Asus Z690 ProArt Creator WiFi (Thunderbolt 4) + i7-12700K + AMD RX 6800 XT

xpertproduction said:

Hello,
I'm having exactly your problem,here is the story:
My motherboard Asus Z690 Creator WiFi has died so I have replaced with a new Z790 Creator WiFi!
But now I'm having problems at booting from OpenCore.It gets stuck when I select to boot into Monterey!
The only fix is by resetting NVRAM, but is very frustrating. What exactly should I change to boot normally without keep resetting NVRAM?
Thank you!

Click to expand...

I explained every mod I made from the EFI post in the first page, and there are not much:
Disable IOMMU preboot behavior in BIOS, it's useless for most people.
Then ACPI code to drop changes as I said, then disable NvmeFix.kext (that may just be for my case because I use samsung 980 pro for windows).

You can try my EFI folder, but you have to add your serial numbers, and change the Intel WiFi patch. It changes for every OS, and sometime update. But remove the SSDT & bootarg for the 6950 XT.
That said, I never tried Monterey with this build, so you may have other issue. And I don't use onboard audio.

Last thing, you should avoid using the 4th NVMe slot : M.2_4 in the manual.

Elias64Fr said:

...
That mean somewhere on motherboard, we should have a flash component that only store Tbt firmware .. we only have to find it and verify if it's a SOIC8 component (If you hadn't found it on down-side maybe on up-side near connectors and under ProArt designed cover)

Click to expand...

Hi @Elias64Fr,

I'll take another look and will post some close-up photos. If there is a SOIC8 chip, that would be great because I
think the EFI shell command does not accept a modified firmware.

Elias64Fr said:

...
I'am on macOS 13.6.6 but I have also 14.4.1 on another drive, both work fine with 3 optionals kernel patches for SwitchType6 (one common to twice version, one for 13.6.6 and one for 14.4.1).

Click to expand...

Could you post the details of these 3 kext patches?

Elias64Fr said:

The following Tbt firmware patches should be applied to your GC-Maple Ridge :
@0x4035: 2 bytes modified from 0x2121 to 0x3131
@0x4081: 1 byte modified from 0x85 to 0x05

Click to expand...

This one (@0x4081) is new --maybe this is the key! We did not make this particular change on Titan Ridge.

CaseySJ said:

I'll take another look and will post some close-up photos. If there is a SOIC8 chip, that would be great because I
think the EFI shell command does not accept a modified firmware.

Click to expand...

This review of the Z790 version shows a 8 Mbit SOIC-8 flash on the back of the board. This is too small for the main UEFI, so it might be for the JHL8540 (I haven't checked though).

AFAICT the Thunderbolt NVM updater app (5EDCCC1A-F4CA-42F4-8D3E-CA4C0B396BF7) just calls into an instance of the EFI_FIRMWARE_MANAGEMENT_PROTOCOL to perform the update. I'm not in front of my computer right now but I believe the instance for TB is installed by the driver in CCF23F50-F7C1-4F00-8E70-13643C37E8B0.

racermaster said:

This review of the Z790 version shows a 8 Mbit SOIC-8 flash on the back of the board. This is too small for the main UEFI, so it might be for the JHL8540 (I haven't checked though).

Click to expand...

Interesting! There appear to be at least two 8-pin packages on the backside of the board. If one of them is nearly opposite the JHL8540 chip, then it may be the firmware ROM. I'll do 2 things over the weekend:

1. Flash my GC-Maple Ridge add-in-card with @Elias64Fr's 3-byte change
2. Disassemble my Asus ProArt Z690 motherboard and check all 8-pin packages on backside

racermaster said:

AFAICT the Thunderbolt NVM updater app (5EDCCC1A-F4CA-42F4-8D3E-CA4C0B396BF7) just calls into an instance of the EFI_FIRMWARE_MANAGEMENT_PROTOCOL to perform the update. I'm not in front of my computer right now but I believe the instance for TB is installed by the driver in CCF23F50-F7C1-4F00-8E70-13643C37E8B0.

Click to expand...

If this method does not check for a valid digital signature then it could flash modified firmware...

CaseySJ said:

Interesting! There appear to be at least two 8-pin packages on the backside of the board. If one of them is nearly opposite the JHL8540 chip, then it may be the firmware ROM. I'll do 2 things over the weekend:

1. Flash my GC-Maple Ridge add-in-card with @Elias64Fr's 3-byte change
2. Disassemble my Asus ProArt Z690 motherboard and check all 8-pin packages on backside



If this method does not check for a valid digital signature then it could flash modified firmware...

