Install OpenCore Legacy Patcher on iMac 21.5" 2011

[james55]

I have a 2011 21.5 inch iMac (12,1) Core i7 with two internal SSDs and 32 GB RAM. The graphics card is a Radeon HD 6770M with 512MB of RAM.

This model still works great on High Sierra, but I would like to upgrade either to Monterey or Ventura using OpenCore Legacy Patcher to take advantage of security updates and to allow some other applications to update. (I have had great success using OpenCore on a more recent machine.)

Has anyone done an upgrade like this? If so, any issues or recommendations? And since I have two SSDs, is it possible to leave my current High Sierra set up intact on its current drive and do the new installation on the other?

 

[rm5]

I have a 2011 21.5 inch iMac (12,1) Core i7 with two internal SSDs and 32 GB RAM. The graphics card is a Radeon HD 6770M with 512MB of RAM.

This model still works great on High Sierra, but I would like to upgrade either to Monterey or Ventura using OpenCore Legacy Patcher to take advantage of security updates and to allow some other applications to update. (I have had great success using OpenCore on a more recent machine.)

Has anyone done an upgrade like this? If so, any issues or recommendations? And since I have two SSDs, is it possible to leave my current High Sierra set up intact on its current drive and do the new installation on the other?

Hey! First, a warm welcome to the forum, I hope you enjoy it here!

I think it's a great idea to use OpenCore Legacy Patcher (OCLP) to upgrade to Monterey! I'd just advise against upgrading to Ventura, because there are still some bugs, even on supported Macs.

It should be possible to use High Sierra still, if you only install OCLP on ONE of the two SSDs, because OCLP can't boot anything older than Big Sur I think (unless you're using a really old version).

The only issues you want to be aware of:

• The Radeon HD 6770M isn't Metal supported, which means:
  • There could be minor graphical artifacts
  • Pro Apps (Logic, MainStage, FCP, Motion, and Compressor) will not work whatsoever, unless you're using a wildly old version of those apps
  • Any other program that requires Metal won't work either
• You can't use Rapid Security Responses (if on Ventura)

There are probably others that I'm missing, but that's about what I can think of at the moment.

Any other questions?

 

[james55]

Hey! First, a warm welcome to the forum, I hope you enjoy it here!

I think it's a great idea to use OpenCore Legacy Patcher (OCLP) to upgrade to Monterey! I'd just advise against upgrading to Ventura, because there are still some bugs, even on supported Macs.

It should be possible to use High Sierra still, if you only install OCLP on ONE of the two SSDs, because OCLP can't boot anything older than Big Sur I think (unless you're using a really old version).

The only issues you want to be aware of:

• The Radeon HD 6770M isn't Metal supported, which means:
  • There could be minor graphical artifacts
  • Pro Apps (Logic, MainStage, FCP, Motion, and Compressor) will not work whatsoever, unless you're using a wildly old version of those apps
  • Any other program that requires Metal won't work either
• You can't use Rapid Security Responses (if on Ventura)

There are probably others that I'm missing, but that's about what I can think of at the moment.

Any other questions?

rm5, thanks very much. It sounds like I can run a dual-boot machine, then. One drive with High Sierra and the other with Monterey.

 

[rm5]

rm5, thanks very much. It sounds like I can run a dual-boot machine, then. One drive with High Sierra and the other with Monterey.

Yeah, that should work! I've never tried it myself (because I couldn't with my Mac Pro), but I think it should work, try it out! You'll just have to exit completely out of OpenCore to do it though.

