macOS 10.14 Mojave on Unsupported Macs Thread

[jhowarth]

Hello, I am running macos mojave 10.14 GM, and I would like to try the version 10.14.1 beta 1.
I downloaded the dude patcher 1.22.
Could you help me how to do it?
My mac is a macbook pro 8,1. I tried by software update but it is not working.

Thank you very much.

The software update contains boot rom upgrades which breaks the installation process on unsupported Macs so everyone will just have to wait until 10.14.1 is released to install via the full installer.

 

[PBear.SF]

When doing a clean install of the Final last week, I reformatted my HDD back to HFS+ after using APFS since around DP4 or DP5. Several weeks ago, I had read the following article (which, I think, was linked in a previous post here but can't remember by whom or when): Using APFS on HDDs... and Why You Might Not Want To.

The points made in the article seemed to become evidently obvious on my machine after using APFS for several weeks: My installation of Mojave Beta grew increasingly more sluggish over time -- until, finally, it became unbearably slow to respond. Apps would take forever to open, as would preference panes in System Prefs. Particularly slow was opening a data file by double-clicking on it to open it directly into an application.

Since reformatting to HFS+ and installing the Mojave final release, my Mac has become extremely fast again. It boots in one-third the time it did under APFS and many applications open almost instantly. I will have to see if even this setup starts to slow down as time goes by but I suspect that it will not slow down as much as it did when trying to run Mojave on an HDD with APFS. I just don't think spinning platters and APFS are a good match.

I realise this may mean that I will lose software updates via System Preferences (although there doesn't seem to be any certainty that this will be true when reverting to the standard update scheme, as I have now unenrolled from the beta program) but I think the trade-off will be worth it in order to have a faster-running machine.

 

[pkouame]

I'm about to upgrade my unsupported MBP5,5 from 10.14 final release to 10.14.1 beta 1. Couple of questions please @pkouame.
Assuming I will receive OTA message from System Preferences | Software Update, download and reboot and post install.

1. Reset my boot-args on nvram ?
2. Do I need to SMC + PRAM reset ?

Thank You.

Also, on the post install, make sure to NOT click on the APFS selection?

I was just being super paranoid, so did some house cleaning.
You may be good with all the standard defaults, if you aren't actively testing and self-administering like some of us are.
YMMV.

 

[CharlieRuiz97]

I have a 4.1 mini with the same 2.4 chip and 320M video system.
How does your 7.1 MB handle 1080p video, any dropped frames?

I dont have any dropped frames, 1080p video on my macbook works fine.

 

[pkouame]

To those arguing about open source, sorry for starting a fight. In my opinion, the distinction is simple.
--> Documentation is vital. What are we patching, and if we were to do it manually, how would we do that?
--> Open source is great, but not necessary. That is up to the author of the software.

For example, how to patch Night Shift is documented here. That is fantastic! There is no reason for dosdude1 to release the code for his automated Night Shift patcher if he doesn't want to. Any of us can write our own, now that the knowledge is public.

Another example is the nVidia Tesla patch. I explained that in detail here. That's all we need, really.

The problematic cases are things like the APFS Boot ROM patcher, SUVMMFaker.dylib, or LegacyUSBInjector. We neither know how those work, nor have the source code. This, in my opinion, needs to be fixed if possible.

I have the code to SUVMMFaker if you want it. @Czo was kind of enough to disclose a while ago.
I rebuilt a special version with extra logging for my own purposes, just because I was curious about the spoofing going on under the hood. I would contact the authors of other critical kexts directly...

 

[ASentientBot]

When doing a clean install of the Final last week, I reformatted my HDD back to HFS+ after using APFS since around DP4 or DP5. Several weeks ago, I had read the following article (which, I think, was linked in a previous post here but can't remember by whom or when): Using APFS on HDDs... and Why You Might Not Want To.

The points made in the article seemed to become evidently obvious on my machine after using APFS for several weeks: My installation of Mojave Beta grew increasingly more sluggish over time -- until, finally, it became unbearably slow to respond. Apps would take forever to open, as would preference panes in System Prefs. Particularly slow was opening a data file by double-clicking on it to open it directly into an application.

Since reformatting to HFS+ and installing the Mojave final release, my Mac has become extremely fast again. It boots in one-third the time it did under APFS and many applications open almost instantly. I will have to see if even this setup starts to slow down as time goes by but I suspect that it will not slow down as much as it did when trying to run Mojave on an HDD with APFS. I just don't think spinning platters and APFS are a good match.

