macOS 11 Big Sur on Unsupported Macs Thread

[Ausdauersportler]

Without formatting to HFS , to install directly on APFS or update a previous BigSur, after "BaseSystem legacy usb fix b9" you could have used from an Installer recovery Utilities terminal simply this: /V*/I*/H*

anyway try booting with CMD+S targeting BigSur then type (if you use opencore make sure you have at least csrutil disable) :

mount -uw /
mount -P 1
mount -P 2
kmutil install --update-all
kcditto
reboot

Otherwise try boot also in safe mode from opencore .

Without following your latest advices I did a complete restart following exactly your former post using an APFS partition and had success! For the first time I could install Big Sur directly to a system not having a native EFI boot selection.

This is a great step forward! I have updated my former post, too.

Thanks, again!

 

[Mo Haya]

@jackluke

Unfortunately, your information did not help with the direct updates.
After all attempts, a macOSInstall folder with UpdateOptions.plist was not seen in any phase.

With Fullinstaller DP9 I'm back with the MacPro3,1.
DoNotSeal and delete telemetry and change the AppleHDA again no problem. Everything else works natively again.

View attachment 962309

Hi there
Great to see your Mac Pro 3,1 running Big Sur, I was wondering if you have tried any AMD gpus. I know there was an issue with both Mojave and Catalina requiring the AMD's SSE2 drivers, which do not work with the 3,1 Mac Pro as it has only SSE4.1. But somebody came up with a work around for them, which Dosdude implemented in his installers for both operating systems. Is there a work around for Big Sur? Just curious. Thanks

 

[David dongfox]

David Mac Mini

So:
In Terminal from your Big Sur USB Installer you type exactly like below, including spaces.
/Volumes/Image\ Volume/patch-kexts.sh /Volumes/David\ Mac\ Mini

Hi, Thank you so much to both of you Justperry and Thatsmeonlyme, is work ! Thanks again.

 

[joevt]

Hi there
Great to see your Mac Pro 3,1 running Big Sur, I was wondering if you have tried any AMD gpus. I know there was an issue with both Mojave and Catalina requiring the AMD's SSE2 drivers, which do not work with the 3,1 Mac Pro as it has only SSE4.1. But somebody came up with a work around for them, which Dosdude implemented in his installers for both operating systems. Is there a work around for Big Sur? Just curious. Thanks

Kexts can be installed in Big Sur so I assume the same SSE 4.2 kext can be used in Big Sur. This won't work if the AMD drivers use more SSE 4.2 instructions. I don't know if anyone has tried.

 

[eminemmm]

I installed beta 9 with micropatcher 0.3.2
when I’m trying to apply the patcher in the very end it gaves kmutil.KMError error 24
any help

 

[Barry K. Nathan]

I installed beta 9 with micropatcher 0.3.2
when I’m trying to apply the patcher in the very end it gaves kmutil.KMError error 24
any help

Please show a screenshot or photo of the screen with this error.

 

[eminemmm]

Please show a screenshot or photo of the screen with this error.

tried it once from USB bootable and one time from normal

 

[Barry K. Nathan]

tried it once from USB bootable and one time from normal

That's a new error I haven't seen before, unfortunately. I have an idea of what might be happening but I'm going to have to do a little experimentation on my own system to verify my theory (and to see if any changes to patch-kexts.sh might be helpful). Edit: Not that I think I can change patch-kexts.sh to fix this error, but I might be able to make changes that would make kmutil show a more useful error message, maybe.
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Barry, first of all, thank you for your great work and to those of others. Second, I'm curious about your Early 2011 13" MacBook Pro. I have one too and have installed the BS betas on it using your micropatcher. Do Maps, Photos, and FindMy work for you? I only get a black image, which I assume is because of the lack of metal. I've been following this thread from the beginning and have searched these topics, and can't seem to get a clear answer. Sorry if this has been answered and I somehow missed it!

These failures are side effects of not having a Metal GPU. I should add this to the README.

 

[eminemmm]

That's a new error I haven't seen before, unfortunately. I have an idea of what might be happening but I'm going to have to do a little experimentation on my own system to verify my theory (and to see if any changes to patch-kexts.sh might be helpful).

