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Bmju

macrumors 6502a
Original poster
Dec 16, 2013
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And the 3,1 fw, as you probably know, is not true uefi but a hybrid efi, I've been told... not sure if that makes a difference?
Yes, all of the firmware affected here, also on the 2009-2012 Mac Pro and iMac, is EFI.
 
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freqrider

macrumors regular
Feb 10, 2019
213
74
Then I have two questions, if I may? Can I load the GOP driver into the RX580 vram and how would I find the insertion offset on that rom? I would Use UEFITools likely. I already have my GPU rom backed up and actually flashed it blind once. Lol
 

reddrag0n

macrumors 6502a
Oct 1, 2007
624
159
Canada
flashed the mac pro firmware with the steps provided in post #1, now i have full boot screen on a flashed 5,1 with an MSI RX 570

image.jpg
 
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Bmju

macrumors 6502a
Original poster
Dec 16, 2013
701
766
Then I have two questions, if I may? Can I load the GOP driver into the RX580 vram and how would I find the insertion offset on that rom? I would Use UEFITools likely. I already have my GPU rom backed up and actually flashed it blind once. Lol
Yes, you can load it into your RX580 VBIOS. It is a Mac Pro 3,1, so it will then hang until you re-flash! 😥 To reply to the other question, the README.md in the download (as covered in post 1) includes how to find the offset.
 
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Zhukovski

macrumors newbie
Feb 17, 2023
1
3
I thank the author and members of the community! This method worked great on my Mac Pro 4.1 with the latest firmware. Previously, I couldn't use a flashed graphics card as it was causing issues when booting UEFI Windows. Now my GTX1080ti displays the bootscreen, displays Open Core, and boots Windows in UEFI mode from the Nvme drive. I haven't noticed any issues with the Mac Pro. But I still have to have modified graphics cards since I also own a Mac Pro 3.1 I really hope there is a solution for 2008 machines in the future! Thanks again!
 

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Bmju

macrumors 6502a
Original poster
Dec 16, 2013
701
766
I thank the author and members of the community! This method worked great on my Mac Pro 4.1 with the latest firmware. Previously, I couldn't use a flashed graphics card as it was causing issues when booting UEFI Windows. Now my GTX1080ti displays the bootscreen, displays Open Core, and boots Windows in UEFI mode from the Nvme drive. I haven't noticed any issues with the Mac Pro. But I still have to have modified graphics cards since I also own a Mac Pro 3.1 I really hope there is a solution for 2008 machines in the future! Thanks again!
I had reports from the iMac crowd that the driver improved Windows boot, too. I think it must be the accurate UEFI 2 forging, inherited from OpenCore, which is helping.
 

roobarb!

macrumors 6502
Jul 30, 2009
277
185
Adding my voice to the success stories here, I'm using a Radeon VII with EnableGopDirect on my MacPro5,1.

I get the previously mentioned visual artefacts where the screen seems to get bored of updating after a few seconds and doesn't draw in all of the drives. However, if I waggle the mouse around over the drives that portion of the screen does update and I'm able to see which one I have selected.

1676627733675.png


Fantastic to have these pre-OC screens back again, I've not seen them since I swapped from the MacVidCards 1080 Ti to the Radeon VII! My thanks to everyone involved and their hard work on this. :)
 
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Bmju

macrumors 6502a
Original poster
Dec 16, 2013
701
766
Adding my voice to the success stories here, I'm using a Radeon VII with EnableGopDirect on my MacPro5,1.

I get the previously mentioned visual artefacts where the screen seems to get bored of updating after a few seconds and doesn't draw in all of the drives. However, if I waggle the mouse around over the drives that portion of the screen does update and I'm able to see which one I have selected.

View attachment 2160044

Fantastic to have these pre-OC screens back again, I've not seen them since I swapped from the MacVidCards 1080 Ti to the Radeon VII! My thanks to everyone involved and their hard work on this. :)
Good to hear the success story! I will try to get round to looking at the issue for this particular card - too many other things going on!

I appreciate it doesn't help yourself, @h9826790 and others who have this card, but I'd like to point out again (just for others jumping in to this thread) that this is the only known card with this issue on this driver, and it was known for having similar issues in OpenCore in the past (indeed, it sounds like they may still really be there, even in OpenCore, but now by luck and judgement largely masked).
 
