macOS 10.15 Catalina on Unsupported Macs

[LuisN]

APFS Boot

Ever since I installed Catalina on an old iMac 7,1, on which the APFS bootrom had been previously installed, the boot has been verbose, and yesterday I noticed System Preferences has an APFS Boot panel. I think I have two APFS boot solutions in place. If so, how do I get rid of that verbose boot screen and how do I get rid of that APFS Boot panel? Or should I leave it just as it is?

Open terminal, "diskutil list" to identify the EFI partition, "sudo diskutil mount diskXs1 (your EFI part.) and delete everything inside. Reboot. Done

 

[Pachnes]

Info:

Catalina can not boot anymore from Firewire drives, so we have to connect the CCC clone via the slow USB2 ports of our older computers. Very slow

Best solution for older computers: Use a Thunderbolt 1 drive, if your computer has Thunderbolt 1 (2011 and later).

 

[jhowarth]

Open terminal, "diskutil list" to identify the EFI partition, "sudo diskutil mount diskXs1 (your EFI part.) and delete everything inside. Reboot. Done

Also don't forget to select the Disable APFS Patch option in the future when you generate the patched installer (which is the origin of your problem) as the default behavior of Catalina Patcher is to install the APFS Patch.

 

[hybra]

Is there a way to get the keyboard backlight back on the MBP4,1 17-inch (Early 2008). A solution would be highly appreciated.

Hi, I have the same model MBP4,1 but the 15" with SSD and 6GB RAM...How it is running with Catalina apart from the keyboard backlight? Is it worth the patched upgrade? Any other big issues? Currently I'm on El Capitan (last Apple supported OS for the machine). Would upgrade to High Sierra/Mojave be better or worse?
Thanks

 

[Pachnes]

Hi, I have the same model MBP4,1 but the 15" with SSD and 6GB RAM...How it is running with Catalina apart from the keyboard backlight? Is it worth the patched upgrade? Any other big issues? Currently I'm on El Capitan (last Apple supported OS for the machine). Would upgrade to High Sierra/Mojave be better or worse?
Thanks

I would first upgrade to High Sierra. This, because when you than install the latest Combo Update of High Sierra 10.13.6, your EFI Bios will be upgraded, to recognize APFS Firlesystems.

 

[hybra]

I would first upgrade to High Sierra. This, because when you than install the latest Combo Update of High Sierra 10.13.6, your EFI Bios will be upgraded, to recognize APFS Firlesystems.

Known issues with patched High Sierra upgrade for MBP4,1? Is for the upgrade a clean install needed ? If yes, can I restore data from a Time Machine backup later? Thanks

 

[Pachnes]

Known issues with patched High Sierra upgrade for MBP4,1? Is for the upgrade a clean install needed ? If yes, can I restore data from a Time Machine backup later? Thanks

Oh, I just see, that your Macbook Pro 4,1, is not supported from Apple to run High Sierra, so there is no new EFI Firmware with APFS support for your notebook. Than you can choose between High Sierra with Dosdude Patcher, Mojave with Dosdude Patcher and Catalina with Dosude Patcher. I do not own a MBP4,1 so I can not tell you, which might be best.

 

[0134168]

APFS Boot

Ever since I installed Catalina on an old iMac 7,1, on which the APFS bootrom had been previously installed, the boot has been verbose, and yesterday I noticed System Preferences has an APFS Boot panel. I think I have two APFS boot solutions in place. If so, how do I get rid of that verbose boot screen and how do I get rid of that APFS Boot panel? Or should I leave it just as it is?

Just leave it. It´s no problem at all.
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Info:

Catalina can not boot anymore from Firewire drives, so we have to connect the CCC clone via the slow USB2 ports of our older computers. Very slow

Best solution for older computers: Use a Thunderbolt 1 drive, if your computer has Thunderbolt 1 (2011 and later).

I use thunderbolt to esata in my Macbook Pro late 2011 and pcie to esata in my Mac Pro 5.1 and 3.1

 

[slvrscoobie]

odd question: my 2011 17" macbook graphics card died the other day - so i popped the drive into my 2012 macbook pro and booted from that drive. running off the external drive fine.
Now its asking if I want to legit update to Catalina Beta 2.
I assume that if I did that, from a working version, then plugged the SDD back into my old laptop it wouldnt boot, is that correct? its not 'that simple' right?

