macOS 10.14 Mojave on Unsupported Macs Thread

[ford.tonthat]

I find my MacBook 5,1 (4GB Ram, 10.14.3) slow when performing tasks such as making 4K videos using FCPX, ect. Can I upgrade my memory to DDR3 - 4GB - Bus 1066Mhz - PC3 - 8500S? It is possible?

On Apple Support page:
Applicable model
MacBook (13-inch, Aluminum, Late 2008)

Memory specifications
This MacBook model has these memory specifications:

Number of memory slots 2
Base memory 2 GB (but also configured to order)
Maximum memory 4 GB
Memory card specifications - Double Data Rate Small Outline Dual Inline Memory Module (DDR SO-DIMM) format
- 30mm
- 1 GB or 2 GB
- 204-pin
- PC3-8500 DDR3 1066 MHz Type RAM
Additional notes For best performance, don't mix sizes; always install two identical memory modules (a pair of 1 GB, 2 GB, or 4 GB memory modules).

These are the original memory in my MacBook now:

Thank you

 

[Mallion]

So I'm new..not to life, but to this whole idea of running Mojave on "outdated" hardware. I was watching a YouTube video 2 days ago & the guy in it was talking about reviving an old white clam-shell mac by installing Mojave on it. I was blown away! I myself own a mid 2011 iMac with AMD Radeon HD 6xxx series GPU acceleration & after dusting it off I found my way here only to potentially have my biggest disappointment of 2019; My Mac isn't supported because of the graphics card!

I love my iMac & the notion that I could breath some new life into the old girl really got me excited. Does anyone know if support for the Radeon HD 5xxx/6xxx series is something that's being addressed or is it something that's already been attempted & isn't fixable?

 

[pollopo]

Hello everyone, i'm in a bit of a pickle right now with Mojave patcher.
I have a MacBook Pro 8,2 (Late 2011 15 inches) and when booting the USB drive the installer doesn't let me install the OS on my main drive because it says there's not enough space even if i have hundreds of GBs free.
Having said that it wouldn't be much of a problem because worst comes to worst i'll just stay on High Sierra, but the GPU disabler tool required/recommended to install on my particular Mac successfully disabled the dedicated GPU and left me over with integrated one that creates all kinds of glitches and even the inability to watch youtube videos.

So i come here to ask you this: How do i undo everything the dGPU disabler did? and how can i fix the installer problem that says that i don't have enough space to install?
Priority would go to the dGPU disabler question because while i would like this machine to rin Mojave i can live with High Sierra.

Thank you.

Edit: for starters i moved the LaunchDaemon tool created by the app away and put the AMD kext back in the folder where they belong and resetted the pram/nvram but no dice, the computer still acts with the integrated gpu with all its glitches

 

[saudor]

I find my MacBook 5,1 (4GB Ram, 10.14.3) slow when performing tasks such as making 4K videos using FCPX, ect. Can I upgrade my memory to DDR3 - 4GB - Bus 1066Mhz - PC3 - 8500S? It is possible?

On Apple Support page:
Applicable model
MacBook (13-inch, Aluminum, Late 2008)

Memory specifications
This MacBook model has these memory specifications:

Number of memory slots 2
Base memory 2 GB (but also configured to order)
Maximum memory 4 GB
Memory card specifications - Double Data Rate Small Outline Dual Inline Memory Module (DDR SO-DIMM) format
- 30mm
- 1 GB or 2 GB
- 204-pin
- PC3-8500 DDR3 1066 MHz Type RAM
Additional notes For best performance, don't mix sizes; always install two identical memory modules (a pair of 1 GB, 2 GB, or 4 GB memory modules).

These are the original memory in my MacBook now:
View attachment 823742 View attachment 823743

Thank you

I think you can upgrade that to 8gb ram (2 x 4gb sticks of 1067 MHz). However, with 4K editing, you're going to be CPU bound so it'll still be slow.

https://everymac.com/systems/apple/...-2.0-aluminum-13-late-2008-unibody-specs.html

 

[ford.tonthat]

I think you can upgrade that to 8gb ram (2 x 4gb sticks of 1067 MHz). However, with 4K editing, you're going to be CPU bound so it'll still be slow.

https://everymac.com/systems/apple/...-2.0-aluminum-13-late-2008-unibody-specs.html

I want to ask if this MacBook 5,1 is compatible with DDR3 - 4GB - Bus 1066Mhz - PC3 - 8500S Type RAM or not because I found on Apple Support that it is compatible with PC3-8500 DDR3 1066 MHz Type RAM. The difference between these memory is the "S" in PC3-8500S or PC3-8500.

