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Resolved Someone still have Firmware Restoration CD 1.5, for early2008/MP3,1?

tsialex

tsialex

Contributor
Original poster
Jun 13, 2016
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I lost my backup with a hard drive crash some years a go for the early-2008 Firmware Restoration CD 1.5, I've tried to download it from Apple but the link is not working at the present time:
Screen Shot 2021-02-24 at 19.40.58.png


When I click on the SLA to accept the agreement and download:
Screen Shot 2021-02-24 at 19.41.07.png


Anyone still have it? I know that is not really very useful for most brick situations, but I'd like to take a look at it as a vector.
 
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Any time you're looking for something old, try going to archive.org and pasting the URL there. Sometimes they miss things, but you'll often get multiple copies of the page you're looking for, sampled on different dates. And as you see, they also archive most of the related files, too (unless they're behind forms or otherwise not directly linked).
 
Syncretic said:
Any time you're looking for something old, try going to archive.org and pasting the URL there. Sometimes they miss things, but you'll often get multiple copies of the page you're looking for, sampled on different dates. And as you see, they also archive most of the related files, too (unless they're behind forms or otherwise not directly linked).
Click to expand...
I usually find what I need with archive.org with easy, but I tried the oldest and newest snapshots and both failed at the SLA agreement - next time I'll check more. Nice seeing the Apple snapshots from the original Aqua era and the later brushed metal, btw.

Also didn't found anything usable by the two different file names Apple used.
 
Couldn't find Firmware Restoration CD 1.5, but I do have dmgs of Firmware Restoration CD 1.3 and 1.4, if either of those would help.
 
I just looked at this thread again, wondering why it was still active. It seems that something got scrambled at archive.org - the URL I posted worked immediately before I posted it. I actually started the download of the .dmg file, but aborted it because I didn't really need it. Now, when I use that link (or the path I took to get there), it says "not found." I wonder what happened in the interim...

EDIT: There's definitely something odd going on at archive.org. The error page says the link is not archived, yet you can see here that they do have archived links to the .dmg file, but both of them are from 2020 (not 2019) and both of them are dead ends. And like I said, the link did work just before I posted it. Weird.
(Hopefully, the link that @permanentmacdabbler posted is what @tsialex is looking for.)
 
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Syncretic said:
I just looked at this thread again, wondering why it was still active. It seems that something got scrambled at archive.org - the URL I posted worked immediately before I posted it. I actually started the download of the .dmg file, but aborted it because I didn't really need it. Now, when I use that link (or the path I took to get there), it says "not found." I wonder what happened in the interim...
Click to expand...
Was it 2.6mb? I think Apple have changed the way the download links are handled over the years and it may be a language/region thing as the link I found came from searching a different region support pages which changes the URL

Edit: Forget all that I think it was probably just a case of using HTTPS ha. The HTTP link fails and doesn’t link outside the Wayback Machine. I did find it through the local URL which was probably completely unnecessary lol.

I think I missed the 'resolved' tag sorry I'm using RSS.
 
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How does Firmware Restoration actually work?

Apple says firmware restoration from the CD is only possible if the firmware is corrupted. How does the Mac (or its firmware) know the firmware is corrupted. Does it calculate some CRC checksum? Is there any way to launch restoration when the firmware is uncorrupted?

How does the Mac know which firmware file to load from the CD? Evidently the file is chosen by its name, or the first characters of the name. For example, the firmware file for the Mac Pro 3,1 is named MP31_006C_02B.fd. Would it be possible to create a CD with a file by the same name, but with a different content? Does the restoration check for the whole name of only for the first character.? There do not seem to be any cryptographic signature or any other checks involved.

What software or firmware on the Mac Pro controls the restoration process? How can the firmware control the process, if it is itself corrupted? Does the firmware update process maintain two identical copies of a part of the firmware, making sure that at least one of them is able to run?

On modern PC motherboards Device Firmware Update (DFU) is controlled by the Intel Management Engine. The firmware can be read from an USB drive without CPU even being present. On modern Macs DFU mode is controlled by the T2 chip. Is the Intel Management Engine responsible for firmware restoration on older Macs? If so, where is the firmware for the Management Engine stored?

The reason I ask is because I would like to test experimental firmware for the Mac Pro 1,1 without the risk of bricking the Mac.
 
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