I realise this may mean that I will lose software updates via System Preferences (although there doesn't seem to be any certainty that this will be true when reverting to the standard update scheme, as I have now unenrolled from the beta program) but I think the trade-off will be worth it in order to have a faster-running machine.

I made the same decision of HFS+ rather than APFS.

Just wanted to mention that the lack of updates via System Preferences is probably a non-issue. Once an update (actual release, not beta) comes out, they will presumably issue a combo updater through their website as always. So updates won't be too bad, either.
[doublepost=1538099124][/doublepost]

I have the code to SUVMMFaker if you want it. @Czo was kind of enough to disclose a while ago.
I rebuilt a special version with extra logging for my own purposes, just because I was curious about the spoofing going on under the hood. I would contact the authors of other critical kexts directly...

Please share

I believe the rest are written by parrotgeek1, right?

 

[pkouame]

I made the same decision of HFS+ rather than APFS.

Just wanted to mention that the lack of updates via System Preferences is probably a non-issue. Once an update (actual release, not beta) comes out, they will presumably issue a combo updater through their website as always. So updates won't be too bad, either.
[doublepost=1538099124][/doublepost]

Please share

I believe the rest are written by parrotgeek1, right?

Yes A LOT was written by @parrotgeek1 . PM me for the original and a few of my faker variations. You have xcode I presume?
[doublepost=1538099680][/doublepost]

The software update contains boot rom upgrades which breaks the installation process on unsupported Macs so everyone will just have to wait until 10.14.1 is released to install via the full installer.

I system upgraded to 10.4.1 developer beta without issue (see previous posts) . Most should still wait for the official updates though.

 

[CharlieRuiz97]

I have this MacBook and helped find some of the patches for it. Never had any trouble with screen colors... Not sure what's up with yours but you might try calibrating it -- there's a button right there. Otherwise, a re-install of the legacy video patch and/or the whole system might help?

I will try to re-install the video-patch, thanks!

It is noticeably different from HS?

Yes by a lot. color hue looks weird and warmer for that reason is that i'm using the Generic RGB Color Profile that looks better.

Patch for Night Shift following the tutorial here or use @jackluke's pre-patched copy.

@dosdude1 launched night shift patch today on the patch updater. but thanks for give me the links to the tutorial.

 

[visberry]

I have strongly considered making the patcher's code public. The main thing I'm worried about, though, if I were to release it, is that somebody will take it, modify it for malicious purposes, and try to distribute it. It does, of course, make modifications to system files. Secondly, I don't like the idea of having untested or unnecessary patches added to it. For example, somebody earlier in this thread mentioned something about adding a "Mid 2010 MacBook Pro GPU Fix" patch to my tool for whatever reason. What obviously was not known by this person is that this "Mid-2010 MacBook Pro GPU issue" is a hardware issue, and that it's not actually an issue with the GPU itself. The actual cause is a failing capacitor on the GPU framebuffer power rail. Lastly, yes, documentation of all the patches included with the tool would be a good idea. I will more than likely write some sort of detailed documentation for it once I have a bit more free time. I'm currently at college, so my time is somewhat limited. Also, I get upwards of around 30 emails asking about some aspect of the patcher every day. I do try to respond to every one of them, which takes quite a bit of time.

Very true, if this patch gets into the wrong hands, it could be bad.

 

[CharlieRuiz97]

I have a Macook 6,1 (identical to 7,1), did you do a clean installation?

yes it was a clean installation.

I did it and later restore all aplications with Time Machine

i didn't make a time machine backup of the apps, i re-installed all of them from zero.

I did it and later restore all aplications with Time Machine but the fan is a full speed and nothing in Activity Monitor is using the CPU.

I don't have that issue, my macbook runs well. try to re-install all the patches or try to re-install mojave again with a clean installation.

 

[visberry]

I somehow missed this until now. It actually helps a lot. Thank you!

Thanks man! Telegram looked terrible without this option on!

 

[grumpycompuprof]

Awesome tip. That was exactly what I was looking for. I put my MacBook Pro Mid-2009 (5,3) to sleep, yet the fans kept on going about 5900 RPM and it got quite warm. Hopefully this will take care of that. I use an external Insignia monitor exclusively and do not need the LCD from the laptop itself. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Now I will donate some to the dosdude1. He deserves it. Keeps my MBP going since Sierra without a hitch.

Hey guys,

I found a great alternative for clamshell mode not working. It is called DisableMonitor and it works with Mojave. And it not only allows you to disable the laptop or external display, it's also an awesome screen resolution switcher which Apple has left missing for quite sometime.

https://github.com/Eun/DisableMonitor

Download:
DisableMonitor-G1.92.zip

View attachment 770356

 

[gnubee]

defaults write -g CGFontRenderingFontSmoothingDisabled -bool NO

This code broke something important concerning the imposition of gray color even in dark mode.