 

[16v]

I think s = Single sided...
Pc8500 = 1066 mhz.
Pc8500S = also 1066mhz.

1066mhz = 1066 mhz...
Black = black and not white.

 

[dosdude1]

Hello everyone, i'm in a bit of a pickle right now with Mojave patcher.
I have a MacBook Pro 8,2 (Late 2011 15 inches) and when booting the USB drive the installer doesn't let me install the OS on my main drive because it says there's not enough space even if i have hundreds of GBs free.
Having said that it wouldn't be much of a problem because worst comes to worst i'll just stay on High Sierra, but the GPU disabler tool required/recommended to install on my particular Mac successfully disabled the dedicated GPU and left me over with integrated one that creates all kinds of glitches and even the inability to watch youtube videos.

So i come here to ask you this: How do i undo everything the dGPU disabler did? and how can i fix the installer problem that says that i don't have enough space to install?
Priority would go to the dGPU disabler question because while i would like this machine to rin Mojave i can live with High Sierra.

Thank you.

Edit: for starters i moved the LaunchDaemon tool created by the app away and put the AMD kext back in the folder where they belong and resetted the pram/nvram but no dice, the computer still acts with the integrated gpu with all its glitches

Sometimes this happens when trying to install to an encrypted volume. All you need to do is mount the volume using Disk Utility after booting from the USB drive, and then you will be able to install Mojave. You will need to do the same when applying the post-install patches.

 

[pollopo]

Sometimes this happens when trying to install to an encrypted volume. All you need to do is mount the volume using Disk Utility after booting from the USB drive, and then you will be able to install Mojave. You will need to do the same when applying the post-install patches.

Thank you very much i will try this immediately, just in case something wrong happens can you also help me undo what dGPU disabler did?

 

[Henk Poley]

I find my MacBook 5,1 (4GB Ram, 10.14.3) slow when performing tasks such as making 4K videos using FCPX, ect. Can I upgrade my memory to DDR3 - 4GB - Bus 1066Mhz - PC3 - 8500S? It is possible?

Given that my (newer) MacBook7,1 has trouble playing 1080p60 in Safari, I think it is more a limitation of the GPU (and possibly CPU) to do 4K decoding. I don't think extra working memory will much help with that.

Professional video studios would first transcode to 1080p30, then do the editing, swap back in the 4K assets just before doing the actual rendering (which will be slow of course).

That said, the MacBook5,1 can go up to 8GB, PC3-8500 SODIMM. I'm not sure if it can take 'low power' (LP or L) 1.35V memory. A cheap memory store.

 

[K two]

Has anyone figured out how to get a APFS SSD to boot from the upper SATA (DVD) connection on a dual-drive Mini3,1? With Mojave properly installed, recommended patches installed. The Mini Boots into the APFS Patch (yellow text scrolling), then loads a MacOS partition from the lower connection SSHDD without fail, while ignoring the Mojave install on the SSD.

A HFS+ SSD is running Mojave 10.14.3. perfectly from the same upper connection. The same Mojave APFS SSD boots from a Firewire enclosure on a iMac 11,2, perfectly.

Gotta be something about the upper SATA connection and the APFS Patch, maybe?

 

[pollopo]

i successfully installed Mojave on my MacBookPro8,2
only issue is that i can't control the brightness but i expected it because it was in the disclaimer of the dgpu disabler, i wonder if i can control it manually through a third party app....

 

[jasoncarle]

1) SIP isn't required for the Recovery it's the no_compat_check argument
2) It's fixable
3) Post here the results from your Mojave Terminal type: diskutil apfs list
And I'll tell how to.

Thanks, here is a screenshot of the entire output of that command in terminal.

 

[0403979]

Thanks, here is a screenshot of the entire output of that command in terminal.

