A Beastly MacBook (4,1) and MacBook Pro (3,1): Fun with entirely unsupported external GPUs

[Amethyst1]

ATI Radeon HD 5770 from a MacPro5,1, wont cold boot the EFI bootROM boot loops, but plugging in at the boot picker it works

[…] that one does work in SL since SL's ATI drivers are advanced enough to auto int)

I used to have a 5770 Eyefinity5 and its DisplayPorts only worked as DVI/HDMI using passive adapters IIRC. Does DisplayPort work on yours? (I presume it does because it’s an Apple OEM card.)

 

[LightBulbFun]

I used to have a 5770 Eyefinity5 and its DisplayPorts only worked as DVI/HDMI using passive adapters IIRC. Does DisplayPort work on yours? (I presume it does because it’s an Apple OEM card.)

I have not tried the 2 mDP's in auto-int mode on the 5770, but interesting about the Eyefinity card, IIRC ATI cards only have I think 2 TMDS transmitters,

this is why no matter what size cinema display you have, if you have 3 of em, apple said you had to drive the 3rd one using their DP to Dual link DVI adapter (since it was an active adapter)

Mac Pro (Early 2009), Mac Pro (Mid 2010), Mac Pro (Mid 2012): Supported display configurations - Apple Support

Learn about supported graphics card and display configurations for the Mac Pro (Early 2009), Mac Pro (Mid 2010), and Mac Pro (Mid 2012) configured with either an ATI Radeon HD 5770 or Radeon HD 5870 graphics card.

support.apple.com

so I assume here the you only ever got 2 displays working at a time?

 

[Amethyst1]

so I assume here the you only ever got 2 displays working at a time?

I don’t remember if I ever tried two.

 

[LightBulbFun]

Oh yeah I plan too! hopefully it will load the Option ROM of the GT 120 like the MBP6,1 does

pleased to report, yes the MBP3,1 does load the Apple-EFI OptionROM of the GT 120 and thus the card even works in Leopard

Ill have to dig out my ATI Radeon 2600 XT and see if that will load its option ROM and if so if it will work in tiger... (I know the card itself does work in tiger, in a Mac Pro)

 

[Amethyst1]

Ill have to dig out my ATI Radeon 2600 XT and see if that will load its option ROM and if so if it will work in tiger... (I know the card itself does work in tiger, in a Mac Pro)

Been there, done that on a MacBook4,1 so looking forward to seeing your results.

 

[LightBulbFun]

Been there, done that on a MacBook4,1 so looking forward to seeing your results.

yeah I suspect the crucial difference is you needed ATY-int, so it sounds like the Firmware was not loading the OptionROM of the card?

so I am hoping with the express-card setup, given it loaded the OptionROM of the GT 120 it will do the same with the ATI Radeon 2600 XT and thus work natively


(as an aside I tried a MacPro3,1 8800 GT with the MBP6,1 and it was either not recognised at all, or hard froze the system early in the boot process or when hot plugged, when cold plugged the EFI firmware boot looped as it does with most other cards it seems for some reason)


I do wonder if I boot the system in clamshell mode that would force it to output the boot screen image via GT 120 eGPU or such

certainly got a few more things to try tomorrow

 

[LightBulbFun]

This is a Kepler card isn't it? I had no issues with those on a 2008 MB or 2007 MBP in Mavericks or El Capitan, they co-existed with the X3100 or 8600M just fine.

pleased to report the GT 740 does actually work, with my MBP4,1 , seems for some reason it just wont play ball on the MBP6,1, I can also boot the MBP4,1 with it plugged in from cold which I cant do with the 6,1

 

[LightBulbFun]

I used to have a 5770 Eyefinity5 and its DisplayPorts only worked as DVI/HDMI using passive adapters IIRC. Does DisplayPort work on yours? (I presume it does because it’s an Apple OEM card.)

DP seems to be working on mine even in Auto int mode I do seem to recall reading that the Display ports on ATI Radeon 5000 cards can be a bit finicky, so worth trying multiple DP devices just incase it does not like a specific one?