I ain’t lucky no more. When I succeeded to download the beta 9 with cURL command and Catalina usb , I’m not able now to patch

 

[Barry K. Nathan]

I ain’t lucky no more. When I succeeded to download the beta 9 with cURL command and Catalina usb , I’m not able now to patch

It's probably another manifestation of your previous problems which we haven't fixed yet. (I was thinking of asking you to try installing beta 9 in case the beta 9 installer could fix it -- but I guess it couldn't.)

I should have more instructions for you to try in the next day or less.

 

[eminemmm]

It's probably another manifestation of your previous problems which we haven't fixed yet. (I was thinking of asking you to try installing beta 9 in case the beta 9 installer could fix it -- but I guess it couldn't.)

I should have more instructions for you to try in the next day or less.

Okey thank you my friend

 

[Barry K. Nathan]

I tried to update to beta 9 with 0.3.2 patch on a 2013 imac 27 but it will not accept my password to unlock the disk before I install beta 9. I tried change my password not and testing it again but that did not work. I also have file vault enabled which I cant seem to disable.

My understanding is that this is due to bugs in Big Sur (if I remember correctly, I've heard of similar bugs happening on supported Macs as well). The only fix that I'm aware of is to do a Time Machine backup (don't worry about encrypting it -- Big Sur makes you encrypt the Time Machine backup, but in my testing Big Sur's Time Machine encryption, unlike FileVault, is stable), erase and reinstall Big Sur, and use the Setup Assistant to restore the Time Machine backup. (Trying to restore from the installer USB does not work, but I don't yet know if this is inherent to Big Sur, inherent to the patching process, or a bug in the patcher.)
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Hey!
why don't you put them also into the git-repository?
Should be easier to maintain and find later on I think.

The fact that it hasn't happened yet is my fault. Sorry I've been dragging my feet on this.

 

[Barry K. Nathan]

Can we enable SIP after installing and patching?

For Late 2013 iMac (or other 2012/2013 machines with upgraded WiFi so they don't need patch-kexts.sh), it's probably safe. For other Macs, it's probably best not to take the risk.

At some point I'll do experiments with reenabling SIP, but that will be after I try to improve the WiFi patch.

 

[Barry K. Nathan]

Successfully updated from PB6 to PB9 using @Barry K. Nathan micro patcher on my Late 2013" 21.5" iMac. Seems to be working well.. I haven't done the step to re-apply setvars via the EFI boot loader (Did that under 3.0??)

There were changes to the setvars program in v0.3.2 to match changes in how disabling SIP works in beta 9, but since you're on a Late 2013 iMac it almost certainly won't make a difference in your case.

 

[justperry]

Hmm, Wifi is flaky again on a 2012 Mac Mini, no networks.

 

[Barry K. Nathan]

Friends of my system is what you see in the picture
I installed Big Sur
But it is a bit stuck
If the software is a little heavy, it causes the system to slow down
And when I minimize a window, it hangs for a few seconds
And ....
Is there a way to solve this problem?
Of course, Big Sur Beta 1 was not good at all
It is much better now
But not much has changed since the release of Beta 6
Will the problem be solved with the arrival of the original version?

No, this will not be solved in the final Big Sur release. Right now, this is inherent to running Big Sur on a 2011 MacBook Pro (it's actually much much worse on 2010 MacBooks, in my experience). When people say there's "no graphics acceleration" on non-Metal GPUs with Big Sur, this is what they're warning about.

For the foreseeable future, this is as good as Big Sur is going to be on 2011 MacBook Pros. (Edit: Go to System Preferences->Accessibility->Display and try turning on Reduce Transparency, Reduce Motion, maybe Increase Contrast as well. Also try running the disable-animations.sh script that comes in the misc-scripts folder of the patcher. Those steps will improve performance a little bit, but you will probably still find it to be unacceptable.)

To the best of my knowledge, there is still work being done by some other patch developers to try to fix this, to try to bring graphics acceleration to non-Metal GPUs on Big Sur, but it's very difficult work, it could turn out to be infeasible in the end, and if it is feasible it could take a while. I personally believe it would be prudent to assume it won't happen and make decisions accordingly -- that way, if it actually happens, it will be a very happy surprise, and if it doesn't, at least you'll still be prepared. (If anyone involved in this work believes that I am mischaracterizing the situation, please speak up and correct me!)