 

[Morn07]

Hello all,
I'm a newbie here and wanted to ask about OCLP. I upgraded my mid 2014 MBP running Big Sur to Ventura. Everything seems to be running smooth except 2 minor things. During the boot process it will stop at the screen asking which device I want to boot into, After a moment brings up the login screen. Secondly, The put the weather app into the dock and when I launch it, it takes a moment to update. And then when I go to close it out up top left, I see the spinning rainbow. Any suggestions? And thank you

 

[rm5]

Hello all,
I'm a newbie here and wanted to ask about OCLP. I upgraded my mid 2014 MBP running Big Sur to Ventura. Everything seems to be running smooth except 2 minor things. During the boot process it will stop at the screen asking which device I want to boot into, After a moment brings up the login screen. Secondly, The put the weather app into the dock and when I launch it, it takes a moment to update. And then when I go to close it out up top left, I see the spinning rainbow. Any suggestions? And thank you

That's completely normal for it to show the boot picker, although you can turn that off in the OCLP settings if you want. Regarding the Weather app, since you're running OCLP, you can't expect it to be perfect, especially on a 9-year-old machine. Also, what specific 2014 MacBook Pro is this? A 13 or a 15-inch? A base model or a top-spec one?

 

[Morn07]

That's completely normal for it to show the boot picker, although you can turn that off in the OCLP settings if you want. Regarding the Weather app, since you're running OCLP, you can't expect it to be perfect, especially on a 9-year-old machine. Also, what specific 2014 MacBook Pro is this? A 13 or a 15-inch? A base model or a top-spec one?

Hi. I have a 15 inch 2.2 GHz Quad-Core Intel Core i7 with 16gb ram, 500gb ssd. It was a hand me down fro my cousin last year. I did replace the power cable and want to have the battery replaced soon at the Apple store.

 

[rm5]

Hi. I have a 15 inch 2.2 GHz Quad-Core Intel Core i7 with 16gb ram, 500gb ssd. It was a hand me down fro my cousin last year. I did replace the power cable and want to have the battery replaced soon at the Apple store.

Hmmm, that's a pretty decent machine for its time, so idk why it's running that slow. And you've restarted it numerous times? I've noticed this with many old Intel Macs I've used with OpenCore, things do just run slower—a lot slower—than on supported operating systems.

I'm really sorry I can't be of more help, maybe someone else has a fix for the Weather issue, but let me say this once more—you are using an old computer, don't expect it to be fast.

 

[Morn07]

Hmmm, that's a pretty decent machine for its time, so idk why it's running that slow. And you've restarted it numerous times? I've noticed this with many old Intel Macs I've used with OpenCore, things do just run slower—a lot slower—than on supported operating systems.

I'm really sorry I can't be of more help, maybe someone else has a fix for the Weather issue, but let me say this once more—you are using an old computer, don't expect it to be fast.

Once I fixed the bootpicker issue, the weather is a minor glitch. Everything else tho, I cannot tell the difference from the Big Sur counterpart. So all is good now!! Thank you kindly for your help.

 

[Ausdauersportler]

rm5, thanks very much. It sounds like I can run a dual-boot machine, then. One drive with High Sierra and the other with Monterey.

Double booting HS and any post Big Sur macOS version is not a good idea since booting HS messes with the preboot partition. I could not even avoid this using different drives for both macOS versions. It affects Ventura and Sonoma beta1 in the same way.

You might considering an GPU upgrade (AMD WX 4130 MXM 2GB ist best card to can get) and move on to Monterey completely.

 

[ShockTroop]

I too have a 2011 iMac 12,2. 12GB RAM, Radeon HD 6970M with a fusion drive. I use the computer as a storage device for my movies and music to AirPlay to my AppleTV.

Would I have any problems moving up to Monterey?

 

[rm5]

I too have a 2011 iMac 12,2. 12GB RAM, Radeon HD 6970M with a fusion drive. I use the computer as a storage device for my movies and music to AirPlay to my AppleTV.

Would I have any problems moving up to Monterey?

What OS are you currently running? I don't see why this would be a problem, just as long as you're on the latest version of OCLP.

 

[ShockTroop]

Currently I am on High Sierra

 

[Ausdauersportler]

What OS are you currently running? I don't see why this would be a problem, just as long as you're on the latest version of OCLP.