(the MBP4,1 EFI bootloops trying to load the optionROM of this card sadly, same as MBP6,1 does also, so I have to hot plug it in at the boot picker)

 

[Amethyst1]

pleased to report the GT 740 does actually work, with my MBP4,1 , seems for some reason it just wont play ball on the MBP6,1, […]

Is it possible that three GPUs is one too many for the 6,1? What about a non-GPU card? Does it also cause the boot loop?

I do seem to recall reading that the Display ports on ATI Radeon 5000 cards can be a bit finicky, so worth trying multiple DP devices just incase it does not like a specific one?

Last time I played with the 5770 it wouldn’t output anything via DVI/HDMI or DP even on Linux so I tossed it.

 

[LightBulbFun]

Is it possible that three GPUs is one too many for the 6,1? What about a non-GPU card? Does it also cause the boot loop?

3 GPU itself seems to work alright, as per my reports on the previous page with the ATI Radeon HD 5770, GeForce GT 120 and GeForce 210, all of those worked fine as eGPUs with the 6,1 but it does not like the GT 740 or 8800 GT for some reason.

(and only the GT 120 will boot from cold, everything else causes a boot loop before the chime with the MBP6,1)


the MBP4,1 that seems a little bit more resilient, it still boot looped with the 5770, but it does not boot loop with the GT 740, and it even worked with the 8800 GT, even cold booting, so that worked in Leopard as well

I still have a few more things to test tho

 

[LightBulbFun]

Last time I played with the 5770 it wouldn’t output anything via DVI/HDMI or DP even on Linux so I tossed it.

ahhh so the card was dying then, then yeah all bets are off in that case

thats a shame it did die, not often you find the more specialised/obscure cards like that!

 

[LightBulbFun]

nothing quite like overkill

sadly it wont play ball with the MBP6,1, on that system I get the Generic NVIDIA Chip Model 256MB when the drivers cant quite talk/setup the card properly, but as you can see above it does work with the MBP4,1 which is even more overkill (the MBP4,1 is happy to boot with it plugged in from cold also)

and heres a janky photo showing the physical setup, that yes it really is real!

 

[Amethyst1]

[…] sadly it wont play ball with the MBP6,1, on that system I get the Generic NVIDIA Chip Model 256MB when the drivers cant quite talk/setup the card properly […]

I got the same with two Kepler GPUs on a MacBookPro2,2. Quite frustrating.

 

[LightBulbFun]

I got the same with two Kepler GPUs on a MacBookPro2,2. Quite frustrating.

yeah I do wonder if thats some sort of memory address space or similar such resource issue, or some sort of issue like that

I am pretty sure thats the issue I am facing with the MBP6,1 and the higher end GPU's (tho I have yet to try linux or windows)

I know even with Mac Pro's if you get the "Right" combination of too many resource hogging GPU's it will prevent the machine from posting or being able to boot OS X fully

Mining on Mac Pro 2009 4,1 4 GPUs installed won't boot

The issue with the multiple GPUs, is not that the Mac Pro 1,1-5,1 cant work with 4 GPUs, its down to which GPUs you use and how said GPUs use certain memory spaces in the firmware, I dont remember the exact specifics but i know modern cards can cause issues when you use a lot of them in one...

forums.macrumors.com

im pretty sure other i945 Macs do work with iGPU's (I recall it being done with an early intel Mac Mini through its wifi mini PCIe slot and the same has been done with an AppleTV1,1 also and even some of the poly carb iMacs too)

I wonder if the error logs in linux might tell us anything? did you ever try the 2600 XT or some other low VRAM card with the machine?


(the 2600 XT is an EBC Firmware card so if the express-card slot on a MBP2,2 is able to load option roms like it can on the MBP3,1+ then it should in theory be able to load the option rom of the 2600 XT despite the MBP2,2 being an EFI32 machine)

 

[Amethyst1]

did you ever try the 2600 XT or some other low VRAM card with the machine?

