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Early Intel - Trash or treasure? MacBook Pro 2008
- Thread starter AphoticD
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Yepp, all merits go to @dosdude1 and his fellows to make this happen. Many thanks again!!!
It's nice to have a thorough test-drive on a spare machine instead of rushing into any early upgrades. That's what I 've learned by using PPCs a lot.
The early 2008-MBP proofs to be a little miracle by the help of the macOS-patches and as long as one don't melt down the GPU by too heavy loads.
Catalina seems to take more resources compared to High-Sierra. I'm looking forward to the first Onyx(4Catalina)-release to even more reduce graphic effects etc., but currently that system is pretty calm, while writing here in MR and even streaming video isn't too much distress.
I'd stay with ElCapitan, if there wasn't the calamity of that asynchronous "Notability"-update, that expelled me from synching iPad with Mac.
So HighSierra will be my next step - it's more mature in terms of less frequent updates, it allows the "old" HFS+ file-system (which Mojave also does) and it seems more responsive compared to Mojave and Catalina. And it's more old-school compared to the black-matter, that follows ...
Update1:
After I've left out a few macOS upgrades since ElCapitan I've noticed only now, that Apple pulled the plug on Aperture and iPhoto. And my old Scansnap m1500 wouldn't work anymore, too - along with a few other nice programs, I got used to.
So Mojave seems to become the (my) last general major upgrade for the foreseeable future and looking back to sturdy G4-PPC/Leopard there still ought to be a long future ahead!
Gonna post how test-drive with A1260/Mojave is going on ... (as for now, it already, just a little bit, does resemble my fancy little steam-book aka 12" G4-PowerBook/Leopard, when it comes to fans and temperature!)
Update 2:
All things HighSierra now ... "In-Place-Upgrade" of my MBP4,1/A1260 went like a charm. (Thanks @dosdude1 !)
My drive was encrypted with FileVault2, so I had to start the installation-process a second time (up to the point, where the drive had to be unlocked) before I could choose the now unlocked FileVault-drive within the "macOS Post-Install"-procedure. So far no big (negative) change of performance compared to ElCapitan and nearly all progs are working fine.
Update 3:
More reasons to stay away from Catalina and APFS: CarbonCopyCloner has some trouble with APFS. Just read their blog about that stuff related to APFS etc.
So, in a mixed environment of PPC and intel-Macs HFS+ and (supported) ElCapitan or (patched)HS/Mojave will be my the boundary for future upgrade-planning ...
That does also mean to take thorough care of any mobile-device's updates, since BigBrother might force you unwillingly into disconnecting (Cloud)-sync of your mobile device from your Mac, because e.g. an auto-updated iOS-App might require a higher macOS than Mojave or your currend uses macOS (this currently happened to my with my favourite note-taking-apps Notability and GoodNotes.
Welcome 1984...
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Any way to get "old-style" Right Mouse Click back on patched HighSierra/Mojave?
So I finally upgraded my daily-driver MBP4,1/ A1260 in two steps to HighSierra (two weeks ago) and then Mojave (yesterday). Kept the SSD in HFS+.
I'm really impressed about system performance on the old machine! 😊
One thing I'm missing: I like to perform right-mouse-click by holding two fingers onto the touchpad and press the touchpad-button. This doesn't work on the MBP4,1 through all patched macOS-versions. Well, it's just a habit, but I allways find myself trying to do that trick to then notice it doesn't work anymore.
Does anyone know a workaround for that?
Update 2019-11-02:
After 3 weeks working with Mojave it still works like a charm! No complaints about distressed CPU/GPU so far. One gadget, "Barkeeper 3.0" is a bit "slow", compared to the ElCap-2.0-version, but on the rest I don't "feel" any important difference.
Knowing, the Catalina-patch is also a further option, the MacBookPro4,1 feels like just coming out of the fountain of youth, ...
So I finally upgraded my daily-driver MBP4,1/ A1260 in two steps to HighSierra (two weeks ago) and then Mojave (yesterday). Kept the SSD in HFS+.
I'm really impressed about system performance on the old machine! 😊
One thing I'm missing: I like to perform right-mouse-click by holding two fingers onto the touchpad and press the touchpad-button. This doesn't work on the MBP4,1 through all patched macOS-versions. Well, it's just a habit, but I allways find myself trying to do that trick to then notice it doesn't work anymore.