No AirPlay and no AppleTV using a stock GPU on any macOS later than Catalina - and there is needs really special patching. Time to read the docs!
I would really appreciate if we all would only make recommendations backed up by knowledge or experience.

 

[rm5]

No AirPlay and no AppleTV using a stock GPU on any macOS later than Catalina - and there is needs really special patching. Time to read the docs!
I would really appreciate if we all would only make recommendations backed up by knowledge or experience.

I'm not going to argue with you, but my recommendation was made based on experience. I've run OCLP on numerous Macs, both Metal and non-Metal, and haven't had problems, so that's what I said, which is based on my experience. If the OP is concerned about the lack of AirPlay, I think they would have made it obvious by now.

There, end of story.

 

[Ausdauersportler]

I'm not going to argue with you, but my recommendation was made based on experience. I've run OCLP on numerous Macs, both Metal and non-Metal, and haven't had problems, so that's what I said, which is based on my experience. If the OP is concerned about the lack of AirPlay, I think they would have made it obvious by now.

There, end of story.

Read the original request to answered to - if you cannot comprehend the few lines posted there you should stay away from answering at all. And to make it all worse your answer was based on experiences made on different systems only - it the best case it was a (wrong) guess.

 

[jaz140261]

I have a 2011 21.5 inch iMac (12,1) Core i7 with two internal SSDs and 32 GB RAM. The graphics card is a Radeon HD 6770M with 512MB of RAM.

This model still works great on High Sierra, but I would like to upgrade either to Monterey or Ventura using OpenCore Legacy Patcher to take advantage of security updates and to allow some other applications to update. (I have had great success using OpenCore on a more recent machine.)

Has anyone done an upgrade like this? If so, any issues or recommendations? And since I have two SSDs, is it possible to leave my current High Sierra set up intact on its current drive and do the new installation on the other?

James, I am sure you have already upgraded/ updated your Imac. This is for you and others who may have the same questions.

I have a late 2011 Imac 27 inch with 3.4Ghz and I7 Dual core, 12,2 version Imac with 16GB ram, one Internal HDD 2TB Hitachi and one 256GB SSD drive under the Optical drive. At that time this was the top of the line except that I opted for the 16GB Ram.

I recently updated the internal SSD with a new SSD from Crucial, 2TB on which I had 3 partitions, the first one being the Windows 11 Partition. I had on another partition made a Clone copy of my High Sierra installation which worked well. The Windows 11 partition, I used Gdisk to mark it as Hybrid MBR, then used the DISM method to load Windows 11 and with Admin privileges (Shift+Control+F3) installed the bootcamp drivers and updated the same. The above two were based on the following Apple Stack Blogs:

How to convert a drive from the GPT format to the hybrid GPT/MBR format when using High Sierra (macOS 10.13.2)

Previous versons of OS X and macOS automatically converted pure GPT drives to hybrid GPT/MBR format when the 2nd, 3rd, and/or 4th GPT partitions were formatted "MS DOS (FAT)" by the Disk Utility

apple.stackexchange.com

Installing Windows 11 on Mid-2011 iMac (full install, not Boot Camp) but it BSODs after the Win 11 logo disappears

I kept getting a BSOD in OOBE when I was setting up Win 11 (error: SYSTEM_SERVICE_EXCEPTION). I've seen people say that it's because of Windows 11 installing Intel display drivers, instead of AMD o...

apple.stackexchange.com

This worked perfectly fine and I have a Windows 11 installation that works.

There are heat issues that make my Dual display shut down after a while but I have just bought Mac Fans to see if that assists in some way or not.

