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KennyW

macrumors 6502
Sep 5, 2007
452
389
Finally installed Catalina on my Mac Pro 3,1 and Radeon 7950. Machine works great. I used Dosdude's 1.4.4 patcher which had support for Radeon 7XXX series cards. So glad I didn't run out and buy a GTX. Many thanks to @dosdude1 for this!!!!

I do have a question though regarding automatic system software updates. Is it best to disable it, or do OTA updates work properly now? Is it safe to leave the following options checked? I'm asking because I'm not sure if v1.4.4 of the Catalina patcher includes functionality for OTA software/security updates directly from Apple.
My experience is that it doesn't matter whether you check them or not since OTA system updates DON'T work even if they are listed. They will report incompatibility with your Mac on either downloading or installation, unless you also use OpenCore or Clover to spoof your Mac ID, which then has a chance to brick you Mac upon installation.
 

K two

macrumors 68020
Dec 6, 2018
2,311
3,182
North America
Finally installed Catalina on my Mac Pro 3,1 and Radeon 7950. Machine works great. I used Dosdude's 1.4.4 patcher which had support for Radeon 7XXX series cards. So glad I didn't run out and buy a GTX. Many thanks to @dosdude1 for this!!!!

I do have a question though regarding automatic system software updates. Is it best to disable it, or do OTA updates work properly now? Is it safe to leave the following options checked? I'm asking because I'm not sure if v1.4.4 of the Catalina patcher includes functionality for OTA software/security updates directly from Apple.
MRT and XProtect will update normally. SUs and Supps can be done using CatalinaOTAswufix.app. Full installers when available can be built with gibMacOS-master or MDS.


Screen Shot 2020-12-20 at 9.27.53 AM.png
 
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amstel78

macrumors 6502a
Aug 12, 2018
517
183
My experience is that it doesn't matter whether you check them or not since OTA system updates DON'T work even if they are listed. They will report incompatibility with your Mac on either downloading or installation, unless you also use OpenCore or Clover to spoof your Mac ID, which then has a chance to brick you Mac upon installation.
Thank you for clarifying. I'm sorry to ask, but this thread is enormous and searching for comprehensive instructions on how to go about applying system/security updates brings up a lot of commentary and questions but no clear or concise steps. Is there a resource available that could walk someone not well versed in MacOS (I use Windows 10 primarily) on how to do these things? When I was running DosDude's High Sierra patch, I ended up leaving my system un-updated for several years due to my poor understanding of the process.
 

ruprik

macrumors newbie
Aug 12, 2015
1
1
Potential fix for "Installer is damaged..." error using Dosdude1's awesome patcher

Hi All. I have a 2008 MacPro 3,1 on El Capitan and using Dosdude1's incredibly easy patcher tool now that my apps are starting to break under El Capitan. Many thanks to Dosdude1 and to contributors to his patch and others that are doing similar things!

I ran into a snag when I went to do a clean install on a new Samsung 1TB SSD. I was getting an error similar to Dosdude1's Catalina FAQ entry "The installer is damaged, and can't be used to install macOS". I would get this error after I had selected 'Reinstall macOS" from the "macOS Utilities menu" after the newly created Catalina Patcher boot USB drive had booted.

The FAQ points to a mismatch between the patcher and the OS as a frequent cause of this error. Consistent with that, I saw a few other posts on the forum where people were requesting Dosdude1 to update the patch for the new OS release. However, I have concluded that there is no mismatch - at least in my situation, this error was caused by a different issue.

Walking through what I did: I downloaded the current patcher and had downloaded the OS via the patcher during the creation of the boot drive and so I was pretty certain that the two matched up. I did try redownloading the OS just in case I actually had some sort of download error but I kept getting the same error when attempting to install.

Like others mentioned is this forum, I concluded that perhaps a new incompatible OS release had come out after the latest Patch update so I downloaded MDS on another Mac (it can only be installed on High Sierra or later I think) and used it to download the first production release of Catalina 15.7. After I tried installing Catalina with this down-rev Catalina installer release, I got the same error so this incompatibility issue was largely ruled out.

Concurrent with getting the install error message, I was having a challenge with formatting the SSD as APFS as is required by Catalina. As per the tutorial video, I was attempting to format the drive as APFS prior to doing the "reinstall macOS" step. It would format OK but Disk Utilities would fail to remount the drive. I took the drive out, put it in a SATA USB sled and it was recognized fine on my newer Mac as an APFS drive so the formatting seemed to take ok.