Does anyone know a workaround for that?
Update 2019-11-02:
After 3 weeks working with Mojave it still works like a charm! No complaints about distressed CPU/GPU so far. One gadget, "Barkeeper 3.0" is a bit "slow", compared to the ElCap-2.0-version, but on the rest I don't "feel" any important difference.
Knowing, the Catalina-patch is also a further option, the MacBookPro4,1 feels like just coming out of the fountain of youth, ...
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Interesting to hear that your GPU was correctly replaced by a UK repair shop. Could you pls share which one? Especially if your MBPro is still performing correctly.
As I've previously mentioned, if Europe to US shipping costs were not the issue I would have sent at least one logic board to dosdude1 for repair.
Another question - to LightBulbFun as you're in UK. Do you plan any MBPro GPU replacements similar to those of dosdude1?
Interesting to hear that your GPU was correctly replaced by a UK repair shop. Could you pls share which one? Especially if your MBPro is still performing correctly.
As I've previously mentioned, if Europe to US shipping costs were not the issue I would have sent at least one logic board to dosdude1 for repair.
Another question - to LightBulbFun as you're in UK. Do you plan any MBPro GPU replacements similar to those of dosdude1?
Yes the repaired MBP is still working fine. Mind The Mac in North London replaced the GPU and did an excellent job.
(Well, I had the difficult choice where to post - in "Club17" or here... But since GPU-failure on the early MBPs has been a big point in this thread, this is the place.)
Today Santa Claus came here long time before Chrismas!
Last week I've won an auction on an early 2008 17" MBP that was to come in the original box.
Instead there was only that bulk grey box arriving today. Humm ...
And then that big sticker "Certified Refurb", which is normaly related to something minor compared to the original thing.
It took me a while to figure out, this might be a unit with a GPU-replacement and Voilà: there's the "green dot" sticking at the edge of the RAM-slot. 😊
(more about that here #108 )
Today Santa Claus came here long time before Chrismas!
Last week I've won an auction on an early 2008 17" MBP that was to come in the original box.
Instead there was only that bulk grey box arriving today. Humm ...
And then that big sticker "Certified Refurb", which is normaly related to something minor compared to the original thing.
It took me a while to figure out, this might be a unit with a GPU-replacement and Voilà: there's the "green dot" sticking at the edge of the RAM-slot. 😊
(more about that here #108 )
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I got an A1260 (2.6 GHz, Early 2008 MBP) from ShopGoodwill a couple weeks ago, and have been unable to get an OS onto it. I have a retail 10.6 DVD, but the drive immediately ejects anything you insert, so I'll assume that is probably toast. So, I restored it onto a flash drive. The laptop tries to boot from that, but almost immediately goes to a Kernel Panic. Is that a sign of the graphics chip being toast, or do I have some hope of something less dire?
How did you create the installer? With those 8600M chipsets, they'll either show some artifacting or not show any image at all when they fail.
I simply used the "Restore" functionality of Disk Utility with the DVD as the source and the flash drive as the target. The flash drive is partitioned using GUID with a single partition.
Have you got any other Mac with a working optical drive and FireWire-connectivity? Then you might start that Mac in TDM and get access to it's optical drive via FireWire an use it for booting up your A1260.
That is a great idea. It is sitting installing via TDM now. Fingers crossed it works when it finishes. Thanks!
Sadly, this revealed that it is indeed the dreaded 8600M issue. After install completed, I still got the KP on boot. Booting into safe mode revealed horrible display artifacts, and the PCIe lane width is all the way down to x1.
KP might also be caused by something other than the GPU (RAM, otherwise defective board etc.), but since PCIe lane width is down, I'd try to fix the GPU first in order to see, if it can be temporarily mended - previous to a proper GPU-replacement, like @dosdude1 offers (read more on p4 within this thread).Sadly, this revealed that it is indeed the dreaded 8600M issue. After install completed, I still got the KP on boot. Booting into safe mode revealed horrible display artifacts, and the PCIe lane width is all the way down to x1.
