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Mac Pro 2,1 and OS X Mavericks

"what to do if a future update will overwrite the boot.efi? "

if you access to a Mac you could remove the drive and fix it or after an update replace the files before rebooting.

If someone good at writing scripts could package this up so it was an installer that would be even easier.
 
What benefit would this new method have over my current Chameleon setup? Would I not need a separate boot partition anymore? Would I only need to change my boot.efi and that's it?
 
Apple online authentification prevents Mavericks installation

Hi guys !

No matter what I do for creation of an USB installation key for Mavericks on a Mac Pro 1,1, It seems that an online authentification towards Apple servers takes place at the beginning of the installation process, refusing to proceed the installation furthermore.

This is not the same thing than when running from a non-modified installation key, which fails almost immediately when checking the machine, no ! The patched installation really starts, using the modified informations (InstallableMachines and so on), but fails on the online authentification.

Seems for me that there is no other way for installing Mavericks on my MacPro 1,1 than using the target mode from a supported Mac, and patching the boot.efi files after the installation. Using that, my MacPro perfectly runs under Mavericks, but I cannot reinstall it without using an external mac, or cloning my previously-saved installation from an external drive.


Any similar experience ?

Thx by advance
 
mikeboss said:
the question from "apple_iBoy" got me thinking... what to do if a future update will overwrite the boot.efi? I made a fresh install of Mavericks to an SSD (while in the MacPro3,1) using my USB thumbdrive I created with the creatinstallmedia command. this will also create a Recovery Partition. I then replaced the boot.efi on the Recovery Partition. AFAIK the Recovery Partition will never be updated by an Apple update. so, if something happens to the precious boot.efi, I can boot to the Recovery Partition and replace the boot.efi on the system volume again.
Click to expand...

When the update has installed and tells you to restart just copy back over the custom EFI before clicking the button. This is the same basic procedure some of us with flashed PC cards have to follow because of the need for modified kexts to enable QE/CI.
 
YvesBd said:
Hi guys !

No matter what I do for creation of an USB installation key for Mavericks on a Mac Pro 1,1, It seems that an online authentification towards Apple servers takes place at the beginning of the installation process, refusing to proceed the installation furthermore.

This is not the same thing than when running from a non-modified installation key, which fails almost immediately when checking the machine, no ! The patched installation really starts, using the modified informations (InstallableMachines and so on), but fails on the online authentification.

Seems for me that there is no other way for installing Mavericks on my MacPro 1,1 than using the target mode from a supported Mac, and patching the boot.efi files after the installation. Using that, my MacPro perfectly runs under Mavericks, but I cannot reinstall it without using an external mac, or cloning my previously-saved installation from an external drive.


Any similar experience ?

Thx by advance
Click to expand...

I think you forgot to modify OSInstall.mpkg. You might try the one I included (on page 2, post 28).
 
Last edited:
Rastafabi said:
I think you forgot to modify OSInstall.mpkg. You might try the one I included (on page 2, post 28).
Click to expand...

Hi,
No I didn't forget it !

I modified System/Installation/Packages/InstallableMachines.plist, System/Installation/Packages/OSInstall.mpkg, and System/Library/CoreServices/PlatformSupport.plist (for both board-id and model).

Indeed I made many different tries, beginning with patching a USB installation key made by the "createInstallMedia" command line. This was unsuccessful and rather difficult to achieve because this key is not made for being modified.

At last, I recreated a key using the "standard" step by step installation, which is almost successful. Unfortunately, when I run the installation from this key, the first "Local" checks are Ok, I click "Continue", and a window appear indicating that "To download and restore OS X, the admissibility of your computer will be checked at Apple". When going on, the information about my machine are sent, and of course the diagnostic is : Mavericks cannot be installed on this computer.

BTW, I also used your guide and files . IORegistryExplorer is a very handy tools !
 
YvesBd said:
Hi,
No I didn't forget it !

I modified System/Installation/Packages/InstallableMachines.plist, System/Installation/Packages/OSInstall.mpkg, and System/Library/CoreServices/PlatformSupport.plist (for both board-id and model).

Indeed I made many different tries, beginning with patching a USB installation key made by the "createInstallMedia" command line. This was unsuccessful and rather difficult to achieve because this key is not made for being modified.

