Installed Windows 10 as UEFI with Mac EFI GPU (AMD), no video when switching to non-Mac GPU (NVIDIA)

[star-affinity]

I have finally managed to get Windows 10 installed so it boots in UEFI mode on my MacPro5,1.

I have the startup disk set to always boot into MacOS and I enter this command in the Terminal to get a one time boot into Windows 10 after a restart:

sudo bless -device /dev/disk0s2 -mount /Volumes/Windows\ 10/ -setBoot -nextonly

My problem now is that I installed Windows using my Mac EFI graphics card that came with the computer (Radeon HD 5870), but I want to use my non-Mac EFI graphics card (GTX 970) and if I put that into my Mac and do the Terminal command to restart into Windows I just get a black screen. Now, since there is no NVIDIA driver installed into Windows I can somewhat understand that’s causing problems, but shouldn’t I get some kind of video, albeit lower res? I can hear Windows 10 has booted fine cause it is making sounds, but no video is shown.

It seems impossible to install the NVIDA drivers while I’m booted from the AMD card. The NVIDIA driver installer wants an NVIDIA GPU to be in there to work.

Any ideas?

 

[bookemdano]

I have finally managed to get Windows 10 installed so it boots in UEFI mode on my MacPro5,1.

I have the startup disk set to always boot into MacOS and I enter this command in the Terminal to get a one time boot into Windows 10 after a restart:

sudo bless -device /dev/disk0s2 -mount /Volumes/Windows\ 10/ -setBoot -nextonly

My problem now is that I installed Windows using my Mac EFI graphics card that came with the computer (Radeon HD 5870), but I want to use my non-Mac EFI graphics card (GTX 970) and if I put that into my Mac and do the Terminal command to restart into Windows I just get a black screen. Now, since there is no NVIDIA driver installed into Windows I can somewhat understand that’s causing problems, but shouldn’t I get some kind of video, albeit lower res? I can hear Windows 10 has booted fine cause it is making sounds, but no video is shown.

It seems impossible to install the NVIDA drivers while I’m booted from the AMD card. The NVIDIA driver installer wants and NVIDIA GPU to be in there to work.

Any ideas?

Not sure that lack of driver is really the problem here, but try installing both cards simultaneously (maybe the Radeon in Slot 1 so it's the primary). Then, assuming it boots successfully, install the NVIDIA drivers (you might have to switch your monitor over to the NVIDIA card first, not sure).

Then, assuming you can get the NVIDIA drivers installed, shut down, remove the Radeon, put the 970 in slot 1 and try booting back to Windows.

 

[star-affinity]

Not sure that lack of driver is really the problem here, but try installing both cards simultaneously (maybe the Radeon in Slot 1 so it's the primary). Then, assuming it boots successfully, install the NVIDIA drivers (you might have to switch your monitor over to the NVIDIA card first, not sure).

Then, assuming you can get the NVIDIA drivers installed, shut down, remove the Radeon, put the 970 in slot 1 and try booting back to Windows.

Thanks so much for your reply!

The problem with this is that I don't know how to power both these cards simultaneously. The AMD card has two 6-pin power connectors and the NVIDIA card has one 6-pin and one 8-pin power connector (the latter requiring me to use an adapter from 6-pin to 8-pin).

Both power connectors from the motherboard are used.
I think it's only possible to use of those GPUs I have at a time?

Like you say, maybe it's not driver related – I should get some kind of video even if I only have the AMD drivers installed and use the NVIDIA card, right? I mean I think that's how it behaves on a MacPro1,1 which I have also experimented with installing Windows 10 on (albeit as legacy boot).

 

[bsbeamer]

You'll need an external PSU to power both simultaneously, or figure out some heavy internal wiring modifications. Not aware of any "standard" ways to power 3x 6-pin & 1x 8-pin with the 2x mini 6-pin's available.