My first MacBook was a Early 2008 17" 4,1 and thankfully I sold it in 2012 because I picked the same model in the 15" variety up for €50! I found an old Time machine backup and wanted to restore my old files on to it! The battery actually worked when it first arrived but after being put away for a few weeks it seems to have died!
In terms of those questioning how powerful it is... I legit edited Arri Alexa footage on the MacBook Pro in Snow Leopard with Final Cut Express and it worked! Posted a video of it here:
I dual booted Catalina on it and I think the Laptop is too old for Catalina, but Snow Leopard runs great and the newest Chrome browser that supports Snow Leopard seems to work! Windows 10 works better on it than Catalina.
That said I'm wondering when the GPU will die, I have a feeling it's not a replacement Nvidia and it's a ticking time bomb which IS a pity because the original 17" I had back in the day had it's motherboard replaced with extended warranty and it got the new Nvidia chip. Do the early chips take advantage of the 6GB of ram or should it just be kept at 4GB as a single 4GB DIMM in DDR2 are pretty expensive for what it is...
I'm going to try bobesch's post and see if that improves performance in Catalina.
In terms of those questioning how powerful it is... I legit edited Arri Alexa footage on the MacBook Pro in Snow Leopard with Final Cut Express and it worked! Posted a video of it here:
I dual booted Catalina on it and I think the Laptop is too old for Catalina, but Snow Leopard runs great and the newest Chrome browser that supports Snow Leopard seems to work! Windows 10 works better on it than Catalina.
That said I'm wondering when the GPU will die, I have a feeling it's not a replacement Nvidia and it's a ticking time bomb which IS a pity because the original 17" I had back in the day had it's motherboard replaced with extended warranty and it got the new Nvidia chip. Do the early chips take advantage of the 6GB of ram or should it just be kept at 4GB as a single 4GB DIMM in DDR2 are pretty expensive for what it is...
I'm going to try bobesch's post and see if that improves performance in Catalina.
My first MacBook was a Early 2008 17" 4,1 and thankfully I sold it in 2012 because I picked the same model in the 15" variety up for €50! I found an old Time machine backup and wanted to restore my old files on to it! The battery actually worked when it first arrived but after being put away for a few weeks it seems to have died!
In terms of those questioning how powerful it is... I legit edited Arri Alexa footage on the MacBook Pro in Snow Leopard with Final Cut Express and it worked! Posted a video of it here:I dual booted Catalina on it and I think the Laptop is too old for Catalina, but Snow Leopard runs great and the newest Chrome browser that supports Snow Leopard seems to work! Windows 10 works better on it than Catalina.
That said I'm wondering when the GPU will die, I have a feeling it's not a replacement Nvidia and it's a ticking time bomb which IS a pity because the original 17" I had back in the day had it's motherboard replaced with extended warranty and it got the new Nvidia chip. Do the early chips take advantage of the 6GB of ram or should it just be kept at 4GB as a single 4GB DIMM in DDR2 are pretty expensive for what it is...
I'm going to try bobesch's post and see if that improves performance in Catalina.
Great story! Got my first Mac in 2009... so you're miles ahead!
Your's new 17" MBP will cope with every all-day-stuff except of >720p/HD video.
Check your RAM-slots! If they shows a green-dot sticker, your on the bright side. If not, you're in god's hand ...
RAM doesn't make any difference. That fan-controll-stuff neither. Best to run fans on factory-settings - they'll work, even if all that f...... software solutions might be offline.
When it comes to operating systems 10.11 plus SSD are running great, but that won't prevent you from sudden GPU-failure.
Check PCIe-lane-width regularly: x16 is normal, x1 is close to shut-down.
If you are to encounter GPU-blackout, there's 150°/15min onto the bare logic-board that might make things temporarily work again ...
I've tested HighSierra-, Mojave- and even Catalina-PATCHES to meet that early-2008 MacBookPro's demands (and mine too), but if Your GPU is one of the vulnerable ones, prepare on a short life of your MBP.
All merits about HighSierra-/Mojave-/Catalina-Patches have to go to @dosdude1. He's offering GPU-replacement too, which is worth any penny on those fine early 2008 MBPs (even if Apple has reached outer space with it's new 16" MBP for the non-mortals)
Assuming by your MBP's keyboard localisation support for a real GPU-replacement is close by ...