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CMCook

macrumors newbie
Mar 9, 2019
19
11
I have a non-success, but non-failure (no brick) here. Wondering if maybe my setup is known to not work properly.
I have a 2010 5,1 with an RX 580 connected to a Dell P2715Q via DisplayPort. It works just fine with the OpenCore bootpicker when GOP is properly enabled.

I used DXEinject to insert the EnableGop.ffs file into my cleanest non-reconstructed firmware image (roughly 42000 free space) and flashed when in firmware mode. Upon restart I had no apple boot picker or progress bar, but it did eventually boot into my failsafe High Sierra installation. I re-dumped the firmware and confirmed the open core "stuff" is in there and where the readme shows it should be.
1676756349961.png

Any ideas here?
 

h9826790

macrumors P6
Apr 3, 2014
16,656
8,584
Hong Kong
I have a non-success, but non-failure (no brick) here. Wondering if maybe my setup is known to not work properly.
I have a 2010 5,1 with an RX 580 connected to a Dell P2715Q via DisplayPort. It works just fine with the OpenCore bootpicker when GOP is properly enabled.

I used DXEinject to insert the EnableGop.ffs file into my cleanest non-reconstructed firmware image (roughly 42000 free space) and flashed when in firmware mode. Upon restart I had no apple boot picker or progress bar, but it did eventually boot into my failsafe High Sierra installation. I re-dumped the firmware and confirmed the open core "stuff" is in there and where the readme shows it should be. View attachment 2160934
Any ideas here?
Which RX580? Did you turned on DirectGopRendering in the OpenCore config.plist?
 

CMCook

macrumors newbie
Mar 9, 2019
19
11
Which RX580? Did you turned on DirectGopRendering in the OpenCore config.plist?
I'm using the MSI RX 580 Armor MK2 8gb model. Standard FW, no mining modded stuff.
In the OpenCore config.plist I have DirectGopRendering set to false and ProvideConsoleGop set to true

The card also has HDMI and DVI outputs. I'll scrounge around to see if i can find a differnet cable type. The monitor only supports 30hz at 4k over HDMI, that's why I use DisplayPort.

Code:
<key>Output</key>
        <dict>
            <key>ClearScreenOnModeSwitch</key>
            <false/>
            <key>ConsoleMode</key>
            <string></string>
            <key>DirectGopRendering</key>
            <false/>
            <key>ForceResolution</key>
            <false/>
            <key>GopPassThrough</key>
            <string>Disabled</string>
            <key>IgnoreTextInGraphics</key>
            <false/>
            <key>ProvideConsoleGop</key>
            <true/>
            <key>ReconnectGraphicsOnConnect</key>
            <false/>
            <key>ReconnectOnResChange</key>
            <false/>
            <key>ReplaceTabWithSpace</key>
            <false/>
            <key>Resolution</key>
            <string>Max</string>
            <key>SanitiseClearScreen</key>
            <false/>
            <key>TextRenderer</key>
            <string>BuiltinGraphics</string>
            <key>UIScale</key>
            <integer>0</integer>
            <key>UgaPassThrough</key>
            <false/>
        </dict>
 
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Bmju

macrumors 6502a
Original poster
Dec 16, 2013
701
766
Which RX580? Did you turned on DirectGopRendering in the OpenCore config.plist?
Setting in config.plist should not matter, actually.

EDIT: Or rather, the setting of DirectGopRendering which you already have in config.plist, before starting, matters as regards which version (EnableGop or EnablGopDirect) you should choose to install; but it does not matter as regards how EnableGop/EnableGopDirect will behave once it is installed. I think perhaps that might not be obvious to users from your comment @h9826790 !
 
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h9826790

macrumors P6
Apr 3, 2014
16,656
8,584
Hong Kong
EDIT: Or rather, the setting of DirectGopRendering which you already have in config.plist, before starting, matters as regards which version (EnableGop or EnablGopDirect) you should choose to install; but it does not matter as regards how EnableGop/EnableGopDirect will behave once it is installed. I think perhaps that might not be obvious to users from your comment @h9826790 !
Yeah, this is exactly what I want to know (if he should use EnableGopDirect).

But it seems the answer is negative. According to his functioning OC config, he choosed the correct ffs.
 
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joergz

macrumors member
Oct 22, 2019
51
48
What‘s the actual difference between the efi and ffs files?

Is .ffs used for the Mac Bootrom and .efi for the GPU Firmware?
 

tsialex

Contributor
Jun 13, 2016
13,437
13,581
What‘s the actual difference between the efi and ffs files?

