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High Sierra on cMP (4,1 flashed to 5,1)

Hi there, I've been reading quite a number of threads and I'm still confused as to whether it's safe for me to upgrade to High Sierra.

I'm on a 4,1 2009 cMP flashed to 5,1. It has a 3.24TB Fusion drive created using Corestorage in Terminal. Both the 256GB SSD and 3TB HDD (that make up the Fusion drive) are sitting in the SATA drive sleds so directly connected.

My understanding thus far is that High Sierra doesn't support AFPS on Fusion drives but this may come in a later update. I've read some posts stating that HS shouldn't auto convert a Fusion drive to AFPS but posters seem uncertain.

Can anyone advise on whether it is safe to proceed with my setup?

Kind regards,

Aidan
 
I was afraid of upgrading my Mac Pro 4,1>5,1 because of the nVidia webdriver for my Geforce 980 but I tried it anyway a few days ago. I installed HS on a test hard drive, not an SSD because I avoid APFS. (I still use El Capitan on my working SSD and El Capitan can't recognize APFS). Boot and shutdowns are slow as expected, but writing speeds are not slow on my SSD as other users told me. As far as I know fusion drives are not converted but will be in a future update.
On my computer performance is acceptable. There are a few compatibility issues however.
You could try it but be sure to have a Carbon Copy Clone backup in case something goes wrong.
At this moment Fusion drives can be converted with a Beta Program.
https://beta.apple.com/sp/betaprogram/apfsfusion
additional info:
https://discussions.apple.com/thread/8053131?start=0&tstart=0
https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT208018
"When you install macOS High Sierra on the Mac volume of a solid-state drive (SSD) or other all-flash storage device, that volume is automatically converted to APFS. Fusion Drives, traditional hard disk drives (HDDs), and non-Mac volumes aren't converted."
 
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I finally did it on my 4,1>5,1. I took extra steps to make sure it would work. First one being to clone my boot drive (SSD) onto a spinner, remove all the drives except the clone, and installing onto it. The firmware update went fine, then the (awfully long) update worked. Had to reboot a lot of times as I wanted to stop at the supplemental update before going to 10.13.1 - Avid Media Composer being only qualified at the moment on Supplemental Update. Between each reboot, I had to reinstall the Nvidia drivers for my flashed 980Ti. Took me a little while to learn about the new HS feature (blocking new kernel extensions, and having to allow them twice after reboot).
After a few hours of tests, I took the plunge and put my SSD drive back in, and installed HS on its El Capitan partition - which I fully wiped first to have a clean install from scratch. Unlike I was told by some here, only that partition got converted to HS, the other partitions remaining in HFS+ (Sierra/Sierra/Mavericks).
I then updated one of the other partitions of my SSD, from Sierra to HS. Was surprised to discover that in the case of an update, I could install the Nvidia drivers without having to authorize them from System Preferences. Interesting.


flehman said:
I experienced the block of text on startup only after installing HS. I have a 4,1->5,1 with a MVC-flashed 980, but I have never enabled File Vault. Did not experience the block of text with any OS before HS. I tried resetting PRAM after the install, which triggered a boot loop. I have since rolled back my system to 10.12.6 because I am concerned about the long-term stability. I am open to re-attempting in the future after several point updates, and perhaps after nVidia rolls out a few more HS web drivers (I got an error message while installing the HS web drivers). For now though I am sticking with 10.12.6.
Click to expand...

Now I'm getting this on boot too. I have a pair of Apple Cinema Display (23" DVi) and they boot on a grey background. I get what looks like a verbose boot for a few seconds. If I start the Mac holding Option down to get to the boot selector, the verbose message appears, then everything appears frozen, then after several seconds, I get the drive icons. But they're relegated to the top left quarter of the screen, and the mouse can't venture in the other parts of the monitor, as if it was a 4 times smaller monitor!
 
Other thing I noticed is that the app I use mainly (Avid Media Composer) is doing great with Sierra and the GT120 to drive the Full Screen Monitor. When I switch to High Sierra, same project, same version of Avid, it stutters and skips frame like crazy.
Clearly the drivers for old gear in HS suck, or the new ressources required just to play video have gone way higher.
 
pierrox said:
Other thing I noticed is that the app I use mainly (Avid Media Composer) is doing great with Sierra and the GT120 to drive the Full Screen Monitor. When I switch to High Sierra, same project, same version of Avid, it stutters and skips frame like crazy.
Clearly the drivers for old gear in HS suck, or the new ressources required just to play video have gone way higher.
Click to expand...

Try the web driver than, I think the GT120 is also supported by the web driver.
 
I use my GT120 from slot 2 to see if the webdriver is properly installed. Then I switch to slot 1 where my Geforce 980 is.
I tried to install after 10.13.1 for the first time. The webdriver was initially blocked by my system but I could fix that in the security control panel. I have no issues on HS so far, but I don't use APFS.
 
Just an update from my previous post. I've had a successful installation of High Sierra on a 4.1->5.1 cMP with a DIY Fusion drive.

I removed all non-essential PCIE cards, reinstalled the stock GPU and it took the new 5.1 firmware without issue.
I then upgraded to High Sierra via the App store app. Of note my DIY Fusion drive is a combination of Samsung Evo 840 250GB and 3TB HDD both of which have their respective drive bays.

Installation took some time (approx 1 hour) but everything appears to be working and I've just completed the supplemental update.