TECHNICALLY speaking, the NVIDIA card may be underpowered if it's 6-pin & 8-pin. Really depends on how you're powering it when it's the only card in the system.

 

[bookemdano]

Oops, yeah didn't even think about the power issue. As bsbeamer said, if you have an ATX power supply (or can "borrow" one from a tower-based PC) that would be the way to go to power both cards for this test.

 

[h9826790]

1) with just the 5870 installed

2) boot to Win 10

3) completely remove AMD driver

4) shutdown

5) remove 5870, install 970

6) boot to Win 10

7) WAIT

As long as you have internet connection, Win 10 should able to install the 970’s driver automatically. Just give it 5-10 min to finish its job.

 

[star-affinity]

You'll need an external PSU to power both simultaneously, or figure out some heavy internal wiring modifications. Not aware of any "standard" ways to power 3x 6-pin & 1x 8-pin with the 2x mini 6-pin's available.

TECHNICALLY speaking, the NVIDIA card may be underpowered if it's 6-pin & 8-pin. Really depends on how you're powering it when it's the only card in the system.

Thanks for you input.

It's worth mentioning that I had this exact same NVIDIA card working fine on the same computer when I was booting into Windows 10 in legacy mode. Not that I know it it matters, but that Windows installation was done on a PC (legacy boot) that had an NVIDIA card (this the drivers was installed) and then I just moved this drive into my MacPro5,1.

Oops, yeah didn't even think about the power issue. As bsbeamer said, if you have an ATX power supply (or can "borrow" one from a tower-based PC) that would be the way to go to power both cards for this test.

No worries.

I think I will try to go for the suggestion below:

1) with just the 5870 installed

2) boot to Win 10

3) completely remove AMD driver

4) shutdown

5) remove 5870, install 970

6) boot to Win 10

7) WAIT

As long as you have internet connection, Win 10 should able to install the 970’s driver automatically. Just give it 5-10 min to finish its job.

Thanks – it's you again.
Funnily enough, while I was away from the computer for a while this is exactly what I was thinking about trying. Do you think this software would be good for this purpose?

https://www.guru3d.com/files-details/display-driver-uninstaller-download.html

The button ”Clean and Shut Down (For installing a new graphics card)” sure sounds good.

 

[Dr. Stealth]

I've used DDU many times with great success. Go for it !

 

[star-affinity]

Guys, you know what – just now I decided to try booting into Windows 10 one more time thinking ”maybe it did install the NVIDIA drivers there when my display was dark and just wanted a restart or something”, and you know what? It works!

The NVIDIA drivers installed by Windows are there.

(Yesterday before going to bed I managed to log in to Windows and shut it down softly without seeing the screen using just the keyboard, typing in the blind (quite impressive, huh?)

Guys, I thank you all for your time and replies. I think I will make a backup of this Windows install ASAP, it's been a mess, but all seems good now and I can enjoy a faster boot time and more responsive Windows 10 now when booted using (U)EFI compared to how it was when I booted into legacy mode.
[doublepost=1535749502][/doublepost]A bit off-topic: how the heck can a clean install of Windows 10 take around 40 GB of storage space?

 

[star-affinity]

Just wanted to add one question that I'm curious if you guys using the Terminal command in my first post also see: now when I was away from my computer over the weekend I shut it down and when I came back just now I started it up and it booted into MacOS as expected. I entered the Terminal command to boot into Windows and restarted but got back to MacOS again. Decided to try the command one more time and this time it worked – I got into Windows upon restarting.

Any ideas why the the Terminal command isn't working consistently for me?

 

[crjackson2134]

Any ideas why the the Terminal command isn't working consistently for me?

Possibly because your install isn't always identified by /dev/disk0s2

You have to check each time before running the command, as it's a dynamic identifier for some reason. It changes in some cases.

 

[star-affinity]

Possibly because your install isn't always identified by /dev/disk0s2

You have to check each time before running the command, as it's a dynamic identifier for some reason. It changes in some cases.