No, I only stumbled upon the 2600 after I had sold the MBP out of frustration (LOL)

On a different matter, I am considering making a WikiPost to consolidate info on (non-)working early Intel eGPU setups (EC/mPCIe/TB1) since it’s currently spread across several pages of two threads.

 

[LightBulbFun]

nothing quite like overkill

and just for giggles heres a quick Unigine Valley benchmark, its actually a little better then I was expecting, I was expecting it to be totally bottle necked by the PCIe 1x link, but despite that, and despite even the weaker CPU etc of the MBP4,1 the GTX 980 Ti still managed to get a foot up over the 5770 with the MBP6,1

 

[LightBulbFun]

Ill have to dig out my ATI Radeon 2600 XT and see if that will load its option ROM and if so if it will work in tiger... (I know the card itself does work in tiger, in a Mac Pro)

so mixed success with this, I dug it out from the my MacPro1,1, you know the one, the one with the Celeron 445 1.86Ghz single Core CPU and 64GB of RAM

and plopped into this eGPU setup, and the MBP4,1 does load the optionROM alls good there works in High Sierra, and it does work in tiger! kinda...


the problem is not with the eGPU setup, but the fact, and this is something I was worried about, is that while normally MacOS X installs are machine agnostic, you take Snow Leopard update it to 10.6.8 and it will work on every mac that SL shipped with

intel tiger, is not quite machine agonstic like that, for the very last intel tiger macs the MBP3,1 and iMac7,1, they shipped with custom versions of MacOS with both the specific drivers for their respective GPUs (GeForce 8600M GT and ATI Radeon 2400 XT/2600 Pro) and also a specfic updated OpenGL.framework version

and these drivers and framework are not included in the 10.4.11 combo update

now thankful for us lot, Apple did putout a couple updates which so happen to include these drivers and frameworks, so you can covert a regular 10.4.11 install into a MBP or iMac one

iMac Software Update 1.2.1 (Tiger)

MacBook Pro Software Update 1.2

but the problem in doing so, and this is something I first discovered way back when my Original 15 inch MacBookPro3,1 still worked is that once convert an install, it stops working properly on any older/different Mac, specifically the OpenGL.framework is not compatible with the older/other GPU drivers

for example it stopped booting on my MacBook2,1's GMA950 and even my MacPro1,1 with its 7300 GT



now the question remained would the 2600 XT and 8600M GT drivers be compatible with each other and the latest OpenGL framework? and sadly, no, the ATI Radeon 2600 XT drives ship with a later OpenGL.framework version that dont work with the 8600M GT drivers

and if I re-install the 8600M GT's framework, then the 2600 XT drivers stop working properly


in either case the machine still boots, but you just get a blue screen with a mouse pointer, on whichever graphics card's screen who's drivers you have borked unless you boot in safe mode



and if I install the 10.4.11's Original framework, then neither drive works, I get to a desktop both displays work, but no graphics acceleration


so yeah so close but no cigar sadly! the interesting one to try from this point forwards is the Quadro FX 5600, see this is a *G80* NVIDIA card and I know from Vintage hackintoshes that G80 GPU's do work with the GeForce 8600M GT's driver set (the 8800 GTS and 8800 GTX do work in tiger)

so it would be interesting to try a Quadro FX 5600 and see if that would work, both with the drivers and also if it would work with the MBP itself (it is crucial for tiger that the MBP can load the optionROM, it cant Auto-int)


or a Mac Flashed 8800 GTS 8800 GTX or Quadro FX 4600, but I think those would be even harder to achieve, as I dont think anyones dumped the ROM from such a card/I dont think MacVidCards ever put the ROM's he made for those cards publicly (while there was an official Mac Quadro FX 5600)



for those curious the MBP6,1 wont play ball with the 2600 XT just boot loops trying to load its optionROM

 

[Amethyst1]

for example it stopped booting on my MacBook2,1's GMA950 and even my MacPro1,1 with its 7300 GT

Same on my Macmini1,1.