Eventually, I realized that because of the failure of the macOS Utilities/disk utilities to mount the APFS drive, I didn't actually have a drive available to install Catalina on (it took me far too long to make this connection...). But at least in the end I was able to conclude that this was probably the real problem with the "installer is damaged..." error message.

More background - I was originally planning on just upgrading to High Sierra (vs. Catalina) and I remember reading a "how to" about disabling SIP which is a root level security scheme that was introduced with El Capitan. Here is a quick primer on it: SIP summary from OWC. Following the instructions at that summary after booting from my current OS recovery partition, I checked to see and SIP was enabled.

So I decided to follow the High Sierra instructions and disable SIP. I rebooted into the recovery disk of my working OS and disabled it per instructions at the summary link. I rebooted into the Catalina Patcher USB drive and all of my problems had been resolved. By disabling SIP, I was able to mount the APFS formatted SSD as well as to get past the "installer is damaged error".

I haven't finished the installation of Catalina yet as I am now waiting for the arrival of my "new" circa 2013 video card as my existing MacPro video card would not support Metal. Onward with fingers crossed!

Note: maybe I missed something in the tutorial or failed to follow some of the instructions along the way so if there is a established procedure or a better "workaround' than my workaround for the above issues, please share! It may just be the result of me going straight from El Capitan to Catalina - anyone that tried to upgrade to an earlier OS would have likely already identified and resolved this SIP issue.
 
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eckbert71

macrumors newbie
Dec 12, 2020
5
4
Run the Patch Updater in the /Applications/Utilities Folder to update that patch, Force rebuild caches.
Ok, I handled it by myself... installing the path isn't the problem, but how to "Force rebuild caches" ... there's NO option in the patch installer. (so I took again my installer stick, choose post install step and disabled the "previous" Library Validation Disabler Patch on completion I choose "Force Rebuild Caches").
But from your response I expected there is a direct way for this, without booting into usb-installer, just rebooting ...
Can someone clearify this?
THanx so far @K two
 
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trifero

macrumors 68030
May 21, 2009
2,952
2,796
Finally installed Catalina on my Mac Pro 3,1 and Radeon 7950. Machine works great. I used Dosdude's 1.4.4 patcher which had support for Radeon 7XXX series cards. So glad I didn't run out and buy a GTX. Many thanks to @dosdude1 for this!!!!

I do have a question though regarding automatic system software updates. Is it best to disable it, or do OTA updates work properly now? Is it safe to leave the following options checked? I'm asking because I'm not sure if v1.4.4 of the Catalina patcher includes functionality for OTA software/security updates directly from Apple.
It`s safe, because you are not going to receive any critical update.
 
Last edited:

KennyW

macrumors 6502
Sep 5, 2007
452
389
Potential fix for "Installer is damaged..." error using Dosdude1's awesome patcher

Hi All. I have a 2008 MacPro 3,1 on El Capitan and using Dosdude1's incredibly easy patcher tool now that my apps are starting to break under El Capitan. Many thanks to Dosdude1 and to contributors to his patch and others that are doing similar things!

I ran into a snag when I went to do a clean install on a new Samsung 1TB SSD. I was getting an error similar to Dosdude1's Catalina FAQ entry "The installer is damaged, and can't be used to install macOS". I would get this error after I had selected 'Reinstall macOS" from the "macOS Utilities menu" after the newly created Catalina Patcher boot USB drive had booted.

The FAQ points to a mismatch between the patcher and the OS as a frequent cause of this error. Consistent with that, I saw a few other posts on the forum where people were requesting Dosdude1 to update the patch for the new OS release. However, I have concluded that there is no mismatch - at least in my situation, this error was caused by a different issue.

Walking through what I did: I downloaded the current patcher and had downloaded the OS via the patcher during the creation of the boot drive and so I was pretty certain that the two matched up. I did try redownloading the OS just in case I actually had some sort of download error but I kept getting the same error when attempting to install.

Like others mentioned is this forum, I concluded that perhaps a new incompatible OS release had come out after the latest Patch update so I downloaded MDS on another Mac (it can only be installed on High Sierra or later I think) and used it to download the first production release of Catalina 15.7. After I tried installing Catalina with this down-rev Catalina installer release, I got the same error so this incompatibility issue was largely ruled out.

Concurrent with getting the install error message, I was having a challenge with formatting the SSD as APFS as is required by Catalina. As per the tutorial video, I was attempting to format the drive as APFS prior to doing the "reinstall macOS" step. It would format OK but Disk Utilities would fail to remount the drive. I took the drive out, put it in a SATA USB sled and it was recognized fine on my newer Mac as an APFS drive so the formatting seemed to take ok.