Click to expand...

I have a GC-Maple Ridge as well that I have flashed. LMK if you need any other testing candidates.

vincerutabaga said:

Hello, it seems lots of people use this thread for the z790 ProArt, like me.

But I noticed a least one mod to be done.
As explained in page 4 of the thread, you need to delete 1 OEMtableID to replaced it with the corrected file.
But it's not the same name for the z790 : xh_rps14

• ACPI --> Add --> Add a new row for SSDT-11.aml
• ACPI --> Delete--> Add an entry for deleting the original version of the table:
  • Signature: SSDT
  • OemTableId: 78685F72 70733134
  • TableLength: 0
  • Comment: Delete original xh_rps14 table
  • Enabled: Check On

I also got a few questions for @CaseySJ , maybe :

Click to expand...

Hello @vincerutabaga,

Apologies for the late reply; just saw your post.

To answer your questions:

vincerutabaga said:

Is it ok to put the SSDT's name of the z690 ProArt, instead of the one from the z790 ?
At first I keep your SSDT, now I made one with the correction explained in page 4.

Click to expand...

Yes it's okay to prefix the SSDT name with "Z690" or "Z790" to make it clear which board it belongs to.

vincerutabaga said:

From time to time I can get random boot fail, due to very different errors. Most of the time, when I change a value in the bios, or try activate/disable something in it , like WiFi-Bluetooth. I try disable them because the error could come from this side.
Clean/reset NVRAM seems to solved it, with the right things set in the BIOS. Is It a know behavior ?

Click to expand...

This is not a known problem. Does anyone with Z790 ProArt Creator have this problem? If so, please let us know.

vincerutabaga said:

For now, I disabled IMMOMU preboot behavior in BIOS, and disabled NVMeFix.kext (slide=0 as no effect),will see....
But since cleaning NVRAM solve the issue, maybe something is going wrong with the NVRAM ?

I also noticed some ACPI errors in the log, before the PCIRoot is found, do you also got that with the z690 ?

Click to expand...

Yes there are many ACPI parsing errors; we can ignore them.

vincerutabaga said:

Edit : @BigPines I got wifi /bluetooth working with the same motherboard, in Sonoma 14.4, some add PatchRAM3, but don't think we need it. Try to disable NVMeFix, I really don't know why but seems to help.

Click to expand...

I don't use PatchRAM3 either. I don't think it's necessary.

CaseySJ said:

This is not a known problem. Does anyone with Z790 ProArt Creator have this problem? If so, please let us know.

Click to expand...

I do not have boot issues. I DO SOMETIMES when I’m attempting to reboot through Jump Desktop, but it’s such a non issue, I’ve never investigated

To anyone with:

• Gigabyte GC-Maple Ridge
• Asus ThunderboltEX 4
• ASRock Thunderbolt 4

@Elias64Fr has done it again! Thunderbolt Bus can be activated in Ventura and Sonoma, allowing hot plug and eGPU capability!

For all the still-unfolding details and developments, we invite you to visit this thread:


We will now investigate the possibility of enabling Thunderbolt Bus on the built-in Maple Ridge controller of our Asus ProArt boards.

Update: Built-in controller has been successfully flashed without using an external flasher.

CaseySJ said:

To anyone with:

• Gigabyte GC-Maple Ridge
• Asus ThunderboltEX 4
• ASRock Thunderbolt 4

@Elias64Fr has done it again! Thunderbolt Bus can be activated in Ventura and Sonoma, allowing hot plug and eGPU capability!

For all the still-unfolding details and developments, we invite you to visit this thread:

Thunderbolt 4, modified firmware, Full Thunderbolt Bus tree

I have bought an Asrock Thunderbolt 4 AIC (Rev 1) with the following specification here : After patching firmware as usual (3 bytes similar to Thunderbolt 3 Titan Ridge)... et voila: This AIC board have a TBTForcePower jumper, no external wire jumper needed. Without a TBTHeader cable and...

www.tonymacx86.com

We will now investigate the possibility of enabling Thunderbolt Bus on the built-in Maple Ridge controller of our Asus ProArt boards.

Update: Built-in controller has been successfully flashed without using an external flasher.

Click to expand...

Hi @CaseySJ
Could you share the modified NVM firmware for on-board Asus Z690 ProArt ? And the SSDT for EFI ?
Thanks

caley13 said:

Hi @CaseySJ
Could you share the modified NVM firmware for on-board Asus Z690 ProArt ? And the SSDT for EFI ?
Thanks

Click to expand...

We are experiencing a sleep issue and actively trying to resolve it.