macOS 10.14 Mojave on Unsupported Macs Thread

[DaniloGeekDude]

Since you succeeded updating Mojave 10.14.1 beta 4, could you tell to the other owners of MacBookPro5,3 your BootROM and SMC versions ?

Just typing from Mojave terminal: system_profiler SPHardwareDataType

your BootROM should be this: MBP53.00AC.B03 (EFI 1.7)
SMC: 1.33f8 (SMC 1.2)

They are useful to others to understand if they have upgraded their firmware, that could be the reason why can't boot more after Mojave updates. Don't worry these two firmware versions are not related in any manner to your serial number, they are identical for all the same machine models. I've posted mine too for the MacBook7,1 models: MacBook7,1 BootROM and SMC from official 10.13.6 used for 10.14.0 APFS

Good Morning (or whatever timezone where you are at).

Here's the info, captured via Terminal. Also included the Software Profile.



For those that have the same device (MacbookPro5,3) that failed upgrade to 10.14.1 beta 4, can you share your existing BootROM and SMC versions too?

Regards.

 

[jackluke]

Good Morning (or whatever timezone where you are at).

Here's the info, captured via Terminal. Also included the Software Profile.

View attachment 797268

For those that have the same device (MacbookPro5,3) that failed upgrade to 10.14.1 beta 4, can you share your existing BootROM and SMC versions too?

Regards.

Ok, I can confirm you that the 1.48f2 SMC version was released in 2010 so you have still original old firmware, now, can those who own the same MBP5,x and have failed to upgrade 10.14.1 beta, check their BootROM and SMC versions ?

I believe this check is explanatory.

 

[grzegorz9141]

I finally ended up reinstalling the old video card, and patching the Mojave install. I used the Legacy Video Card patch since the ATI card was installed. Everythig worked, so I reinstalled the Nvidia card. Everything works now with the GTX765, except I don’t have hardware acceleration.

Is there anyway to uninstall the Lagacy Video Card patch? (e.g. revert to Mojave’s default Nvidia drivers). Preferably without rerunning the Mojave installer.

I have same problem, how to remove Legacy Video Card patch?

Thanks

 

[hal90088]

Any idea about how to patch the backlight of an iMac 7.1 manually?

I'm thinking that may be possible by copying this two kext from my macbook 5.1 to the iMac 7.1

- AppleBacklight.kext
- AppleBacklightExpert.kext

I suppose that this two kexts may be what the patcher modifies. But Macbook 5.1 has a Nvidia graphics card and the iMac 7.1 has an ATI graphics card, so doing it has some risks.

Any idea to patch the backlight buttons in a safe way?

 

[jhowarth]

It was probably trying to do a firmware update. Did you force the system to power off at any point during this process (held down power button/unplugged system)? If so, you interrupted a firmware update, which bricked your machine. The only way to fix it now is to desolder the SPI-ROM, and reflash it using an external SPI programmer.

Should we expect the current Mojave patcher application to suppress attempts at the new firmware updates or will this likely require a new version? Also has anyone seen attempts at firmware updates on a MacPro for 10.14.1?
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Here’s an interesting story - bit long but hopefully worth reading...

MacPro 3.1 (Early 2008) - 8 core, 64GB RAM, OWC PCI card with SSD boot disk, several other SSD internally, plus a Sonnet USB 3.0 card and an official GeForce 680 Mac GPU card, connected via HDMI to a 32” 4K monitor.

Upgraded to Sierra fine back in the day - no issues.

When it came out, I tried to upgrade to High Sierra multiple times over many weeks and months (using DosDude1’s tools and a USB stick), never worked: the upgrade would go in (on an internal SSD - not the PCI SSD), I applied the post-install patches, but rebooting into HS never worked - would hang for 20+ hours and I would reboot and try again. And again. And again...and eventually gave up.

Ok so now I tried to upgrade to Mojave - even though allegedly cannot do that without going to HS first. The upgrade would go in (again on an internal SSD), I applied the post-install patches, rebooting into Mojave would eventually work but it took 2+ hours before it was up.

Once booted it was “functional” but pretty much everything (opening Safari, Console, System Prefs etc) took 20+ mins to open, and once open, operations such as changing a tickbox in System Prefs took 5+ mins to register. Nothing obvious in the logs as to why this was happening.


So I started removing hardware…

PCI SSD card out - no change
USB 3.0 card out - no change
all SSDs other than newly installed Mojave SSD - no change

Only leaves the GPU and perhaps the RAM. I don’t have any other GPU easily to hand (flashed MacVids Titan X in my MaxPro 2012 but that is my daily driver so staying put for now).