Suffices to say that High Sierra works well, as does Windows 11 and with Open Core Legacy, I have also installed Ventura which works well too. The latest version of Open Core which is 1.20

 

[Kent W]

My own experiences upgrading to Monterrey/Ventura/Sonoma with OCLP oon my non-metal GPU iMac 2011 27´compared to staying on High Sierra:

+ A modern snappy OS with modern design and relatively stable
+ Gmail login works in Mail app (protocol for login outdated in HS)
+ Safari on latest supported version (outdated, unsafe, with artifacts on some web pages in HS), Firefox ESR only supported browser to be used in HS
+ Updated versions of iWork apps
+ App Store, Stocks, Calendar, Music, Reminders and other apps works well

- Photos app is not really working. Select a thumbnail and there is no photo showing. Just an empty app frame. You will at least for now have tom make a web app out of iCloud Photos instead or use Google Photo.
- Apple TV app is not really functional. It may run trailers after a couple of crashes. You can start a show and view about 30 seconds before it crashes.
- Not possible to run 32-bit apps and older ported games (Appstore had many Mac ported classic Windows games)
- Find My, Maps, Wheather, Books and other apps doesn't work on non-metal GPU.
- Sometimes a bit troublesome to upgrade if you upgrade MacOS version a bit too early before OCLP team fully had the chance to iron out all potential glitches on all HW.
- Not easily possible to run e.g. iMove or Final Cut Pro (you can get 2019 version of Final Cut Pro to work if you open package contents and run it from there, potentially the same with an older iMovie version as well). Logic Pro from 2019/20 works. So generally it's possible to use older versions, but never the newer Metal only versions.

So if you can live without Apple Photos app some older 32-bit apps and e.g. older Mac ported games (often 32-bit), you run Find My through the browser, use Google Maps instead of Apple Maps, you use some other video editing app instead of iMovie etc. and you are prepared for minor glitches and play it safe with MacOS upgrades, then it may be great to upgrade.

If on the other hand, you want to continue to use all/most Apple apps even if it means older versions (except Safari which is not really working well or safe in the older version). Have a number of 32-bit apps still in use (games, Apple Aperture, etc.) then it may still be better to stay on High Sierra. If you are online Firefox ESR will save you until late 2024 at least, but after that internet browser support might get flaky.

These machines are really nice and just keeps working like new, but to invest in a new GPU, open up and adapt HW, frimware, etc. to get the remaining apps to work is in my view a bit of a stretch for a 12 year old machine. A couple of years ago I added RAM and an external Thunderbolt SSD to run MacOS on. It will have to do since it's not my primary machine anymore.

 

[IanOnSummit]

I would also like to share my recent experience of upgrading a mid-2011 27" iMac12,2 with non-metal AMD Radeon HD 6770M graphics and 12 GB RAM, from High Sierra to Ventura with OCLP. This Mac had been previously upgraded to a 1 TB SSD (with the OWC thermal sensor) and an AirPort Extreme Broadcom BCM94360CD (Combination WiFi + Bluetooth 4.0), and has continued to serve me well despite it’s age.

The OCLP upgrade to Ventura went without a hitch, following the detailed guide by Mr Macintosh, using the upgrade path rather than a clean install

Following the upgrade the bluetooth was still working, contrary to problems reported by some, possibly as the Bluetooth/WiFi module had previously been upgraded.

The system generally feels as responsive as it had been on High Sierra, which has been quite good since the previous SSD upgrade, and runs the latest Safari, Thunderbird (including Gmail login) and Firefox, also Zoom, Skype, and Signal apps for audio and video calls. The App Store, PhotoBooth, Music, Calendar, Messages, Notes, and Preview apps all seem fine.

The Kindle Classic App v1.40.3 could now be installed under Ventura, and opens recent purchases - not possible using the latest version under High Sierra. The Books app v5.2 works for me, but I have no purchased content, only imported ePub and PDF files. Excel and Word from Microsoft Office for Mac (2016) is also still functional.

I can still run existing virtual machines for Win 10, 8 & 7 under Parallels, and also the Logmein Hamachi VPN client, I use for remote assistance of friends and family, both of which would have been lost if I had upgraded to a new M1 iMac instead of the OCLP Ventura upgrade.

