Mac Pro 1.1 upgraded to 2.1 with 48Gigabytes of DDR 2 ECC

[simie]

Mac Pro 1.1 upgraded firmware and the ram.

The firmware is now 2.1 and I now have 48 Gigabytes of Ram. These Macs will go all the way up to 64 and probably beyond with modification.

An interesting point is that I executed Yosemite installer and it launched and checked Apple server for validation and came back as unknown Mac

I will use PikeYoseFix to install.

Where to go from here, Yosemite installed on another HDD.

Open to suggestions

Install a second graphics card (metal capabilities)

Install SSD or NVME device

 

[Nguyen Duc Hieu]

My suggestion:
Buy a cheap mining RX580

Use the cMP 1,1 with Windows.

According to Hrutkay Mods, 64GB RAM is not stable with cMP 1,1/2,1.

You may try flashing the RX580 with MacVidCard vBIOS. but it is just for the boot screen.

 

[theMarble]

and probably beyond with modification.

The X5365 doesn't support more than 64GB of RAM. From my research, 16GB DIMM's for DDR2 don't exist. 8GB seems to be the max.

NVMe drives will not run under OS X on a 1,1/2,1. There is no point in running a Metal card since El Capitan is the highest you can go and Metal support was very limited. You are much better off with a 980 Ti. No hack can get Sierra+, the CPU's are too old and don't support SSE4.

Your best options for using it are to just run Windows and/or Linux (of which you'll need to modify the ISO to give it a 32-bit kernel, native 64-bit Windows/Linux won't run without hacks) or downgrading it to Tiger-Snow Leopard and use it as a retro machine with a X1900 XT, 8800 GT or 5770/5870.

 

[Amethyst1]

Install SSD or NVME device

As @theMarble said, NVMe SSDs require High Sierra to be recognised and a later Mac Pro to be bootable. If you want a PCIe SSD, you need an elusive AHCI one.

Actually, Apple’s NVMe SSDs will work in Yosemite and El Capitan but they won’t be bootable either.

 

[simie]

As @theMarble said, NVMe SSDs require High Sierra to be recognised and a later Mac Pro to be bootable. If you want a PCIe SSD, you need an elusive AHCI one.

Actually, Apple’s NVMe SSDs will work in Yosemite and El Capitan but they won’t be bootable either.

Thanks for the comments, I am not worried about boot up times but having faster access to software and data.

 

[Nguyen Duc Hieu]

Thanks for the comments, I am not worried about boot up times but having faster access to software and data.

nVME is not faster than SATA in old computers.

 

[theMarble]

nVME is not faster than SATA in old computers.

It is depending on what you are doing. eg: A scratch disk would be much faster on NVMe/PCIe than SATA 2. Boot times and opening apps won't be any faster. A much better option for a 1,1 would be to get a SATA 3 PCIe card (like the ones Sonnet make) and have your boot drive on SATA 3 instead of 2.

 

[Amethyst1]

nVME is not faster than SATA in old computers.

It sure is, at least in terms of transfer rates.

 

[simie]

It is depending on what you are doing. eg: A scratch disk would be much faster on NVMe/PCIe than SATA 2. Boot times and opening apps won't be any faster. A much better option for a 1,1 would be to get a SATA 3 PCIe card (like the ones Sonnet make) and have your boot drive on SATA 3 instead of 2.

I was thinking of a ram disk for the for the scratch disk, I know on my G5 I have an app for creating ram disks easily but this does not seem to be the case for the Intel Macs. The other thing that I have noticed is that older software soon disappears off of the innerweb. This is a real shame that software and information has to be deleted. This is a big failing of the interweb. It relies on us folk to create sites to store this software.

 

[Amethyst1]

[…] on my G5 I have an app for creating ram disks easily but this does not seem to be the case for the Intel Macs.

You don’t need any software.

 

[simie]

If I told you guys that this little project has cost me less than £65 would you believe me and this includes the computer - ram - graphics card. So getting anything extra to run is a challenge

You don’t need any software.

diskutil erasevolume HFS+ "RAMDisk" `hdiutil attach -nomount ram://4194304`

I read somewhere that there is a limit on ramdisk size?

I have not seen any values for anything bigger!

 

[Amethyst1]

I read somewhere that there is a limit on ramdisk size?

diskutil erasevolume HFS+ "RAMDisk" `hdiutil attach -nomount ram://134217728` creates a 64 GiB RAM disk for me on macOS Mojave but my system only has 8 GiB RAM so I can't test if I can fully utilise it. The value is given by (size in MiB) * 2048.

