How to build your own iMac Pro [Successful Build/Extended Guide]

[panell]

Hello
I am not able to change any of these two settings in Ai Tweakre (on ASUS 299 Deluxe motherboard)
b.) AVX Instruction Core Ratio Negative Offset: "3" [optional "Auto", see important notification below!]
c.) AVX-512 Instruction Core Ratio Negative Offset: "2" [optional "Auto", see important notification below!]

Both options are grayed out and have Auto value that cannot be changed
I have bios 1401 from the first post.

 

[panell]

I would like to propose an update to point D.4) and the macOs install process

In order to perform a clean install of macOS High Sierra 10.13.6 (17G65), prepare a virgin NVMe, SDD or HDD destination drive for the iMac Pro macOS installation by formatting the drive with HFS+ [(Mac OS Extended (Journaled)] and a GUID partition table by means of Apple's Disk Utility on any other Hackintosh or Mac of your choice.
...

One big issue with the above is the fact that with new motherboards many of us will use have M.2 drives. This makes it almost impossible to prepare the drive "on any other Hackintosh or Mac" and often we don't have another computer with M.2 port and removing the drive from the motherboard is a bit time-consuming (drives are usually hidden under the radiator which requires removal of a graphics card). Below proposal assumes that MacOs installer will create appropriate partitions on disk during install and does not require drive removal.

As an update, I propose to describe the alternative path of installing MaOs:
0. Assuming Install macOS High Sierra exists in the Applications folder
1. Use Unibeast to create bootable pendrive
2. Use Clover Configurator to mount EFI partition and update EFI folder (according to files prepared in this post)
3. Boot computer from pen drive
4. Select Boot macOs Install from Install macOs High Siera in clover menu option
5. After the reboot boot again from USB Boot macOs from macOs in clover menu option
6. After system successfully installed and booted mount EFI partition of system drive and copy all the files from EFI partition of USB pen drive

Above path does not require removing a disk from the computer. Also, it gives us a pen drive wit clover with may be used as a backup in case we mess up with clover configuration of EFI partition on the system drive.

 

[kgp]

Hello
I am not able to change any of these two settings in Ai Tweakre (on ASUS 299 Deluxe motherboard)
b.) AVX Instruction Core Ratio Negative Offset: "3" [optional "Auto", see important notification below!]
c.) AVX-512 Instruction Core Ratio Negative Offset: "2" [optional "Auto", see important notification below!]

Both options are grayed out and have Auto value that cannot be changed
I have bios 1401 from the first post.

You need to enter the numbers with the keyboard..

 

[kgp]

I would like to propose an update to point D.4) and the macOs install process

In order to perform a clean install of macOS High Sierra 10.13.6 (17G65), prepare a virgin NVMe, SDD or HDD destination drive for the iMac Pro macOS installation by formatting the drive with HFS+ [(Mac OS Extended (Journaled)] and a GUID partition table by means of Apple's Disk Utility on any other Hackintosh or Mac of your choice.
...

One big issue with the above is the fact that with new motherboards many of us will use have M.2 drives. This makes it almost impossible to prepare the drive "on any other Hackintosh or Mac" and often we don't have another computer with M.2 port and removing the drive from the motherboard is a bit time-consuming (drives are usually hidden under the radiator which requires removal of a graphics card). Below proposal assumes that MacOs installer will create appropriate partitions on disk during install and does not require drive removal.

As an update, I propose to describe the alternative path of installing MaOs:
0. Assuming Install macOS High Sierra exists in the Applications folder
1. Use Unibeast to create bootable pendrive
2. Use Clover Configurator to mount EFI partition and update EFI folder (according to files prepared in this post)
3. Boot computer from pen drive
4. Select Boot macOs Install from Install macOs High Siera in clover menu option
5. After the reboot boot again from USB Boot macOs from macOs in clover menu option
6. After system successfully installed and booted mount EFI partition of system drive and copy all the files from EFI partition of USB pen drive

Above path does not require removing a disk from the computer. Also, it gives us a pen drive wit clover with may be used as a backup in case we mess up with clover configuration of EFI partition on the system drive.

1.) Why one should need Unibeast to create a bootable pen drive? Up to my knowledge Unibeast does not work with X299.
2.) To use Clover Configurator for mounting the EFI partition and to update the EFI folder, you also another Hackintosh or Mac of your choice..
3.) If Unibeast would work, there would not be any need to update the EFi-Folder..

Using a virgin factory pre-formatted M.2 drive for the macOS clean install, there is no need to change the entire macOS clean installation approach described in the guide.

A simple, important NVME/M.2 nooby user notification now has been added to Section D.1):

 

[4min]

One more question on installing without Mac available: does TSCAdjustReset.kext need to be recompiled very often? I created this archive for my friend so that he can try and perform an install on any of his available X299 machines. Are there any downsides in doing it this way?

1) Unzip the archive: https://drive.google.com/file/d/1nIFjHI1JIaxORC6nBbWUfhCZuKcWnlOI
2) Rename the file matching your number of cores to "TSCAdjustReset.kext"
3) Copy the file here: EFI\CLOVER\kexts\Other

 

[kgp]

One more question on installing without Mac available: does TSCAdjustReset.kext need to be recompiled very often? I created this archive for my friend so that he can try and perform an install on any of his available X299 machines. Are there any downsides in doing it this way?

1) Unzip the archive: https://drive.google.com/file/d/1nIFjHI1JIaxORC6nBbWUfhCZuKcWnlOI
2) Rename the file matching your number of cores to "TSCAdjustReset.kext"
3) Copy the file here: EFI\CLOVER\kexts\Other

For a friend? On any of his available X299 machineS?

 

[4min]

He was the one who sold me this motherboard at a good discount - that's a good way to make a friend!

He's actually a system builder, so has some WIP projects for his clients. I figure if you would pay somebody in California to build a PC for you - that might as well be an X299 workstation.

 

[kgp]

Thanks alot KGP for detailed guide with x299-deluxe! I DIY my rig the same hareware components with yours. verything goes great except the thunderbolt 3. I come up with the following problems and questions:
a.) Is it mandatory to install win10 in uefi mode first to make thunderbolt3 card works
b.) hot-plug functionality works on 10.13.4! but after I update to 10.13.6, it fails. and I just confused with all the sevary sst-amls! Shoud I place all of them into ACPI patch folder?

sorry for my ignorance, so would you kindly just email me your current perfectly working EFI to me? ([email protected])
my hardware is I9-7980xe, GTX1080TI and x299-deluxe with thunderbolt 3 card in PCIE slot_3

Just use the TB-SSDT currently implemented in and attach to the guide.. You might have to adopt it to your system and slot configuration to make it work..

BTW... TB-SSDT funtionality is independed from macOS version!

 

[kgp]

@panell , @bundog

please add your Skylake-X/X299 system specs (mobo, GPU, CPU) to either your profile or signature!

Thanks in advance,

KGP

 

[mm2margaret]

@kgp

Any reason to think that the X299-A motherboard wouldn't work with your X299 efi? Any known issues or problems with that board that you know of? I'm working on a new build and I have a really good deal on the X299-A, and I don't really need the dual ethernet (and some of the other stuff) that comes with the X299 Prime Deluxe.