Look at the menus of applications that have no dark mode.

@jackluke / @pkouame this may be interesting for you.

To change it back try:

defaults delete -g CGFontRenderingFontSmoothingDisabled

 

[webg3]

To change it back try:

defaults delete -g CGFontRenderingFontSmoothingDisabled

defaults write -g CGFontRenderingFontSmoothingDisabled -bool YES

 

[jlnsgr]

Hey,

I'm currently running 2018/09/12 DP11, 2018/09/12 PB10, build 18A389, installer 14.0.21 on my unsupported MacBook Pro 13" Late-2011 and I was wondering what process do I need to follow if I want to update to 2018/09/24 Final 10.14, build 18A391, installer 14.0.22.
Can I just update my MacBook Pro from System Preferences or do I need to do anything else regarding the patch?

I tried to find info about updating but didn't find any. Thanks in advance.

 

[BookEmDanno]

I was just being super paranoid, so did some house cleaning.
You may be good with all the standard defaults, if you aren't actively testing and self-administering like some of us are.
YMMV.

My attempt to upgrade from 10.14 final to 10.14.1 beta failed.

Did a OTA (System Preferences | Software Update) and then used @dosdude1's patcher/macos post install versions 1.1.2, 1.2.0, 1.2.1 and 1.2.2. No dice.

I guess I will need to wait for the "boot rom upgrades" needed for unsupported macs. I do not wish to wait for the final 10.14.1 final release as I need to do some testing with Xcode 10.1 development plus the other options now available on the beta.

Mahalo @pkouame, @TimothyR734 for your suggestions, contributions. Special Mahalo to @dosdude1 for his continuing work on this thread.

 

[sapphade]

I did a fresh install of Mojave on my iMac 9,1. Its the first time I have installed it on this machine and everything seems to work bar the brightness control . When I press the control buttons the increments do go up and down but the actual brightness on the screen doesn't get brighter or darker its just stuck in the middle brightness. Any ideas ?

 

[jackluke]

Would you clarify that? Are you saying that that only happens when you're in verbose boot, as in there is some difference (beyond logs) between regular and verbose boot?

Not only, it happens even during "standard boot mode" shutting down, but can't be noticed, while it can be noticed only if booting from verbose mode, "verbose parts" showed are at startup, log-out and shutdown, and there is no difference between regular and verbose boot.
[doublepost=1538121420][/doublepost]

defaults write -g CGFontRenderingFontSmoothingDisabled -bool NO

This code broke something important concerning the imposition of gray color even in dark mode.

Look at the menus of applications that have no dark mode.

@jackluke / @pkouame this may be interesting for you.

Infact I prefer the default "bolded" Mojave fonts.
Deleting that variable or setting its "bool TRUE" gives the same result: default fonts.
[doublepost=1538121753][/doublepost]

Hey,

I'm currently running 2018/09/12 DP11, 2018/09/12 PB10, build 18A389, installer 14.0.21 on my unsupported MacBook Pro 13" Late-2011 and I was wondering what process do I need to follow if I want to update to 2018/09/24 Final 10.14, build 18A391, installer 14.0.22.
Can I just update my MacBook Pro from System Preferences or do I need to do anything else regarding the patch?

I tried to find info about updating but didn't find any. Thanks in advance.

I guess you can't from System Preferences since it's required the APFS file system, it seems that the dosdude1's USB Mojave installs Mojave on HFS+ by default, so at the moment the only safe way to upgrade is to recreate a new USB Installer with the latest Mojave Patcher and then booting from it re-install again into your current Mojave Volume doing a refreshing re-installation.
[doublepost=1538122798][/doublepost]

Maybe each system needs it's own prelinkedkernel? Idk much about this subject but I know my patch works for me and yours don't. @dosdude1

As far I know, when you create a correct prelinkedkernel it will work on almost any machine like those used in any MacOS Installer or Recovery, I confirm that I've tested your prelinkedkernel and it's working.

 

[Aletancredo]

My attempt to upgrade from 10.14 final to 10.14.1 beta failed.
View attachment 789902
Did a OTA (System Preferences | Software Update) and then used @dosdude1's patcher/macos post install versions 1.1.2, 1.2.0, 1.2.1 and 1.2.2. No dice.

I guess I will need to wait for the "boot rom upgrades" needed for unsupported macs. I do not wish to wait for the final 10.14.1 final release as I need to do some testing with Xcode 10.1 development plus the other options now available on the beta.

