ATI HD5450 Graphics Card

[dave_allen77]

I have just built my 1st Mac PC and have graphics working from the onboard graphics which is a hd2000. I have an external HD5450 card but have tried to get this working but i don't get a display after it boots. Can someone tell me if there is an idiots guide to getting this to work. Also I have two monitors so would be grateful if i can them both up and running on dvi and vga.

 

[potemkin]

HD 5450 is a very difficult card to get to work.
I had one for about a month.
I had to use efi injection and modify kexts to get it to work.
It is very low performance on OS X.
There are a number of successes out there,but they are not easy.
You can search for hours to get close to a solution.
Also this card comes from many manufacturers who have rolled their own.
You need to search for specific brand name, memory etc.

Time wise it is cheaper to pick a card that Tonymac suggests.
The GT 210 and GT 640 are good choices.
The GT 640 is very good on compatibility as drivers are available.

HD 2000 only works well enough to setup machine.
You will not have Quartz/CL. Many things do not work properly with HD 2000.
You are running in VESA mode.

Buy a card or buy a HD 3000/ HD 4000 compliant processor.

 

[AppleMacIdiot]

Hi Dave,

Like Potemkin says, the HD5450 can be a tricky card initially.
Getting it to work actually isn't that difficult, getting it to work 100% with full acceleration, multiple displays and HDMI audio, however, requires getting your hands dirty...

As with all things Hackintosh, the process requires an initially steep learning curve, but it is by no means impossible and the lessons learned will go a long way to maintaing your build, future builds and any further hardware modifications. If this is not for you, get one of the nVidia cards Potemkin suggested. Otherwise, if the HD5450 is the only game in town for you right now, let me know and I'll do my best to get you up and running

j.

 

[dave_allen77]

Sounds like a plan to me!!! I'll give anything a shot. Trying not to spend anything more than I can as Christmas has taken it's toll

 

[shibirian]

Sell the 5450 on ebay or elsewhere and get yourself a pure hackintosh compatible card, like the 6850, 6870, 5770, or 6450. The latter two cards can be had for $50,- or so on ebay or second hand stores, and they are fully compatible. (At least the Gigabyte and Sapphire brands are.)

Spare yourself the trouble, its generally not worth it.

 

[AppleMacIdiot]

Hi Dave,

If you're still up to the challenge, here's a quick guide to get you started with your HD5450...

• First boot with the kernel flag "GraphicsEnabler=No" (without the quote marks), this should at least get you a display so that you can make further edits.
• If not disable your discrete card in the BIOS or simply unplug it for now and reboot.
• Once you get a desktop you can make a few tweaks and hopefully get basic support for your HD5450
• Now navigate to the Macintosh HD/System/Library/Extensions folder.
• Here you need to find and copy the following two .kext files to your desktop for editing ---> AMDRadeonAccelerator.kext & ATI5000Controller.kext

• Now Right-click (or Ctrl + Click) on the AMDRadeonAccelerator.kext that's on your desktop and select "Show Package Contents"
• In the new window open the Contents folder and open the "Info.plist" file in TextEdit.app
• There's A LOT of text in the document. Don't freak out, we're literally adding in one PCI ID for your card.
• Do a text search for "Cedar" (this is the family to which your HD5450 card belongs). There's only two results and they're both exactly where we want to be.
• Look down the list of keys and strings and find the line that says <string>0x68E01002</string> (It'll be right below <key>IOPCIMatch</key>)
• Now add in this... 0x68F91002 (this is the PCI ID for your card and almost all HD5450 cards) after 0x68E1002. The line should now look like this <string>0x68E01002 0x68F91002</string>
• Save the file and close.

• Now Right-click (or Ctrl + Click) on the ATI5000Controller.kext that's on your desktop and select "Show Package Contents"
• As you did with the previous Kext file, navigate to and open the "Info.plist" file in TextEdit.app
• About half way down the document you'll see a string with a long line of PCI IDs (now that you know what they look like)
• As you did before simply add your same PCI ID (ie. 0x68F91002) to the end of the list.
• Save the file and close. You're done editing! Yay!

• This is entirely optional, but you may want to select both of these files, Right-Click them and assign a Label Colour of some sort before installing them. This will help you identify them later in the Extensions folder as having been edited in some way.

• Now you need to download a Kext installer/utility/app of some sort.
Kext Wizard is my favourite as it gives you the option to make back-ups of any original kexts that you you're replacing (just incase things go wonky and you need to put the originals back in place). It also has a tool to rebuild your Kext Cache.

• Cool! Use Kext Wizard to install your two modified Kext files. It's a drag and drop affair. Just remember to tick the "Backs Kexts..." box and then hit install.
• Now Execute the "Rebuild Cache" script under "Maintenance"

• You should now be ready to reboot
• With your HD5450 card enabled/plugged in, Boot with the following kernel flags "GraphicsEnabler=Yes AtiConfig=Null -f" (without the quote marks)
This enables Chimera/Chameleon to identify your card; assign the generic framebuffer personality (ie. RadeonFrameBuffer); and forces all Kexts (including the ones you've just edited) to load.

Whew! Now with a bit of luck you should now have a mostly functioning display via your HD5450 card and multiple display support.

PLEASE NOTE: At this point your card will only be mostly functioning...
DVD Player and Chess WILL crash when you launch them and you might not have 100% native acceleration (but hardly noticeable). If this isn't too much of a deal breaker for you, you can continue like this until you want to delve a little deeper into getting a 100% working card with native acceleration and HMDI Audio and no crashing apps etc...

I hope this helps and good luck!!!

 

[stawheed]

Hey there, I don't know how this might sound but if i'll just do the same steps for my ATI HD 4350 card what is there to loose? I just want to get it work so that me and others will share the experience before upgrading the hardware.

 

[AppleMacIdiot]

Hi Strawheed,

It's well worth a try... I don't have a card to test, but the worst you can do is a kernel panic or a blank screen.

• From a bit of Googling around I suggest that if you attempt to enable your HD4350, you will need to add your card's Device ID to the "Info.plist" file inside the ATI4600Controller.kext (No need to edit AMDRadeonAccelerator.kext)

• I can't be 100% certain, but i think your card's ID would be 0x954F1002 best to find out first, though.

• You may also need to specify "GraphicsEnabler=Yes AtiConfig=Null" (without quote marks) at boot as there is still no apparent FrameBuffer Personality for your card that I'm aware of... and attempting to specify one might invoke the ATIRadeonX2000.kext and cause a kernel panic.

• Keep an eye out for a "Card Unsupported" error message briefly after the Chimera boot screen. If you see this Chimera has failed to identify your card and you might not get very good performance even if you do get some sort of display.

Good luck with your attempt and let us know how it goes...

Ciao!

 

[dave_allen77]

Thanks for all your advice. Will be away from the PC for a weekend so will give this a go next week. So will let you know how it goes.

 

[stawheed]

Posted full procedure in the forum.
You can check it here

Do I need to say thank you. I mean I was so happy and thanked you all along when I saw my monitor glowing.