 

[tokyogentleman]

No, this will not be solved in the final Big Sur release. Right now, this is inherent to running Big Sur on a 2011 MacBook Pro (it's actually much much worse on 2010 MacBooks, in my experience). When people say there's "no graphics acceleration" on non-Metal GPUs with Big Sur, this is what they're warning about.

For the foreseeable future, this is as good as Big Sur is going to be on 2011 MacBook Pros. (Edit: Go to System Preferences->Accessibility->Display and try turning on Reduce Transparency, Reduce Motion, maybe Increase Contrast as well. Also try running the disable-animations.sh script that comes in the misc-scripts folder of the patcher. Those steps will improve performance a little bit, but you will probably still find it to be unacceptable.)

To the best of my knowledge, there is still work being done by some other patch developers to try to fix this, to try to bring graphics acceleration to non-Metal GPUs on Big Sur, but it's very difficult work, it could turn out to be infeasible in the end, and if it is feasible it could take a while. I personally believe it would be prudent to assume it won't happen and make decisions accordingly -- that way, if it actually happens, it will be a very happy surprise, and if it doesn't, at least you'll still be prepared. (If anyone involved in this work believes that I am mischaracterizing the situation, please speak up and correct me!)

Barry thanks for your practical common sense and all that you do!

 

[Barry K. Nathan]

@Barry K. Nathan

just FYI: Repeated kernelpanics, MBP 2012 13", GPU related

Thanks for the info. I'll keep an eye out for this. Is this a MacBookPro9,2 (Mid 2012 non-Retina) or MacBookPro10,2 (Late 2012 Retina)?

 

[MacPeet]

Hi there
Great to see your Mac Pro 3,1 running Big Sur, I was wondering if you have tried any AMD gpus. I know there was an issue with both Mojave and Catalina requiring the AMD's SSE2 drivers, which do not work with the 3,1 Mac Pro as it has only SSE4.1. But somebody came up with a work around for them, which Dosdude implemented in his installers for both operating systems. Is there a work around for Big Sur? Just curious. Thanks

No, I haven't tried AMD.

 

[internetzel]

To those who tested this: https://forums.macrumors.com/thread...unsupported-macs-thread.2242172/post-28973673

and got prohibitory symbol after made the patched BaseSystem legacy USB Installer, there was a minor issue on the fix2, that I noticed after @Alex-Microsmeta send me a log of the patch, due since I used a previous folder for that, I ignored that apple from beta 9 has completely removed the PrelinkedKernels, and so also with the stock createinstallmedia (beta 9) Big Sur installer there wasn't any folder for this, but now it's fixed.

So maybe if @Ausdauersportler could retry the BaseSystem legacy USB fix beta 9 too.

Because using my BaseSystem fix you should get a bootable Big Sur installer without using opencore, from apple startup manager directly, and when in the recovery installer menu you will get also Wifi to use Safari and Sound to enable with CMD+F5 .

Here is the updated fix (also attached on previous post): BigSur BaseSystem legacy usb fix b9.zip

So your method is to boot a prelinkedkernel instead of a BootKernelExtensions.kc .
And I should be able to build a Big Sur prelinkedkernel from Mojave or Catalina?
And as you say on your GitHub Big Sur beta 6 and up don't support being booted via prelinkedkernel any longer - so are you using an older kernel or did you find another way of booting the current Big Sur kernel as a prelinkedkernel, like putting the prelinkedkernel in the place where the BootKernelExtensions.kc should be?

 

[jackluke]

So your method is to boot a prelinkedkernel instead of a BootKernelExtensions.kc .
And I should be able to build a Big Sur prelinkedkernel from Mojave or Catalina?
And as you say on your GitHub Big Sur beta 6 and up don't support being booted via prelinkedkernel any longer - so are you using an older kernel or did you find another way of booting the current Big Sur kernel as a prelinkedkernel, like putting the prelinkedkernel in the place where the BootKernelExtensions.kc should be?