 

[0134168]

odd question: my 2011 17" macbook graphics card died the other day - so i popped the drive into my 2012 macbook pro and booted from that drive. running off the external drive fine.
Now its asking if I want to legit update to Catalina Beta 2.
I assume that if I did that, from a working version, then plugged the SDD back into my old laptop it wouldnt boot, is that correct? its not 'that simple' right?

Sorry to hear that. Are you gonna fix it? Disable the fried GPU?

 

[slvrscoobie]

Sorry to hear that. Are you gonna fix it? Disable the fried GPU?

mine is whacked out, and I cant read the screen to disable the GPU in software, even so, the apple diagnostics page is scrambled too, so rather than mod the motherboard, im sending to to a shop in FL that can reball the chip and make it functional again.
As such I removed the SSD and HDD before shipping it to them. now the big question:
Keep Catalina that seems a troublesome, or roll back to HS where everything works (and is accelerated) as should... hmm decisions...

 

[ASentientBot]

mine is whacked out, and I cant read the screen to disable the GPU in software, even so, the apple diagnostics page is scrambled too, so rather than mod the motherboard, im sending to to a shop in FL that can reball the chip and make it functional again.
As such I removed the SSD and HDD before shipping it to them. now the big question:
Keep Catalina that seems a troublesome, or roll back to HS where everything works (and is accelerated) as should... hmm decisions...

Third and arguably best option: Mojave!

• Doesn't rely too much on Metal
• Stabler than Catalina
• An extra year of software support
• Very few updates to break things
• Dark theme!

Edit: I did not see that you have an AMD GPU that won't get used by the Mojave patch. Definitely if you feel that Catalina is too slow or you do graphically intensive tasks, skip Mojave. If the iGPU is enough, then Mojave will be worth a try.

 

[slvrscoobie]

Third and arguably best option: Mojave!

• Doesn't rely too much on Metal
• Stabler than Catalina
• An extra year of software support
• Very few updates to break things
• Dark theme!

this was another option i was thinking. Roll back to HS and apply the Mojave patch. I guess the question is does Mojave or Catalina utilize the dedicated card over the intel GPU, where as high Sierra will run it.
I feel like if im paying for it to get fixed (and not just bypassed) using the OS that will utilize it would be better than getting it working and then not utilizing the card (if I understand the hacks that are out there for Mojave/catalina)

 

[dosdude1]

mine is whacked out, and I cant read the screen to disable the GPU in software, even so, the apple diagnostics page is scrambled too, so rather than mod the motherboard, im sending to to a shop in FL that can reball the chip and make it functional again.
As such I removed the SSD and HDD before shipping it to them. now the big question:
Keep Catalina that seems a troublesome, or roll back to HS where everything works (and is accelerated) as should... hmm decisions...

Reballing will NOT fix a thing with those 2011 15" and 17" machines, the chip itself is defective. There is also no good new chipset you can install on those systems, as AMD never fixed the defect in their design. Because of this, there is NO WAY to properly repair those systems, other than permanently disabling the garbage dedicated AMD GPU. I have come up with a very good, permanent way to do so, which you can read about here. Also, when using Mojave or Catalina, the garbage AMD GPU HAS to be disabled anyways, so definitely don't waste any money on the scam known as reballing.

 

[0134168]

Third and arguably best option: Mojave!

• Doesn't rely too much on Metal
• Stabler than Catalina
• An extra year of software support
• Very few updates to break things
• Dark theme!

Edit: I did not see that you have an AMD GPU that won't get used by the Mojave patch. Definitely if you feel that Catalina is too slow or you do graphically intensive tasks, skip Mojave. If the iGPU is enough, then Mojave will be worth a try.

Mojave works like a charm in my Macbook Pro 17, AMD gpu disabled
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this was another option i was thinking. Roll back to HS and apply the Mojave patch. I guess the question is does Mojave or Catalina utilize the dedicated card over the intel GPU, where as high Sierra will run it.
I feel like if im paying for it to get fixed (and not just bypassed) using the OS that will utilize it would be better than getting it working and then not utilizing the card (if I understand the hacks that are out there for Mojave/catalina)

Not gonna work. You have to disable the AMD gpu. Otherwise, it´s almost unuseable.

 

[K two]

Works like a charm.