Eventually, I realized that because of the failure of the macOS Utilities/disk utilities to mount the APFS drive, I didn't actually have a drive available to install Catalina on (it took me far too long to make this connection...). But at least in the end I was able to conclude that this was probably the real problem with the "installer is damaged..." error message.

More background - I was originally planning on just upgrading to High Sierra (vs. Catalina) and I remember reading a "how to" about disabling SIP which is a root level security scheme that was introduced with El Capitan. Here is a quick primer on it: SIP summary from OWC. Following the instructions at that summary after booting from my current OS recovery partition, I checked to see and SIP was enabled.

So I decided to follow the High Sierra instructions and disable SIP. I rebooted into the recovery disk of my working OS and disabled it per instructions at the summary link. I rebooted into the Catalina Patcher USB drive and all of my problems had been resolved. By disabling SIP, I was able to mount the APFS formatted SSD as well as to get past the "installer is damaged error".

I haven't finished the installation of Catalina yet as I am now waiting for the arrival of my "new" circa 2013 video card as my existing MacPro video card would not support Metal. Onward with fingers crossed!

Note: maybe I missed something in the tutorial or failed to follow some of the instructions along the way so if there is a established procedure or a better "workaround' than my workaround for the above issues, please share! It may just be the result of me going straight from El Capitan to Catalina - anyone that tried to upgrade to an earlier OS would have likely already identified and resolved this SIP issue.
Yes, to install a higher version of OS in an unsupported Mac requires SIP disabled. Then all the issues you previously encountered gone. DosDude1 Catalina Patcher is very user friendly. There is no need for you to wait for your new card as your current one can give you a Boot screen and would work in Catalina, albeit low performance without metal support. The only point in preparing the USB Catalina Installer is to disable the Autopatch during preparation of the USB Drive so that in the Post-Install run, you can DE-SELECT the Legacy Video Patch to prepare for your new Metal compatible card. Otherwise, your new OS will run slow.
 

amstel78

macrumors 6502a
Aug 12, 2018
517
183
@ruprik I installed Catalina on my 2008 Mac Pro 3,1 yesterday. I just downloaded the patcher and let it update my High Sierra boot drive automatically. Risky I know, but I didn't have the time to perform the install via external drive. All works perfectly.
 
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K two

macrumors 68020
Dec 6, 2018
2,311
3,182
North America
Ok, I handled it by myself... installing the path isn't the problem, but how to "Force rebuild caches" ... there's NO option in the patch installer. (so I took again my installer stick, choose post install step and disabled the "previous" Library Validation Disabler Patch on completion I choose "Force Rebuild Caches").
But from your response I expected there is a direct way for this, without booting into usb-installer, just rebooting ...
Can someone clearify this?
THanx so far @K two

Nevermind, the Kextcache automatically rebuilds in Patch Updater. You're all good.
 
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rc3105

macrumors member
Oct 30, 2019
79
23
Hey all I have a (hopefully) silly question.

Catalina Patcher 1.4.4 with "install macOS Catalina.app" 15.7.02 is erroring with the "apfs firmware update required" msg on a 2011 iMac 12,1, except it's at Boot ROM Version: 87.0.0.0.0

I upgraded the video card to a Quatro K1100m back in May and made sure to update the firmware at the time. It's been running High Sierra since. I thought that was the current rom for this machine, am I nuts or what?


edit: I'm pretty sure it already has APFS support since that's what HighSierra was installed to...
 
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Pascal Baillargeau

macrumors 6502
Mar 4, 2019
342
304
France
Hey all I have a (hopefully) silly question.

Catalina Patcher 1.4.4 with "install macOS Catalina.app" 15.7.02 is erroring with the "apfs firmware update required" msg on a 2011 iMac 12,1, except it's at Boot ROM Version: 87.0.0.0.0

I upgraded the video card to a Quatro K1100m back in May and made sure to update the firmware at the time. I thought that was the current rom for this machine, am I nuts or what?
It's not an error, just a warning. You can continue, 87.0.0.0.0 is the current rom for 2011.
 
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darrenangel

macrumors newbie
Sep 13, 2008
3
0
2009 mac pro 5.1. why use patcher 1.4.4/1.3.0, to install catalina 10.15.6 and 10.15.7 /10.15.3, it still show "this copy of the install macos catalina application is damaged, and can't be used to install macOS?"WHy?????I am crazy!Hope you help me.THX
I change the date, it still cause above same erro!
 

KennyW

macrumors 6502
Sep 5, 2007
452
389
2009 mac pro 5.1. why use patcher 1.4.4/1.3.0, to install catalina 10.15.6 and 10.15.7 /10.15.3, it still show "this copy of the install macos catalina application is damaged, and can't be used to install macOS?"WHy?????I am crazy!Hope you help me.THX
I change the date, it still cause above same erro!
You need to disable SIP from Recovery mode.
 