Aha, you're right! I see it now when I do ”diskutil list”, I have a different number for my Windows drive this time around. That's a bit unfortunate as I just did an Apple Script with the command so I wouldn't have to fire up the Terminal every time.

Oh, well. Good I don't need to boot into Windows that often, would be a bit of a hassle otherwise. But I can live with it.

 

[crjackson2134]

Aha, you're right! I see it now when I do ”diskutil list”, I have a different number for my Windows drive this time around. That's a bit unfortunate as I just did an Apple Script with the command so I wouldn't have to fire up the Terminal every time.

Oh, well. Good I don't need to boot into Windows that often, would be a bit of a hassle otherwise. But I can live with it.

I use BootRunner3 here. Works like a charm for me.

 

[Traace]

all this wear to your nvram... Good luck for these machines.

 

[crjackson2134]

all this wear to your nvram... Good luck for these machines.

Stop fear mongering. Everything you do wears on the computer.

Use a SSD = Every write wears a little
Use a HDD = Every write/read/power cycle wears a little
Do a PRAM Reset = wear the NVRAM a little
Use Power Button = Every Press wears a little
Apply Power to System in any manner = wearing the system a little


Every-time you use the Startup Disk App, it writes to the NVRAM, this is no different.

This machine isn't made of Rice Paper. It's pretty robust and designed to be used. Yes, each use of ANY KIND will wear something in/on the system. Your fear is unwarranted... It can handle the wear.

 

[star-affinity]

I use BootRunner3 here. Works like a charm for me.

Aha. I've read a bit about that. A bit much for just this particular purpuse I think, but maybe it's worth it? Doesn't seem there's a way to try it without paying up the $30.

May I ask how you use it? Can you just lauch it when being logged into your MacOS user account with several apps running and have it restart gracefully, i.e. quitting all apps and then doing a restart into Windows?

I was thinking maybe a more sophisticated Apple Script that also looked for the /dev/disk name of the Windows driver would perhaps do the trick. But probably not worth the effort...

all this wear to your nvram... Good luck for these machines.

Sorry, could you elaborate? Not sure I understand what you mean.

 

[h9826790]

Sorry, could you elaborate? Not sure I understand what you mean.

NVRAM has limited write cycle, typical 100,000 write on normal consumer grade product.

So, let's say Apple only use those normal grade NVRAM on our cMP but not anything better. So that, we can only write it 100,000 times.

And, assume we need to switch between Windows and macOS 10 times a day.

100,000 / 10 / 365 = 27.4 years

TBH, I wouldn't worry about wearing the NVRAM too much.

 

[crjackson2134]

Aha. I've read a bit about that. A bit much for just this particular purpuse I think, but maybe it's worth it? Doesn't seem there's a way to try it without paying up the $30.

May I ask how you use it? Can you just lauch it when being logged into your MacOS user account with several apps running and have it restart gracefully, i.e. quitting all apps and then doing a restart into Windows?

I was thinking maybe a more sophisticated Apple Script that also looked for the /dev/disk name of the Windows driver would perhaps do the trick. But probably not worth the effort...



Sorry, could you elaborate? Not sure I understand what you mean.

BootRunner3 has a 14 day free trial. I tried it and love it so far. It's great if you also boot to Linux / Windows and just about to anything else.

On my machine, I use auto login so I just boot and never know it's there. If I want to boot to Windows, I hit the logoff menu item. It logs me out of macOS, and presents me with a boot picker screen that resembles the Option/BootPicker that Apple EFI presents (only this one is nicer looking, more modern, and fully customizable if you want). I just use the defaults.

If you system is set to use a password, you will be presented with the BootRunner/Picker screen and you just click the OS you want.

When you exit your selected OS or reboot/restart, you will either boot directly back to the macOS desktop (my option), or to the macOS login/boot picker screen. You configure it however you like.

Now to elaborate on the wear he was talking about.

