macOS 11 Big Sur on Unsupported Macs Thread

[MacHacJac]

I finally got it going using the hax.dylib method. It seems stuck at this point, though. Will update soon.

About an hour ago I sent this post. Well, it passed, and Big Sur installed successfully (but without WiFi ) on my 2011 MacBook Pro 13". When I got to the set up, everything was extremely slow and stuttering. When I logged in, I was signed out of my iCloud and had to log in, but when I did after 10 minutes I was informed that the iCloud thing in Apple couldn't be reached. So I couldn't sign into iCloud even though I got the WiFi working. (Yay!!! (not really)) Fortunately I installed it on a partition so I could easily boot back into Catalina when holding alt-option on boot. Will not recommend doing this on the same partition as your old update as it'll be hard to make it back to your old OS version. For reference, I used these steps:

1. Download pkg from http://swcdn.apple.com/content/down...kxzj3zjshu1srsh4n74a41n4/InstallAssistant.pkg
2. Download https://forums.macrumors.com/attachments/really-simple-installer-hack-zip.926156/
3. Copy hax.dylib to home folder
4. Boot into recovery
5. Run csrutil disable in Terminal
6. Reboot and run this in Terminal while on current OS - sudo defaults write /Library/Preferences/com.apple.security.libraryvalidation.plist DisableLibraryValidation -bool true
7. Run this in terminal launchctl setenv DYLD_INSERT_LIBRARIES $PWD/Hax.dylib
8. Open the InstallAssistant.pkg and open the Installer.app in Launchpad / applications folder
9. Wait for install to finish
   Final step (only required if trying to boot on machine older than Mid 2012 (?)) - on Catalina or other OS that can access your APFS partition, delete telemetry from /System/Library/UserEventPlugins/com.apple.telemetry.plugin when complete.

At least the steps worked...

I will probably wait for the patcher unless somebody finds a more reliable approach to this. Let me know.
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[BitVolcano]

A lot of progress has been made in a single week

 

[whgmkeller]

Hi guys. I'm following this topic with great interest - it's fascinating to see all you tech-guru's take on this problem.

Can I ask for some advice please?

I have a 2012 Mac Pro 5,1 with two 27" apple cinema display monitors (non-thunderbolt) connected to a Radeon HD 7950 GPU. Current OS is Mojave. Mac firmware is 140.0.0.0.0 (thanks to tsialex), OS disk is a PCIE APFS card, data sits on a SSD APFS disk.
I would like to upgrade to Big Sur. What would be the best approach?
- update current Mojave to Catalina on my Mac Pro, and try to update to BS from there?
- or install BS on a external SSD disk hooked up to a current iMac that I also possess, then transplant the BS SSD into the Mac Pro and work from there?

I'm not really into Unix and Terminal, but I am fairly confident that I can manage this, having also updated my processors.

Also, I have a Wifi update card laying around; should I install that before doing anything else?

All suggestions welcome - Thanks !

Willem
Netherlands

 

[Allan Fox]

Mid 2012 unibody MacBook pro doesn’t need Siri kext fixes it instantly works and finally my wifi works
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[telepati]

You missed 1 step thats why it's showing no entry sign.

If you installed big sur on a separate volume then boot into Catalina-> open terminal and run this command

sudo nvram boot-args="-no_compat_check

Then boot into big sur.

or boot into recovery and run above command in terminal then boot into big sur

No, no boots args already added. That is not a problem.

 

[justperry]

hello guys,
im trying to get macOS Big Sur on my MacBook Air 2012. but with the installer I have I don't get the option to install on any disk. its just gray... somebody help?

Maybe start reading this thread, there's a ton in info in this thread, start reading from the beginning.
Don't be lazy.

You missed 1 step thats why it's showing no entry sign.

If you installed big sur on a separate volume then boot into Catalina-> open terminal and run this command

sudo nvram boot-args="-no_compat_check

Then boot into big sur.

or boot into recovery and run above command in terminal then boot into big sur

Better edit your post, it's

sudo nvram boot-args="-no_compat_check"

* You forgot the " in the end

 

[jackluke]

Extract this zip and replace the boot.efi file in /Volumes/BigSurUSBLabel/System/Library/CoreServices with the patched one from ASentientBot to disable BaseSystem Verification =) I also got that Kernel Panic log when modifying BaseSystem without replacing the boot.efi file.