RAM is 8x 8GB from OWC:

- Removed all but top RAM card slots 1/2 (leaving 16GB total) - Mojave booted quickly and ran normally !!! WTF ???
- Added bottom RAM card slots 1/2 (32GB total) - still booting/working fine.
- Added top card slots 3/4 (48GB total) - ditto !
- Added bottom RAM card slots 3/4 (64GB total) - uh oh slow boot again :-(
- Removed bottom RAM card slots 1/2, moved slots 3/4 to slots 1/2 (48GB total) - all good - so it’s not the RAM per se…
- Top and bottom RAM card are interchangeable, so swapped them over - repeated above changes - same results - so it’s not the RAM cards per se.

Remember that the RAM all worked fine in Sierra - all 64GB registered, no issues ever - so that rules out a Motherboard hardware issue.

I tend to discount firmware because back in Sierra it all works fine again with the same firmware - so it’s the O/S that has triggered this.

So I am left with the idea that from Sierra to HS & Mojave, something changed in the O/S that caused previously fine 64 GB RAM setup to no longer work - presumably this is causing constant hardware interruptions that is slowing processing to an absolute crawl.

Could be something with the RAM itself that the O/S does not like ? Official max with these machines is 32GB RAM, but some time ago it was found max 64GB RAM was possible and 8x8GB RAM sets were made available - worked fine up to Sierra, but now under HS and Mojave this no longer works ?

Or could it be a Motherboard issue with bottom RAM card slots 3/4 - again worked fine under Sierra, but something changed in the O/S under HS/Mojave that now those slots do not work properly ?

Thoughts ?

Are these attempts all upgrade installs or did you try a clean install of Mojave? Also what file system are you installing on? I have clean installed with migration on a MacPro 3,1 with 16 Gb of ram and a Mac rom flashed GTX-680 without issue. The SanDisk 3D Ultra on the machine in question was formatted as APFS and the APFS ROM patches were applied to the boot firmware.

 

[hwojtek]

A patched Mojave boots up from a USB SSD and then aborts seconds into the installation with "unable to unmount disk for repair".

Just to add to my own post in case anyone else searches for a solution, as apparently, this happens not only on Mojave, but also is a general issue with upgrades. This message is 100% remedied with following terminal commands issued on the system you are willing to upgrade (remember to cd to root folder):

sudo mv /.quota.ops.user /.quota.ops.user.org
sudo mv /.quota.user /.quota.user.orig

Neither Disk Utility nor any other disk maintenance app I was able to find could solve this, since this is not a disk problem but a Mac OS bug. The commands, however, are totally safe.

 

[idnovic]

Any idea about how to patch the backlight of an iMac 7.1 manually?

I'm thinking that may be possible by copying this two kext from my macbook 5.1 to the iMac 7.1

- AppleBacklight.kext
- AppleBacklightExpert.kext

I suppose that this two kexts may be what the patcher modifies. But Macbook 5.1 has a Nvidia graphics card and the iMac 7.1 has an ATI graphics card, so doing it has some risks.

Any idea to patch the backlight buttons in a safe way?

I have the same iMac and can tell you that brightness control works for me. But I rebooted the installer and just reinstalled the patches that did not function. And since I upgraded from Sierra I also used onxy or onyx? to clean the system. Do not reinstall the audio patch if volume control works for you because I lost control after reboot after patching audio again. Thanks for the bluetooth information. Still need to uprade wireless on mine. Only thing not working for me is night shift. Is night shift working for you? (I am currently using f.lux)

 

[jhowarth]

Does anyone here have a true EVGA GTX-680 Mac Edition card (not a flashed one)? If so, what does GPU-z under Windows show for the VBIOS of that card? I am curious if there are any newer than 80.04.87.00.09? I ask because the nvidia proprietary linux drivers beyond the 340 release no longer work.

 

[Bion1nc]

Hello,

Configuration of the Xserve 2009:

2.26 GHz Quad-Core Intel Xeon, 6GB of RAM 1066 DDR3 and Nvidia Geforce 120GT 256MB.

I managed to install Mojave 10.14 on a Xserve3,1, actually there is another way to install I THINK Mojave on each machine the way I installed mine.

I managed to install 10.14 on a spare hard drive that I had from my cMP, once finished I navigated to /System/Library/CoreServices/PlatformSupport.plist ( used Wrangler to edit and unlock ) and there added to entries ( your board ID ) you can get the board ID by typing:

var_ID=$(ioreg -p IODeviceTree -r -n / -d 1 | grep board-id);var_ID=${var_ID##*<\"};var_ID=${var_ID%%\">};echo $var_ID

First Entry goes at SupportedBoardIDs
Second one goes at SupportedModelProperties

Put the HD or SSD back in place, and the machine will boot. You have a first boot and no acceleration, now take your patched Mojave from your USB Thumb and boot from it open the PostInstall and Patch your HD, choose your model, and let the PostIntall do the rest.