Please mount your recovery and post a picture of the filesystem. It has an usually large size and is most likely home to around 4-5 recovery folders for different volumes even thought there is only one top level volume.
[doublepost=1551295403][/doublepost]

So I'm new..not to life, but to this whole idea of running Mojave on "outdated" hardware. I was watching a YouTube video 2 days ago & the guy in it was talking about reviving an old white clam-shell mac by installing Mojave on it. I was blown away! I myself own a mid 2011 iMac with AMD Radeon HD 6xxx series GPU acceleration & after dusting it off I found my way here only to potentially have my biggest disappointment of 2019; My Mac isn't supported because of the graphics card!

I love my iMac & the notion that I could breath some new life into the old girl really got me excited. Does anyone know if support for the Radeon HD 5xxx/6xxx series is something that's being addressed or is it something that's already been attempted & isn't fixable?

This issue is most likely not fixable. The Mac Pro has similar issues related to what graphics cards can be used with it. I would recommend sticking with High Sierra since the performance is much better.

 

[jackluke]

Thanks, here is a screenshot of the entire output of that command in terminal.

Well, since you have a 2011 machine then you don't need the legacy prelinkedkernel so in this case try this:

open Mojave Terminal and type:

diskutil mount disk2s3
open /Volumes/Recovery/156BEA9A-0F88-46FF-90C0-2788AFE29D0C

replace inside this path from Finder the file I attached and modified for your partition scheme, reboot hold CMD+R and check.
[doublepost=1551295859][/doublepost]

Please mount your recovery and post a picture of the filesystem. It has an usually large size and is most likely home to around 4-5 recovery folders for different volumes even thought there is only one top level volume.

Every APFS partition grow up in size dynamically, that's the new special feature of APFS, teorically inside PreBoot, Recovery and VM you can copy everything you want even your personal files and they will grow their size without affecting the disk. And then he could manually delete probably the multiple Recoveries created as you wrote by previous installations.

 

[NeonBlack]

Just so you know Target Display Mode only works with certain computers. Search Apple for the help file it tells everything.

I know and I have a Late 2009 iMac (11,1 model) and it works perfectly fine with High Sierra. On the other end of the Mini DisplayPort cable I have a Windows PC with an Nvidia GTX 1080 GPU and the iMac screen switches the signal as soon as I connect it.

On Mojave it doesn't work: connecting the cable the OS X desktop disappears for less then a second, short black screen and then appears again.

That's why I'm keeping a small partition with High Sierra but it is annoying, as I have to choose the version of OS X to boot every time I turn on the iMac, knowing what to do (use OS X or play with PC).

Which iMac do you have and what/how are you connecting?
And it did work until the latest beta, you said?

I just had this issue.
Newer models need to have a thunderbolt port. Thunderbolt 3 works with the apple adapter but just USB C doesn’t work.

https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT204592#requirements

Also the old white Mac keyboard (translucent / plastic) without FN Keys doesn’t let you enable it. Or at least I didn’t figure out how.

I don't know much about Thunderbolt as my iMac is way older.

You don't need the Apple keyboard and the shortcut, though: just connect the cable and the iMac detects the input, switching the signal. If the two machines are already connected, detach the cable and plug it in again.

 

[jackluke]

I know and I have a Late 2009 iMac (11,1 model) and it works perfectly fine with High Sierra. On the other end of the Mini DisplayPort cable I have a Windows PC with an Nvidia GTX 1080 GPU and the iMac screen switches the signal as soon as I connect it.

On Mojave it doesn't work: connecting the cable the OS X desktop disappears for less then a second, short black screen and then appears again.

That's why I'm keeping a small partition with High Sierra but it is annoying, as I have to choose the version of OS X to boot every time I turn on the iMac, knowing what to do (use OS X or play with PC).

Which iMac do you have and what/how are you connecting?
And it did work until the latest beta, you said?

I don't know much about Thunderbolt as my iMac is way older.

You don't need the Apple keyboard and the shortcut, though: just connect the cable and the iMac detects the input, switching the signal. If the two machines are already connected, detach the cable and plug it in again.