Tried that, I used these steps to modify BaseSystem.dmg (that from BigSur is an APFS with Preboot):

cd /Volumes/USBInstallerBigSur/BaseSystem/

hdiutil attach -owners on BaseSystem.dmg -shadow

Customize (directly from Finder) BaseSystem adding patched files

hdiutil detach /dev/diskX (or eject/unmount the "MacOS Base System" volume from Finder)

hdiutil convert -format UDZO -o BaseSystem2.dmg BaseSystem.dmg -shadow

mv BaseSystem.dmg BaseSystembackup.dmg

mv BaseSystem2.dmg BaseSystem.dmg

But even using the patched boot.efi still getting kernel panic (booting single user mode at least the legacy usb are responsive after added LegacyUSBInjector to the BootKernelExtensions.kc).

In few words I can't get a patched BigSur BaseSystem.dmg to boot.

 

[Alex-Microsmeta]

@jackluke Reinstalled BS using hax2, stoll no BS Recovery. REMOVED (renamed) telemetry with Olarila BS Recovery, BS still crashes on boot the sane way!!! I suspect that could be the graphic card Nvidia 320M 🤔 Now I try your patch 😊

 

[PBear.SF]

From your current macOS terminal: kextstat | grep AirPort

if the output contains "com.apple.driver.AirPort.BrcmNIC", this is a supported Broadcom BigSur Wifi ac card that works without patches.

What if mine returns "com.apple.driver.AirPort.Brcm4360 (1400.1.1)"?

 

[parrotgeek1]

In terms of ease of use, my patcher won't catch up to ParrotGeek's until maybe next week. (I plan to do a new release of my patcher, v0.0.5, today or tomorrow, but it will still be a little harder to use than ParrotGeek's.)

The catch right now with ParrotGeek's patcher is that his fork of Hax.dylib is functionally similar to ASentientBot's original Hax and not Hax2 or Hax3, and it does not try to prevent volume sealing. Otherwise I would just enthusiastically say, forget my patcher for the near future, use his instead. (I think I'm still going to update my readme to mention his patcher as an alternative to consider.)

It does not try to prevent volume sealing because I am creating a method to load the Wi-Fi drivers WITHOUT needing to disable sealing

 

[Allan Fox]

Getting everything ready

 

[0423MAC]

Hi guys. I'm following this topic with great interest - it's fascinating to see all you tech-guru's take on this problem.

Can I ask for some advice please?

I have a 2012 Mac Pro 5,1 with two 27" apple cinema display monitors (non-thunderbolt) connected to a Radeon HD 7950 GPU. Current OS is Mojave. Mac firmware is 140.0.0.0.0 (thanks to tsialex), OS disk is a PCIE APFS card, data sits on a SSD APFS disk.
I would like to upgrade to Big Sur. What would be the best approach?
- update current Mojave to Catalina on my Mac Pro, and try to update to BS from there?
- or install BS on a external SSD disk hooked up to a current iMac that I also possess, then transplant the BS SSD into the Mac Pro and work from there?

I'm not really into Unix and Terminal, but I am fairly confident that I can manage this, having also updated my processors.

Also, I have a Wifi update card laying around; should I install that before doing anything else?

All suggestions welcome - Thanks !

Willem
Netherlands

I would upgrade to Catalina first to see how the system handles it. Big Sur being in Beta I would just wait it out till the proper full release as this appears to be a workstation you will use on a regular basis.

Interested in seeing how it plays out with those Mac Pros. Still powerful machines.