Mahalo @pkouame, @TimothyR734 for your suggestions, contributions. Special Mahalo to @dosdude1 for his continuing work on this thread.

Hello thanks for share with us. Using system preferences and then software update I received a message that there is no new software actually I am running the GM 10.14. I tried to install the version 10.14.1 using the dosdude1 patcher 1.22 with a pen drive but my Mac is still on the GM 10.14. I don't know what I am doing wrong.

 

[webg3]

As far I know, when you create a correct prelinkedkernel it will work on almost any machine like those used in any MacOS Installer or Recovery, I confirm that I've tested your prelinkedkernel and it's working.

How do I use this prelinkedkernel?
Where do I put the file?
Which commands to use in Terminal?
Can you teach me, please?
Thank you very much.

PS: No other Patch worked on my hardware, just Patch 1.2.0, I believe I will have to learn to do manually in the near future.

 

[MX20]

"

• Graphics anomalies: Currently, pre-metal video cards used in Mojave will produce a weird darkish grey Menu Bar and Finder sidebar when using the light theme. In the dark theme, these anomalies are not present, while other, less obvious anomalies are present (window corners may not render properly, bottom part of dock menus may have artifacts). A workaround for graphics anomalies in light mode is to enable Reduce Transparency in System Preferences > Accessibility > Display (this might create additional side effects beside the obvious loss of transpareny as some systems with pre-metal AMD graphics render the dock in dark gray)."

Is there a way to fix it with the upcoming patch?

 

[yeiyei0891]

#!/bin/bash
echo “Reduce Transparency of Menus and Finder, keep the Dock transparent.”
# Run on.
defaults write com.apple.universalaccess reduceTransparency -bool false
killall Finder
killall Dock
killall NotificationCenter
sleep 3
defaults write com.apple.universalaccess reduceTransparency -bool true
killall Finder
killall Spotlight
defaults write com.apple.universalaccess reduceTransparency -bool false
killall Finder
killall Dock
killall NotificationCenter
sleep 3
defaults write com.apple.universalaccess reduceTransparency -bool true
killall Finder
killall Spotlight
defaults write -g CGFontRenderingFontSmoothingDisabled -bool NO

kill `ps -A | grep -w Terminal.app | grep -v grep | awk '{print $1}'`
echo "Done!"

I applied this at the beginning but many texts still look bad, with BOLD.
Can this be solved in the future with a patch?

 

[jackluke]

How do I use this prelinkedkernel?
Where do I put the file?
Which commands to use in Terminal?
Can you teach me, please?
Thank you very much.

PS: No other Patch worked on my hardware, just Patch 1.2.0, I believe I will have to learn to do manually in the near future.

You have to replace the prelinkedkernel file into the USB Mojave Installer path: /System/Library/PrelinkedKernels/
probably the prelinkedkernel inside is "locked", to unlock simply ctrl+click on it, "Get Info" and de-select "locked", after you can move, rename or replace it.

edit:
Keep in mind that prelinkedkernel NOT contains the current Mojave kernel, but the last one available when has been created, however it works, you can build a custom prelinkedkernel even using a Mojave beta 1 kernel, and it will work anyway.

 

[roronl]

Hello thanks for share with us. Using system preferences and then software update I received a message that there is no new software actually I am running the GM 10.14. I tried to install the version 10.14.1 using the dosdude1 patcher 1.22 with a pen drive but my Mac is still on the GM 10.14. I don't know what I am doing wrong.

Remove your beta program profile. Reboot, update.
(https://www.imore.com/how-opt-out-macos-beta-program)

 

[0403979]

Not only, it happens even during "standard boot mode" shutting down, but can't be noticed, while it can be noticed only if booting from verbose mode, "verbose parts" showed are at startup, log-out and shutdown, and there is no difference between regular and verbose boot.
[doublepost=1538121420][/doublepost]

Infact I prefer the default "bolded" Mojave fonts.
Deleting that variable or setting its "bool TRUE" gives the same result: default fonts.
[doublepost=1538121753][/doublepost]

I guess you can't from System Preferences since it's required the APFS file system, it seems that the dosdude1's USB Mojave installs Mojave on HFS+ by default, so at the moment the only safe way to upgrade is to recreate a new USB Installer with the latest Mojave Patcher and then booting from it re-install again into your current Mojave Volume doing a refreshing re-installation.
[doublepost=1538122798][/doublepost]

As far I know, when you create a correct prelinkedkernel it will work on almost any machine like those used in any MacOS Installer or Recovery, I confirm that I've tested your prelinkedkernel and it's working.

I am assuming that it’s simply dosdude’s files that aren’t working then, what device did you test it on?