macOS 10.15 Catalina on Unsupported Macs

[Barry K. Nathan]

I had a restart issue but now after every restart or shut down the MacBook takes a long time.

Download the latest macOS Catalina Patcher that just came out tonight (v1.2.3) and use it to make a USB stick. Then start up from the USB stick, run the post-install tool, reinstall the patches and restart the Mac.

I suspect that rebuilding the caches is the only thing that's needed, but reinstalling the patches doesn't take that much longer and is more likely to actually fix the problem in the event that my suspicions are wrong. And if you did just the cache rebuild, you would still need to have the updated stick around anyway, in case something went wrong and your Mac stopped booting altogether.

 

[zfrogman]

I have updated the Mojave Patcher as well. You do not need WiFi in the installer, just boot the installer drive made with Catalina Patcher, and install Catalina.
[automerge]1572764891[/automerge]

That Legacy Video Card Patch update contains the latest of @ASentientBot's transparency fixes. I'd recommend you install it.

I just updated with 1.2.3 via USB stick install MBP 8,2 (15" 2011). Everything functions flawlessly with one exception- Airdrop. The lost WiFi issue is something I had encountered in 1.2.1 after installing Airdrop but recovered functionality after reinstalling complete Post install patch. With regard to the "missing" Airdrop functionality, Airdrop does appear in the Finder Preference pane but doesn't in "Favorites". A reinstall of proposed Jackluke procedure which worked before 1.2.1 update. Any suggestions?

Thanks again to Dosdude and Co. for making the Vintage Macs great again (and contributing to saving the environment in a way)!

UPDATE Re: Airdrop missing: my bad didn't realize I had Finder/Favorites "Hide" instead of "Show" so Airdrop is good to go in 10.15.1 with Dosdude 1.2.3

 

[ASentientBot]

is the source code for the Legacy GPU patches etc available?

Almost everything is open source:
- Both Julian's and Collin's patchers are on GitHub
- A few of the patches have source code linked on the front page of the Mojave thread
- My code is included in the attachment with each of my releases, and some other people did the same thing

The thing is, most of the patches don't necessarily have source code per se, they just involve copying a few files from an older macOS and maybe making some slight modifications to them. These aren't documented in any centralized place, you'll just have to search through the relevant threads to find them.

Is there something in particular that you're looking for? If it's anything I did, I'm happy to provide the details to reproduce it yourself. (I have step-by-step notes for manually patching my 2010 MacBook, though I'm not too knowledgeable about other Macs.) Everything about this project should be completely open.
[automerge]1572784709[/automerge]

Does this new transparency patch fixes dark mode issues, like the black outline on windows?

No.

 

[OnawaAfrica]

View attachment 874401

Applied video legacy patch. No more notification crashes!
Well done guys! Thanks a lot.

how did u get the dock to look like that

 

[Macbookprodude]

Why does Catalina installer keep saying it’s damaged ??? I tried downloading it again and still saying it’s damaged ?? Should I wait till Catalina is fixed ?

 

[ASentientBot]

Why does Catalina installer keep saying it’s damaged ??? I tried downloading it again and still saying it’s damaged ?? Should I wait till Catalina is fixed ?

Try setting your date to October 20, 2019.

 

[Macbookprodude]

Try setting your date to October 20, 2019.

I tried that I think and it didn’t work.

 

[Macbookprodude]

I think that some people may be quite happy about this.
View attachment 874639

Today I stumbled across a complete non-Metal transparency patch, menu bar included, that doesn't involve any material swapping -- just a couple bytes in SkyLightOriginal.

0x216c60: NOP

While it doesn't directly use your patches, thank you to @pkouame and especially @testheit for pointing me in the right direction with your discoveries involving materials in SkyLight. It was by looking at related code that I came across this.

The file is attached for testing Please report any issues.

Hi, how do I install this for Mojave ? When I run it in terminal it says can't run executable.

 

[rayd8or]

Just to let @dosdude1 and others that I successfully installed Catalina 10.15.1 on my MacBook Pro 8,2.

I tried to create a bootable USB but I am still getting the error that I and others have reported at the 'Restore Base Image' stage.

However, 'Install to this Machine' worked perfectly and everything is running sweetly.

Many thanks to all who made this possible.

 

[chris1111]

Now you can Build your own package for the Legacy Video Patch
Using pkgbuild
For Nvidia and Intel
Follow the new video
☞ Legacy Video Patch

 

[telepati]

I too had similar issue on restart. After installation gets stuck with beach ball on restart and does not restart. Had to force shutdown. Now every time I start or shutdown takes lot of time.

Yes, exactly. I thought maybe this is the happening size of the patch (370MB). That's, why I wait too long maybe it restarts itself but it never restarts. Just like you, I made force restart.

 

[zfrogman]

Just to let @dosdude1 and others that I successfully installed Catalina 10.15.1 on my MacBook Pro 8,2.

I tried to create a bootable USB but I am still getting the error that I and others have reported at the 'Restore Base Image' stage.

However, 'Install to this Machine' worked perfectly and everything is running sweetly.

Many thanks to all who made this possible.

Hi Rayd8or, like you have an 8,2 MBP but didn't encounter bootable USB error 'Restore Base Image' stage and creation and subsequent use to install using 1.2.3 went smoothly. It would possibly be something not necessarily related to the patcher itself. Have you disabled your dGPU or are you among the "fortunate" ones? FYI, I created the USB installer using a Samsung 16GB EVO micro SD with USB adapter using my thunderbolt connection to create the USB patcher (but obviously using USB to install

 

[rayd8or]

Hi Rayd8or, like you have an 8,2 MBP but didn't encounter bootable USB error 'Restore Base Image' stage and creation and subsequent use to install using 1.2.3 went smoothly. It would possibly be something not necessarily related to the patcher itself. Have you disabled your dGPU or are you among the "fortunate" ones? FYI, I created the USB installer using a Samsung 16GB EVO micro SD with USB adapter using my thunderbolt connection to create the USB patcher (but obviously using USB to install

Hi, I have disabled dGPU using the tool provided by @dosdude1 I use a 128GB Kingston DataTraveler USB stick but have had the USB error every time since 10.14 release both on the MacBook and my iMac. The error tells me to ensure the USB is formatted correctly, which it is.