Their is a SPI chip on your Mac that holds selections like changing your boot disk, WiFi password, iCloud configuration, etc... It's comprised of NVRAM similar to an SSD. It has a finite number of write cycles. Every time you make a change to the NVRAM you reduce the write cycle count for each cell written to.

It's not new, it's normal, and all kinds of stuff writes there. That's why it's designed to handle 10's of Thousands of write cycles. Don't worry about, just use it.

Do you worry about every time you start the engine of a new car how much microscopic wear occurs to the cylinders/rings? Of course not...

 

[Traace]

For people that want to keep writing to nvram as low as possible I recommand newest rEFInd.
Following feature was added by developer:

• The new use_nvram token, if set to false, off, or 0, causes rEFInd to store its variables to files on the hard disk (in the vars subdirectory of rEFInd's home directory). When use_nvram is set to true or one of its synonym, as is the default, these variables are stored in NVRAM, as was always the case for previous versions. This feature is intended to improve functionality on computers with flaky NVRAM and to reduce wear-and-tear on the computer's NVRAM, albeit at the cost of increasing the risk of filesystem damage. (There's no free lunch.)

I use it since release, never had a filesystem damage all fine

 

[crjackson2134]

For people that want to keep writing to nvram as low as possible I recommand newest rEFInd.
Following feature was added by developer:

• The new use_nvram token, if set to false, off, or 0, causes rEFInd to store its variables to files on the hard disk (in the vars subdirectory of rEFInd's home directory). When use_nvram is set to true or one of its synonym, as is the default, these variables are stored in NVRAM, as was always the case for previous versions. This feature is intended to improve functionality on computers with flaky NVRAM and to reduce wear-and-tear on the computer's NVRAM, albeit at the cost of increasing the risk of filesystem damage. (There's no free lunch.)

I use it since release, never had a filesystem damage all fine

For those of us who don’t have an EFI GPU, how would we make a boot selection? Does rEFInd have a solution for that?

 

[LK LAW]

For those of us who don’t have an EFI GPU, how would we make a boot selection? Does rEFInd have a solution for that?

In theory yes, I've read people who succeeded doing this or achieve the same with clover.
I would do ample research though before using clover. Also maybe contact the author of rEFInd?
Also report back if you succeed...

 

[h9826790]

For those of us who don’t have an EFI GPU, how would we make a boot selection? Does rEFInd have a solution for that?

It’s possible to blindly use rEFInd.

Of course, it’s much better to install rEFInd with mac EFI GPU. And record down the disk order etc. Otherwise, can be very hard to use blindly if no experience of rEFInd.

Only on 3,1, a special version of rEFInd can actually make AMD UEFI GOP GPU provide boot screen.

https://forums.macrumors.com/threads/boot-menus-for-graphics-output-protocol.2089181/

 

[Traace]

It’s possible to blindly use rEFInd.

Of course, it’s much better to install rEFInd with mac EFI GPU. And record down the disk order etc. Otherwise, can be very hard to use blindly if no experience of rEFInd.

Only on 3,1, a special version of rEFInd can actually make AMD UEFI GOP GPU provide boot screen.

https://forums.macrumors.com/threads/boot-menus-for-graphics-output-protocol.2089181/

Yes this is a great mod of rEFInd. It has its limits currently but a good example of whats possible.


another project that forked rEFInd and supporting UEFI AMD/Nvidia GOP cards too is Next-Loader: http://abdyfran.co/projects/next-loader

The developer just updated codebase to rEFInd 0.11.3 5 hours ago (current, with nvram features)
https://github.com/abdyfranco/next-loader/commit/e90907ac7a251f53e4314f8086982c557fa69c79


If you like to test next-loader with recent changes keep in mind to build from source (binary build on github is 3 months old) | How to compile: https://github.com/abdyfranco/next-loader/blob/master/src/efi/BUILDING.txt

Btw: thanks @abdyfranco , amazing work so far, appreciated.