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

[the-darkvoid]

2) The time has come. It's time to tackle High Sierra. I will begin transitioning the guide to 10.13, still with a cautious, LTS-minded approach.

@bozma88 ,

Note that loosely based on your guide I have published an already running 10.13.2 installation, for XPS 9360 QHD 8th gen:
https://github.com/the-darkvoid/XPS9360-macOS

 

[the-darkvoid]

@jkbuha ,

Recently you were posting about PCIe link speed on the XPS 9360. I'd like your opinion on the following.

In Linux I can see the following information for NMVe:

3c:00.0 Non-Volatile memory controller: Sandisk Corp Device 5001 (prog-if 02 [NVM Express])
        LnkSta:    Speed 8GT/s, Width x4, TrErr- Train- SlotClk+ DLActive- BWMgmt- ABWMgmt-

This would indicate that the 8th gen XPS 9360 is running on x4 PCIe lanes already for the NVMe controller?
I.e. it should benefit from a faster NVMe SSD?

 

[mtbfrc]

No "Problem Reporting" files attached.
Read FAQ, "Problem Reporting" again. Carefully. Attach all requested files/output.
https://www.tonymacx86.com/threads/faq-read-first-laptop-frequent-questions.164990/

Apologies. Information is attached.

My WiFi is not functioning. Nothing shows up for it in the Network System Preferences pane or System Profiler. However, Bluetooth is perfectly functional. I have followed the guide exactly, with the one exception that I am running 2.1.0 for the BIOS, as the older versions seemed unavailable and other posters indicated that it functioned properly. Help would be much appreciated. Thanks.

 

[entea]

No "Problem Reporting" files attached.
Read FAQ, "Problem Reporting" again. Carefully. Attach all requested files/output.
https://www.tonymacx86.com/threads/faq-read-first-laptop-frequent-questions.164990/

Posting with debug info zip.

Hey @bozma88 !
Thanks for wonderful guide.

I'm on XPS 9360 UHD with no mods to your settings and currently my system clock is lagging behind.
I wonder if anyone has seen something similar and can advise me what to do.
Also, I have audio crackling, not sure how to win that.

 

[jkbuha]

@jkbuha ,

Recently you were posting about PCIe link speed on the XPS 9360. I'd like your opinion on the following.

In Linux I can see the following information for NMVe:

3c:00.0 Non-Volatile memory controller: Sandisk Corp Device 5001 (prog-if 02 [NVM Express])
        LnkSta:    Speed 8GT/s, Width x4, TrErr- Train- SlotClk+ DLActive- BWMgmt- ABWMgmt-

This would indicate that the 8th gen XPS 9360 is running on x4 PCIe lanes already for the NVMe controller?
I.e. it should benefit from a faster NVMe SSD?

Unfortunately not. The LnkSta shows the theoretical maximum speed of the bus, which is then power limited through the ME/BIOS by only enabling 2 PCIe lanes. To verify this boot into windows, load up HWINFO, AIDA or any other utility that can properly view PCI bus configuration and you'll see that it's limited to 2 lanes.

As I've said previously, this is good power planning on Dell's behalf, because enabling full link speed (especially on a 4-core 8th gen like yours) will generate power consumption way above the 15W TDP, resulting in excessive throttling and/or component heat stress. With an optimised (or active) cooling strategy this could be mitigated, or else running an external GPU would be a more realistic solution, which is where BIOS modding becomes more feasible.

On that note, I have finalised the modded BIOS to flash but unfortunately I've hit a technical challenge. The 7th and 8th gen 9360s do not come with the standard SOIC-based IC, but instead have a brand new (32MB) BIOS chip which comes in the new WSON8 package. This means the standard on-chip flashing using the usual SPI programmers can't work because there aren't yet any WSON8 test clips available. Have been asking around on more specialised forums, but to no avail. If anyone has had any experience with flashing WSON-package ICs, please do reach out.

 

[entea]

I guess I've sorted out the clock and audio crackling issue.

I've made the following change to the config.plist and now clock is not lagging behind and audio is playing perfectly:

    <key>CPU</key>
    <dict>
        <key>FrequencyMHz</key>
        <integer>2700</integer>
        <key>Type</key>
        <string>0x706</string>
        <key>UseARTFrequency</key>
        <false/>
    </dict>

To clarify, the only thing that's different from the initial config in post #1 is these lines:

<key>UseARTFrequency</key>
<false/>

Hope this helps other guys with audio issue.

Edit: i'm on bios 2.3.1

 

[RehabMan]

Note that I have taken care to disable USB on Google Chrome and any other problems potentially blocking the USB port access.

The latest Chrome removes the option to disable the webusb hooking.
So... we might need to find a way to avoid the problem (intermittent/hardware dependent).
Maybe carefully placed IOSleep (ugh), or some way of hooking IOUSBHostDevice:pen (Lilu.kext?)

 

[the-darkvoid]

The latest Chrome removes the option to disable the webusb hooking.
So... we might need to find a way to avoid the problem (intermittent/hardware dependent).
Maybe carefully placed IOSleep (ugh), or some way of hooking IOUSBHostDevice:pen (Lilu.kext?)

I've been testing with nvram bluetoothHostControllerSwitchBehavior=always to influence how the bluetooth transport behaves.
Haven't had sleep issues with bluetooth as of yet.

 

[landmarker]

Hello Everyone!
Very happy to see that my guide is still followed by a lot of members.

My 9360 is working incredibly well, the build is so stable that I never encountered any issue (the only one, unfortunately, being Bluetooth not reliable after standby).
After almost one year, the battery still lasts 10+ hours at full brightness (with SATA SSD swap).
I'm very happy, best laptop purchase ever.

I have two news for you all:

1) I am preparing a small hardware add-on to make use of the internal USB header occupied (uselessly) by the touchscreen. I will document my findings asap.
2) The time has come. It's time to tackle High Sierra. I will begin transitioning the guide to 10.13, still with a cautious, LTS-minded approach.

Will update you soon.

Thanks again BozMan. I am still running a completely stable QHD system on BIOS 1.3.7 and 10.12.6 based on your guide.
I have played a bit with High Sierra without much success, I didn't want to upgrade the bios to 2.3.1 to play with some of the newer guides as I wasn't sure I'd be able to downgrade again.
Looking forward to the updates.

 

[jkbuha]

Haven't been following this really closely, but I've just noticed that updating Clover to v4344 breaks my wifi.
The last known working build (that I've compiled at least) is v4302. Still on 10.12.6; not sure if anyone else has seen this.