Thanks! Once I manually installed the 1.3 update, the firmware update started, so it must have been on the computer but needed the other update.
Got a tip for us?
Let us know
Become a MacRumors Supporter for $50/year with no ads, ability to filter front page stories, and private forums.
iMac Graphics Firmware Update 1.0
- Thread starter centic
- Start date
- Sort by reaction score
Thanks! Once I manually installed the 1.3 update, the firmware update started, so it must have been on the computer but needed the other update.
freeze during update
What a stress.... iMac freeze during the update graphics firmware. Waited for a hour to shut it down the way I was just getting used too - power off. Lucky me it came up with the message sucsessfully installed
So far so good no more freezing.
What a stress.... iMac freeze during the update graphics firmware. Waited for a hour to shut it down the way I was just getting used too - power off. Lucky me it came up with the message sucsessfully installed
So far so good no more freezing.
fixed my artifacts
I had this little artifact on the screen just after my cursor, whether I was typing on the internet or in E-mail it was always there, I kept trying to move forward and delete it but it just wouldnt move, well after I have installed Leopard and the firware update last night, that little artifact is gone, and no freezing for me either.
THanks Apple
Trout
I had this little artifact on the screen just after my cursor, whether I was typing on the internet or in E-mail it was always there, I kept trying to move forward and delete it but it just wouldnt move, well after I have installed Leopard and the firware update last night, that little artifact is gone, and no freezing for me either.
THanks Apple
Trout
You should be set. Firmware is deep in hardware so it won't go away w/ a clean install. Also, Macs haven't used BIOS in years, if ever. I know Intel Macs use EFI while fruit colored G3s (no beige nor early laptops), G4s & G5s used Open Firmware. BIOS, OF & EFI are just different forms of firmware if my understanding is correct.
ahhh, Beige G3's did have open firmware (the last of the old world) just like the new world mac's did. hold command+optopn+o+f on boot chime and you went into OF
yes bios, OF and EFI are just different forms of firmware,
I'm getting the error message that my computer doesn't need this update. Mine has been freezing in Mail, even after I've deleted the preferences for Mail. Could it be because I'm using 10.4.11 instead of 10.4.10?
I manually downloaded and installed the iMac Software 1.2.1 update.
I manually downloaded and installed the iMac Software 1.2.1 update.
Update does not solve the problem with my iMac 24"
Obviously the firmware update does not cover all affected iMacs. I am using a 24" 2.4 GHz with 10.4.10 and the 1.0 iMac update. I earlier tried it with the 1.21 iMac update but got constant freezes every few minutes then. The 10.4.10 / 1.0 combination did quite well for me, except that I can not use the iMac with Windows XP SP2 (even with the latest ATI drivers) because the iMac is constantly freezing.
Then I tried software update today and the firmware update did not show up. So I installed 10.4.11 and 1.21 because I guessed this might be the reason it did not show up with software update. Booted into 10.4.11 - 30 seconds, first freeze. Booted again with extension disabled launched software update - no firmware update. Downloaded it manually - can not be applied because Apple thinks it is not necessary. Booted into 10.4.11 again - 60 seconds, first freeze. Reverted to 10.4.10 an 1.0 - everythings fine in Mac OS X but iMac unusable with Windows XP. Tried it with two other iMacs in the company that were as well delivered by the end of october - same problem.
Looks like either there are more defective ATI Radeon 2600 PRO in the wild than Apple covers with it's detection or there are even more problems with this graphic adapter than Apple does imagine. Anyhow I guess I will be sending all three iMacs back next week.
Obviously the firmware update does not cover all affected iMacs. I am using a 24" 2.4 GHz with 10.4.10 and the 1.0 iMac update. I earlier tried it with the 1.21 iMac update but got constant freezes every few minutes then. The 10.4.10 / 1.0 combination did quite well for me, except that I can not use the iMac with Windows XP SP2 (even with the latest ATI drivers) because the iMac is constantly freezing.
Then I tried software update today and the firmware update did not show up. So I installed 10.4.11 and 1.21 because I guessed this might be the reason it did not show up with software update. Booted into 10.4.11 - 30 seconds, first freeze. Booted again with extension disabled launched software update - no firmware update. Downloaded it manually - can not be applied because Apple thinks it is not necessary. Booted into 10.4.11 again - 60 seconds, first freeze. Reverted to 10.4.10 an 1.0 - everythings fine in Mac OS X but iMac unusable with Windows XP. Tried it with two other iMacs in the company that were as well delivered by the end of october - same problem.
