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startergo

macrumors 603
Sep 20, 2018
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Yes but the BootCamp control panel issue affects every Mac, not just the cMP. And the workaround (boot picker) is going to continue to work for 7950/680 users (or owners of MVC cards). It's specifically "Boot Camp Assistant" which appears to be blocked now on the cMP no matter what GPU is installed. I was just saying it's not a huge loss to lose BCA because it's best to install Windows from USB on its own drive anyway.
Please elaborate. You say boot camp assistant control panel in Windows is blocked? Do you mean it is blocked after the 138 upgrade or something else? It still works for me on 138. Or you mean it is blocked on Mojave?
 

h9826790

macrumors P6
Apr 3, 2014
16,656
8,587
Hong Kong
Yes but normally the GM (Final) build is released to beta testers at least a few days before the public release. There is still some debate on the Mojave forum over whether the build Apple released last week is the GM. It lacks a beta designation in the build number, but it also includes the Feedback Assistant in the dock, which normally gets removed for a non-beta release. Folks aren't really sure at this point whether the public release has been delayed or not. Guess we'll find out in a couple of days.

From memory, the lastest beta does looks like GM to me (build number default to be hidden in “About this Mac”).

I am now away from my home town, can’t boot to the latest 10.14 and confirm this.

But AFAIK, for real beta, build number default to display. For GM / official release, build number default to be hidden.
 

tsialex

Contributor
Original poster
Jun 13, 2016
13,454
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Please elaborate. You say boot camp assistant control panel in Windows is blocked? Do you mean it is blocked after the 138 upgrade or something else? It still works for me on 138. Or you mean it is blocked on Mojave?
Mojave, not 138.0.0.0.0 related.

BootCamp control panel problem is support for APFS containers, it's broken since High Sierra, not Mojave or 138.0.0.0.0 related.
[doublepost=1537639379][/doublepost]
From memory, the lastest beta does looks like GM to me (build number default to be hidden in “About this Mac”).

I am now away from my home town, can’t boot to the latest 10.14 and confirm this.

But AFAIK, for real beta, build number default to display. For GM / official release, build number default to be hidden.

Apple do not show the build number anymore on About My Mac, and removed beta suffix from the SUCatalog, but do you consider it GM if even Apple says on the release notes that is a Developer Preview?
 

h9826790

macrumors P6
Apr 3, 2014
16,656
8,587
Hong Kong
Mojave, not 138.0.0.0.0 related.

BootCamp control panel problem is support for APFS containers, it's broken since High Sierra, not Mojave or 138.0.0.0.0 related.
[doublepost=1537639379][/doublepost]

Apple do not show the build number anymore on About My Mac, and removed beta suffix from the SUCatalog, but do you consider it GM if even Apple says on the release notes that is a Developer Preview?

By considering there is no contradiction between DP and GM. I personally consider the last DP is one of the GM candidate.
 
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startergo

macrumors 603
Sep 20, 2018
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Mojave, not 138.0.0.0.0 related.

BootCamp control panel problem is support for APFS containers, it's broken since High Sierra, not Mojave or 138.0.0.0.0 related.
[doublepost=1537639379][/doublepost]

Apple do not show the build number anymore on About My Mac, and removed beta suffix from the SUCatalog, but do you consider it GM if even Apple says on the release notes that is a Developer Preview?

I am still on high sierra and my boot camp control panel works fine. I can always return to OSX from Windows through the boot control panel.
 

bookemdano

macrumors 68000
Jul 29, 2011
1,514
846
Please elaborate. You say boot camp assistant control panel in Windows is blocked? Do you mean it is blocked after the 138 upgrade or something else? It still works for me on 138. Or you mean it is blocked on Mojave?

Boot Camp Assistant is the Mac utility to partition your hard drive and facilitate installing Windows + appropriate drivers. That is what is blocked from running on the cMP under Mojave. It's not really a problem for most people because the steps it takes can be done via other methods.

Boot Camp Control Panel is the Windows Utility you use to (among other things) instruct your Mac to reboot back into macOS. But the problem is that with High Sierra and now Mojave, Apple converts all macOS drives to its new file system APFS. But they have never fixed Boot Camp Control Panel to be able to "see" APFS partitions, so you can no longer use this method to get back to macOS after being in Windows. This problem applies to every single Mac that runs Mojave.

But with most other Macs, including cMPs with an EFI GPU like the Mac edition Radeon 7950 and Nvidia GTX 680, you can hold down the option key at boot to bring up the boot picker and select your macOS partition that way. So it's not a big problem for those people.

Who it is a problem for are cMP users with a non-EFI GPU such as the two cards Apple recommended for Mojave (RX 560 and RX 580). Because these cards lack an EFI driver, they cannot use the boot picker. There are some hacks to work around the limitation, but none of the Apple-provided methods work. This is why I think Apple blocked the Boot Camp Assistant from running on a cMP.
 