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trifero

macrumors 68030
May 21, 2009
2,952
2,796
2009 mac pro 5.1. why use patcher 1.4.4/1.3.0, to install catalina 10.15.6 and 10.15.7 /10.15.3, it still show "this copy of the install macos catalina application is damaged, and can't be used to install macOS?"WHy?????I am crazy!Hope you help me.THX
I change the date, it still cause above same erro!
I suggest to download again the Catalina installer.
 

amstel78

macrumors 6502a
Aug 12, 2018
517
183
I've just discovered that desktop background selections aren't being saved after a reboot. Time Machine drive icon also isn't changing to the green icon unless I deselect the disk and reselect it. Can't find a desktop.plist in Catalina to clear the desktop preferences. How can I fix?

Regarding the desktop backgrounds, I've been selecting the dynamic images located under Apple/Desktop Pictures. However, after rebooting, it always default to the following:
1608650677620.png
 
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strof

macrumors newbie
Dec 20, 2020
7
1
I just install Catalina on my unsupported iMac late 2009 and the only that not work is the auto switch the dark mode. Any suggestions?
 
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K two

macrumors 68020
Dec 6, 2018
2,311
3,182
North America
I've just discovered that desktop background selections aren't being saved after a reboot. Time Machine drive icon also isn't changing to the green icon unless I deselect the disk and reselect it. Can't find a desktop.plist in Catalina to clear the desktop preferences. How can I fix?

Regarding the desktop backgrounds, I've been selecting the dynamic images located under Apple/Desktop Pictures. However, after rebooting, it always default to the following:
View attachment 1699255

For random post-install weirdness, give Onyx/Maintenance a go? The default settings are safe.
 

amstel78

macrumors 6502a
Aug 12, 2018
517
183
AFAIK that feature has never worked on unsupported Macs.
Are you talking about this function:
1608675048030.png


I wonder why? Dynamic desktop backgrounds seem to work fine, but I've noticed that when I switched it to auto just now, all of the menus and system windows got bright and stayed bright.

Edit: I take it back. Auto mode seems to work fine on my Mac Pro 3,1. Just had to wait an hour I guess.
1608682768276.png
 
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amstel78

macrumors 6502a
Aug 12, 2018
517
183
Welp, found something that wouldn't run. Photoshop 22.1 crashes the moment I try to open it. Seems it needs SSE 4.2. I really hate these companies sometimes. I thought DosDude1's 1.4.4 Catalina patcher had SSE 4.2 emulation in it to allow Radeon 7XXX cards to function?

1608683156713.png
 
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amstel78

macrumors 6502a
Aug 12, 2018
517
183
Hi, I have solved the problem with this command sequence:

Download libopencv_world.4.4.0.dylib from here:
Code:
https://www.sendspace.com/file/meab5g

copy it to Photoshop 2021 Framework directory:
Code:
sudo cp libopencv_world.4.4.0.dylib /Applications/Adobe\ Photoshop\ 2021/Adobe\ Photoshop\ 2021.app/Contents/Frameworks/


Download libopenjp2.7.dylib from here:
Code:
https://www.sendspace.com/file/59abvl

copy it to:
Code:
sudo cp -p libopenjp2.7.dylib /usr/local/opt/openjpeg/lib/


From the second libopencv_world.4.4.0.dylib downloadable from here:
Code:
https://www.sendspace.com/file/jwxnni

copy only libtesseract.4.dylib and liblept.5.dylib:
Code:
sudo cp -p libtesseract.4.dylib /usr/local/opt/tesseract/lib/
sudo cp -p liblept.5.dylib /usr/local/opt/leptonica/lib/


Install Brew
Code:
/bin/bash -c "$(curl -fsSL https://raw.githubusercontent.com/Homebrew/install/master/install.sh)"

Code:
brew install libpng
brew install giflib
brew install libtiff
brew install webp


That's all

Maybe someone can achieve this with less commands using only brew
Thank you, thank you!!!! Photoshop 22.1 now runs on my Mac Pro 3,1. You guys are a bunch of geniuses!!! :)
1608688736017.png
 

amstel78

macrumors 6502a
Aug 12, 2018
517
183
@lumos - many thanks for your instructions on getting PS2021 to start, however the program still crashes when attempting to do certain things, such as applying filters.

View attachment 1699534

For anyone else that has gotten PS2021 working on their 3,1 Mac Pro - is it stable?
 
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