 

[dionisy]

Experience of installing Big Sur on MBP 13 Late 2011 / macbookpro 8,1


I try install 3-4 times. First problem - domain error, second - abort installation with message «installation of macOS could not continue».
Solution which help in my case:

0. Make bootable usb flash drive with Catalina installer (use dosdude1 patch for creating the flash)
1. Create separate Partition (not just Volume). [Install Catalina firstly, if you haven’t yet]
2. Downloading installer of Big Sur [ http://swcdn.apple.com/content/down...kxzj3zjshu1srsh4n74a41n4/InstallAssistant.pkg ] Download, run it.
3. Downloading hax.dylib [ https://forums.macrumors.com/attachments/really-simple-installer-hack-zip.926156/ ] Copy hax.dylib to home folder (I also copy it in the folder above and in the folder beyond ‘home’)
4. Boot into recovery mode (Cmd+R after reboot; another way - boot from bootable usb with installer, for example, Catalina, then choose terminal). Run terminal, run ‘csrutil disable’. Then reboot.
5. Automated way for disabling library validation, compatibility check etc.: download scripts from https://github.com/4ndv/big-sur-plz and run it.
6. Run the Big Sur installer (after step 2 it is in Application folder)



Notification!
Some steps have alternatives. All steps write down exactly as I apply it. Check it, try and correct.

Thanks to Andrey Viktorov for manual on medium ‘How to install Big Sur to Mac Mini Late 2012 and other Catalina-capable machines’,
Thanks to GameRoof for manual on MacRumors ( https://forums.macrumors.com/thread...unsupported-macs-thread.2242172/post-28593727 )
Thanks to ASentientBot for ‘really simple installer hack’ and especially hax.dylib ( https://forums.macrumors.com/thread...unsupported-macs-thread.2242172/post-28589245 )
Thanks to 4ndv (aka Andrey Viktorov?) for automated script for disabling ( https://github.com/4ndv/big-sur-plz )
Thanks to johncaling40 for answer in PM on discord and brief step-by-step guide based on his expirience of installing BS on MBP 13 2011
And all community MacRumors and all, who name I don’t called.
Sorry for my English - it is not my native languge; I hope in general message is understandable =)


Good luck you. Thanks for attention.

P.S.
Some remarks on Big Sur using.

Model - MBP 13 late 2011 macbookpro 8,1
Troubles
system randomly log out
iCloud working (still)
Memoji in message - don’t work
Internal wifi don’t work
Accel don’t work
Sound don’t work, volume don’t work
Display’s Brightness don’t work
Icons in top menu bar are invisible if light mode (in dark mode all is visible)
Keyboard’s Backlit and brightness working


Safari - faster (IMHO)
System using fewer resources (IMHO)

 

[Alex-Microsmeta]

Single-user mode is Command + S, not Command + R. (Of course, if there was a reason you were trying to boot to recovery instead of single-user and I missed it in your earlier posts, then never mind.)

You are right, I was confusing the 2 options... 🙃 I can enter Single-Mode with @ASentientBot patch, but now mount -uw / giives me error 66 😕

 

[jackluke]

What if mine returns "com.apple.driver.AirPort.Brcm4360 (1400.1.1)"?

It's not a BigSur supported Wifi card but works with a patched IO80211Family.kext: https://forums.macrumors.com/thread...unsupported-macs-thread.2242172/post-28595200

It will work for any unsupported BigSur mac Wifi card.

 

[CuchoM]

Mid 2012 unibody MacBook pro doesn’t need Siri kext fixes it instantly works and finally my wifi works
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How did you Wi-Fi working? Snapshot not permitted in terminal to me

 

[hvds]

Now that you have "my BigSur prelinkedkernel fix", you can also swap this disk and boot from external USB Big Sur installation, currently (skip a normal booting or CMD+V) use from opencore CMD+S , select BigSur Volume (in your case Samsung840 - Data Label) and then type "exit" this will boot BigSur with IOUSB legacy and telemetry fixed all the times.

Instead if you don't use single user mode (for non-APFS BigSur install), randomly you might get unresponsive IOUSB legacy as for 10.16 Recovery (dmg) , that's because @parrotgeek1 should update the LegacyUSBInjector.kext to align with the BigSur IOUSBHostFamily.kext/Plugins/AppleUSBHostMergeProperties.kext

Meanwhile I asked to @Syncretic (because his AAAMouSSE and telemetrap have correctly assigned a kernel cache ID on BigSur and both work with kextstat) to upgrade that "USB Legacy injector" to allow it to prelink to BigSur (SDK and IOKit), but it's not easy to make it work with BootKernelExtensions.kc .

