[Guide] Dell XPS 13 9360 on MacOS Sierra 10.12.x - LTS (Long-Term Support) Guide

[jkbuha]

I had success with Clover 5.1 5126 on Big Sur Beta 11.0.1 on the XPS 9360 Kaby Lake HD620 FHD 1920x1080. Set SMBios to MacBookPro 15.2, installed CPUfriend kexts and Usb wifi kexts.

Graphics, brightness, Trackpad gestures, Bluetooth, battery, sound, andUsb C (Dock and Hdmi) work. Sleep will not wake - I have disabledarkwake=0 in boot arguments. Trackpad gestures use voodooPs2.kext only - VoodooI2C.kext causes Kernel Panic on boot. SMCProcessor.kext cannot be used because of kernel panic.

Otherwise MacOS Big Sur runs well with similar Power usage to OC boot (Intel Power Gadget). Clover is a better option since I triple Boot Windows, Mac and Linux. Clover does not take over the Bios like OC.

I have your same triple boot config, but quite frankly using OpenCore is a breath of fresh air. No more messing about with L/E or S/L/E and temperamental boots. It just works. Also it's more Apple-esque (single user boot by pressing CMD+S, Safe using Shift, etc).

With regards to booting other OSes, Linux boots without any issues straight from OpenCore, and - whilst I haven't yet spent time looking at native Windows booting - I've inserted a CLOVER entry into OC which allows me to chainload OC->Clover->W10. That way I can still reboot into Windows quickly.

At some point I'll try and take a look at bringing CLOVER back to macOS. Just to check though - do you still put all your extra CLOVER kexts into L/E?

 

[Lopburi]

I spoke too soon. After removing voodooinput.kext from I am getting constant HalDmWatchdog set RF changeIn Progress=T or F for minutes before boot into MacOS. I might have to revert to original VoodooPS2Controller.kext . Tried clearing Cache without clearing this problem. A hard restart on the Power button will boot up ok.

Put SSDT-I2C1-SPED.aml in seems to solved the problem for me.

 

[ebaymic60]

I have your same triple boot config, but quite frankly using OpenCore is a breath of fresh air. No more messing about with L/E or S/L/E and temperamental boots. It just works. Also it's more Apple-esque (single user boot by pressing CMD+S, Safe using Shift, etc).

With regards to booting other OSes, Linux boots without any issues straight from OpenCore, and - whilst I haven't yet spent time looking at native Windows booting - I've inserted a CLOVER entry into OC which allows me to chainload OC->Clover->W10. That way I can still reboot into Windows quickly.

At some point I'll try and take a look at bringing CLOVER back to macOS. Just to check though - do you still put all your extra CLOVER kexts into L/E?

MacOS is not my main OS it is just for experimental use. As I said previously Open Core boot loader takes over the Bios and does not load windows and Linux properly. Windows 10 boots into recovery mode and Linux will not load. I realise that I could modify settings for Linux but it much easier with the Clover boot loader detecting the other OS correctly.

The latest Clover boots quick enough and MacOS runs well. I do not have kexts in L/E Folder only in the EFI Clover. folders.

 

[ebaymic60]

Put SSDT-I2C1-SPED.aml in seems to solved the problem for me.

Looked around the web just found SSDT-I2C.aml - does not work. Can you send me a copy of SSDT-I2C1-SPED.aml ?

 

[Lopburi]

Looked around the web just found SSDT-I2C.aml - does not work. Can you send me a copy of SSDT-I2C1-SPED.aml ?

Here you go.

 

[ebaymic60]

Here you go.

Thank you for the file. I still have the same problem with "HalDmWatchdog set RF changeIn Progress" .
Update: Did not need SSDT-I2C1-SPED.aml . Removed voodooinput.kext plugin from Contents of VoodooI2C.kext. Latest VoodooPS2Controller.kext kept unmodified. No errors on boot and Trackpad working well with Gestures.

 

[oli.mathieu]

Hello
I can't connect My bluetooth headset to catalina
The Bluetooth System PreferencePane List remains empty!
I use OC with those Kexts https://dortania.github.io/Wireless-Buyers-Guide/types-of-wireless-card/m2.html
In System profile information ➧Bluetooth ➧ Discoverable is Off
is it normal ?


Thanks in advance

 

[Mrgeque]

Not that I'm aware of. @4GHz on all cores exceeds the stated TDP rating for this chip, so Intel prevents max clock on all 4 cores simultaneously.

Just out of interest, how are you measuring core speed? We used to have a pretty good tool (HWInfo) but since VirtualSMC has come along I haven't found a way to display clock speed/multipliers...

I guess you've found a way to do this (4GHz on all cores)

 

[jkbuha]

I guess you've found a way to do this (4GHz on all cores)

Yes that's correct, but there's a few other settings that need to be changed too for optimum performance. For instance, if default temperature thresholds aren't set properly, the bios auto defaults back to base settings when an upper limit threshold is reached.

Am experimenting with a few new UEFI settings at the moment (which is why you'll see wildly different GB4 scores over the coming days). Once I have a few stable configurations will revert.

 

[jkbuha]

cinebench R20 ,xps 9360 i7-8550u 16G ram, default TDP PL1:23W, PL2:51W.
My best score is 1450.Lowest score is 1377 on AC power.
So i think your score is not good.

And when running cinebench test , if you open Intel Power Gadget ,you might see the PL1 remain 23W.

Figured out the cause (but not the solution) of low macOS (but high Linux/Windows) scores on my rig. I'm getting high kernel_task CPU usage, which is likely (a) incorrect/malfunctioning kexts (b) conflicting software.

To prevent having to reinstall macOS again, does anyone have a good advanced guide on troubleshooting kernel_task loads?