Different packaging of the same modules for different situations.

Is .ffs used for the Mac Bootrom and .efi for the GPU Firmware?

The *.efi files are the modules that you can run directly from the EFI shell Edit: and are used as the source for the GPU injection script, while the *.ffs files are the modules that you gonna inject to the Mac BootROM or to the GPU firmware itself.
 
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Bmju

macrumors 6502a
Original poster
Dec 16, 2013
701
766
The *.efi files are the modules that you can run directly from the EFI shell, while the *.ffs files are the modules that you gonna inject to the Mac BootROM or to the GPU firmware itself.
Almost but not quite correct actually.

.ffs is for injecting into the main firmware.

But .efi is the file to start from when injecting into vBIOS. The layout of vBIOS option ROM firmware is simpler than FV, and you inject the .efi file differently: you compress it with a different tool (EfiRom), which does not result in a .ffs, before injecting it.
 

tsialex

Contributor
Jun 13, 2016
13,437
13,581
Almost but not quite correct actually.

.ffs is for injecting into the main firmware.

But .efi is the file to start from when injecting into vBIOS. The layout of vBIOS option ROM firmware is simpler than FV, and you inject the .efi file differently: you compress it with a different tool (EfiRom), which does not result in a .ffs, before injecting it.
Thx for the correction.
 
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aclarubicin

macrumors member
May 27, 2018
75
20
Can confirm this added bootscreen function to the VBIOS of my NVIDIA K420, anyone tried for AMD cards?
 

CMCook

macrumors newbie
Mar 9, 2019
19
11
The card also has HDMI and DVI outputs. I'll scrounge around to see if i can find a differnet cable type. The monitor only supports 30hz at 4k over HDMI, that's why I use DisplayPort.

@h9826790 @Bmju I dug up a HDMI cable and connected it to my monitor instead of through the displayport cable. In this configuration I was able to see the standard apple boot picker when holding option/alt key. All the drive icons were tiny; like in OpenCore when the picker isn't scaled for high dpi (UIScale = 1). But it worked!

Now for some additional troubleshooting. Need to find a DVI cable and borrow a 2nd (not 4k) monitor to see if it's the displayport interface itself or the combo of 4k or this specific monitor over DisplayPort. Still is somewhat odd since the OpenCore boot picker displays as expected, but the apple boot screen is a different beast.

I remember that my original apple firmware ATI 5770 wouldn't show a boot picker or progress bar when connected to a 4k monitor over mini displayport connection. Wonder if it's related.
 
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Bmju

macrumors 6502a
Original poster
Dec 16, 2013
701
766
@h9826790 @Bmju I dug up a HDMI cable and connected it to my monitor instead of through the displayport cable. In this configuration I was able to see the standard apple boot picker when holding option/alt key. All the drive icons were tiny; like in OpenCore when the picker isn't scaled for high dpi (UIScale = 1). But it worked!

Now for some additional troubleshooting. Need to find a DVI cable and borrow a 2nd (not 4k) monitor to see if it's the displayport interface itself or the combo of 4k or this specific monitor over DisplayPort. Still is somewhat odd since the OpenCore boot picker displays as expected, but the apple boot screen is a different beast.

I remember that my original apple firmware ATI 5770 wouldn't show a boot picker or progress bar when connected to a 4k monitor over mini displayport connection. Wonder if it's related.
Have you tried switching between DisplayPort 1.1 and DisplayPort 1.2 settings on your monitor? If that's what matters, you typucally need to have the right one selected already _before_ you start the machine.
 

OldMacPro2

macrumors regular
Jun 23, 2022
169
92
Has anybody done the VBIOS method on an AMD card? I have a RX 460 and a RX 580 that I am willing to try the VBIOS method on either of them.
 
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internetzel

macrumors 6502a
Apr 29, 2015
623
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Macschrauber

macrumors 68030
Dec 27, 2015
2,976
1,483
Germany
See https://github.com/Ausdauersportler/IMAC-EFI-BOOT-SCREEN/wiki/EnableGop for how to do that; depending on the size of your original VBIOS this might be relatively easy or a lot of work.
Correctly done this has already been proven to work for many AMD cards - no negative results until now.

Can you guys please adapt the instructions for PCIe Cards for Mac Pros?

I am quite sure that the part with "Open the iMac enabled GOP vBIOS (OBJ_INFO adjusted to recognized the main LCD as an internal display)" is not needed for PCIe Cards in Mac Pros ;-)
 
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