Big Sur on HP EliteDesk 800 G4/G5 Mini - The Perfect MacMini8,1 Hackintosh - Open Core

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This is a place-holder for installing / running Big Sur on the HP EliteDesk 800 G4/G5 Mini PC. This thread is derived from the original Catalina Guide and will gradually replace the Catalina guide.

Getting help with your hack
Before you ask for help, do your homework by reading ALL Known Issues here. If you want assistance with your hack or you have an issue that needs to be resolved, please post your question in this thread with your problem reporting files. If using OC, post your sanitized EFI (remove MLB, SystemSerialNumber, SystemUUID). If using CLOVER, use @black.dragon74 's problem reporting tool here. If macOS's Read-Only protections block your installation of black.dragon74's gen_debug script, please copy the gen_debug script attached here to your Desktop, change script properties with the terminal command 'chmod a+x ~/Desktop/gen_debug' and run the script from your Desktop. While this thread focuses on a solution with OpenCore, CLOVER questions can still be posted in this thread.

See BIOS configuration here

Tested BIOS Versions (G4 Mini): 02.11.01 Rev.A, 02.12.00 Rev.A, 02.14.01 Rev.A, 02.15.00 Rev.A
Tested BIOS Versions (G5 Mini): 02.07.01 Rev.A, 02.08.00 Rev.A

Draft OC 0.6.6 EFI Attached

Switching from CLOVER to OC here

Big Sur install screen shots here

Big Sur GeekBench 5 CPU Benchmark here

 

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Revision History

• 13-November-2020: Created thread with draft content
• 14-November-2020: Attached new OC 0.6.3 EFI to Post #1. This updated EFI includes a revised config.plist that enables Kernel Quirks AppleCpuPmCfgLock and AppleXcpmCfgLock which may be necessary after confirming that the HP EliteDesk 800 G4 Mini BIOS has locked MSR 0xE2 register.
• 17-November-2020: Attached new OC 0.6.3 EFI (r004) to Post #1. This revised EFI removes SSDT-USBX.aml (kUSB power properties are already in USBPorts.kext) and changes internal and Type C USBConnections (port types) and changes kUSB power properties to match MacMini8,1.
• 22-November-2020: Attached new OC 0.6.3 EFI (r005) to Post #1. This revised EFI updates Lilu.kext (from 1.4.8 to 1.4.9), AppleALC.kext (from 1.5.3 to 1.5.4) and WhateverGreen.kext (from 1.4.3 to 1.4.4).
• 02-January-2021: Attached new OC 0.6.3 EFI (r006) to Post #1. This revised EFI includes the changes listed here.
• 04-January-2021: Attached new OC 0.6.5 EFI (r001) to Post #1. This revised EFI includes the changes listed here.
• 06-January-2021: Attached new OC 0.6.5 EFI (r002) to Post #1. This revised EFI includes the changes listed here.
• 03-February-2021: Attached new OC 0.6.6 EFI (r001) to Post #1. This revised EFI includes the changes listed here. Deleted older draft EFIs from Post #1.
• 03-February-2021: Attached new OC 0.6.6 EFI (r002) to Post #1. This revised EFI includes the changes listed here. Deleted OC0.6.6-EFI-r001 from Post #1.
• 13-February-2021: Updated Post #1 with new tested BIOS versions for G4 Mini and G5 Mini
• 17-February-2021: Attached new OC 0.6.6 EFI (r003) to Post #1. This revised EFI includes the change listed here.

 

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Methodology

• Started with Catalina as described here
• Established a new OC test environment as described here
• First experimented with OC here
• Resolved performance issues and established first OC EFI release candidate here

 

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References

• See initial references here
• Dortania OC Guide

 

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Known Issues and their solutions