Looks like either there are more defective ATI Radeon 2600 PRO in the wild than Apple covers with it's detection or there are even more problems with this graphic adapter than Apple does imagine. Anyhow I guess I will be sending all three iMacs back next week.
So you've gotten same-pattern freezes after having the fix applied to the machine?
Holding off on a purchase here...
Typo
Dude, you somehow transcribed the above wrong. I downloaded the "Imac Graphics Firmware Update Installer" but I looked in iMacGraphicsFWUpdate.dist and the script has 'rev==600' . Anyway, this confused me.
Mine is a rev 900 so the update won't install. Mine has frozen a few times -- but not in a while since updating to 1.2.1, etc. Maybe some people (like me) are helped with earlier updates? I guess time will tell.
Dude, you somehow transcribed the above wrong. I downloaded the "Imac Graphics Firmware Update Installer" but I looked in iMacGraphicsFWUpdate.dist and the script has 'rev==600' . Anyway, this confused me.
Mine is a rev 900 so the update won't install. Mine has frozen a few times -- but not in a while since updating to 1.2.1, etc. Maybe some people (like me) are helped with earlier updates? I guess time will tell.
So far so good.
I was one of the people that had issues after upgrading to Leopard and no longer had the 1.0 iMac update. (My mac stopped freezing if I rolled back to 10.4 with iMac update 1.0)
I've pushed it with all the things that used to lock it up and all is working smoothly. Fast scroll with coverflow finder, all screensavers and full screen 1080p HD are free of the snowflake artifacts now. I think they have done it!
For those keeping track: Early release 24" 2.4GHz 2GB RAM (installed by Apple)
I was one of the people that had issues after upgrading to Leopard and no longer had the 1.0 iMac update. (My mac stopped freezing if I rolled back to 10.4 with iMac update 1.0)
I've pushed it with all the things that used to lock it up and all is working smoothly. Fast scroll with coverflow finder, all screensavers and full screen 1080p HD are free of the snowflake artifacts now. I think they have done it!
For those keeping track: Early release 24" 2.4GHz 2GB RAM (installed by Apple)
take it in!
"Constant freezes" means it is broken. Take it in for repair or return it.
"Constant freezes" means it is broken. Take it in for repair or return it.
Hopefully the combo of updates adds stability to my iMac. I've been getting crashes where my screen goes black every few days and Leo has been a little less stable and a little slower for some things. Totally expected and I'm not complaining; my MB hasn't had any of these problems. But, hopefully the updates add stability 
This sounds crazy.
Either you are telescoping a lot of stuff into one post and leaving out some important details or you seem to be just "randomly trying stuff" (based on hunches), to see if it works. You can't solve anything that way, that's actually the opposite of troubleshooting.
Like others, I have no idea why you have not returned this machine (or all three) previous to getting to this point unless you are actively interested in such things and are trying to "solve it together" with the Apple guys. This idea is kind of belied by the fact that you seem to be very angry about it all.
Why haven't you just returned it, if it's that frustrating? This is an outrageous situation by anyone's measure if what you are saying is in fact true. The very fact that this last fix appears to be the solution for everyone's computer but yours is an indication that it is simply broken and should be returned.
The odds of this happening on even one computer seem quite long, and for you to have three of them all with this outrageous, rare, extreme problem is very hard to believe indeed.
Installed: 10.4.11 update, iMac 1.2.1 update, 1.0 Firmware update.
My machine was NOT a freezer, even though I have a 600.
That said, I still have a weird issue with screen flicker at low brightness settings. Click the brightness control down 3 clicks from full and the lower 3rd of the screen lightly flickers.
To make things more confusing, It doesn't do it first thing in the AM.
Also, as I posted in another thread, iTunes visualizer was grayscale before at fullscreen. All is well now at 60+ fps
SO I guess my machine is a cooler not a freezer
Strange.....
My machine was NOT a freezer, even though I have a 600.
That said, I still have a weird issue with screen flicker at low brightness settings. Click the brightness control down 3 clicks from full and the lower 3rd of the screen lightly flickers.
To make things more confusing, It doesn't do it first thing in the AM.
