MP 4,1 flashed to 5,1 won't boot after FileVault

[SolidCake]

Hey guys,

Recently I overhauled my Mac Pro 4,1. I flashed it to 5,1 and upgraded the CPU to 2 x Xeon X5690's, which I successfully delidded myself *proud*. I also upgraded the RAM to 32GB 1333MHz and OSX is running from a Samsung EVO 850 @ 500GB.

When I wanted to encrypt the drive, using FileVault, I got the standard reboot dialog. Upon restarting the Mac to start the encryption process the screen just stays black. I got the regular start-up chime but other than that the screen just stays dark and nothing happens. After a while the mac shuts down by itself.

I went into recovery mode and used the terminal to check the encryption process using this command: "diskutil cs list"

I saw that the encryption process was still running along just fine. I stayed in recovery mode until the process was completed, checking the terminal, and then tried to boot the Mac. Still, got the black screen and nothing happened. I ended up using time machine to go back before the drive was encrypted and the Mac started to boot normally.

Is there a way to resolve this problem?

Can you encrypt a SSD on a Mac Pro 4,1 -> 5,1 using FileVault?

Please help!

Mac Pro 4,1 -> 5,1

OS X, El Capitan, 10.11.5

SSD, Samsung EVO 850, 500GB

 

[leon771]

Do you have an EFI graphics card installed?

If not that may be your problem.

 

[b0fh666]

if indeed non-efi card, try this on the black screen : type 2 or 3 letters of your username then type your password and <enter>, see if it boots.

if yes that would be ultimate security! full encryption and blind boot process

 

[SolidCake]

The Mac Pro still has the stock GPU; nVidia Geforce GT 120, 512MB.

Upon booting I also get the RAM chime, forgot the mention that.

 

[h9826790]

Do you have an EFI graphics card installed?

If not that may be your problem.

if indeed non-efi card, try this on the black screen : type 2 or 3 letters of your username then type your password and <enter>, see if it boots.

if yes that would be ultimate security! full encryption and blind boot process

He can use the recovery partition, of course that's an EFI GPU.

Hey guys,

Recently I overhauled my Mac Pro 4,1. I flashed it to 5,1 and upgraded the CPU to 2 x Xeon X5690's, which I successfully delidded myself *proud*. I also upgraded the RAM to 32GB 1333MHz and OSX is running from a Samsung EVO 850 @ 500GB.

When I wanted to encrypt the drive, using FileVault, I got the standard reboot dialog. Upon restarting the Mac to start the encryption process the screen just stays black. I got the regular start-up chime but other than that the screen just stays dark and nothing happens. After a while the mac shuts down by itself.

I went into recovery mode and used the terminal to check the encryption process using this command: "diskutil cs list"

I saw that the encryption process was still running along just fine. I stayed in recovery mode until the process was completed, checking the terminal, and then tried to boot the Mac. Still, got the black screen and nothing happened. I ended up using time machine to go back before the drive was encrypted and the Mac started to boot normally.

Is there a way to resolve this problem?

Can you encrypt a SSD on a Mac Pro 4,1 -> 5,1 using FileVault?

Please help!

Mac Pro 4,1 -> 5,1

OS X, El Capitan, 10.11.5

SSD, Samsung EVO 850, 500GB

How do you connect the 850 Evo?

 

[SolidCake]

Hey Guys,

I'm still trying to figure out a solution to this problem. I recently got the same issue when installing the MacOs Sierra public beta on another drive (drive-bay 2). Upon restarting, to further the installation, the Mac Pro booted into the 'same' black screen. Same issues aswel, ram-chime, dark screen and shut down automatically after a while.

I could only boot back into my main OS when physically removing the drive that housed the Sierra beta.

If anyone can help me figure this out, that would be awesome!

How do you connect the 850 Evo?

I am using a 3.5 to 2.5 conversion bracket to get the SSD to fit properly in the Mac Pro drive bays. I bought them from OWC but they are rather expensive. There are cheaper solutions as wel.

 

[h9826790]

I am using a 3.5 to 2.5 conversion bracket to get the SSD to fit properly in the Mac Pro drive bays. I bought them from OWC but they are rather expensive. There are cheaper solutions as wel.

you mean the adaptor that allow you to connect the SSD directly to the native SATA port, right?

And even without file vault, you still can't install the Sierra beta, correct?

 

[SolidCake]

you mean the adaptor that allow you to connect the SSD directly to the native SATA port, right?

And even without file vault, you still can't install the Sierra beta, correct?

Yes, that is adapter/caddy I am using for the drives. The weird thing is that I could get the developer bete working, the .1 version. But the public one just gives me the black screen.

 

[aajeevlin]

Very curious. I think we have the same problem although the setup is different. I put in a pcie SSD and boot from it just fine the first few time. Then I encrypted the drive and reboot after that came up with the same exact situation as you. Weird.

Update (almost a year later): In case anyone is having this issue, I'm putting up my final update via this link: https://forums.macrumors.com/threads/mac-pro-4-1-pcie-ssd-boot-issue.1982549/

 

[pigsyn]

I just enabled FileVault on my samsung 850 Evo.
I didn't have any problem with my flashed 4,1. (Hardware in signature)