• See Catalina Known Issues and Solutions here
• (Solved. Switched to VirtualSMC.kext which is included in the EFI attached to Post #1) The 'old' FakeSMC.kext has compatibility issues with OC. If you like FakeSMC's HWMonitor.app/Sensors, there's a newer version of FakeSMC. See here and here. I suspect that the 'old' FakeSMC is responsible for a random restart that I experienced when updating BS 11.2 to BS 11.2.1 and that it was responsible for random restarts that I observed after upgrading my G4 Mini's BIOS from 2.14.01 to 2.15. If you're using VirtualSMC.kext (instead of FakeSMC), you can disregard this issue.
• (Solved and included in the EFI attached to Post #1) Big Sur update notifications do not appear via the normal 'Software Update' mechanism. Big Sur updates may require certain SIP levels. The EFI attached to Post #1 has SIP fully enabled (in OC config.plist, NVRAM>Add>7C436110-AB2A-4BBB-A880-FE41995C9F82>csr-active-config is <00000000>). If you have fully or partially disabled SIP, you may not be notified of Big Sur updates.
• (Solved. Not yet included in EFI attached to Post #1) USBPorts.kext may be incorrectly classifying the connector type for the USB-C port. See here and here. Since this port appears to be functioning without issues, this issue may be more cosmetic than functional.
• (Not included in EFI attached to Post #1) If your system includes a SATA SSD, you may need to enable Kernel > Quirk > ThirdPartyDrives to enable TRIM on your 3rd-party SSD. NVMe SSDs do not require this Quirk.
• (Resolved and included in the EFI attached to Post #1) USBPorts.kext has wrong HS14 port type and incorrect USB Sleep/Wake Power properties. See here.
• (Resolved and included in the EFI attached to Post #1) Real time clock error during Big Sur Installation. Use RTCMemoryFixup.kext as discussed here.
• (Not yet resolved, but doesn't appear to be a critical error) The MSR 0xE2 register is locked in the HP EliteDesk 800 G4 Mini BiOS. The OC EFI currently attached to Post #1 attempts to address this by enabling Kernel Quirks AppleCpuPmCfgLock and AppleXcpmCfgLock, but according to Dortania's Guide, this may result in instability. The preferred method is a BIOS Mod.
• (Resolved and included in the EFI attached to Post #1) At some point during my Catalina experimentation, I had tried switching boot-arg darkwake=2 to darkwake=3. This did not make any difference, but I never changed back. My OC EFIs will continue to use darkwake=2.

 

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Install Big Sur on HP EliteDesk 800 G4/G5 Mini

• To be provided

 

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CLOVER Specifics

• I will not be posting a Clover-based solution for Big Sur. Open Core will be my only bootloader for Big Sur.

To switch from CLOVER to OC, do the following:

1. Make a full system backup before you convert
2. Open Hackintool and collect the following info (collecting this from your CLOVER config.plist is possible, too, if you can avoid the confusion of RtVariables.MLB and SMBIOS.BoardSerialNumber):
   1. Serial Number (this will be OC's PlatformInfo.Generic.SystemSerialNumber)
   2. System ID (this will be OC's PlatformInfo.Generic.SystemUUID)
   3. ROM (this will be OC's PlatformInfo.Generic.ROM)
   4. Board Serial Number (this will be OC's PlatformInfo.Generic.MLB)
3. Follow this guide to remove the CLOVER stuff from your system: Converting from CLOVER to OC
4. After you have completely removed the CLOVER EFI from your system, replace it with your OC EFI
5. Populate your OC config.plist with the values you collected in Step 1
6. Reboot (now with OC bootloader)
7. Follow any prompts to allow extensions for apps that you've installed

 

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Open Core Specifics

• To be provided

 

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Still being investigated

• See Catalina items still being investigated here.
• After confirming that MSR 0xE2 register is locked in the HP EliteDesk 800 G4 Mini BiOS, I have enabled Quirks AppleCpuPmCfgLock and AppleXcpmCfgLock (a work-around that is apparently not as good as a BIOS Mod). I will continue to observe after making these Quirks changes.
• CFG-Lock is enabled in BIOS. I have extracted the BIOS .bin from multiple HP EliteDesk 800 G4 Mini BIOS versions and examined with UEFITool / Universal IFR Extractor as discussed here, but I am not able to find the 'Setup' in the BiOS .bin and Universal IFR Extractor reports everything I try to examine as "Unknown Protocol."

 

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*** Reserved ***