The Photos App opens but only for thumbnails, no full image, so no editing etc. but iCloud Photo Library content can be dragged out and viewed/edited with Preview or a third party editor like XnView.

The Apple TV App crashes on opening every time for me. However, the existing library content can still be shared and viewed with other Apple devices on the same account using Home Sharing.

Apple Maps and FindMy open, but don’t display a map.
Acorn was also broken, a nice third party graphics editor that I will sorely miss.
Not to mention MPEG Streamclip (32 bit) R.I.P.

I have read this post…

2011 iMac Graphics Card Upgrade

iMac 2009 to 2011 MXM3 graphics card upgrade (Lastest update 10/13/2023 - this is the official documentation page - you found it finally!) This is the single and only documentation post. During the last years we constantly updated this post to reflect the lastet development of vBIOS and OCLP...

forums.macrumors.com

and decided to attempt a graphics card upgrade, using a metal capable AMD WX4130 MXM3.0 A video card to see if this can fill a few of the gaps in the current upgrade.

 

[rocknrotty]

Just did this also on a 13" 2012 MBP 16G Ram 1.5T storage (2 OWC SSD drives)
using the new OCLP 1.3.0 and Monterey. Only running on a NVMe 500G at the moment through USB.

After about 30 hours still running fine all Apple Apps working.
Machine is very responsive graphics better than ever (VLC). No artefacts on screen
Fans not on alot
Firefox working good with 3 windows open and about 70 tabs open.

Anyway I'll use it like this foe a few more days and maybe i'll try it on the internal SSD.

Cheers

 

[IanOnSummit]

I would also like to share my recent experience of upgrading a mid-2011 27" iMac12,2 with non-metal AMD Radeon HD 6770M graphics and 12 GB RAM, from High Sierra to Ventura with OCLP. This Mac had been previously upgraded to a 1 TB SSD (with the OWC thermal sensor) and an AirPort Extreme Broadcom BCM94360CD (Combination WiFi + Bluetooth 4.0), and has continued to serve me well despite it’s age.

The OCLP upgrade to Ventura went without a hitch, following the detailed guide by Mr Macintosh, using the upgrade path rather than a clean install

Following the upgrade the bluetooth was still working, contrary to problems reported by some, possibly as the Bluetooth/WiFi module had previously been upgraded.

The system generally feels as responsive as it had been on High Sierra, which has been quite good since the previous SSD upgrade, and runs the latest Safari, Thunderbird (including Gmail login) and Firefox, also Zoom, Skype, and Signal apps for audio and video calls. The App Store, PhotoBooth, Music, Calendar, Messages, Notes, and Preview apps all seem fine.

The Kindle Classic App v1.40.3 could now be installed under Ventura, and opens recent purchases - not possible using the latest version under High Sierra. The Books app v5.2 works for me, but I have no purchased content, only imported ePub and PDF files. Excel and Word from Microsoft Office for Mac (2016) is also still functional.

I can still run existing virtual machines for Win 10, 8 & 7 under Parallels, and also the Logmein Hamachi VPN client, I use for remote assistance of friends and family, both of which would have been lost if I had upgraded to a new M1 iMac instead of the OCLP Ventura upgrade.

The Photos App opens but only for thumbnails, no full image, so no editing etc. but iCloud Photo Library content can be dragged out and viewed/edited with Preview or a third party editor like XnView.

The Apple TV App crashes on opening every time for me. However, the existing library content can still be shared and viewed with other Apple devices on the same account using Home Sharing.

Apple Maps and FindMy open, but don’t display a map.
Acorn was also broken, a nice third party graphics editor that I will sorely miss.
Not to mention MPEG Streamclip (32 bit) R.I.P.

