MAC Pro1.1 Upgradability and Future Use

[ejwjohn]

I have the old MacPro 1.1 and was thinking of loading Ubuntu onto it and then using virtualization software to have a working copy of windows for some "one of" special jobs i sometimes need to do.

The first problem came when i tried to load Unbuntu using the iso loaded onto a USB drive, seems the Boot Rom needs a later version, but having source what i thought was an upgrade for the Boot ROM and the SMC when i try to upgrade using the utility programs in the LION Utility folder i get the messages that

1. The software is up to date
2. and the upgrade software .dmg's i have are not compatible with my system.

The system info for my machine indicates that the boot rom is at MP11.005C.B08 and the SMC is at 1.7f10

The upgrade firware i downloaded via this Forum links is as follows:-

1. Boot Rom i believe it is an upgrade to 2.0
2. SMC i am afraid i am not 100% sure what level it is??

Can anyone advise if this little project i have is achievable? or should i give up on the MacPro1.1

thanks

JohnW

 

[Amethyst1]

Don’t give up on the machine

The MacPro1,1has a 32-bit EFI which means a 64-bit Ubuntu ISO/stick needs to be modified to boot on it. This also applies if you flash the MacPro2,1 firmware onto it.

 

[ejwjohn]

Thank You very much for this advice.

There is a lot to absorb within your response link, and i need to ensure i fully understand what you are suggesting, and that i am capable of executing without any major issues....

Hopefully, let you know in the next 24 hrs on how i get on....

JohnW

 

[Amethyst1]

The site links to already-modified ISOs for Ubuntu so you could give these a try.

 

[ejwjohn]

OK, But did i miss something? there is no link?

JohnW

 

[eyoungren]

OK, But did i miss something? there is no link?

JohnW

They appear to be text links. Roll over the one you want to get where it's blue and the cursor will change to a clickable link.

 

[ejwjohn]

Apologies, bit slow this evening.. got it now.

Thanks

JohnW

 

[ejwjohn]

OK,

Not great news I am afraid.

I downloaded the Ubuntu iso - ubuntu-22.04-desktop-amd64-mac-mattgadient.com- from this site.

I created a clean USB disk using the Disk Utility and selected MS Dos and GUID Partition.

Then using Etcher I flashed the ISO to the USB.

Inserted the USB into the MacPro 1.1 and turned it on with the Option selected on the Keyboard....

The only Boot options i got were, Recovery HD and the existing OSX LION disk,

What have i done wrong?

JohnW

 

[ejwjohn]

Hello,

Made a further attempt to try and get this to work, but with no success ???

I used the link on your site to create a Live CD on a USB Stick at https://mesom.de/efi32boot/index.html, i am not great at Linux terminal, but I got through the process without any reported issues so i was confident the stick had been created correctly but alas no joy....

Thank you for your help

JohnW

 

[netsrot39]

Try to burn the .iso to a DVD and boot from it. I know it is old school but it is my preferred method and I've had more success with this method than with creating USB installers (not Linux in my case but Windows). Anyways, give it a try.

 

[Amethyst1]

You could also try writing the .iso to the USB stick manually, in case the problem is with how Etcher is doing it.

1. Fire up Applications > Utilities > Terminal and type diskutil list, followed by [Enter].
2. Look for the name of the partition you created on the USB stick. It's best to give it an easily identifiable name like "STICK". Note the drive number that is listed above the partition, such as /dev/disk2.
3. Type sudo diskutil unmountDisk /dev/disk2, press [Enter], enter your password and press [Enter] again to unmount all partitions on the stick. /dev/disk2 is the drive number you determined in step 2. Make sure this is the correct one.
4. If step 3 completed successfully (you'll receive a message if it did), type sudo dd if= but don't press [Enter] or any other key!
5. Instead, open a Finder window, browse to the folder where the .iso is and drag it into the Terminal window. The full path to the .iso will now be shown directly after sudo dd if=.
6. Press the space bar once and type of=/dev/disk2 bs=8M. Change /dev/disk2 to match the drive number of the stick. This is extremely important since dd will delete everything that is on the drive without asking any questions!
7. The command should now look similar to the following, but the path to the .iso and drive number will be different for your setup. sudo dd if=/Users/john/Downloads/ubuntu-22.04-desktop-amd64-mac-mattgadient.com.iso of=/dev/disk2 bs=8M.
8. Once you're sure the command is correct, press [Enter], enter your password, press [Enter] again and let it do its job. (When it's done the command prompt will simply appear again. If something's gone wrong you'll receive an error message.)