 

[zfrogman]

Hi, I have disabled dGPU using the tool provided by @dosdude1 I use a 128GB Kingston DataTraveler USB stick but have had the USB error every time since 10.14 release both on the MacBook and my iMac. The error tells me to ensure the USB is formatted correctly, which it is.

Have you reformatted the USB stick from Scratch (rather than just erase or tried another USB to see if you get same error?

 

[rayd8or]

Have you reformatted the USB stick from Scratch (rather than just erase or tried another USB to see if you get same error?

Reformatted from scratch several times. I don't have another USB unfortunately but this one works fine for everything else.

 

[air.man]

how did u get the dock to look like that

It's an app called cdock that change the appearance of the dock. And it works with Catalina thanks to the video patches done recently. Thanks again to Dosdude and co.

 

[zfrogman]

Reformatted from scratch several times. I don't have another USB unfortunately but this one works fine for everything else.

Hi rayd8or, for what it's worth I had a similar problem with another USB (but not in Catalina case) and switched to another USB and it worked. When you can, try another USB stick. Not being an expert by any means, my empirical hunch would be that if you were able to install "direct to Catalina-installed Drive" would point to USB stick (perhaps hardware-wise or partition-wise as being the issue) as it relates to the Catalina base image restore error.

P.S. btw I use a long form version to disable defective dGPU found in MacBook Pro forums (Force 2011 MacBook Pro 8,2 with failed AMD GPU to ALWAYS use Intel integrated GPU (EFI variable fix) thread #875 to initially disable dGPU but also to create a simple shell script "force-iGPU-boot.sh" that I have reside in root (once Catalina is installed as it will erase it at every new Cat. Install) that in the case of an "unlikely but possible" need to reset PRAM or SMC with loss dGPU bypass I can simply and quickly execute in single user mode to restore dGPU disabling.

What I have noticed is however that the "extensions-off" folder that you create in that process where the AMDRadeonX3000.kext resides doesn't seem necessary any more to run Catalina using the Dosdude patch (which makes it "reside in the Extensions folder) However I still create the folder Extensions-off (with the Loginhook script mentioned in thread) as it states "the system doesn't know how to power-management the failed AMD-chip. Dosdude (Collin) or the forum gurus would need to chip in as to what really is necessary or not and what can be made redundant.

I tried using Dosdude's disable method but my system in the past crashed and rebooted to a blank grey screen so I have just kept going with the tried and true which seems to hold across the various patches and updates.

 

[sig357]

Try setting your date to October 20, 2019.

I tried that as well and still receiving damaged error.

MP5,1
Rx580

 

[dosdude1]

I tried that as well and still receiving damaged error.

MP5,1
Rx580

You need to download a new copy of the Catalina installer and remake your drive, or just try a different USB drive.

 

[fabioroberto]

Hi all,
My contribution:
I found a "make up" for the shadow (and consequently the corners) below the dock menu at HIToolbox (Mojave and Catalina)
Consider that this is not a correction, but only an adjustment in the intensity and position of the shadow.

8cd8d cmp al, 0xff
8cd8f mov edx, 0x2

 

[sig357]

You need to download a new copy of the Catalina installer and remake your drive, or just try a different USB drive.

i have tried multiple new download over the past couple of patcher updates. I have t tried a new drive. Will test. Thank you

 

[ASentientBot]

Hi all,
My contribution:
I found a "make up" for the shadow (and consequently the corners) below the dock menu at HIToolbox (Mojave and Catalina)
Consider that this is not a correction, but only an adjustment in the intensity and position of the shadow.


View attachment 874745 View attachment 874746

8cd8d cmp al, 0xff
8cd8f mov edx, 0x2

That looks amazing! I wonder if something similar will be possible for window outlines too.

 

[jowaju]

Installed the new video card patch and Light Mode is definitely working fine. Unfortunately about half of the programs on Mojave stopped working, looks like it is directly related to the patch judging by the error report. Keynote, Pages, Numbers, All Office 2011 Programs, iDVD, lots of others. I attached a few of the Error reports, if you need the others just let me know. Hope it's an easy fix!

Termination Reason: DYLD, [0x2] Wrong architecture

 

[ASentientBot]

Installed the new video card patch and Light Mode is definitely working fine. Unfortunately about half of the programs on Mojave stopped working, looks like it is directly related to the patch judging by the error report. Keynote, Pages, Numbers, All Office 2011 Programs, iDVD, lots of others. I attached a few of the Error reports, if you need the others just let me know. Hope it's an easy fix!

Termination Reason: DYLD, [0x2] Wrong architecture

Yeah, I did not intend for @dosdude1 to include this in his Mojave patcher. The SkyLightOriginal binary for Catalina has no 32-bit fork. I'll try to create a patched version this evening when I get onto a 10.14 system.

 

[Macbookprodude]

Hi all,
My contribution:
I found a "make up" for the shadow (and consequently the corners) below the dock menu at HIToolbox (Mojave and Catalina)
Consider that this is not a correction, but only an adjustment in the intensity and position of the shadow.


View attachment 874745 View attachment 874746

8cd8d cmp al, 0xff
8cd8f mov edx, 0x2

File is damaged.. Says it won't open.