I'm case this was very useful as I needed to run macOS Mojave 10.14 DP1 and with the patched version I could not boot and install it on.

I was even able to update the bootrom to 140.0.0.0.0

On that same one agin lol, I dumped the EFI form my cMP and flashed the Xserve with, results now I have a system Xserve seen as a cMPmid2012 running X5690 ( 6 Cores ) yes you heard it well 6 core on a Xserve2009.

Now I have not done that on a Xserve 2 sockets but I think I want to know if it works, and in theory it should work.

The only thing I can't get back is the regrettable blue light CPU loads. trying to find a way to bring that back and I'm now not sure that it is stored in the EFI rom. 100% actually.

 

[0403979]

Any idea about how to patch the backlight of an iMac 7.1 manually?

I'm thinking that may be possible by copying this two kext from my macbook 5.1 to the iMac 7.1

- AppleBacklight.kext
- AppleBacklightExpert.kext

I suppose that this two kexts may be what the patcher modifies. But Macbook 5.1 has a Nvidia graphics card and the iMac 7.1 has an ATI graphics card, so doing it has some risks.

Any idea to patch the backlight buttons in a safe way?

This is the patch, I haven’t tried this but you can probably figure it out from the files. Download here.

 

[dosdude1]

This is the patch, I haven’t tried this but you can probably figure it out from the files. Download here.

It was causing kernel panics on some systems apparently, so try at your own risk. That's why I haven't fully released this patch for Mojave yet.

 

[DaKKs]

Is this patcher specifically made for betas? Been trying to get the release version working. Installed but it wont wont work, just KPs when i do the same steps. I imaged back my working public beta onto my machine, cause, well it worked...

I'm running Raid0 ssds so my options are limited. Either sierra or mojave.

 

[dosdude1]

Is this patcher specifically made for betas? Been trying to get the release version working. Installed but it wont wont work, just KPs when i do the same steps. I imaged back my working public beta onto my machine, cause, well it worked...

I'm running Raid0 ssds so my options are limited. Either sierra or mojave.

You need to make sure you re-apply the post-install patch after installing the final release, otherwise it will kernel panic on Core 2 Duo systems.

 

[0403979]

@dosdude1 Are you investigating the issues with 10.14.1? Do you have an idea on how to fix this?

 

[DaniloGeekDude]

Ok, I can confirm you that the 1.48f2 SMC version was released in 2010 so you have still original old firmware, now, can those who own the same MBP5,x and have failed to upgrade 10.14.1 beta, check their BootROM and SMC versions ?

I believe this check is explanatory.

@jackluke, can you point me to info source on where you confirmed the SMC version for my particular device? Or more comprehensive source or database that list corresponding device | original smc versions? Thanks.
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Hi DaniloGeekDude,

I'm trying to install Mojave 10.14.1 Beta 4 on top of mac Mojave Version 10.14 (18A391),
every time I try to install from the Apple Store it never completes the install, the progress bar goes a half way then never moves after that. When I install it and does the first install and reboots I hold the "option/alt" key then select mojave patcher USB drive and boot off it, then select the terminal >csrutil disable next I run the post patcher select my macbook pro 5,3 then do the cache option too, then it reboots and tries to complete the rest of the Mojave 10.14.1 Beta 4 but never complete, the progress bar stays about in the middle of completion. I only have a public beta version of Mojave 10.14.1 Beta 4 not paid version.

Thank you,

I am not sure if Public Beta and Developer Beta is the same version as far as 10.14.1 betas are concerned. If the fact that it appeared on your OTA (System Preferences | Software Update), then it probably is.
Also check if your SMC version is 1.48f2 (same as mine, so it should work)

One more thing, my process of upgrading was done primarily via terminal, with this sequence of steps:

• sudo softwareupdate -da (downloads the files only on /Library/Updates)

or

• sudo sh -c "softwareupdate -ia && reboot" (for this step, let it go thru the upgrade. Then when it reboots (after 10.14.1 install), option key to boot to @dosdude1's usb mojave patcher and ran post install.
  
  Hope it works for you.

 

[Dannyy]

I have a huge performance boost after installing Mojave on my MBP5,1, and i'm wondering, is it because i have disabled spotlight indexing or there is another reason. Is it really so heavy and use that much cpu when it's enabled? I miss spotlight, i really enjoy to use it, but... Without it macOS is freaking smooth, no delays, animations are very smoothly, scrolling just give me amazing experience. Feels about 3-4x better performance than on High Sierra. I just can't believe.