I've reinstalled my NVIDIA GeForce GTX 760 2 GB GPU, downloaded the NVIDIA web driver and it all seems to be working without issue.
Boot times are unchanged and I haven't noticed any issues so far.
 
Quick question, I’m trying to do the update with mine as well, I had thought that the firmware update should work with the GTX680 I have, but it seems that’s not the case...it’s not a Mac Edition card, it’s a Zotac 4gb card that is probably flashed as it works without web drivers.

So, that means no HS for me unless I can get a stock Apple-supplied GPU?

Only other thing I’m thinking of is to pull out the SSD boot drive and boot my MacBook Pro from it and use that to run the update.
 
Derived, I don't think it will work. Your Mac Pro's firmware needs to be updated. Perhaps you have or can obtain a stock GT120 Nvidia? You need to connect the monitor to this card. You can leave the other card in it's slot.
 
You need the boot screens to do the firmware updates.

If you run the upgrade from your macbook then you can get HS installed but if it is AFS (since SSD) then won't boot.
 
Derived said:
Quick question, I’m trying to do the update with mine as well, I had thought that the firmware update should work with the GTX680 I have, but it seems that’s not the case...it’s not a Mac Edition card, it’s a Zotac 4gb card that is probably flashed as it works without web drivers.

So, that means no HS for me unless I can get a stock Apple-supplied GPU?

Only other thing I’m thinking of is to pull out the SSD boot drive and boot my MacBook Pro from it and use that to run the update.
Click to expand...

Wrong concept. All 680 work natively in OSX regardless flashed or not. It's about Device ID, not the firmware.

As long as your 680 can show the boot screen. It is flashed and can update the firmware regardless if it's a genuine Mac Edition card.

If your 680 can't show boot screen at this moment. Do some study, flash it by yourself, and it will behave like a 680 Mac Edition card.
 
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h9826790 said:
Wrong concept. All 680 work natively in OSX regardless flashed or not. It's about Device ID, not the firmware.

As long as your 680 can show the boot screen. It is flashed and can update the firmware regardless if it's a genuine Mac Edition card.

If your 680 can't show boot screen at this moment. Do some study, flash it by yourself, and it will behave like a 680 Mac Edition card.
Click to expand...

Thanks, I have been wondering about this for a while...just tried to do a firmware update and it in fact did not work, it tried but after rebooting, nothing. And no boot screen anyway, it's been so long since I rebooted with it (normally use a 1080) that I had forgotten all about that. I suppose I will have to flash it.

Thanks for all the info guys, appreciate it. For reference, the SSD is a SATA unit on a PCIE card, so, I'm assuming that's fine? I have a time machine backup of my current system anyway if it isn't.
 
Derived said:
Thanks, I have been wondering about this for a while...just tried to do a firmware update and it in fact did not work, it tried but after rebooting, nothing. And no boot screen anyway, it's been so long since I rebooted with it (normally use a 1080) that I had forgotten all about that. I suppose I will have to flash it.

Thanks for all the info guys, appreciate it. For reference, the SSD is a SATA unit on a PCIE card, so, I'm assuming that's fine? I have a time machine backup of my current system anyway if it isn't.
Click to expand...

Yes, SSD on PCIe card can perform the cMP firmware upgrade. I did that on my own cMP.
 
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I have a 4,1 that is flashed to 5,1 and can't seem to upgrade to 10.13.1. Can someone help?
 
William Payne said:
What stage are you getting to? How is it not allowing you to upgrade?
Click to expand...

Did more search on the forums (thanks, all)... took out my GTX 760 card and re-installed the factory video card -- voila! Everything is working and I am running 10.13.1 on my 5,1 (flashed from 4,1). I put my GTX 760 card back and everything is back to "normal".
 
Yaccster said:
Embarrassingly enough just a simple zapping of the pram cured it for me, used to do that all the time, now not so much.
Click to expand...
You reset your PRAM and could then activate iMessage? Guess I should try that... I was avoiding having to do that since I would have to reset the web driver and disable SIP again...

Edit: Yupe, that fixed... sheesh... Had to fix the boot loop after reseting PRAM, apparently doesn't like booting with Nvidia kexts in the directory (have to manually delete them), even though reseting PRAM should have caused the default driver back to default... Updating to 10.13.1 and going to install the latest web drivers...
[doublepost=1511022465][/doublepost]
macpro00 said:
Did more search on the forums (thanks, all)... took out my GTX 760 card and re-installed the factory video card -- voila! Everything is working and I am running 10.13.1 on my 5,1 (flashed from 4,1). I put my GTX 760 card back and everything is back to "normal".
Click to expand...
check here too... http://www.macvidcards.com/blog/10131-update when you put back in the factory card, did you disable the web driver?
 
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Only reinstall to create new volume if you use the software/hfs+ raid.

This is also both insecure as hell and slower than it could be - no filevault on software RAID and SSD via SATA in HW RAID is way faster.
 
William_si said:
Only reinstall to create new volume if you use the software/hfs+ raid.

This is also both insecure as hell and slower than it could be - no filevault on software RAID and SSD via SATA in HW RAID is way faster.
Click to expand...

Reinstall as software raid 0 but APFS?
 
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Not that the current version of High Sierra 10.13.2 leads to very long boot times on APFS on non-Apple drives. My SSDs were taking 3 minutes before I reverted to HFS+.
 
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