At last, I recreated a key using the "standard" step by step installation, which is almost successful. Unfortunately, when I run the installation from this key, the first "Local" checks are Ok, I click "Continue", and a window appear indicating that "To download and restore OS X, the admissibility of your computer will be checked at Apple". When going on, the information about my machine are sent, and of course the diagnostic is : Mavericks cannot be installed on this computer.

BTW, I also used your guide and files . IORegistryExplorer is a very handy tools !
Click to expand...

Well, I don't know about such an approval, nor I understand it, as the installer does not connect to the internet, unless you do this manually. And without a connection this massage can't be displayed.

I personally had a similar issue (I could boot, but once I clicked install it gave an error that my machine is not supported). This was while trying to modify the OSInstall.mpkg. That's why I finally made an universal one which does not check for the machines it's being installed on at all.

The only thing I can imaging, which could give such an error is trying to make an internet recovery instead of an offline installation. This would happen if you did not copy the packages folder from InstallESD.dmg to /System/Installation/Packages on your installation media.
 
Rastafabi said:
Well, I don't know about such an approval, nor I understand it, as the installer does not connect to the internet, unless you do this manually. And without a connection this massage can't be displayed.
Click to expand...

Hi again and thx for your response,

I finally suspected my USB key, and decide to use an external 500 Go USB disk (from LG) instead. And ... it works, this time I was able to start on the USB disk and to perform the installation. All works fine. I am now trying to rebuild the USB key after having fully reinitialized and reformat it (I don't want to "block" my external USB drive). It's a bit slow because this "cheap" USB key seems to be not very good ...

On the other hand, this installation method does work only by booting from the USB installation media : I tried again to start the "Install Mavericks" app from the Finder, and got the same result than before (Online Apple Check which block the installation). Nevertheless, the problem is solved because all I want is to have an external USB installation-startup media, which is now the case.



[Update] After réinitialization of my USB key, it now works like a charm. Don't know exactly what happened the first time, but now the problem is solved.
 
Last edited:
Guys,

First off, thanks for great way to install Mavericks on unsupported Mac Pro!

I'm still having issue booting from USB. When I reboot my Mac Pro, Mavericks starts booting from USB and then it halts with the last line being:

Still waiting for the root device...

I've created install media from the guide Tiamo posted. I copied and edited all the plists and I edited OSInstall.mpkg with my Mac Pro info. I alternatively tried copying premade OSInstall.mpkg from user Rastafabi. Same issue.

I tried changing USB ports, no luck. Any advice would be extremely welcome!
 
mnlth0 said:
Guys,

First off, thanks for great way to install Mavericks on unsupported Mac Pro!

I'm still having issue booting from USB. When I reboot my Mac Pro, Mavericks starts booting from USB and then it halts with the last line being:

Still waiting for the root device...

I've created install media from the guide Tiamo posted. I copied and edited all the plists and I edited OSInstall.mpkg with my Mac Pro info. I alternatively tried copying premade OSInstall.mpkg from user Rastafabi. Same issue.

I tried changing USB ports, no luck. Any advice would be extremely welcome!
Click to expand...

The error message indicates, that OS X dislikes your USB drive. Try to repair it using Disk Utility (drive & partition). If this does not fix the issue reformat the drive and try again. Else use another drive.
 
Rastafabi said:
The error message indicates, that OS X dislikes your USB drive. Try to repair it using Disk Utility (drive & partition). If this does not fix the issue reformat the drive and try again. Else use another drive.
Click to expand...

Just tried another drive, same issue : ( I even unplugged all the other drives, usb devices etc.

From my hackintosh days I recall this specific error being because of IDE DVD drive and also for storage devices not being set up as AHCI. Which is strange because i'm working on actual Mac Pro.

Small note, I have MacPro1,1 whose firmware I've updated to MacPro2,1.
 
mnlth0 said:
Just tried another drive, same issue : ( I even unplugged all the other drives, usb devices etc.

From my hackintosh days I recall this specific error being because of IDE DVD drive and also for storage devices not being set up as AHCI. Which is strange because i'm working on actual Mac Pro.

Small note, I have MacPro1,1 whose firmware I've updated to MacPro2,1.
Click to expand...

Maybe you just don't have luck with the drives. You could try another one again. Although OS X installers do not require to boot from a GUID volume with hfs+ you could try doing so as this can fix potential errors.
 