 

[nekton1]

Reballing will NOT fix a thing with those 2011 15" and 17" machines, the chip itself is defective. There is also no good new chipset you can install on those systems, as AMD never fixed the defect in their design. Because of this, there is NO WAY to properly repair those systems, other than permanently disabling the garbage dedicated AMD GPU. I have come up with a very good, permanent way to do so, which you can read about here. Also, when using Mojave or Catalina, the garbage AMD GPU HAS to be disabled anyways, so definitely don't waste any money on the scam known as reballing.

While I generally agree, reballing is not always a scam. My 27" iMac 2009 developed a failed HD4850 card 4 years ago. I took it to a reballing specialist factory that does work for Sony here in Tokyo where they X-rayed it to show me the cracks, and then removed the 4850 chip, and reballed it all for $60 using an IR reball/reflow work station. I got an extra 4 years out of that iMac until it finally died the day after I installed Catalina 10.15 GM (using your wonderful patch—for which many thanks).

 

[dosdude1]

While I generally agree, reballing is not always a scam. My 27" iMac 2009 developed a failed HD4850 card 4 years ago. I took it to a reballing specialist factory that does work for Sony here in Tokyo where they X-rayed it to show me the cracks, and then removed the 4850 chip, and reballed it all for $60 using an IR reball/reflow work station. I got an extra 4 years out of that iMac until it finally died the day after I installed Catalina 10.15 GM (using your wonderful patch—for which many thanks).

The Radeon HD 4xxx is a different story. That chipset is NOT defective, because it was actually manufactured by ATI before AMD took over the chipset manufacturing after the buyout, and ruined the quality. In this case, reballing MAY actually be a viable solution to repairing those cards. This, however IS NOT, and will NEVER be the case with Radeon HD 5xxx and 6xxx video chipsets (which were manufactured by AMD itself, NOT ATI like the 4xxx series and earlier). These chipsets have a defect as a result of poor AMD quality control (has to do with poor quality underfill material bonding the die to its PCB), which AMD to this day has still never rectified with a new chipset revision.

 

[Macbookprodude]

So I gave up installing Catalina - it was a good run for the 2011, so now I have a 2012 and may visit Dosdude’s hack when 2012’s not supported with next OS.

 

[bbb555]

just after some advice on my Mac Pro to upgrade to Catalina.
It's a 4,1 that has had its firmware upgraded to a 5,1 to run high Sierra.
I've removed the GT120 and installed a Mac flashed GTX680 which supports metal and am running Mojave without issues.
Can I just run the @dosdude1 installer patch? Will it recognise the patches for it as a 4,1 or 5,1 (or their patches are identical)?
Already running APFS and BootROM is 144.0.0.0
Hoping just to do an upgrade using the bootable usb installer process as per the youtube video.
thanks.

 

[dosdude1]

just after some advice on my Mac Pro to upgrade to Catalina.
It's a 4,1 that has had its firmware upgraded to a 5,1 to run high Sierra.
I've removed the GT120 and installed a Mac flashed GTX680 which supports metal and am running Mojave without issues.
Can I just run the @dosdude1 installer patch? Will it recognise the patches for it as a 4,1 or 5,1 (or their patches are identical)?
Already running APFS and BootROM is 144.0.0.0
Hoping just to do an upgrade using the bootable usb installer process as per the youtube video.
thanks.

Yeah, that will work fine. Patches for a 5,1 will be used.

 

[bbb555]

Yeah, that will work fine. Patches for a 5,1 will be used.

legend ! thanks @dosdude1

 

[sgtnathsmiffy]

Ok so I have been thinking, I'm pretty sure I updated to 10.15.0 and then to 10.15.1 I am thinking If I clean install to 10.15.1 I may get the secondary display to work.

 

[kinetos]

Hello ! I have a big problem with my macbook pro 4.1 15 ''. I had 10.15.0 that worked well on it and I made an update to 10.15.1 but since my macbook pro reboots during the launch or when it started. I tried to install Mojave but it's the same thing. Can not boot from High Sierra with the patcher either. Do you have an idea of the problem?

 

[0134168]

Hello ! I have a big problem with my macbook pro 4.1 15 ''. I had 10.15.0 that worked well on it and I made an update to 10.15.1 but since my macbook pro reboots during the launch or when it started. I tried to install Mojave but it's the same thing. Can not boot from High Sierra with the patcher either. Do you have an idea of the problem?

Did you reset the PRAM and NVRAM?