 

[ejwjohn]

Hello,

When i look at the USB stick using the Mac terminal, is indicates that there are basically 2 partitions i believe they are Disk11s1 which is listed as 0xEF, and then there is disk11s2 which is listed Linux..... before i start your procedure, is this what you would expect to be on the USB stick after i executed the previous procedure?

Back to your suggestion do i have to format the USB stick again? and do i have to put the iso now on what i call partition 1 ie disk11s1?.. because if this is the case the partition is currently not big enough for the Linux iso.

thanks

JohnW

 

[Amethyst1]

When i look at the USB stick using the Mac terminal, is indicates that there are basically 2 partitions i believe they are Disk11s1 which is listed as 0xEF, and then there is disk11s2 which is listed Linux..... before i start your procedure, is this what you would expect to be on the USB stick after i executed the previous procedure?

That looks fine: a small EFI partition and the main Linux partition.

Back to your suggestion do i have to format the USB stick again? and do i have to put the iso now on what i call partition 1 ie disk11s1?.. because if this is the case the partition is currently not big enough for the Linux iso.

The format shouldn't™ matter since the entire stick will be overwritten starting from the beginning. dd writes the iso to the stick (/dev/disk11) block-by-block so it will end up having the format specified in the iso.

 

[TheShortTimer]

When I was dabbling with Linux on the Mac and searching for a suitable distro, I successfully used the second method that's outlined in this article to create bootable Live USB drives from the Terminal. I'd imagine that @Amethyst1's suggestions will get you over the finish line but if not, give it a go.

 

[Amethyst1]

You can try installing the rFFInd boot manager and see if it picks up the Ubuntu stick. It offers way more options than the standard [Alt]/[Option] boot picker too.

 

[ejwjohn]

When I was dabbling with Linux on the Mac and searching for a suitable distro, I successfully used the second method that's outlined in this article to create bootable Live USB drives from the Terminal. I'd imagine that @Amethyst1's suggestions will get you over the finish line but if not, give it a go.

OK I tried the method you recommended but still no joy i am afraid.

I am using the latest OSX and it created the ubuntu.dmg and not the ubuntu.img but i tried both with the same result.
for your info the USB stick i am using is listed here as disk8 see image below for how it looked after the initial Erase.

and the image below is how it looked after writing the ubuntu.img file

Do these look right to you please?

thx

JohnW

 

[ejwjohn]

You can try installing the rFFInd boot manager and see if it picks up the Ubuntu stick. It offers way more options than the standard [Alt]/[Option] boot picker too.

Interesting about RFFind utility.

When I read the info about what it will do, I thought this is "Way above my pay grade" i am not that familiar with the command line so thought it would be a waste of time trying it, but went ahead and installed it on the Mac Pro 1.1

When i restarted the Mac using the Alt/Option Key nothing changed I got the same selections of boot from the MAC OSX disk or the Recovery disk... i never managed to get rFFind to identify either the USB stick or the DVD drive which i burnt with the relevant modified version of Ubuntu.

However i inadvertently booted the MAC with no keys pressed and "bingo" it booted to rEFind with more options but no sign of the DVD or the USB stick, so i selected the MAC OSX drive......... and it hung the machine could not now boot from the OSX Drive???

To cut a long story very short i had to revert to the Recovery disk option in the end and when i finally got a working copy of Lion up and running on the MAc Pro 1.1 and ran Disk Utility it reported that the original MAC OSX drive i had successfully used to boot before installing rFFind was damaged and OSX could not repair it ?????? so nto sure what happened there ???

One other point i have tried to locate where the Boot code is located on my Mac and i have failed??? any ideas i thought i would be located the mysterious UEFI code to ee what i actually have installed .....

Thanks for your guys help on this, is it possible to load a version of Windows directly onto this hardware without going through the Linux step?

