MP 1,1-5,1 MacPro5,1: What you have to do to upgrade to Mojave (10.13/10.14 BootROM upgrades instructions thread)

[tsialex]

Thanks...btw clean install didn't work either. Disk utility> format drive (APFS) > install Mojave...installation works but black screen with Radeon RX 580...fine with 5770

Do a BootROM dump, I'll PM instructions.

 

[UniqueUserName]

My MSI Radeon RX560 arrived today and install was flawless.

Thanks, @tsialex for this guide.

 

[markfrautschi]

Thank you TSIAlex for this guide. Very helpful.

I have a datapoint to add. This is not a recommendation. It is merely a datapoint.

I have a MacPro5,1 now running boot ROM 130.0.0.0.0 after a successful Mojave Mac OS 14.1 upgrade with a borrowed Sapphire Pulse Radeon RX570 graphics card. The absent EFI support meant that I could not run FSCK and other single user mode tasks. To perform these, I reinstalled the original card, an ATI Radeon HD 5770 and I could perform the single user mode tasks under Mojave. Once these were complete, a reboot command resulted in a normal boot. Booting with the option key held down allowed me to change the boot disk at boot time as usual. Once booted into Mojave with the ATI Radeon HD 5770, I went to System Information and looked for Metal support in case there was any information. It was not listed.

Perhaps I will experience a run time error when encountering an absent Metal API call or have other instabilities. I am not in a position to test for these or other problems. I achieved a normal boot, however, I cannot speak to usability or stability.

My plan is to find a reasonable cost replacement graphics card with EFI support so that I can perform boot time tasks.

Thanks.

 

[tsialex]

Thank you TSIAlex for this guide. Very helpful.

I have a datapoint to add. This is not a recommendation. It is merely a datapoint.

I have a MacPro5,1 now running boot ROM 130.0.0.0.0 after a successful Mojave Mac OS 14.1 upgrade with a borrowed Sapphire Pulse Radeon RX570 graphics card. The absent EFI support meant that I could not run FSCK and other single user mode tasks. To perform these, I reinstalled the original card, an ATI Radeon HD 5770 and I could perform the single user mode tasks under Mojave. Once these were complete, a reboot command resulted in a normal boot. Booting with the option key held down allowed me to change the boot disk at boot time as usual. Once booted into Mojave with the ATI Radeon HD 5770, I went to System Information and looked for Metal support in case there was any information. It was not listed.

Perhaps I will experience a run time error when encountering an absent Metal API call or have other instabilities. I am not in a position to test for these or other problems. I achieved a normal boot, however, I cannot speak to usability or stability.

My plan is to find a reasonable cost replacement graphics card with EFI support so that I can perform boot time tasks.

Thanks.

A Mac EFI card, like the original HD 5770, works with Mojave un-accelerated, so you can use it with boot screens/boot selector and with most apps but you can use anything that needs Metal support or video acceleration - You just need a supported Metal GPU to do the install, like you did.

 

[crjackson2134]

Thank you TSIAlex for this guide. Very helpful.

I have a datapoint to add. This is not a recommendation. It is merely a datapoint.

I have a MacPro5,1 now running boot ROM 130.0.0.0.0 after a successful Mojave Mac OS 14.1 upgrade with a borrowed Sapphire Pulse Radeon RX570 graphics card. The absent EFI support meant that I could not run FSCK and other single user mode tasks. To perform these, I reinstalled the original card, an ATI Radeon HD 5770 and I could perform the single user mode tasks under Mojave. Once these were complete, a reboot command resulted in a normal boot. Booting with the option key held down allowed me to change the boot disk at boot time as usual. Once booted into Mojave with the ATI Radeon HD 5770, I went to System Information and looked for Metal support in case there was any information. It was not listed.

Perhaps I will experience a run time error when encountering an absent Metal API call or have other instabilities. I am not in a position to test for these or other problems. I achieved a normal boot, however, I cannot speak to usability or stability.

My plan is to find a reasonable cost replacement graphics card with EFI support so that I can perform boot time tasks.

Thanks.

I have a flashed AMD Radeon HD7970 (EFI) Card that works very well in Mojo. It’s just as fast as the RX580 for daily (non video editing/rendering) use with documents, web browsing, etc. I personally can’t even see or feel a difference with photo editing, but I don’t do much of that, so it’s hard for me to really compare these.

It I were going to buy another EFI card today, it’d likely be an NVidia GTX 680 and flash it myself.

I will put the RX580 back in my system today or tomorrow (simply because I have it), but the HD7970 is my goto Card when I need EFI. The RX580 is not faster than the HD7970 for my use, but it’s newer, and current tech. You can’t buy a HD7970 or GTX 680 new unless someone has one that’s been languishing on a shelf, collecting dust for years.

 

[emazingsole]

Thank you so much Alex! I was able to upgrade my 5,1 with the BootROM, correct firmware, and Mojave (clean install) with a flashed gtx680 (plus a new ssd). Wouldn't of been able to do it so seamlessly without your instructions. I thank you again.