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crjackson2134

macrumors 601
Mar 6, 2013
4,847
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Charlotte, NC
I am still on high sierra and my boot camp control panel works fine. I can always return to OSX from Windows through the boot control panel.

Yeah, here's what I do.

My main drive is APFS, I have a bootable backup (CCC clone) formatted to HFS+. If I'm going to be using windows, for any reason, I'm booted into the HFS+ drive. There, bootcamp options are all functional for me. I can boot back to the HFS+ drive without a PRAM. If I'm done with Win10 for the day, then I boot to the main drive (APFS) from the HFS+ drive and leave it there. It's convoluted but it's workable and easy. I'll always have a CCC clone so, no harm in formatting it to HFS+. It works well that way.

I also use BootRunner3 which works well, but any reboot (in my configuration) takes me back to the APFS drive. There is no BootRunner3 controls for Windows. It's the only shortcoming I can find with that app.
[doublepost=1537641406][/doublepost]
HFS+. Let me install Mojave in APFS on the other disk to test it.

It doesn't work. I'm running it now.
 
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startergo

macrumors 603
Sep 20, 2018
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Yeah, here's what I do.

My main drive is APFS, I have a bootable backup (CCC clone) formatted to HFS+. If I'm going to be using windows, for any reason, I'm booted into the HFS+ drive. There, bootcamp options are all functional for me. I can boot back to the HFS+ drive without a PRAM. If I'm done with Win10 for the day, then I boot to the main drive (APFS) from the HFS+ drive and leave it there. It's convoluted but it's workable and easy. I'll always have a CCC clone so, no harm in formatting it to HFS+. It works well that way.

I also use BootRunner3 which works well, but any reboot (in my configuration) takes me back to the APFS drive. There is no BootRunner3 controls for Windows. It's the only shortcoming I can find with that app.
[doublepost=1537641406][/doublepost]

It doesn't work. I'm running it now.

That is precisely what I would have suggested except I don' use any third parties, but first mount the appropriate EFI partition with a script, then bless and restart.
 

Mattww

macrumors 6502
Jan 11, 2008
395
19
and now Mojave, Apple converts all macOS drives to its new file system APFS.

I've not tested any Mojave betas - waiting on the full release - but are you saying volumes in the cMP other than the boot disk (including any mechanical drives) are auto upgraded from HFS+ to APFS?

Given I now have an RX580 my idea for using bootcamp (should the need arise after the upgrade) was to partition a separate disk to my Mojave boot disk (I'd probably buy another SSD), install Windows (NTFS partition) together with an older version of MacOS (10.13 or even 10.12 on an HFS+ partition) on that Windows disk so I could boot to that then back to Mojave.
 

crjackson2134

macrumors 601
Mar 6, 2013
4,847
1,957
Charlotte, NC
I've not tested any Mojave betas - waiting on the full release - but are you saying volumes in the cMP other than the boot disk (including any mechanical drives) are auto upgraded from HFS+ to APFS?

Given I now have an RX580 my idea for using bootcamp (should the need arise after the upgrade) was to partition a separate disk to my Mojave boot disk (I'd probably buy another SSD), install Windows (NTFS partition) together with an older version of MacOS (10.13 or even 10.12 on an HFS+ partition) on that Windows disk so I could boot to that then back to Mojave.

It only converts the boot disk.
 

bjar

macrumors regular
Feb 20, 2013
232
105
Sugar land, tx
Yeah, here's what I do.

My main drive is APFS, I have a bootable backup (CCC clone) formatted to HFS+. If I'm going to be using windows, for any reason, I'm booted into the HFS+ drive. There, bootcamp options are all functional for me. I can boot back to the HFS+ drive without a PRAM. If I'm done with Win10 for the day, then I boot to the main drive (APFS) from the HFS+ drive and leave it there. It's convoluted but it's workable and easy. I'll always have a CCC clone so, no harm in formatting it to HFS+. It works well that way.

I also use BootRunner3 which works well, but any reboot (in my configuration) takes me back to the APFS drive. There is no BootRunner3 controls for Windows. It's the only shortcoming I can find with that app.
[doublepost=1537641406][/doublepost]

It doesn't work. I'm running it now.

This is pretty much what I do. I clone my apfs drive to hfs using ccc. And I clone to a smaller ssd and only pick certain files so it will fit. In windows I pick the hfs drive to boot to, then once booted I pick the apfs. Takes an extra 30 sec but seemed like the easiest route.
 

tsialex

Contributor
Original poster
Jun 13, 2016
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bookemdano

macrumors 68000
Jul 29, 2011
1,514
846
I've not tested any Mojave betas - waiting on the full release - but are you saying volumes in the cMP other than the boot disk (including any mechanical drives) are auto upgraded from HFS+ to APFS?

What I meant is that Mojave converts any disk you try to install it on to APFS, in contrast to High Sierra which only auto-converted SSDs (HDDs and Fusion drives weren't converted). The Mojave installer won't touch any other drives in your system. Sorry for the confusion.
 
