A few impressions post-install of OpenCore Monterey on Mac Pro 3,1. Perhaps it could help someone else out if stumbling upon similar issues. My plan/wish was to fully move both my Mac Pro 3,1 to (at least) Monterey. One of them acts like a test-bed to be able to identify what works and what (might) not work.
This is a quick system setup listing of my second Mac Pro 3,1, currently works well with Dosdude's patched High Sierra:
* 2 x 2.8 GHz Quad-Core Intel Xeon
* 4 x 1 GB 800 MHz DDR2 FB-DIMM (Being a test-install system, memory will likely be increased later)
* AMD Radeon R7850 Twin Frozr 2GD5/OC (2x mini DP, 1x HDMI, 1x DVI), non-Mac native/non-flashed, https://www.msi.com/Graphics-Card/R7850-Twin-Frozr-2GD5OC/Specification
* 2x 30-inch Apple Cinema Display HD (Confirmed working on my primary, other, El Capitan Mac Pro 3,1 via Dosdude's patcher on ATI Radeon HD 5770 1024 MB.)
* Samsung 250 GB SSD SATA 2.5-inch, in the first drive bay. All other remaining (2 to 4) drive bays are empty.
* Wired Apple Pro Keyboard 2005 and wired Logitech mouse in case Bluetooth is not enabled.
* Using OpenCore Legacy Patcher 1.3.0, downloaded 28 December 2023, using a 128 GB Kingston USB-drive, USB 3.2-enabled.
Walkthrough:
* Time elapsed for creating the USB-drive, downloading Monterey, writing to disk, etc. : approximately 1 hour over 100 MB/s network.
* I was initially using the standard ATI Radeon HD 2600 XT in the Mac Pro 3,1 to be able to follow along in the installation process as it has native boot screen. After a while, I came to the conclusion that it created more (unnecessary) issues than needed. For example, the installation process of OpenCore to the USB-drive was straight-forward. However, when rebooting to initiate the installation of Monterey, it writes the installer to disk, entering "Recovery", enabling you to erase your internal SSD, start the installation. Now, when the system reboots, booting via OpenCore, then selecting "Monterey Installer with disk", not the "Monterey Installer-only"-icon, the system "hangs", no Caps Lock-led works.
* After several tests with NVRAM resets (Option+Command+P+R) upon boot, the behavior is persistent, even after removing the ATI Radeon HD 2600 XT and replacing it with the 7850.
* At this point, I decided to move the USB-disk to my other (primary work system) El Capitan Mac Pro 3,1, re-create the OpenCore installer, also adding the AMD GOP Injection during creating the OpenCore USB-disk. I also downloaded Monterey again, wrote it to the USB-disk. I rebooted, restarted the Monterey installation via OpenCore USB-boot by removing all disks (disconnecting all hard disks trays an inch from their drive bays), leaving the Radeon 7850 in the system, restarting the install sequence. This forces OpenCore to boot as there is no other alternative available than the USB-disk. This also confirmed a "boot screen" from the Radeon 7850, also that the 7850 "actually works" and is not "defect".
* I removed the SSD drive tray, connected it to a SATA-adapter-to-USB-adapter, erasing the drive in my "working" Mac Pro 3,1 to ensure nothing can boot from the internal SSD. Re-connecting the SSD drive bay to the test-bed Mac Pro 3,1, rebooting, installing Monterey to the SSD and at this point the behavior was similar as "previously" as the Monterey installer would not progress after the "first reboot", meaning not being able to continue with its "progress bar" after Monterey is written to the internal SSD. From this point, I started trying the other display ports/connectors as initially the DVI-port was used, connected to one of my 30-inch Cinema Display HD via a Apple Mini DisplayPort-Dual DVI. This, apparently, enabled the installer to continue whilst no actual "button" was pressed to "continue to install". Very "strange" - yet this is what "did the trick".
* Passing the point to actually "see what is going on on screen", the Monterey installer rebooted 3-4 times in total, also having to reset the NVRAM after each reboot because only the "Monterey Installer" was visible. After resetting the NVRAM, the "Monterey Installer with disks" was visible, enabling me to select that icon and the installer could continue.
* Upon last reboot, the installer and its progress bar did not show any "percentage", possibly due to OpenCore does not apply any specific patches for the graphics due to the AMD Radeon 7850 is Apple Metal-enabled.
* After "final" reboot, the process from start to "seeing the welcome screen in macOS", took approximately 2 hours, excluding the trial-and-error with the graphics, re-creating the OpenCore USB-drive, etc. Instantly after the first visual appearance of the "macOS login screen" with the "automatic writing of Welcome", the lines are drawn slightly slower, like there was no graphics acceleration, yet it seemed to revert to be "fully working" within seconds.
