFI hack.

Otherwise I really wanted this modification (I have the same Xeon Ivy Bridge) I even wanted to dedicate it to my recently deceased sister, it turns out that it was her iMac that she gave me quite a year ago.

HS: New test at the end of this month beginning of next month RAM ECC.

Best regards too,

Translated with www.DeepL.com/Translator (free version).

 

[358]

Bonjour,
Many, many hours of research, a lot of tests of all kinds but I have not solved the problem of deep sleep.

I found and adapted a tutorial to change the type of microprocessor suddenly my system can see a Quad-Core Intel Xeon (On clover 0x05A5 "Hexadecimal", On OpenCore 1445 "Decimal)".

Informations matériel :

  Nom du modèle :    iMac
  Identifiant du modèle :    iMac12,1
  Nom du processeur :    Quad-Core Intel Xeon
  Vitesse du processeur :    3,4 GHz
  Nombre de processeurs :    1
  Nombre total de cœurs :    4
  Cache de niveau 2 (par cœur) :    256 Ko
  Cache de niveau 3 :    8 Mo
  Technologie Hyper-Threading :    Activé
  Mémoire :    16 Go
  Version de la ROM de démarrage :    87.0.0.0.0

View attachment 913089

Hi there, can you please share the knowledge on how you got "About this Mac" to recognise Xeon? also I got the e3-1275 with iGPU but i also have the sleep bug issue. driving me nuts

 

[StephN999]

Bonjour,

To my knowledge there is no fix for the standby mode whether the Xeon is with or without IGPU, I had thought that putting ECC ram could fix the problem, I ordered some but I messed up and I took dimm (yet simple to put sodimm though...).

For the recognition I just checked one more box with OpenCore configurator, PlatformInfo -> UpdateNVRAM

Bonne journée.

 

[StephN999]

Bonjour,

I was able to cancel my Dimm order, it's a bit hard to find what I want, the Innodisk brand seems to be the easiest to find but not really in France, I would like SODIMM DDR3 1600Mhz strips in 8GB (as long as I can take as much in 1600Mhz if one day we can make Ivy Bridge work and as I already have a Xeon).

Anyway if someone can help me on this one.

Bonne journée.

fix: Added forgotten information.

 

[profcutter]

Bonjour,

Already tested, we can fortunately go back to the original firmware.

to come back with the last posts, I remind you that the tracks (not sure of the translation of this word) on the motherboard are very fragile, that's what happened on my 2 other motherboards.

So some people are going to test for the Ivy Bridge with these projects?
I've reached the end of my skills on this subject, and we have a dedicated topic.

Have a nice day.

I believe the term you’re looking for is “traces” on the motherboard.

 

[StephN999]

Hello,

Thanks for your answer, I just looked on the French Wikipedia of "Circuit imprimé" and it's well track.
Edit: nothing says your term is bad, though.

couche de cuivre, illustrant la formation d'une piste (track en anglais)

Just in case, someone has some clues on the subject, I'm too limited skill level and it's also my only machine, so it's really too constraining, otherwise I would have done a lot more research.

Bonne journée.👍

 

[profcutter]

No worries, Steph, but the shiny metal things on PCBs that connect components are called traces. Never heard them called tracks, but as long as people know what you mean, whatever works.

 

[StephN999]

Re,

Thank you for your precision. 😊

Edit: I finally found in French, it's "pastille".

 

[StephN999]

Bonjour,

A SODIMM Hynix 8Go 2RX8 EP3L-12800E DDR3L-1600 ECC Un-Buffered ram bar bought 40$, we will finally be able to test it! (Some 2011 machines are natively compatible with ram at 1600Mhz at worst it should still go to 1333Mhz)

Bonne soirée.

 

[StephN999]

Bonsoir,

Ram received and non-functional, tested alone it beeps when there is no memory at all, with another one in the same bank error beeps, alone with memory in the other bank, starts but doesn't see the memory bar, i.e. if they work by 2 in ECC or it's simply incompatible or I have a faulty bar, I can't tell...

Otherwise I tested the ram in 1600Mhz same brand as the ECC (4GB), passes in 1333Mhz, it must be really rare that the ram 1600Mhz works in 1600Mhz on the iMac 2011, great luck on the other hand that it works in 1600Mhz on a Macbook Pro of the same year.

Bonne soirée.

PS: If you have an idea, an opinion about the fact that my ECC bar does not work I am all "ears".

 

[StephN999]

Bonjour,

Concerning the ECC ram I think it works by pairs (after that it's not guaranteed to work), because when you look at the configurations of different servers you always see pairs, so I'll see later to get another bar from time to time.

Bonne journée.

Edit: 2nd ram bar ordered, suspense... 😅
Edit2: Out of Stock. 😭

 

[nandor690]

Any kind of update on getting Ivy Bridge to work in these iMacs?

 

[StephN999]

Bonjour,

Still not 😭, I still hope to find someone more qualified than me to help him.