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PianoPro

macrumors 6502a
Sep 4, 2018
511
385
That is precisely what I would have suggested except I don' use any third parties, but first mount the appropriate EFI partition with a script, then bless and restart.

I used this shell script command to bless and boot into Win 10. It worked great except that the # in disk#s1 of the disk identifier for the "BOOTCAMP" volume can/will/does change when starting up a Mac Pro (I have 2 SSD, and 3 HD in my system). Do you have a scripting solution for that problem?

do shell script "bless -device /dev/disk2s1 -mount /Volumes/EFI -setBoot -nextonly" password "mypassword" with administrator privileges
 

expede

macrumors regular
Jan 15, 2018
236
67
Sweden
Hi!
Should it not be;

"sudo bless -device /dev/diskXsX -mount /Volumes/BOOTCAMP -setBoot -nextonly" ? X being your own BootCamp disk (mine was disk5s2). Edit 180923 13:11

Best regards

/Per

do shell script "bless -device /dev/disk2s1 -mount /Volumes/EFI -setBoot -nextonly" password "mypassword" with administrator privileges
 
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PianoPro

macrumors 6502a
Sep 4, 2018
511
385
Hi!
Should it not be;

"sudo bless -device /dev/diskXsX -mount /Volumes/BOOTCAMP -setBoot -nextonly" ?

Best regards

/Per

that's fine (except its /Volumes/EFI when typed from the terminal, but the password "mypassword" with administrator privileges part in what I wrote takes care of the sudo part in a script.

What I typed works totally fine in a script as long as the X in /dev/diskXs1 is the disk with the Windows volume. The problem is that the disk number X is assigned by the order that multiple physical discs in the Mac Pro are enumerated at power up and that can (and often does) change from one power-up to another power-up in a non-predictable way. What is needed is a more complex script that first checks which disk has the Windows volume - with something like

diskutil info "BOOTCAMP" |grep Node, which returns

Device Node: /dev/diskX

and then extracts X from that and replaces the 2 (making it diskX instead of disk2) in my line of the script.

I'm not a Unix guy, not familiar with scripting, etc. so I don't know how to write a script to do that. (I can figure it out if I have time, but I have lots of higher priority things to do - I don't mod Macs as a hobby). Which is why I asked the OP what script he was using to make this work ALL the time.
 

expede

macrumors regular
Jan 15, 2018
236
67
Sweden
Hi!

Niether am I, a Unix guy. I was just trying your script and it didn´t work for me. But if I did the "sudo"-thing it worked.
The X in my "line" is representing "your own" BootCamp" disk. Mine is "disk5s2". You can save the line in a texteditor document as plain text and do a "chmod 700" and get it executable. But we are way out of topic here.

Sorry tsialex!

Best regards

/Per

flibmmtk.png


that's fine (except its /Volumes/EFI when typed from the terminal, but the password "mypassword" with administrator privileges part in what I wrote takes care of the sudo part in a script.

What I typed works totally fine in a script as long as the X in /dev/diskXs1 is the disk with the Windows volume. The problem is that the disk number X is assigned by the order that multiple physical discs in the Mac Pro are enumerated at power up and that can (and often does) change from one power-up to another power-up in a non-predictable way. What is needed is a more complex script that first checks which disk has the Windows volume - with something like

diskutil info "BOOTCAMP" |grep Node, which returns

Device Node: /dev/diskX

and then extracts X from that and replaces the 2 (making it diskX instead of disk2) in my line of the script.

I'm not a Unix guy, not familiar with scripting, etc. so I don't know how to write a script to do that. (I can figure it out if I have time, but I have lots of higher priority things to do - I don't mod Macs as a hobby). Which is why I asked the OP what script he was using to make this work ALL the time.
 
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PianoPro

macrumors 6502a
Sep 4, 2018
511
385
I was just trying your script and it didn´t work for me. But if I did the "sudo"-thing it worked.
The X in my "line" is representing "your own" BootCamp" disk. Mine is "disk5s2". ... But we are way out of topic here.
Yes, this is off topic, so this my last comment here. Unfortunately I got very little response in the Windows area on this topic so when this thread went off topic and startergo said he had a script for this [he's now sent his to me in a PM] ...

Anyway, do you realize that you need to point at the EFI disk ID, which is probably s1 of diskX, and you need to disable SIP nvram? See this thread:

https://forums.macrumors.com/threads/how-to-boot-camp-without-a-boot-screen.2114788/
 

tsialex

Contributor
Original poster
Jun 13, 2016
13,454
13,601
Mojave to be released any time today. I don't expect changes, seems that 18A389 is the GM and maybe it's the final release too.

So, finally we will have the answers of our questions and maybe we can expect some changes with 10.14.1 betas.

On a personal note: I just did a reinstall of 10.13.6 on my main SSD. I liked a lot Mojave betas, I have it installed on a secondary SSD, but I'm not going to jump to it on my work drive now.
 
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