The 4K Dell OptiMac - 9020 MT - Core i7-4790 - Radeon RX 570 - LG 4K IPS Monitor

[bluepr0]

Hello!

I've finally made all the changes I wanted to the build is officially done (except for a little thing, read at the end). Thanks so much for putting this together @trs96 and for your alternative guides @nicksoph.

Here's a few tests I did

After applying the 4K tweaks 99% of the time the display turns ON and receives the video signal soon enough so it doesn't goes back to sleep. Looks like this had a very positive impact on the problems I was having. I wish I could make the wake up process a bit quicker (around 12-14 seconds now) but at least it's working almost perfectly.

I think I also fixed another problem with wake by disabling to allow BT devices to wake the computer. This wasn't happening always but tried with this and looks like now works more reliable to avoid dark waking up of the device randomly or right after it went to sleep.

I'm using the Apple Magic Keyboard and I love that I can use it right on the BIOS as well. Currently using the Fenvi-919 with Wifi/BT working correctly (OOB).

I'm only missing one thing
I'm unable to activate or setup it in a way so the display runs at its full resolution (4k) but doing scalling of the UI to 2560x1440 using HiDPI. As suggested I tried with ResXtreme and SwitchResX (the latter the one that have the most options for custom resolutions) but couldn't find a way around it. I'm starting to think this is not supported by either the Intel HD4600 or the driver itself. (see image attached below, this is using my Macbook Pro)

Get this app!
I'm in love with this app called MonitorControl, using your keyboard (works with Magic Kb too) you can control the brightness and volume of your display IF it supports DDC. Can't recommend it enough. Even if you use a real Mac with a Non-Apple external display... this is gold. In case you use brew, it's on cask too:

brew cask install monitorcontrol

I'm planning on installing Catalina GM this weekend on my second SSD and see how it goes. Will report back if you guys are interested.

Thanks once again.

 

[nicksoph]

applying the 4K tweaks 99% of the time the display turns ON and receives the video signal soon enough so it doesn't goes back to sleep

Interested about the 99% wake up rate on monitor only because mine is 100% and would be good to know what makes the difference - it might be the monitor. Im not able to compare for a while but might do later. Glad your happy with it. (a search will show how to get OSX to show all the resolutions (I think its something like by holding down the Cmd key and clicking on the drop down of the res)

 

[bluepr0]

Interested about the 99% wake up rate on monitor only because mine is 100% and would be good to know what makes the difference - it might be the monitor. Im not able to compare for a while but might do later. Glad your happy with it. (a search will show how to get OSX to show all the resolutions (I think its something like by holding down the Cmd key and clicking on the drop down of the res)

I've bought an DP to mini DP cable to test with my LED Cinema display, so I can confirm if the problem is from the monitor or the display itself.

I can select on both apps 2560x1440, but it's actually running at that resolution so everything looks a bit blurry. What I need is to make the display run at full 4k but with scalling enabled, so it's running at full 4k but showing a UI that "looks like" 2560x1440" that also uses HighDPI

Basically what shows this image below (this is my Macbook Pro)

 

[trs96]

Interested about the 99% wake up rate on monitor only because mine is 100% and would be good to know what makes the difference.

It's also related to what is or isn't installed via PCIe. Every PCIe card requires a small block of memory to be allocated by the firmware. This allocation is done by the EFI memory driver. So if someone has a graphics card and wifi card in the two available PCIe slots more of the DVMT memory gets used up. This happens at boot up and when waking up from sleep. So changing DVMT to 64MB from 32 could certainly help resolve the wake from sleep problems.

 

[bluepr0]

Catalina installed without any changes or updates on the EFI folder.

Looks like the patch on AppleIntelFramebufferAzul for 4K is not working tho. I'm not getting retina resolutions now.

 

[nicksoph]

This happens at boot up and when waking up from sleep. So changing DVMT to 64MB from 32 could certainly help resolve the wake from sleep problem

I think we are setting to 96MB (3) I did try 128MB but as the 96MB was working fine on my setup I ddint notice any difference but maybe ...

