No Boot Screen on Sapphire 7950 Mac Edition

[willtothewong]

Hello everyone,

I purchased a brand new 7950 Mac Edition from OWC last week and finally had time to install it into my 2012 Mac Pro.

Boots just fine but I am not getting any boot screens; just goes straight to log in screen.

I've tried the dip-switch in both places and no luck with either setting. The card shows up in OS X as AMD Radeon HD 7xxx 3072 MB. The weird thing is, it boots just fine to OS X with either dip-switch and displays the same information regarding the card.

Contacted OWC, they said to contact Sapphire. I created a ticket with Sapphire and waiting responses.

Has anyone else here experience the same issue? I've read that most people simply moved the switch to the other setting, which I did, and no luck with boot screens in either position.

Any help would be appreciated.

My system:

2012 Mac Pro 5,1 (12 core 2.4ghz)
Apple 27 LED Cinema Display
12 GB RAM

 

[Mr. Zarniwoop]

It sounds like both copies of the firmware came flashed with the PC firmware. I've heard other people complain about that before.

You can contact Sapphire and see what they can do, likely an exchange, or you can take matters into your own hands and flash one of the firmware copies on the card for Mac yourself.

 

[h9826790]

If you can wait, better to wait for the official solution.

I agree that most likely both chip contain the UEFI ROM, but none of them were flash with the Mac Edition ROM.

If you don't want to wait, or their solution will cost you extra money (e.g. due to extra shipping required). You can dump one of the UEFI ROM image file and make a Mac Edition ROM by yourself, then flash it back to the card.

If you want to go further, you may go to this page and use one of the image file. This image file will permanently fix the flickering issue (but consume more power at idle), and let the card run quieter (when loaded).

 

[willtothewong]

It sounds like both copies of the firmware came flashed with the PC firmware. I've heard other people complain about that before.

You can contact Sapphire and see what they can do, likely an exchange, or you can take matters into your own hands and flash one of the firmware copies on the card for Mac yourself.

Your thoughts do sound right.

I am waiting on Sapphire right now to get back to me (if they get back to me). I will do an RMA with OWC if I do not hear anything back from Sapphire by the week's end.

Flashing is last of my list of things to do. I'd much rather have macvidcards flash a PC card for me.

Thanks for your input.

----------

If you can wait, better to wait for the official solution.

I agree that most likely both chip contain the UEFI ROM, but none of them were flash with the Mac Edition ROM.

If you don't want to wait, or their solution will cost you extra money (e.g. due to extra shipping required). You can dump one of the UEFI ROM image file and make a Mac Edition ROM by yourself, then flash it back to the card.

If you want to go further, you may go to this page and use one of the image file. This image file will permanently fix the flickering issue (but consume more power at idle), and let the card run quieter (when loaded).

Having both PC ROM's on the card does make sense to me. I appreciate your help and suggestions.

If they do not give me a clean refund/exchange, I may simply send it back (eat the cost) and purchase one, pre-flashed, from macvidcards.

I do not trust myself that much to flash an almost $500 video card. Unless there are good tutorials out there.

Thanks again!

 

[FireArse]

Mac Edition 7950

I have the exact same card, bought brand new. It should have worked.

Both sides of the switch had the 'windows' EFI.

Black Sheep helped a great deal and provided the required Mac EFI. I have it somewhere. Let me know if you get stuck - unlikely Sapphire will help you on this..!

https://forums.macrumors.com/threads/1559680/

 

[willtothewong]

I have the exact same card, bought brand new. It should have worked.

Both sides of the switch had the 'windows' EFI.

Black Sheep helped a great deal and provided the required Mac EFI. I have it somewhere. Let me know if you get stuck - unlikely Sapphire will help you on this..!

https://forums.macrumors.com/threads/1559680/

Thanks for the link and information.

I will definitely consider this option should I need to.

I'm planning on RMA'ing it by this coming Friday should I hear nothing back from Sapphire (which I highly doubt they will provide any type of real support).

If that new, RMA'ed card exhibits the same behavior (not boot screen regardless of ROM switch position), then I will follow the guides you posted for sure.

Thanks again.