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MP 1,1-5,1 Mac OS 11.3 has broken support for older Mac Pros

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Tachanka

macrumors member
Mar 8, 2021
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Stex said:
@Tachanka and @MisterAndrew:

this is a friendly note from a newbie: the issues you raise are interesting, valid, and worth debating. but please do that in a separate thread.

like other commenters mentioned before me, let's keep this thread focused and on topic, please.

Many of us are following this thread closely and are very grateful to the OP and the experts who are generously and proactively trying to identify the problem.
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You are absolutely correct but it seems like it keeps coming up in these threads so I felt like addressing it forcefully.
 
Dayo

Dayo

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Dec 21, 2018
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tsialex said:
I've explained to you that Mac Pros with PCIe SATA or PCIe AHCI drives (even Apple made ones) can't also boot 11.3, the only reliable reports of early-2009 to mid-2012 booting successfully 11.3 are from people that is using SATA drives connected to the southbrige SATA ports. Since no one using non NVMe PCIe drives can boot 11.3 reliably, so this eliminate NVMe as the real motive of the crashes.
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You know that this discussion did not take place. It may be a conclusion you reached afterwards but just to point the discrepancy out.

Anyway, putting it all in the past including the unfortunate and disappointing choice of words earlier.
 
Dayo

Dayo

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tsialex said:
First, anything connected to the slots 3 and 4 are downstream to the PCIe switch. Only the slot 1 and 2 and the devices connected to the PCIe lines of the southbridge, like the FW and mini-PCIe, are not directly connected to the same lines of the PCIe switch.

Second, even if you have nothing connected to slots 3 and 4, you still have the switch logically enabled, that's why I'll look at disabling it interrupting the power feed.

2019 Mac Pro had serious problems with a second switch downstream of the first one, it would not be to crazy to think that Apple did something to solve this problem that caused our current one.
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Just to be clear, cMP 3,1 does not use all this switching stuff?

EDIT: Explaned here
All Mac Pros released after the early-2008 model have PCIe switches to overcome the necessity of more PCIe lanes, even the trashcan.
Click to expand...
 
tsialex

tsialex

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Jun 13, 2016
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Dayo said:
You know that this discussion did not take place. It may be a conclusion you reached afterwards but just to point the discrepancy out.

Anyway, putting it all in the past including the unfortunate and disappointing choice of words earlier.
Click to expand...

Look, I don't really get your point here. If any other type of PCIe drive do not also work, why we should single out and focus on the NVMe EFI module?
 
Dayo

Dayo

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Dec 21, 2018
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tsialex said:
Look, I don't really get your point here. If any other type of PCIe drive do not also work, why we should single out and focus on the NVMe EFI module?
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Not sure where and how you picked up that anyone has suggested it should be singled out and focused on to the detriment of any other possibility. It was an option to be tested in the absence of further information at the time. Now that you have since made the big reveal about the switches, obviously best to focus on that.

I suppose there is no point debating this and best to let things be.
 
Dayo

Dayo

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Dec 21, 2018
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@tsialex ... iMac8,1, iMac9,1, iMac11,2 and MacBook7,1 appear to be also affected.
Not sure whether they also have these switches.
 
tsialex

tsialex

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Dayo said:
@tsialex ... iMac8,1, iMac9,1, iMac11,2 and MacBook7,1 appear to be also affected.
Not sure whether they also have these switches.
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Can't be the same thing, AFAIK, none of these have PCIe switches and I'm pretty sure that iMac8,1 (20" early-2008 iMac) and MacBook7,1 (mid-2010 unibody MacBook) are just SATA/ATA, don't have a Thunderbolt port and the AirPort Extreme is connected to the south bridge, since I have both in my collection.

Btw, why anyone is trying to run 11.3/11.4 with a iMac8,1? It's firmware limited to 6GB of RAM, the ATI 2400XT/2600PRO GPU is not METAL supported and can't be upgraded since it's a very weird non standard format/MXM-HE connection. You can't even use the top of the line 8800GS from the 24" model of the same year without cutting the case a lot to install it.
 
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Norbert Mikołajczyk

Norbert Mikołajczyk

macrumors 6502
May 26, 2016
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Accidentally I have found some posts from the worker at AMD, he told everyone that 11.4 will be over for us cMP user because apple will use new pci driver. Here is the topic and screenshot.
As I understand the new pcie driver is needed to run the new amd6000 gpus, so the Xeons could communicate properly with newest cards...

https://www.facebook.com/groups/macprousers/permalink/2621452111334150/
 

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startergo

startergo

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Sep 20, 2018
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Well I guess it is game over for cMP. I am just wondering MBP11,3 is BS supported and you can install NVMe there. Are they gonna kill that line too? It is already in the supported group.
 
startergo

startergo

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I am also suspicious now about some reports claiming they have no issues with NVMe drives and 11.3RC or 11.4. I have my reasons.
 
tsialex

tsialex

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Jun 13, 2016
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startergo said:
I am also suspicious now about some reports claiming they have no issues with NVMe drives and 11.3RC or 11.4. I have my reasons.
Click to expand...

I really don't know how I'm still surprised with all the dubious reports as working when was clearly not working with my tests.

Btw, it's not just NVMe. Let's be crystal clear on this. Anything connected to a PCIe controller is not booting 11.3/11.4b1 reliably.
 
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JohnD

JohnD

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Jun 2, 2005
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Los Angeles, California
Norbert Mikołajczyk said:
Accidentally I have found some posts from the worker at AMD, he told everyone that 11.4 will be over for us cMP user because apple will use new pci driver. Here is the topic and screenshot.
As I understand the new pcie driver is needed to run the new amd6000 gpus, so the Xeons could communicate properly with newest cards...
Click to expand...
That guy is Mr. Negative. He's been spreading doom and gloom for a long time. He said 11.4 wouldn't run on our Mac Pro's, to which I replied with a screenshot. Here's another excerpt of his wisdom, and my responses. This is one of many - you be the judge.

1619300838041.png
 
eVasilis

eVasilis

macrumors 6502
Jan 13, 2010
425
182
tsialex said:
Real insiders are tight-lipped.
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His comment "Intel doesn’t support AMD GPU’s only there own GPU’s" is too bizarre to be taken seriously. I guess if that were true that would be the end of all platforms using intel cpus.
 
tsialex

tsialex

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Jun 13, 2016
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eVasilis said:
His comment "Intel doesn’t support AMD GPU’s only there own GPU’s" is too bizarre to be taken seriously. I guess if that were true that would be the end of all platforms using intel cpus.
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I'm not even going there, since at least Friday, people has been posting geekbenchs with NAVI21 cards and hackintoshes all over, so, he really don't know what he is talking.

Changing topic, I've read some comments for some time that the NAVI21 GPUs require a CPU that have AVX support. This I'm inclined to believe, since AMD already have enterprise tools and several libraries that require AVX.
 
eVasilis

eVasilis

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Jan 13, 2010
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tsialex said:
Changing topic, I've read some comments for some time that the NAVI21 GPUs require a CPU that have AVX support. This I'm inclined to believe, since AMD already have enterprise tools and several libraries that require AVX.
Click to expand...
Could AVX be emulated?
 
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