Looks like the patch on AppleIntelFramebufferAzul for 4K is not working tho

Not sure but I'd try two things - 1. Drop in the old file (rename the new one), 2. look into what the patch does and the search terms needed to effect same change in new kext

 

[bluepr0]

I think we are setting to 96MB (3) I did try 128MB but as the 96MB was working fine on my setup I ddint notice any difference but maybe ...

Not sure but I'd try two things - 1. Drop in the old file (rename the new one), 2. look into what the patch does and the search terms needed to effect same change in new kext

I will have to learn how to do that, but should be fun.

Have you guys ever tried to install latest Clover 5.x? Just in case it improves in something. I'm also considering take a look at OpenCore.

 

[trs96]

Have you guys ever tried to install latest Clover 5.x? Just in case it improves in something.

Not a good idea. 5000+ versions of Clover currently don't work well with this Dell Hackintosh and Mojave. 4920 through 49xx have no problems and should be used instead. See this post for details about the changed file structures in Clover 50xx. https://www.tonymacx86.com/threads/...xxx-v2-4k-r4972-to-v2-5-r5018-example.281428/

I'm also considering take a look at OpenCore.

OpenCore is OT for this thread. One person mentioned that they will be starting an OpenCore/Catalina thread related to this Optiplex model in Catalina Desktop Guides. I will post a link to that once it goes live. I'm certain that it will be best to clean install Catalina and use OC, virtualSMC etc. as these are all designed to work together. There will still be "growing pains" using all of the new kexts/bootloader features. So for most of us, I feel it's prudent and wise to stay with Clover/fakeSMC and Mojave for at least the next 3 months until we've got some experience as a community with this new approach. Once you've finally got Mojave stable and working enjoy using it awhile before jumping into a whole new venture.

I'd like to keep all of the OC/Catalina discussion in the new thread once it gets posted. I'm not moving my Dell to Catalina until the about the .3 or .4 update. The current guide as presented will work for installing Catalina. I tested this by installing one of the Catalina betas on a small partition. There will be some fine tuning necessary which should all be covered in the new thread. That thread will also go over the use of OpenCore and present info/guides necessary to use that.

 

[trs96]

RX480 Chips Rebranded as an AMD RX550 ?
​

in one of the HP threads, one person reported that their RX550 was working OOB with Catalina. Impossible right ? Maybe not. Apple hasn't added support for the low end RX550 it's more likely that some graphics card makers are rebranding RX480s as RX550s so that they can liquidate the oversupply of older RX480 chips. Here's what I found when looking into this. Two major brand names, Gigabyte and MSI, appear to be using the RX480 GPU in the so called 550s. This would explain the higher than normal prices they are charging for these "550s" Theoretically these should perform better than the RX560 and at a lower price point. If anyone tries these I'd like to hear how well they work in your Dell Optiplex.

Neither card needs any supplemental power. One downside is only one HDMI 2.0 port and not a single DP output on the MSI RX550 LP card. DP works better with macOS. If you have a MT Dell OptiMac and use just a single 4K Display, The Gigabyte full height version of the RX550 is a great low budget choice for 4K graphics. It's even 8K ready ! When you have to upgrade the Dell 290W PSU to a name brand 500W PSU and buy the 24 to 8 pin adapter it can easily cost $60 to $75. The GA-RX550 card doesn't require any other upgrades for it to work.

They are certainly targeting low budget gamers with these cards. They primarily use monitors with only HDMI input. TN panels with really high refresh rates of up to 144 Hz.

Comparing FPS rates in major games, the RX480 4GB usually is a much better performer.

The Sapphire Pulse and MSI RX 560s are in low supply most everywhere. The ones you can buy sell for over $200.

 

[craighazan]

Not a good idea. 5000+ versions of Clover currently don't work well with this Dell Hackintosh. 4920 through 49xx have no problems and should be used instead.

I haven't been getting issues with 5058.