Agree, I don't think it works on Mojave unsupported Mac, since TDM feature is based not only on iMac 27" lcd display but also on ATI 4850 miniDP input/output and its GPU Acceleration kexts, so something missing related also to those kext that are instead fully supported on HighSierra.

 

[ford.tonthat]

I think s = Single sided...
Pc8500 = 1066 mhz.
Pc8500S = also 1066mhz.

1066mhz = 1066 mhz...
Black = black and not white.

So you mean that it is compatible with my MacBook 5,1 ,right?

 

[jasoncarle]

Well, since you have a 2011 machine then you don't need the legacy prelinkedkernel so in this case try this:

open Mojave Terminal and type:

diskutil mount disk2s3
open /Volumes/Recovery/156BEA9A-0F88-46FF-90C0-2788AFE29D0C

replace inside this path from Finder the file I attached and modified for your partition scheme, reboot hold CMD+R and check.
[doublepost=1551295859][/doublepost]

Every APFS partition grow up in size dynamically, that's the new special feature of APFS, teorically inside PreBoot, Recovery and VM you can copy everything you want even your personal files and they will grow their size without affecting the disk. And then he could manually delete probably the multiple Recoveries created as you wrote by previous installations.

I appreciate your efforts, but that didn't work. How about this. I completely erased this drive before the install, I did not do an in-place upgrade. Why is this grub even there? How do I reinstall Mojave and erase ALL of what's on the drive? Apparently Disk Utility didn't do it.

 

[dosdude1]

I appreciate your efforts, but that didn't work. How about this. I completely erased this drive before the install, I did not do an in-place upgrade. Why is this grub even there? How do I reinstall Mojave and erase ALL of what's on the drive? Apparently Disk Utility didn't do it.

To erase the entire drive, you need to make sure you select "View" then "Show All Devices" in Disk Utility. Then, select the root drive, and use the erase tab to erase it.

 

[jasoncarle]

To erase the entire drive, you need to make sure you select "View" then "Show All Devices" in Disk Utility. Then, select the root drive, and use the erase tab to erase it.

I still have my USB Installer, so I may make another go at this and see how that goes. Thanks.

 

[avz]

So you mean that it is compatible with my MacBook 5,1 ,right?

I guess the answer to your question is yes, as my original Apple 1GB memory sticks read PC3-8500S.

 

[jackluke]

I appreciate your efforts, but that didn't work. How about this. I completely erased this drive before the install, I did not do an in-place upgrade. Why is this grub even there? How do I reinstall Mojave and erase ALL of what's on the drive? Apparently Disk Utility didn't do it.

Ok, I've deleted the file attached because now after erase and re-install the APFS UUID will change completely, even if using the same drive on the same machine. But most probably is grub bootloader your issue.

 

[ford.tonthat]

I guess the answer to your question is yes, as my original Apple 1GB memory sticks read PC3-8500S.

Thank you for your help!

 

[Flacko]

Has anyone figured out how to get a APFS SSD to boot from the upper SATA (DVD) connection on a dual-drive Mini3,1? With Mojave properly installed, recommended patches installed. The Mini Boots into the APFS Patch (yellow text scrolling), then loads a MacOS partition from the lower connection SSHDD without fail, while ignoring the Mojave install on the SSD.

A HFS+ SSD is running Mojave 10.14.3. perfectly from the same upper connection. The same Mojave APFS SSD boots from a Firewire enclosure on a iMac 11,2, perfectly.

Gotta be something about the upper SATA connection and the APFS Patch, maybe?

Someone had a similar booting problem but with a Mac Pro 3.1 using the apfs software patch. They solved the problem by using the ROM updater to make the machine use apfs natively. I have not got a Mac mini so see if there are members who can advise you if you go for the ROM update. There is a chance that you could brick your machine if the update does not go smoothly.

 

[K two]

Someone had a similar booting problem but with a Mac Pro 3.1 using the apfs software patch. They solved the problem by using the ROM updater to make the machine use apfs natively. I have not got a Mac mini so see if there are members who can advise you if you go for the ROM update. There is a chance that you could brick your machine if the update does not go smoothly.

Thank you for the response. If the APFS SSD does not boot from the lower SATA connection, I'll look into the ROM update.