 

[brkkyk]

[doublepost=1543133465][/doublepost]Thank you so much tsialex for all the help you are taking the time to provide. I have followed these instructions to the tee. Only to be thwarted. No matter what I do. Unplug everything. Remove all cards except for the GTX 680 Mac ver. I can never get pass ROM MP51.0087.B00.

When I run macOSUpdCombo10.13.6 it does not ask to update the firmware. It restarts several times and comes back up fine but no change in the ROM version.

If I just run the Mojave installer it never initiates the shutdown after I enter the admin password for the helper app. It just sits there. If I gto ahead and shut it down and boot with the button down. The lights blink, I let go and the tone sounds. Then a normal reboot back to 10.13.6.

What now?

View attachment 806407 View attachment 806408

No, you don't followed the instructions - ComboUpdates don't upgrade MacPro5,1 firmware.

You have to use the MacAppStore full macOS installer for 10.13.6.

First upgrade to MP51.0089.B00, then you use the 10.14.1 full Mac App Store installer to upgrade to 140.0.0.0.0. It's a two step upgrade.

For those who can't upgrade firmware to MP51.0089.B00 with flashed GTX680, i finally found the solution after months. Please add this instructions into first message :thumbsup:

First download Full High Sierra Installer as you said, after that you should mount some thumb stick or hard drive into your mac pro then you should create bootable High Sierra Installer into this mounted device with running following command:
sudo /Applications/Install\ macOS\ High\ Sierra.app/Contents/Resources/createinstallmedia --volume /Volumes/Untitled(YOUR MOUNTED DRIVE PATH) --applicationpath /Applications/Install\ macOS\ High\ Sierra.app




just open installer from here and TA-DA... now it'll shutdown successfully. remaining instructions same as you said in first post.

 

[zen94]

Don't do this, you will risk loosing your data. Backup your files, upgrade your firmware and then do a clean install.

I wish I could have saw this warning before my stupid move.....
I did exactly the same thing and it's now blacked out with no starting beep.

 

[tsialex]

I wish I could have saw this warning before my stupid move.....
I did exactly the same thing and it's now blacked out with no starting beep.

Did you really bricked your Mac Pro? Nothing on the screen/black screen, no beep? EFI diag led off?

If so:

• you can desolder the SPI flash, reprogram it externally, solder it back (start from this post #929),
• replace the backplane,
• buy a Mac Pro MATT card.

 

[zen94]

Did you really bricked your Mac Pro? Nothing on the screen/black screen, no beep? EFI diag led off?

If so:

• you can desolder the SPI flash, reprogram it externally, solder it back (start from this post #929),
• replace the backplane,
• buy a Mac Pro MATT card.

Thanks for your help.
It's not bricked, seems like some issue with fusion drive and it's fixed now.
But now it came with a new problem: as I bought a RX550 before doing any research and hoping to get my OS updated, I first plug the rx550(2g) with the mojave, it seems good but some times the screen will black out for like half a second.
I thought it was something wrong with the rx550 which doesn't appear in the support list of mojave so I bought another asus RX570(ASUS Radeon EX-RX-570-O4G), but it's not getting any better.
I tried to monitor the status of RAMs, cpu, VRAMS, but can't find any hints related to that...
I also tried reset smc and PRAM

 

[tsialex]

Thanks for your help.
It's not bricked, seems like some issue with fusion drive and it's fixed now.
But now it came with a new problem: as I bought a RX550 before doing any research and hoping to get my OS updated, I first plug the rx550(2g) with the mojave, it seems good but some times the screen will black out for like half a second.
I thought it was something wrong with the rx550 which doesn't appear in the support list of mojave so I bought another asus RX570(ASUS Radeon EX-RX-570-O4G), but it's not getting any better.
I tried to monitor the status of RAMs, cpu, VRAMS, but can't find any hints related to that...
I also tried reset smc and PRAM

RX-550/570 are not officially supported by the Apple native drivers for AMD GPUs, what you can do is a clean install of 10.14.2 into another drive and check if the ill behaviour disappears, if not, you can start to think into a better supported GPU.

 

[pojavi]

Hi all. I have a mac pro 4.1 flashed to 5.1 with firmware MP51.007F.B03 and NVIDIA GeForce GT 120 card. Right now the mac has two ssd hd samsung evo, one with mac os el capitan and the other with sierra. The problem is that when I turn off the machine holding down the button until the long beep, to update the firmware requested by high sierra, the firmware doesn´t install and it carries me again to the desktop. I disabled also SIP, but it didn´t do the trick.

What options do I have to install high sierra or mojave? I´ve seen the tools of dosdude to update old models, but the app prompts with warning telling that my machine is natively supported.

I would appreciate your help in orden not to mess it up.

Thanks in advance.