I have read this post…

2011 iMac Graphics Card Upgrade

iMac 2009 to 2011 MXM3 graphics card upgrade (Lastest update 10/13/2023 - this is the official documentation page - you found it finally!) This is the single and only documentation post. During the last years we constantly updated this post to reflect the lastet development of vBIOS and OCLP...

forums.macrumors.com

and decided to attempt a graphics card upgrade, using a metal capable AMD WX4130 MXM3.0 A video card to see if this can fill a few of the gaps in the current upgrade.

Further to my earlier post, I would like to report that following the successful graphics card upgrade to the metal capable AMD WX4130 Radeon Polaris, almost all of the Apple Apps previously failing to work under the OCLP install of Ventura on my 2011 27" iMac12,2 are now fully functional.
Specifically the Photos App, AppleTV, FindMy, AppleMaps & Garageband are now fully functional.

The only non-functional app I have found to date is QuickTime v10.5 which will play media, but is not capable of screen recording - it appears to work, but the captured file is empty.

I have also discovered that Universal Clipboard only functions in one direction, from iPhone or iPad to the iMac, but not the other way. Possibly an issue related to the current AirPort card being a BCM94360CD (installed a few years ago), rather than the BCM943602CD recommended in the OCLP pages here...

Universal Control on unsupported Macs | OpenCore Legacy Patcher

In it's current state, it looks like my 2011 iMac will provide many more years of useful service, thanks to the OCLP team and Macrumors for invaluable guidance on the hardware upgrade process.

 

[J33Bee]

Just did this also on a 13" 2012 MBP 16G Ram 1.5T storage (2 OWC SSD drives)
using the new OCLP 1.3.0 and Monterey. Only running on a NVMe 500G at the moment through USB.

Firefox working good with 3 windows open and about 70 tabs open.

I've updated my 27" iMac 2011 (12,2) to Sonoma using an AMD Radeon HD 6770M 512 MB GPU. So far so good (running more than a week now).

The only issues I have, are with FireFox. Some websites are not loading correctly or buttons are only visible when hovering over with the mouse. Monterey is also based on Metal right? I assume your MBP GPU supports this?

I hope I can fix these also, otherwise I may have to fall back to Safari.

 

[rocknrotty]

I've updated my 27" iMac 2011 (12,2) to Sonoma using an AMD Radeon HD 6770M 512 MB GPU. So far so good (running more than a week now).

The only issues I have, are with FireFox. Some websites are not loading correctly or buttons are only visible when hovering over with the mouse. Monterey is also based on Metal right? I assume your MBP GPU supports this?

I hope I can fix these also, otherwise I may have to fall back to Safari.

I don't have an Imac yet but this is the first post on this site

Have you tried this?

2011 iMac Graphics Card Upgrade

iMac Late 2009 to Mid 2011 graphics card upgrade (Lastest update 02/21/2022) This is not a plug and play solution! You need some macOS / Unix system administration knowledge, the ability to run programs from the Terminal app and some manual skills to assemble your iMac again. If you have not...

forums.macrumors.com

If it is working thats great

Cheers

 

[J33Bee]

I don't have an Imac yet but this is the first post on this site

Have you tried this?

2011 iMac Graphics Card Upgrade

iMac Late 2009 to Mid 2011 graphics card upgrade (Lastest update 02/21/2022) This is not a plug and play solution! You need some macOS / Unix system administration knowledge, the ability to run programs from the Terminal app and some manual skills to assemble your iMac again. If you have not...

forums.macrumors.com

If it is working thats great

Cheers

No I didn't replace my AMD Radeon HD 6770M. I was waiting for the moment I could upgrade without the Metal challenges and that worked pretty awesome!

This iMac is used just for some browsing etc. so replacing the GPU is the last thing I would like to do. I was hoping to fix the browsing issues I have with FireFox, but it's not that big a deal I want to replace the GPU.

 

[J33Bee]

Patched my 27" iMac 2011 (12,2) to Sonoma 14.4.1 based on OpenCore Patcher 1.4.3. Running without issues (for now). WiFi & bluetooth is working.