Catalina worked fine on my MBP4,1 , but I went back to Mojave to be my currently last macOS- version installed on that machine, since I don't want to give up all my favorite 32-bit applications.
If you're going for Catalina, make sure to switch off that face-recognition-stuff and all unnecessary background-activities!
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I’ve got a MacBookPro2,2 for sale if anyone here is interested:
Faulty GPU as far as I know.
Faulty GPU as far as I know.
Just to be clear... what period do most think of as "early Intel"? I would say 2006 until 2008. The 2009 Intel Macs were a big step in performance all across the lineup.
I'd say "early Intel" holds as long as the system looks identical to its PPC-based predecessor. So, aluminum iMacs, unibody MacBooks, the 2010-and-later Mac minis and the cylinder Mac Pro are out.
Considering my own personal lineup, I would say anything pre-Core i series (2011-ish) should probably be included in our camp at this point in time.
It’s interesting to consider the humble Core 2 Duo served nearly 4 years in the Mac lineup with only a few minor revisions. Unlike the Core i series which go through so many major improvements it's impossible to class an i5 from '11 in the same league as a 2019 i5.
In comparison, the G4 served nearly 7 years from the Yikes in '99 to the last of the iBooks in 2006... And the longest running CPU before that was probably the 68000 from the original 1984 Macintosh to the Mac Plus in 1990.
It’s interesting to consider the humble Core 2 Duo served nearly 4 years in the Mac lineup with only a few minor revisions. Unlike the Core i series which go through so many major improvements it's impossible to class an i5 from '11 in the same league as a 2019 i5.
In comparison, the G4 served nearly 7 years from the Yikes in '99 to the last of the iBooks in 2006... And the longest running CPU before that was probably the 68000 from the original 1984 Macintosh to the Mac Plus in 1990.
Boot-Loop on an early 2008 MBP4,1 A1260.
Got a cheap A1260 in not-working condition for spare parts.
Under the hood everything looks like never touched before even (or because) it was really packed with fluff (maybe that's why it died from overheating?)
Trying to boot the unit there's the "bong", screen is on and by pressing the ALT-key I can choose between internal-drive, FireWire-connected Mac in TDM or external bootable USB-drive. Then the light-grey screen with dark-grey Apple-logo appears and the progress bar reaches up to about 70% before booting stops and system reboots. Same result on all three above mentioned booting methods.
I've migrated logic-board & heatsink as one block to another MBP from which I've removed the logic-board before (previous owner hat messed inside that MBP and burned it's board beyond repair. Also messed with the GPU 😬, but he didn't mention anything in the auction).
Since that other MacBook was able to boot a few times before it's GPU finally died, and since I replaced RAM by two other RAM-bricks from another working A1260-unit, I'm sure, the logic-board is faulty and causes the boot-loop.
Anything I could try or any guess, whatsoever is causing the boot-loop?
Thanks for any help!
Got a cheap A1260 in not-working condition for spare parts.
Under the hood everything looks like never touched before even (or because) it was really packed with fluff (maybe that's why it died from overheating?)
Trying to boot the unit there's the "bong", screen is on and by pressing the ALT-key I can choose between internal-drive, FireWire-connected Mac in TDM or external bootable USB-drive. Then the light-grey screen with dark-grey Apple-logo appears and the progress bar reaches up to about 70% before booting stops and system reboots. Same result on all three above mentioned booting methods.
I've migrated logic-board & heatsink as one block to another MBP from which I've removed the logic-board before (previous owner hat messed inside that MBP and burned it's board beyond repair. Also messed with the GPU 😬, but he didn't mention anything in the auction).
Since that other MacBook was able to boot a few times before it's GPU finally died, and since I replaced RAM by two other RAM-bricks from another working A1260-unit, I'm sure, the logic-board is faulty and causes the boot-loop.
Anything I could try or any guess, whatsoever is causing the boot-loop?
Thanks for any help!
Check the GPU, I have seen this happen when the 8600M GT fails on these. If it's a non-revised chip, that's probably the issue.
I didn't remove the heatsink yet since I ran out of thermal-paste ... but there's no green dot and I think, it carries the old NVIDIA G84-602.
I thought, the faulty GPU-chip would only result into the black-screen-failure ...