Regards.
[doublepost=1544971709][/doublepost]Hi all. I have a mac pro 4.1 flashed to 5.1 with firmware MP51.007F.B03 and NVIDIA GeForce GT 120 card. Right now the mac has two ssd hd samsung evo, one with mac os el capitan and the other with sierra. The problem is that when I turn off the machine holding down the button until the long beep, to update the firmware requested by high sierra, the firmware doesn´t install and it carries me again to the desktop. I disabled also SIP, but it didn´t do the trick.

What options do I have to install high mojave? I´ve seen the tools of dosdude to update old models, but the app prompts with warning telling that my machine is natively supported.

I would appreciate your help in orden not to mess it up.

Thanks in advance.

Regards.

 

[tsialex]

You have to correctly put your Mac Pro into Firmware Programming Mode and upgrade your BootROM. You are limited to Sierra if you don't do that.

The easiest way to accomplish this is to do a clean install of Sierra into a empty drive on a SATA bay, remove all other drives from your Mac, then download the full installer of 10.13.6 and do the firmware upgrade.

120GT is not supported by Mojave.

 

[pojavi]

thanks a lot for the quick respond. Is there any tutorial to follow?. Sorry if this has been already asked.

 

[tsialex]

thanks a lot for the quick respond. Is there any tutorial to follow?. Sorry if this has been already asked.

Read the first post. Do all there until the Mojave part.

This is the easiest way to get into Firmware Programming Mode:

1. Shutdown your Mac,
2. Press and keep pressed the power button,
3. You will hear a loud beep, keep pressed,
4. You will hear the startup chime, release the power button when it ends or when starts loading macOS.

 

[tommy chen]

you can release the button when the light flashes

 

[tsialex]

you can release the button when the light flashes

For some Macs, you have to keep it pressed. Some Mac Pros are really hard to get into Firmware Programming Mode.

 

[pojavi]

Read the first post. Do all there until the Mojave part.

This is the easiest way to get into Firmware Programming Mode:

1. Shutdown your Mac,
2. Press and keep pressed the power button,
3. You will hear a loud beep, keep pressed,
4. You will hear the startup chime, release the power button when it ends or when starts loading macOS.

I tried too, but the mac just loads the default operating system. When I flashed it to convert it into a 5.1 I didn´t have problems accesing firmware update module holding down the power button. It just went ok. But in this case, I don´t know why the firmware does not load.

 

[tsialex]

I tried too, but the mac just loads the default operating system.

Do a clean install, into a drive installed into a SATA bay, keep it simple, remove all drives and PCIe cards, keep just the original Apple GPU. Then try again.

 

[MarkC426]

I tried too, but the mac just loads the default operating system. When I flashed it to convert it into a 5.1 I didn´t have problems accesing firmware update module holding down the power button. It just went ok. But in this case, I don´t know why the firmware does not load.

Are you definitely using the full installer, as suggested.

 

[tsialex]

Are you definitely using the full installer, as suggested.
Not the version from mac app store.

The firmware upgrade is only present into the full Mac App Installer for High Sierra, currently 10.13.6.

The delta upgrade from the Mac App Store don't apply here, since the user has Sierra - no delta upgrades between major releases.

 

[tommy chen]

For some Macs, you have to keep it pressed. Some Mac Pros are really hard to get into Firmware Programming Mode.

i programmed 12 macpro (all original 5.1) in the last 4 weeks
from MP51.007F.B03 >MP51.0084.B00 >MP51.007F.B03 > 138.0.0.0 > 140.0.0.0

all of them had no problem

perhaps the 4.1 > 5.1 flashed models get into the hard mode

 

[tsialex]

i programmed 12 macpro (all original 5.1) in the last 4 weeks
from MP51.007F.B03 >MP51.0084.B00 >MP51.007F.B03 > 138.0.0.0 > 140.0.0.0

all of them had no problem

perhaps the 4.1 > 5.1 flashed models get into the hard mode

It's not a 4,1 thing, it happens with mid-2010/mid-2012 too, if you search this thread and the BootROM thread you will find various cases of Mac Pros almost impossible to get into the Firmware Programming Mode, but this is off-topic.

 

[pojavi]

The firmware upgrade is only present into the full Mac App Installer for High Sierra, currently 10.13.6.

The delta upgrade from the Mac App Store don't apply here, since the user has Sierra - no delta upgrades between major releases.

just tried it too. Downloaded 10.13.6 installer and again loads operating system. I don´t know what else to test. Perhaps the only way is to use dosdude tools for unsupported Macs, but I pisses me off not to have a clean official install.

 

[tsialex]

Did you installed a empty disk, then did a clean install of Sierra? Removed all drives and PCIe cards and tried again? You can't upgrade your firmware without a EFI partition, so no hacked installs or non standard macOS installs like RAIDs or MBR/APM partition types.

Your GPU is the original NVIDIA GT 120, from 2009 Mac Pros and with Mac EFI? You can't upgrade your firmware to MP51.0089.B00 without a Mac EFI GPU.