Rastafabi said:
Maybe you just don't have luck with the drives. You could try another one again. Although OS X installers do not require to boot from a GUID volume with hfs+ you could try doing so as this can fix potential errors.
Click to expand...


After 2 full days of struggle with my deficient USB key, I can just enforce Rastafabi advice. You probably missed one important step when preparing your USB key :
- Format it (Mac OS Extended Journalized)
- PARTITION IT with one partition (GUID mode in options).
- when Restoring the "BaseSystem.dmg" file, do it to this unique partition rather than to the root key itself.

It may appear that this partition step is not necessary, and indeed the full creation process is done without any problem, BUT you fall into the "Waiting for boot device" error.
I am pretty sure this is due to the lack of partition stage, as I falled myself into this problem during my first attempts to work with the USB key. This problem disappeared once I did the partition as a pre-requisite step.
 
Thanks tiamo!

First of all I would like to thank tiamo. Great work. I sent the guy some money on paypal.

I came into possession of a Mac Pro 2006 1,1. It has been soft upgraded to a 2007 2,1 using MacEFIRom's tool. Upgraded to a Dual Quad X5355s, 16GB of RAM, and a ORICO USB 3.0 card. Replaced the card with a XFX Radeon 6870 (no boot screen; but that isn't important to me at all). Worked great with my SSD and HD as a fusion drive also. The machine is flying! iMessage etc.. without any hackintosh type workarounds.

I had trouble modifying the installer, but simply took a 10.9 install from another machine and overwrote with tiamo's boot.efi in both places on the drive and updated PlatformSupport.plist (not sure if that was needed). It booted the first time without issue. I also installed Windows 8.1 on a separate drive using bootcamp. Also works great.
 
YvesBd said:
After 2 full days of struggle with my deficient USB key, I can just enforce Rastafabi advice. You probably missed one important step when preparing your USB key :
- Format it (Mac OS Extended Journalized)
- PARTITION IT with one partition (GUID mode in options).
- when Restoring the "BaseSystem.dmg" file, do it to this unique partition rather than to the root key itself.

It may appear that this partition step is not necessary, and indeed the full creation process is done without any problem, BUT you fall into the "Waiting for boot device" error.
I am pretty sure this is due to the lack of partition stage, as I falled myself into this problem during my first attempts to work with the USB key. This problem disappeared once I did the partition as a pre-requisite step.
Click to expand...

For me it worked without GUID and hfs+, but i will add it to the guide. Concerning the restore location you are right.
 
Rastafabi said:
Maybe you just don't have luck with the drives. You could try another one again. Although OS X installers do not require to boot from a GUID volume with hfs+ you could try doing so as this can fix potential errors.
Click to expand...

I got it working! But first, I'm an idiot!!! Few weeks back I installed SATA3 pcie card because I use SSD. All those "waiting for the root device" issues were because of the card, I completely forgot about it! I remove SATA3 card (not just unplug SSD) and USB installer booted.

Thank you for your help and also BIG thank you to user Tiamo!
 
I finally got mine working too....couldn't get the USB stick to donut so I did the hack install with an ssd drive. Worked perfect. What did happen too is I got ticked because my 1,1 albeit upgraded to 8 core 2.66 runs like a champ. No reason they didn't grandfather these machines.
 
Wow! Very interesting!

I've been running the Chameleon solution on my Mac Mini 1,1 (flashed with 2,1) as a headless Mavericks server (using the leaked x86_64 kexts for GMA950). It's working quite alright, but I would love to be able to run more vanilla (sound, sleep, power efficiency etc.)

I tried the boot.efi with little success. Followed all instructions, tried both with a USB stick and the internal SATA drive. It hangs/gets stuck almost immediately with the following state:

OGULe4o.jpg


Anyone with success beyond this with a Mac Mini 1,1 (flashed to 2,1)?

EDIT:
Tried putting an empty disk in the Mini so that only one boot option was available. Then I tried to boot the USB and got only the flashing folder icon. I then put a Snow Leopard DVD into the SuperDrive and tried again, now the DVD is booting up when selecting the Mavericks USB with the custom boot.efi.

It seems like the EFI somehow selects any other available boot disk and not the USB. What could be wrong?