Quadro FX 4600

I guess a FX 4500 wouldn’t work since it’s an older EFI32 card?

the interesting one to try from this point forwards is the Quadro FX 5600 […]

Trying to get my hands on a 5600 now LOL. Can you point me to the ROM (if it isn’t http://themacelite.wikidot.com/local--files/wikidownloads2/FX_5600_EFI64.ROM.zip), flasher and instructions?

 

[LightBulbFun]

I guess a FX 4500 wouldn’t work since it’s an older EFI32 card?

yeah I have one of those but as you say its an EFI32 card so no good with a MBP3,1/4,1, would be an interesting one to try with a MBP1,1/1,2/2,1/2,2 tho

Trying to get my hands on a 5600 now LOL. Can you point me to the ROM (if it isn’t http://themacelite.wikidot.com/local--files/wikidownloads2/FX_5600_EFI64.ROM.zip), flasher and instructions?

hah yeah I really wish I picked one up when they where plentiful on eBay, I had my eye on them for a long time, but it was only fairly recently did I get a MacPro3,1 (or these MBPs) to use one in

(MVC did develop an EFI32 Quadro 5600 ROM but again not sure if thats ever been dumped)


that is indeed the right ROM, and ya just flash it to the card with nvflash like any sort of ROM flash/update, ya might need to use an older version of NVFLASH but thats about it, it should not be anything more complicated (thankfully even PC cards have a large enough EEPROM for the Mac ROM)


my only worry is will the Quadro FX 5600's Mac EFI OptionROM play ball with the MBP3,1/4,1 firmware, my current findings is the MBP3,1/4,1 firmware is more forgiving then the MBP6,1 firmware, but its not 100% infallible as mentioned an ATI Radeon HD 5770 will cause even a MBP3,1/4,1 to boot loop when cold booted,

so I want to dig out one of my flashed Kepler cards and see if that plays ball or not



a little while back I fortuitously stumbled across in a CEX one of those the special HP OEM, Dual full size DisplayPort single DVI port NVIDIA GeForce GT 630 cards for which MVC made a ROM for, so I quickly grabbed it, and got that flashed and and I currently have it sitting MP3,1, so ill dig it out and chuck it at the eGPU setup

might also finally give me the motivation to get my GT 640 flashed properly (I got it flashed but with an older MVC firmware so some of its display outputs are bit non-functional, but I know I have a later firmware that I have been meaning to try, I got said GT 640 primarily for that Xserve you can see hiding in the setup shot a few posts above which it is currently hiding inside of )

both the GT 630 and GT 640 are 2GB VRAM modern resource hungry cards, so should prove a good test for the MBP3,1/4,1 firmware



IE if the MBP3,1/4,1 can handle one of those then i'd feel more confident about it being able to handle a 1.5GB Quadro FX5600


then again im not 100% what the crack is, the 2600 XT is only a 256MB VRAM card but the MBP6,1 rejects it still



as an aside note on the GT 630, when MVC made the ROM for that and set the display name for the card he put NVIDIA GeForce GT 630" note the double space and it bugs the ever loving crap out of me LOL

I really want to fix it and remove that double space but I am not sure how to edit the display name of a Mac NVIDIA card in ROM....

(ok I think the forum is being too smart for its own good and not allowing a double space LOL every time I try and add one between GT and 630 it just reverts back to single space)

 

[LightBulbFun]

IE if the MBP3,1/4,1 can handle one of those then i'd feel more confident about it being able to handle a 1.5GB Quadro FX5600

well im pleased to report the MBP4,1 can load MVC's GT 630 Mac ROM

and note the double space in the name that bugs the crap out of me so much LOL


weirdly the card wont auto-int at all, in that if I hot plug it, its just not seen at all go figure (as i was trying to show it without the double space, when a card is auto-int'ed the driver sets the name to be displayed rather then the ROM)

but the important thing is it does work cold booted so, hopefully fingers crossed a Quadro FX 5600 would as well once suitably flashed