* As a last detail, OpenCore ("automatically") suggested to be written to the internal SSD. The system now boots within 25 seconds from a "cold start", having switched off the system after last night's install. The macOS Monterey login screen is properly visible, no USB-disk needed to boot.
At this point, I have not been able to fully test the system. I will revert after having done some basic testing, installing some applications.
Here are some quick observations - written to help others/developers/... with accompanying questions:
* One of the first visible "issues" could be the "Volume Hash Mismatch". Any workarounds regarding this as of late December 2023?
* CPU, fans, speed: Normal
* Network, Ethernet: Fully works
* Graphics: No graphical glitches visible as of yet, using Light and Dark "Appearance"/Mode works seamlessly, transparency, etc. The Radeon 7850 is detected as "Chipset Model: AMD Radeon HD 7XXX" in System Information. Single and Dual Screen setup works, 2x 30-inch Cinema Display HD, connected to mini-DisplayPort. DVI also works. Display sleep and wake up works. A quick, "non-scientific test", viewing a 4K@60fps video via Youtube utilizes each of the 8 cores continuously at about 40%. CPU fans and the Radeon 7850 fans do not speed up.
* No audio is detected. System Preferences do not show any audio devices in the "Output"-section. System Information > Audio has no listed devices.
USB: USB-drives (obviously) work, my Apple Pro Keyboard (white keys with numeric keypad from 2005) with a "simple" Logitech two button USB-mouse, connected to the back of the Mac Pro 3,1 in each USB-port: Works.
Bluetooth: Trying to "Turn Bluetooth On" does not work. (Primary El Capitan Mac Pro 3,1 has working Bluetooth).
System Sleep: via Apple logo > Sleep: Does not work. The screen goes to sleep, the system does not. In System Preferences > Energy Saver, there is no "Computer sleep"-option or "time out selector". Only "Turn display off after:". (Both Computer sleep and Display sleep is visible in System Preferences and working in El Capitan/Dosdude patcher.)
* No peripherals, such as for example printers, have been attached to test their compatibility.
In conclusion, so far as of December 30, the Mac Pro 3,1 two details remain unsolved:
* Audio is not working.
* Bluetooth is not working.
* Computer sleep is not working.
I also ticked off the options for automatic system updates in System Preferences > Software Update > Advanced to disable any unwanted downloads and updates.
Has anybody attempted to resolve the above audio, Bluetooth and computer sleep-matters? Any tips?
(Edit: Typo where OpenCore was referenced as 1.4.0 is changed is now corrected to 1.3.0.)
This is a quick system setup listing of my second Mac Pro 3,1, currently works well with Dosdude's patched High Sierra:
* 2 x 2.8 GHz Quad-Core Intel Xeon
* 4 x 1 GB 800 MHz DDR2 FB-DIMM (Being a test-install system, memory will likely be increased later)
* AMD Radeon R7850 Twin Frozr 2GD5/OC (2x mini DP, 1x HDMI, 1x DVI), non-Mac native/non-flashed, https://www.msi.com/Graphics-Card/R7850-Twin-Frozr-2GD5OC/Specification
* 2x 30-inch Apple Cinema Display HD (Confirmed working on my primary, other, El Capitan Mac Pro 3,1 via Dosdude's patcher on ATI Radeon HD 5770 1024 MB.)
* Samsung 250 GB SSD SATA 2.5-inch, in the first drive bay. All other remaining (2 to 4) drive bays are empty.
* Wired Apple Pro Keyboard 2005 and wired Logitech mouse in case Bluetooth is not enabled.
* Using OpenCore Legacy Patcher 1.3.0, downloaded 28 December 2023, using a 128 GB Kingston USB-drive, USB 3.2-enabled.
Walkthrough:
* Time elapsed for creating the USB-drive, downloading Monterey, writing to disk, etc. : approximately 1 hour over 100 MB/s network.
* I was initially using the standard ATI Radeon HD 2600 XT in the Mac Pro 3,1 to be able to follow along in the installation process as it has native boot screen. After a while, I came to the conclusion that it created more (unnecessary) issues than needed. For example, the installation process of OpenCore to the USB-drive was straight-forward. However, when rebooting to initiate the installation of Monterey, it writes the installer to disk, entering "Recovery", enabling you to erase your internal SSD, start the installation. Now, when the system reboots, booting via OpenCore, then selecting "Monterey Installer with disk", not the "Monterey Installer-only"-icon, the system "hangs", no Caps Lock-led works.
* After several tests with NVRAM resets (Option+Command+P+R) upon boot, the behavior is persistent, even after removing the ATI Radeon HD 2600 XT and replacing it with the 7850.