EDIT2:
This is my bless info:
Code: 
$ sudo bless --info /Volumes/Mavericks/
finderinfo[0]:     23 => Blessed System Folder is /Volumes/Mavericks/System/Library/CoreServices
finderinfo[1]:  54349 => Blessed System File is /Volumes/Mavericks/System/Library/CoreServices/boot.efi
finderinfo[2]:      0 => Open-folder linked list empty
finderinfo[3]:      0 => No OS 9 + X blessed 9 folder
finderinfo[4]:      0 => Unused field unset
finderinfo[5]:     23 => OS X blessed folder is /Volumes/Mavericks/System/Library/CoreServices
64-bit VSDB volume id:  0xD6E846C9EC1E311F

The UUID for my USB doesn't match what boot.efi is trying to boot (see above picture):
Code: 
$ diskutil info disk1s2 | grep UUID
   Volume UUID:              AB7A7CCE-A2CD-35E9-90B3-748BFB55D130
 
Last edited:
bolen said:
Wow! Very interesting!

I've been running the Chameleon solution on my Mac Mini 1,1 (flashed with 2,1) as a headless Mavericks server (using the leaked x86_64 kexts for GMA950). It's working quite alright, but I would love to be able to run more vanilla (sound, sleep, power efficiency etc.)

[…]

EDIT:
Tried putting an empty disk in the Mini so that only one boot option was available. Then I tried to boot the USB and got only the flashing folder icon. I then put a Snow Leopard DVD into the SuperDrive and tried again, now the DVD is booting up when selecting the Mavericks USB with the custom boot.efi.

It seems like the EFI somehow selects any other available boot disk and not the USB. What could be wrong?

[…]
Click to expand...

Blessing using Chameleon does not make sense as all as the bless information will be written to fake nvram. Try blessing using a Lion/MLPF stick or a 10.4/5/6 install DVD.

Additionally try resetting nvram/smc upon boot (search the Apple support website how to do this for your machine). Also you might try to boot with the kernelcache file (not) being disabled. (Search the web on how to (re-)build it.)
 
Last edited:
Rastafabi said:
Blessing using Chameleon does not make sense as all as the bless information will be written to fake nvram. Try blessing using a Lion/MLPF stick or a 10.4/5/6 install DVD.

Additionally try resetting nvram/smc upon boot (search the Apple support website how to do this for your machine). Also you might try to boot with the kernelcache file (not) being disabled. (Search the web on how to (re-)build it.)
Click to expand...

Thanks for your reply. I'm currently not using Chameleon on this test setup. I use it on another mini though. Sorry about the confusion.

I've tried to reset the nvram/smc with no success. However, I think it have something to do with the kernel extensions. I re-built the USB drive and did the steps to allow my board ID, I then did not add the GMA950 kext (which I did previously) and it booted up the installer! Howerver, adding the kext made it fail again and then even removing the kexts doesn't help. I'll re-build the USB drive again....

EDIT:
OK - So I rebuilt the USB drive with a fresh Mavericks+boot.efi etc. Skipping adding the GMA950 kexts to /System/Library/Extensions solves my issue and it's booting into the setup and install fine!

The only issue I have is that the GPU is recognized as a generic Intel built-in. However, I don't think that's much worse than the pre-release version of the 64-bit GMA950 kexts that got canned before release.

The Mini lacks more hardware support though. No sound, no WiFi and sleep doesn't work (probably due to the graphics kexts). I'll do some power usage tests tonight to see if the energy efficiency was improved over the Chameleon approach.

This solution will still give a fairly nice headless little Mini server. Thanks for the efi hack, really sweet solution to an annoying problem!
 
Last edited:
apple_iBoy said:
Could you help clarify the process to overwrite the boot.efi?

[...]
Click to expand...

(choose 'Replace' in all instances)

sudo chflags nouchg /Volumes/[your install/media]/System/Library/CoreServices/boot.efi

sudo cp /System/Library/CoreServices/boot.efi /[your backup/folder]/boot.efi.orig

sudo cp /[your download/folder]/boot.efi /System/Library/CoreServices/

sudo cp /[your download/folder]/boot.efi /usr/standalone/i386

sudo chown root:wheel /System/Library/CoreServices/boot.efi

sudo chflags uchg /System/Library/CoreServices/boot.efi

sudo chown root:wheel /usr/standalone/i386/boot.efi

(this worked for me; twice)
 
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