Also to show to others that you succeeded to boot BigSur from a non-APFS mac use these commands from a BigSur terminal:

system_profiler SPHardwareDataType | grep "Model Identifier"

ioreg -l | grep -i board-id

sysctl machdep.cpu.brand_string

sysctl machdep.cpu.features

system_profiler SPUSBDataType | grep Host

Although you are already miles ahead, and encouraged by your present work, I've swapped disks back so BS is now on USB.
I confirm it boots fine via opencore. Thanks!

 

[TheSkywalker77]

Follow this for wifi https://medium.com/@andv/making-wif...d-macs-with-failed-with-66-error-36c98e3f7965

I followed it and it didn't fix WiFi for me.

 

[quaccOS]

You should replace the HighSierra's AppleHDA.kext in /Volumes/BigSurSystemLabel/System/Library/Extensions/
but if you can't "mount -uw /" from BigSur single user mode or normal booting, then you should replace the AppleHDA.kext as @libneko Wifi kext replacing method, that is through snapshot booting.

My opencore config is mainly to quickly disable csrutil (SIP), platform check (board-id), amfi (library validation), telemetry (penryn core2duo kp), and to enable APFS driver and IOUSB legacy (non-APFS mac).

I replaced the AppleHDA & IO80211Family kexts with the High Sierra versions through a Big Sur USB recovery terminal, but I still have the same Wi-Fi/audio situation too.
I did kextcache -i / kmutil install --update-all kcditto but I presume now, that I have to do this from single-user mode. However, I'm getting error 66 when mounting system volume as writable — and I'm not sure how to disable/delete snapshot booting to circumvent the error.
I don't fully understand snapshots tbh…it's difficult to grip an understanding of.

 

[quellosenzanome]

Hi everyone, has anyone tried on iMac 11,2 yet?
I've tried to install Big Sur on that iMac but it instantly reboots when trying to boot the macOS Install Volume even with -no_compat_check and amfi_get_out_of_my_way=1 set. Any idea?

 

[jvlfilms]

I have a drive with my main Mojave install and a spare drive with Mojave which I then upgraded to Catalina using dosdude's patcher on my cMP 4,1 to 5,1. Then used the script above to install BS - I couldn't boot into it because I also didn't have any boot screens. But then I installed OpenCore and was able to select that drive but couldn't actually get it to load.

I then formatted that drive and figured I'd start from scratch but was getting errors trying to get the Big Sur installer to work.

Anyone have luck on a 5,1 Mac Pro?

 

[Luki1979]

It's not a BigSur supported Wifi card but works with a patched IO80211Family.kext: https://forums.macrumors.com/thread...unsupported-macs-thread.2242172/post-28595200

It will work for any unsupported BigSur mac Wifi card.

I replaced my card to BCM94360CS2 and now works OTB but this instructions are not good man, there is new system security in Big Sur and you cannot just replace the kext like that in the instructions. You would have to install it in Recovery and rebuild cache and build new snapshot otherwise you will brick the disk!

 

[Bravo2zero]

Maybe start reading this thread, there's a ton in info in this thread, start reading from the beginning.
Don't be lazy.





Better edit your post, it's

sudo nvram boot-args="-no_compat_check"

* You forgot the " in the end

I agree , i made same mistake

 

[justperry]

I agree , i made same mistake

No worries, it's just common sense to try and read first, maybe I was a bit to harsh, don't be offended when people try to point that out.

I replaced my card to BCM94360CS2 and now works OTB but this instructions are not good man, there is new system security in Big Sur and you cannot just replace the kext like that in the instructions. You would have to install it in Recovery and rebuild cache and build new snapshot otherwise you will brick the disk!

Yeah, seems like someone has to write a step by step instruction for those of them which find these instructions hard.
I am comfortable using the terminal but not looking forward to actually try to fix Wifi not working on my Mac Mini, some say it could brick the OS, would take ages to recover from this.

Side note, my mac on BS is giving me headaches right now, I got the spinning wheel in Safari, had to force quit, now, after starting Safari typing severy lags in Safari.
CPU usage seems to be OK though, first bug I encounter.

 

[Bravo2zero]

No worries, it's just common sense to try and read first, maybe I was a bit to harsh, don't be offended when people try to point that out.

My mistake was missing out the " , you don't copy the first few and when you get to the point you need to as one has 2 sets " " i missed off the one that should have been included.

Anyways got there in the end