* At this point, I decided to move the USB-disk to my other (primary work system) El Capitan Mac Pro 3,1, re-create the OpenCore installer, also adding the AMD GOP Injection during creating the OpenCore USB-disk. I also downloaded Monterey again, wrote it to the USB-disk. I rebooted, restarted the Monterey installation via OpenCore USB-boot by removing all disks (disconnecting all hard disks trays an inch from their drive bays), leaving the Radeon 7850 in the system, restarting the install sequence. This forces OpenCore to boot as there is no other alternative available than the USB-disk. This also confirmed a "boot screen" from the Radeon 7850, also that the 7850 "actually works" and is not "defect".
* I removed the SSD drive tray, connected it to a SATA-adapter-to-USB-adapter, erasing the drive in my "working" Mac Pro 3,1 to ensure nothing can boot from the internal SSD. Re-connecting the SSD drive bay to the test-bed Mac Pro 3,1, rebooting, installing Monterey to the SSD and at this point the behavior was similar as "previously" as the Monterey installer would not progress after the "first reboot", meaning not being able to continue with its "progress bar" after Monterey is written to the internal SSD. From this point, I started trying the other display ports/connectors as initially the DVI-port was used, connected to one of my 30-inch Cinema Display HD via a Apple Mini DisplayPort-Dual DVI. This, apparently, enabled the installer to continue whilst no actual "button" was pressed to "continue to install". Very "strange" - yet this is what "did the trick".
* Passing the point to actually "see what is going on on screen", the Monterey installer rebooted 3-4 times in total, also having to reset the NVRAM after each reboot because only the "Monterey Installer" was visible. After resetting the NVRAM, the "Monterey Installer with disks" was visible, enabling me to select that icon and the installer could continue.
* Upon last reboot, the installer and its progress bar did not show any "percentage", possibly due to OpenCore does not apply any specific patches for the graphics due to the AMD Radeon 7850 is Apple Metal-enabled.
* After "final" reboot, the process from start to "seeing the welcome screen in macOS", took approximately 2 hours, excluding the trial-and-error with the graphics, re-creating the OpenCore USB-drive, etc. Instantly after the first visual appearance of the "macOS login screen" with the "automatic writing of Welcome", the lines are drawn slightly slower, like there was no graphics acceleration, yet it seemed to revert to be "fully working" within seconds.
* As a last detail, OpenCore ("automatically") suggested to be written to the internal SSD. The system now boots within 25 seconds from a "cold start", having switched off the system after last night's install. The macOS Monterey login screen is properly visible, no USB-disk needed to boot.
At this point, I have not been able to fully test the system. I will revert after having done some basic testing, installing some applications.
Here are some quick observations - written to help others/developers/... with accompanying questions:
* One of the first visible "issues" could be the "Volume Hash Mismatch". Any workarounds regarding this as of late December 2023?
* CPU, fans, speed: Normal
* Network, Ethernet: Fully works
* Graphics: No graphical glitches visible as of yet, using Light and Dark "Appearance"/Mode works seamlessly, transparency, etc. The Radeon 7850 is detected as "Chipset Model: AMD Radeon HD 7XXX" in System Information. Single and Dual Screen setup works, 2x 30-inch Cinema Display HD, connected to mini-DisplayPort. DVI also works. Display sleep and wake up works. A quick, "non-scientific test", viewing a 4K@60fps video via Youtube utilizes each of the 8 cores continuously at about 40%. CPU fans and the Radeon 7850 fans do not speed up.
* No audio is detected. System Preferences do not show any audio devices in the "Output"-section. System Information > Audio has no listed devices.
USB: USB-drives (obviously) work, my Apple Pro Keyboard (white keys with numeric keypad from 2005) with a "simple" Logitech two button USB-mouse, connected to the back of the Mac Pro 3,1 in each USB-port: Works.
Bluetooth: Trying to "Turn Bluetooth On" does not work. (Primary El Capitan Mac Pro 3,1 has working Bluetooth).
System Sleep: via Apple logo > Sleep: Does not work. The screen goes to sleep, the system does not. In System Preferences > Energy Saver, there is no "Computer sleep"-option or "time out selector". Only "Turn display off after:". (Both Computer sleep and Display sleep is visible in System Preferences and working in El Capitan/Dosdude patcher.)
* No peripherals, such as for example printers, have been attached to test their compatibility.
In conclusion, so far as of December 30, the Mac Pro 3,1 two details remain unsolved:
* Audio is not working.
* Bluetooth is not working.
* Computer sleep is not working.
I also ticked off the options for automatic system updates in System Preferences > Software Update > Advanced to disable any unwanted downloads and updates.
Has anybody attempted to resolve the above audio, Bluetooth and computer sleep-matters? Any tips?
(Edit: Typo where OpenCore was referenced as 1.4.0 is changed is now corrected to 1.3.0.)
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