Frustrated...

[plasticuser]

On the most recent clover update, reboots are to a black screen on my 6700K/Gigabyte Z170MX-5, Asus 1080 Ti 11GB, 48GB system. I haven't been able to do updates to High Sierra since 10.13.3 without rolling back to that.

Anyhow, bought a new Samsung 1TB SSD and decided to go for a fresh install since my install was becoming dated.

Got as far as completed install, but I can't do a bunch of things, even following the guides precisely. What happens just doesn't match the screenshots.

I'm self-employed and haven't been able to do any work for three days. I'm missing deadlines due to my lack of knowledge and the increasing complexity of clover...

Am I better off continuing trying to get a working current High Sierra install with my current hardware, or would I be better off buying a new motherboard/CPU that is more compatible and easier to set-up?

What would you do in my situation?

 

[Stackshoe]

Hard for anyone to address your closing questions without your being more specific about what it is you can't do. You say you completed the install. Even that much information is not entirely clear. Did you go through the MacOS setup screens for region, language, internet etc?

 

[plasticuser]

Hard for anyone to address your closing questions without your being more specific about what it is you can't do. You say you completed the install. Even that much information is not entirely clear. Did you go through the MacOS setup screens for region, language, internet etc?

Yes. I got to the MacOS desktop. Then I ran MultiBeast and chose sane settings (UEFI, audio chipset, bare minimal config). I got the nVidia web driver installed but can't get it to activate. Then, when prompted to update clover I accepted, and now it boots to a black screen. Even if I boot off the USB drive and choose the SSD it goes to black screen. The previous clover had a black background and the updated clover has a gray background.

I would offer more info but sharing "xx.plist" etc is hard because I couldn't find those files, and now I can't access the drive at all.

It's hard because the last time I did this was 18+ months ago and I barely remember what/how I did it. I remember following specific instructions to get the video card recognized but I can't find those despite a lot of searching. I was never able to get the drive bootable and always needed to leave the USB drive plugged in to boot.

I use my system with 2x 43" 4K displays to design PCBs for retro computing. I also edit video sometimes. My reason for updating was some software I rely on needed a more up to date version of Mac OS than I had installed so it could use the most current version of the nVidia drivers for the 1080 Ti.

 

[plasticuser]

If it helps any, I can connect the SSD to my old macbook via SATA<>USB adapter. It mounts fine and I can access the EFI and High Sierra partitions. If I can resolve the black screen issue from here.... I'd be off to a running start.

 

[Stackshoe]

Sorry, your setup is quite far beyond what I'm familiar with, especially the two 4K displays. Oddly enough I found that my own issue with bootup landing me at a black screen was resolved simply by moving the HDMI cable to the other HDMI port in the motherboard back panel. I haven't worked out why, the BIOS settings all look appropriate for using whichever HDMI port I like. Unfortunately if you're running two monitors, you can't try that option.

I hope someone is able to help you out on this, I doubt that I'm going to be any use here. You may need to post verbose booting screen photos to show people what's happening. However, when I was getting a black screen myself, I had to reboot a couple of times to get the shots, because when it went to black screen, verbose booting display itself would disappear, and very suddenly.

 

[plasticuser]

Yeah, it's a bit of a trap. I plan to do some more testing this weekend with a single multisync monitor, in case it is just showing some weird mode that is sending the monitor to sleep.

Meanwhile I am working with my 2011 MBP 17", so I am getting by.

 

[plasticuser]

I tested with a multisync and the video card stops outputting a signal but the machine is still running and I can blindly log in and cause HD activity.

I have decided to buy a new CPU and motherboard, and approach this with newer hardware.

 

[pastrychef]

You should be able to run macOS on your existing hardware.

You say you get black screen, what system definition are you using? What kexts do you have installed?

Remember, macOS dropped support for VGA video output a long time ago. It's best to use DisplayPort with macOS.

 

[canyondust]

Are you using Lilu + Nvidiagraphicsfixup?

 

[plasticuser]

I'll wait for this new CPU and motherboard, as they're 370 chipset and that limited edition 40th anniversary i7-8086K Intel is selling (4GHz, 5GHz turbo, 6 core 12 thread)...
When I get those I'll start over with a new thread if I still have problems.
GTX 1080: I use the HDMI outputs, and they worked fine for two years with two 4K displays. I have tried it with and without Lilu & nvidiagraphicsfix.
Thanks everyone!