I found that method during beta 1 , then build a patched prelinkedkernel from BigSur beta 3 Build 20A5323l (you need of course mount -uw / and snapshot booting disabled), it is based on BigSur kernel and extensions.
That is mainly to embed Legacy USB for non-APFS Mac (allowing at least a BigSur recovery environment with responsive usb input devices) , but for recent USB Mac as Ivy bridge you can use also a stock BigSur Beta 6 prelinkedkernel (from beta 9 apple removed the PrelinkedKernels).

Beta 6 prelinkedkernel does work only till single user mode, but on later booting stuck on apple logo stage 2 loading (when graphics kext switching should occur).

About Clarkdale i3 and Arrandale i5 i7 CPUs that kp at early booting due to incompatible *ACPI*.kext , if you after used "BaseSystem Legacy USB fix" replace the prelinkedkernel with a 10.15.7 one, in single user mode the BaseSystem will boot with ACPI but kp later of course due to different Catalina kernel (and its kext) embedded in prelinkedkernel.

 

[internetzel]

I found that method during beta 1 , then build a patched prelinkedkernel from BigSur beta 3 Build 20A5323l (you need of course mount -uw / and snapshot booting disabled), it is based on BigSur kernel and extensions.
That is mainly to embed Legacy USB for non-APFS Mac (allowing at least a BigSur recovery environment with responsive usb input devices) , but for recent USB Mac as Ivy bridge you can use also a stock BigSur Beta 6 prelinkedkernel (from beta 9 apple removed the PrelinkedKernels).

Beta 6 prelinkedkernel does work only till single user mode, but on later booting stuck on apple logo stage 2 loading (when graphics kext switching should occur).

About Clarkdale i3 and Arrandale i5 i7 CPUs that kp at early booting due to incompatible *ACPI*.kext , if you after used "BaseSystem Legacy USB fix" replace the prelinkedkernel with a 10.15.7 one, in single user mode the BaseSystem will boot with ACPI but kp later of course due to different Catalina kernel (and its kext) embedded in prelinkedkernel.

Thanks for the explanation!
I'm actually looking for a method to try replacing the kexts involved in the crash (with the ones from Catalina for example). For that I'd need a method to build my own Big Sur prelinkedkernel with my own set of included kexts, I think. That still sounds doable to me or am I missing something?

 

[jackluke]

Thanks for the explanation!
I'm actually looking for a method to try replacing the kexts involved in the crash (with the ones from Catalina for example). For that I'd need a method to build my own Big Sur prelinkedkernel with my own set of included kexts, I think. That still sounds doable to me or am I missing something?

If you point in the com.apple.Boot.plist (Preboot) as Kernel Cache the prelinkedkernel then you can build it directly from BigSur single user mode simply with:

mount -uw /
mount -P 1
mount -P 2
kextcache -i /
kcditto

(snapshot booting disabled and csrutil disable are mandatory for mount -uw /)

Otherwise from externally this should work too:

kextcache -prelinked-kernel /path/prelinkedkernel -kernel /path/kernel -local-root -- /path/Library/Extensions/ /path/System/Library/Extensions/

 

[elise_s1]

As of writing, only WiFi appears to be broken.

is there a list of Big Sur tested as compatible Wlan/BT modules?
Is the Intel BX200 compatible with Big Sur? Will it retain compatibility with (much) older iOS like High Sierra?

 

[Ausdauersportler]

is there a list of Big Sur tested as compatible Wlan/BT modules?
Is the Intel BX200 compatible with Big Sur? Will it retain compatibility with (much) older iOS like High Sierra?

If you are talking about the iMac in your signature give this thread a try, both the BCM94360CD and the BCM943602CDP work, the latter one out of the box with HandOff and Continuity, the former one needs an edited /System/Library/Frameworks/IOBluetooth.framework/Versions/A/Resources/SystemParameters.plist. You have to find out your board ID (this is the iMac 2011 27") and set the value to TRUE manually to get HandOff and Continuity working:

        <key>Mac-942B59F58194171B</key>
        <dict>
                <key>ContinuitySupport</key>
                <true/>
                <key>DID ProductCode</key>
                <integer>18975</integer>
        </dict>

To achieve this on Big Sure follow the guide in this post how to mount a writeable version of the root files system and how to make the changes with a snapshot persistent.

Both cards work perfectly with High Sierra, Mojave and Catalina, but your 2010 iMac will probably not run Big Sur...