JohnW

 

[Amethyst1]

[…] is it possible to load a version of Windows directly onto this hardware without going through the Linux step?

Yes, but if you want to use a 64-bit version, you also need to modify the Windows iso — it’s the same 32-bit EFI conundrum.
A 32-bit version should work out of the box but will limit you to 4 GB RAM (or maybe even less).

 

[netsrot39]

is it possible to load a version of Windows directly onto this hardware without going through the Linux step?

It is but as Amethyst1 has pointed out you have to modify the installer. Here is how I did it without modifying anything: I installed Windows 7 x64 on my Mac Pro 3,1 (64-bit EFI) and swapped the drive back to my Mac Pro 2,1 (also 32-bit EFI as Mac Pro 1,1). The funny thing is that after the install you do not have to modify anything in order to boot Windows with a 32-bit EFI even with a 64-bit installation BUT you have to install first on a 64-bit EFI machine like a later Mac Pro oder a similar PC. Simply swap the drive after the installation and you should be good to go.

 

[ejwjohn]

Yes, but if you want to use a 64-bit version, you also need to modify the Windows iso — it’s the same 32-bit EFI conundrum.
A 32-bit version should work out of the box but will limit you to 4 GB RAM (or maybe even less).

Hello,

I am stuck on the first challenge i cannot install oscdimg onto my OSX system.... i am assuming i can run this command in Terminal.

John

 

[ejwjohn]

It is but as Amethyst1 has pointed out you have to modify the installer. Here is how I did it without modifying anything: I installed Windows 7 x64 on my Mac Pro 3,1 (64-bit EFI) and swapped the drive back to my Mac Pro 2,1 (also 32-bit EFI as Mac Pro 1,1). The funny thing is that after the install you do not have to modify anything in order to boot Windows with a 32-bit EFI even with a 64-bit installation BUT you have to install first on a 64-bit EFI machine like a later Mac Pro oder a similar PC. Simply swap the drive after the installation and you should be good to go.

Interesting, I have access to another old mac (Mac Mini 2013 approx) so if all else fails i may try to mount the Mac Pro 1.1 disk externally and see if i can create a bootable disk that way.

Thanks

JohnW

 

[Amethyst1]

One other point i have tried to locate where the Boot code is located on my Mac and i have failed??? any ideas i thought i would be located the mysterious UEFI code to ee what i actually have installed .....

1. Fire up Applications > Utilities > Terminal and type diskutil list.
2. Find the identifier for the hard drive you've booted from. It's the one that has the partition Lion booted from on it.
3. Create a mount point for the EFI system partition by typing sudo mkdir /Volumes/efi.
4. Mount the EFI system partition by typing sudo mount -t msdos /dev/disk0s1 /Volumes/efi, replacing /dev/disk0 with the identifier for the hard drive you've booted from. Don't forget to add s1 afterwards to point to the first partition on the drive, which should™ be the EFI system partition (it is on my systems).

 

[Amethyst1]

I am stuck on the first challenge i cannot install oscdimg onto my OSX system.... i am assuming i can run this command in Terminal.

oscdimg is for Windows.

 

[ejwjohn]

Hmmmm... Thanks

 

[ejwjohn]

1. Fire up Applications > Utilities > Terminal and type diskutil list.
2. Find the identifier for the hard drive you've booted from. It's the one that has the partition Lion booted from on it.
3. Create a mount point for the EFI system partition by typing sudo mkdir /Volumes/efi.
4. Mount the EFI system partition by typing sudo mount -t msdos /dev/disk0s1 /Volumes/efi, replacing /dev/disk0 with the identifier for the hard drive you've booted from. Don't forget to add s1 afterwards to point to the first partition on the drive, which should™ be the EFI system partition (it is on my systems).

Hello,

For the uninitiated, ie me, why would I do this, please? I am trying to learn as i go on this one...

Before i hit the Post Reply button i thought i would find out what i have on the system at present, please see the image below

Both disks appear to have an EFI partition already, is this what you would expect?

In this image the disk that is the boot disk is Disk1 but since i took this i have switched the physical drives around so now the boot drive is Disk0

Thanks

JohnW