Also, as I posted in another thread, iTunes visualizer was grayscale before at fullscreen. All is well now at 60+ fps
SO I guess my machine is a cooler not a freezer
Strange.....
It is just a simple as this: We bought three 24" iMacs a few weeks ago in order to replace some of the approx. 20 Macs we are running at my workplace. All of them are from the same lot and all of them have vendor 100, revision 600 ATI graphic adapters with a 113-B2250F-212 rom. All of them are showing the same problem, as they are technicaly identical and obviously there *is* a severe problem with the ATI graphic adapter. As I have been a Mac admin for more than 20 years now, I know that sometimes it takes some time to give Apple the chance to fix driver/firmware problems. And this apparently is a firmware problem because it is not a matter of the OS hosted on the iMac(s). Unfortunately none of the patches provided by Apple so far (1.1 iMac update, 1.2.1 iMac update) did any better on the OS X side (just the contrary) nor did Apple provide a patch to make the iMac (the ATI graphic adapter) run with Windows XP or Vista (used by some of my collagues).
Fine to read that the 1.0 firmware update solved the problems to many of the "freezers" but - as I told earlier - there are obviously more iMacs affected than those the firmware update can be applied to or the pre-installation check does not detect all configurations that might be in need for the patch).
It's been a full day now since I've installed the Graphics Firmware update. So far so good. No more white pixels when scrolling over the dock-icons and NO more freezes!
I have a 24 inch iMac 2.8 Ghz running OS 10.5.1.
This is how it shows up after the update:
ATI Radeon HD 2600 Pro:
ROM Revision: 113-B2250F-219
EFI Driver Version: 01.00.219
I have a 24 inch iMac 2.8 Ghz running OS 10.5.1.
This is how it shows up after the update:
ATI Radeon HD 2600 Pro:
ROM Revision: 113-B2250F-219
EFI Driver Version: 01.00.219
Yea .. I have not had ANY issues with my 24" 2.8GHz Core 2 Extreme so I am not going to install ANYTHING. ...
I wish that you could choose to update security issues separately from driver updates. My computer works fine but, in the past, I have had problems when updating my MacBook (wireless issues). Whenever I see that the update includes security updates I feel that I should update knowing that it may screw up my system hardware.
Cheers.
Yea .. I have not had ANY issues with my 24" 2.8GHz Core 2 Extreme so I am not going to install ANYTHING. ...
I wish that you could choose to update security issues separately from driver updates. My computer works fine but, in the past, I have had problems when updating my MacBook (wireless issues). Whenever I see that the update includes security updates I feel that I should update knowing that it may screw up my system hardware.
Cheers.
I'm with you, but I just decided to roll the dice...I didn't have a single issue at all with my 24" Alum iMac, but just installed the graphics update (and 10.5.1)...hope I don't regret it.
Yea .. I have not had ANY issues with my 24" 2.8GHz Core 2 Extreme so I am not going to install ANYTHING. ...
I wish that you could choose to update security issues separately from driver updates. My computer works fine but, in the past, I have had problems when updating my MacBook (wireless issues). Whenever I see that the update includes security updates I feel that I should update knowing that it may screw up my system hardware.
Cheers.
I also have a 24" 2.8GHz Core 2 Extreme and I never had ANY issues. I installed the updates and I'm still not having ANY issues. So, you shouldn't feel hesitant to run the update.
Installed: 10.4.11 update, iMac 1.2.1 update, 1.0 Firmware update.
My machine was NOT a freezer, even though I have a 600.
That said, I still have a weird issue with screen flicker at low brightness settings. Click the brightness control down 3 clicks from full and the lower 3rd of the screen lightly flickers.
To make things more confusing, It doesn't do it first thing in the AM.
Also, as I posted in another thread, iTunes visualizer was grayscale before at fullscreen. All is well now at 60+ fps
SO I guess my machine is a cooler not a freezer
Strange.....
Sounds like we may be in similar boats. The only thing that "freezes" for me and still does even after running all the same updates as you have is that iTunes takes 5-10 minutes of spinning lollipop time to run. I launch iTunes, iTunes opens, then spinning lollipop. I called Apple Care and gave up after being bounced around for 45 minutes while the techs would say it's an iMac issue then the other would claim it an iTunes problem and pass me back and for. Very frustrating. Yes, I'll call again when I have 1 or 2 hours of my life to waste!
Cheers,
Mike