 

[Amethyst1]

~>diskutil erasevolume HFS+ "RAMDisk" `hdiutil attach -nomount ram://4294967296`
Started erase on disk6
Unmounting disk
Erasing
Initialized /dev/rdisk6 as a 2 TB case-insensitive HFS Plus volume
Mounting disk
Finished erase on disk6 RAMDisk

2 TiB is the partition size limit for HFS+, so you should be covered LOL!

 

[simie]

Moving the ram trays around causes OSX to be unstable, so is there a rule regarding positioning Ram, smallest then biggest.

 

[theMarble]

Moving the ram trays around causes OSX to be unstable, so is there a rule regarding positioning Ram, smallest then biggest.

Funnily enough Apple intends you to do the opposite way:

Largest Pair - Second Largest Pair
Third Largest Pair - Fourth Largest Pair

 

[Nguyen Duc Hieu]

Moving the ram trays around causes OSX to be unstable, so is there a rule regarding positioning Ram, smallest then biggest.

As for today, the rules are pretty simple:
Use 8 sticks of the same type RAM.
I bought 8 sticks 4GB for 24$ (3$/stick), you might get them for free if you search from local junk shops.

 

[simie]

As for today, the rules are pretty simple:
Use 8 sticks of the same type RAM.
I bought 8 sticks 4GB for 24$ (3$/stick), you might get them for free if you search from local junk shops.

The only reason that I moved the trays was that I needed to remove the Fans to get access to the SATA ports and the Mini PCIE port to install hardware, when I put the Mac back together I Put them in the wrong way round. This caused the MAC to freeze and crash, so swapping them back fixed the problem. My 48Gb@s runs fine now.

 

[simie]

I went on Ebay a couple of weeks ago and purchased a pair Xeon 5355 CPU's for less than £8, I have just spent the last hour upgrading the Mac Pro 2006. It took ages to get the dam cage out for the memory risers once the screws were taken out. I could not get the clips released.

I eventually succeeded and cleaned all the accumulated dust out of the mac. I also found 6 screws loose in the case. These must have been from the previous owner removing the HDD's

After a good clean and reassembling the MAC it is now running fantastically. I could not find any 3 Ghz Xeons in the UK only from China and they were not cheap.

 

[simie]

I did want to upgrade OSX further but after installing Pikestool, it really screwed up the OS and would not boot, I had to reinstall Lion again.

I am wondering about the large space where the DVD writer goes. What a waste of space this is, any ideas on what could be installed in this space? I am not worried about a writer as I have a portable Blu-ray writer.

I could install SSD's in this space using the spare sata connections, any ideas.

I do not need a DVD writer in this computer.

 

[Nguyen Duc Hieu]

I did want to upgrade OSX further but after installing Pikestool, it really screwed up the OS and would not boot, I had to reinstall Lion again.

I am wondering about the large space where the DVD writer goes. What a waste of space this is, any ideas on what could be installed in this space? I am not worried about a writer as I have a portable Blu-ray writer.

I could install SSD's in this space using the spare sata connections, any ideas.

I do not need a DVD writer in this computer.

The space can be fitted with 2 3.5HDDs, if you plan to use it as a file server. Or 2 SATA SSD because they use the same protocol for connection.
What you will need are 2 SATA data cables to plug in the open ports on the logicboard, and 2 Molex to SATA power cables, to get power from the Molex jacks of the stock ODD. Wiring the 2 SATA data cables and removing the IDE cable is quite troublesome, but doable.
While SSD can be duct taped to the place, 3.5HHD may require 5.25 to 3.5 adapter, to keep them stable inside the case. But as you already have 4 slot-in bays for HDDs, maybe you just can leave the empty space intact.

 

[simie]

The space can be fitted with 2 3.5HDDs, if you plan to use it as a file server. Or 2 SATA SSD because they use the same protocol for connection.
What you will need are 2 SATA data cables to plug in the open ports on the logic board, and 2 Molex to SATA power cables, to get power from the Molex jacks of the stock ODD. Wiring the 2 SATA data cables and removing the IDE cable is quite troublesome, but doable.
While SSD can be duct taped to the place, 3.5HHD may require 5.25 to 3.5 adapter, to keep them stable inside the case. But as you already have 4 slot-in bays for HDDs, maybe you just can leave the empty space intact.

Perhaps 3D print a suitable frame to hold SSD drives.

 

[Nguyen Duc Hieu]

Perhaps 3D print a suitable frame to hold SSD drives.

Perhaps buying a pre-made 5.25" to 3.5" adapter/bay is a better option.

 

[simie]

I was wondering if the space could be rigged up also with suitable GPU's for rendering. I remember someone doing something like this in another thread. this would depend on the space and the size of the cards. This only difference was that this persons was external. Anything that would increase performance would do.

 

[simie]

Perhaps buying a pre-made 5.25" to 3.5" adapter/bay is a better option.

Remember that SSD's are actually smaller than 3.5". I do have suitable brackets that I have installed to reduce to 3.5" but then realising that the SSD's are actually smaller.

 

[simie]

Perhaps something similar to this would work.