 

[roronl]

I have a huge performance boost after installing Mojave on my MBP5,1, and i'm wondering, is it because i have disabled spotlight indexing or there is another reason. Is it really so heavy and use that much cpu when it's enabled? I miss spotlight, i really enjoy to use it, but... Without it macOS is freaking smooth, no delays, animations are very smoothly, scrolling just give me amazing experience. Feels about 3-4x better performance than on High Sierra. I just can't believe.

After the indexing, there is no heavy-cpu-load from Spotlight, so, turn it on, give it time to build a catalogus and you're good to go.

 

[jackluke]

@jackluke, can you point me to info source on where you confirmed the SMC version for my particular device? Or more comprehensive source or database that list corresponding device | original smc versions? Thanks.

Here is the official apple firmware list, but as stated by them, it's incomplete and deprecated: https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT201518

They still allow to download (and install) old firmwares both EFI and SMC, but I don't recommend to those who upgraded their (Mojave) firmware to attempt a downgrade, it could result into a brick, so better stay with your current firmware version.

 

[hal90088]

It was causing kernel panics on some systems apparently, so try at your own risk. That's why I haven't fully released this patch for Mojave yet.

world belongs to brave people!!

I try the brightness patch in my iMac 7.1 and I can confirm that in this model the patch works well. I haven't got any kernel panic (yet). Well... I was trying it since... only an hour. But I was working hard during this hour and it seems to work very well.

 

[visberry]

I am pretty confused on this whole thing with EFI updates. Mine is a MacBookPro7,1, so am I on the correct version?

Hardware Overview:


Model Name: MacBook Pro

Model Identifier: MacBookPro7,1

Processor Name: Intel Core 2 Duo

Processor Speed: 2.4 GHz

Number of Processors: 1

Total Number of Cores: 2

L2 Cache: 3 MB

Memory: 6 GB

Boot ROM Version: MBP71.003D.B00

SMC Version (system): 1.62f6

Serial Number (system): ---

Hardware UUID: XXXXXXE-4E28-XXXX-B0X1-A5XXX8XXXD4X

Sudden Motion Sensor:

State: Enabled

 

[hal90088]

I have the same iMac and can tell you that brightness control works for me. But I rebooted the installer and just reinstalled the patches that did not function. And since I upgraded from Sierra I also used onxy or onyx? to clean the system. Do not reinstall the audio patch if volume control works for you because I lost control after reboot after patching audio again. Thanks for the bluetooth information. Still need to uprade wireless on mine. Only thing not working for me is night shift. Is night shift working for you? (I am currently using f.lux)

YES!!! With the brightness patch now in mojave works all that was working in High Sierra. Night shift is working too. Now I can use bluethooth, wifi, the buttons to control bright and volume, sound... ALL!!! But i don't needed to patch audio. I use all the patches that appear in the installation of "mojave patcher" for this computer. Then, I patched manually bluethooth and I use the brigthness patcher. Only with this all is working.

 

[0403979]

YES!!! With the brightness patch now in mojave works all that was working in High Sierra. Night shift is working too. Now I can use bluethooth, wifi, the buttons to control bright and volume, sound... ALL!!! But i don't needed to patch audio. I use all the patches that appear in the installation of "mojave patcher" for this computer. Then, I patched manually bluethooth and I use the brigthness patcher. Only with this all is working.

There should be a bluetooth patch available in the patch updater for you.

 

[WarHeadz]

Sorry if it's been asked a million times over, but I'm having the brightness control issue on my iMac 9.1. Any fix for that yet?

 

[nrobfd]

I just installed mojave on my iMac 12,2. Everything went smoothly, but now I've got an odd lag. For example, when typing into the address bar in Chrome, there's a delay before the letters show up. I'm assuming this is not to be expected... anyone else have this issue / a solution?

 

[jhowarth]

I am pretty confused on this whole thing with EFI updates. Mine is a MacBookPro7,1, so am I on the correct version?

Hardware Overview:


Model Name: MacBook Pro

Model Identifier: MacBookPro7,1

Processor Name: Intel Core 2 Duo

Processor Speed: 2.4 GHz

Number of Processors: 1

Total Number of Cores: 2

L2 Cache: 3 MB

Memory: 6 GB

Boot ROM Version: MBP71.003D.B00

SMC Version (system): 1.62f6

Serial Number (system): ---

Hardware UUID: XXXXXXE-4E28-XXXX-B0X1-A5XXX8XXXD4X

Sudden Motion Sensor:

State: Enabled

Basically, on unsupported hardware, you shouldn't get any of the firmware updates applied which would change your Boot ROM version to a purely numeric version without any prefixed model identifier letters.