NootRX

[craighazan]

Anyone tested this?. Some advice though when communicating with the developers. If you have a bug to report make sure you’re precise with your description. I reported a bug that wasn’t a bug, but the response was nice and I felt like I learnt something in the process, oh! Sonoma in zero acceleration mode!. But that might not always be the case, so try not to bother them with difficult questions and respect the fact they’re young and very busy.

Navi 21, on macOS Big Sur and newer
Navi 22, on macOS Monterey and newer (Yup)
Navi 23, on macOS Monterey and newer
(No native cards)

Navi 24 support soon™

GitHub - ChefKissInc/NootRX: Lilu plug-in for RDNA 2 dGPUs. No commercial use.

Lilu plug-in for RDNA 2 dGPUs. No commercial use. Contribute to ChefKissInc/NootRX development by creating an account on GitHub.

github.com

 

[Edhawk]

This is to verify that the RX6700 XT (PowerColor Fighter 12GB) card works in macOS Ventura 13.6.

1. First thing I did was create a copy of my current OC EFI folder on a USB pen drive.
2. I removed WhateverGreen.kext from the /EFI/OC/Kexts folder.
3. I added NootRX.kext to the /EFI/OC/Kexts folder.
4. Opened the config.plist in ProperTree, used the OC Clean Snapshot feature to update the config.plist with the changed kexts.
5. As the card I replaced was a RX 5700 XT, which is a Navi 10 card, the config.plist already contained the agdpmod=pikera boot argument.
   1. If you are updating from an older card Polaris or Vega series you would need to add this boot argument to your config.plist, otherwise you could end up with a black screen issue.
6. Saved the config.plist.
7. Rebooted the system from the USB pen drive,
   1. Used the ResetNvramEntry from the OC boot screen, to clear any old NVRAM entries.
   2. Entered the bios after the automatic reboot to reset my boot disk priority, so my Windows 11 drive wasn't set as first boot drive.
8. Booted from the USB pen drive and this time selected the macOS icon on the OC boot screen.
9. System booted as normal to the first Apple progress bar, then the dual screens went black until the macOS Login screen appeared on both displays. So no sign of the second stage Apple progress bar, no big loss!
10. Signed in and everything seems normal, full 12GB VRAM accessible, acceleration, transparency in the dock etc.

Just to confirm that I swapped out a PowerColor RX 5700 XT 8GB card and replaced it with a PowerColor RX 6700 XT 12GB card, in my ASUS TUF Gaming B550 WiFi II / Ryzen 5 5600G system. Straight swap no messing.

Below are a few screenshots showing the About this Mac, System Settings > About and System Information > Graphics/Displays with the new RX 6700 XT card installed.

About this Mac, transparency from the Desktop.

System Settings > About tab.

System Information > Graphics/Displays report.

Obviously some further testing will be required, but as it stands I think this is a great boost the RootRX developers have given the Hackintosh community.

Here are some screenshots from Hackintool, showing the RX 6700 XT card properties.

Hackintool General > System tab

Hackintool General > Peripherals tab

Hackintool PCIe tab, with RX 6700 XT highlighted.

 

[craighazan]

This is great news @Edhawk!. Team Noot is making incredible progress with their projects. @Stork mentioned that the 6700XT is the sweet spot for the 6000 series, more options for the hackintosh community.

 

[Edhawk]

I bought the RX 6700 XT on ebay.co.uk from Ebuyer.co.uk, go figure!

Original price was £314. After the discount I ended up paying £236 for a brand new RX 6700 XT. Don't suppose that will ever happen again!

I ran a few Geekbench tests on the system, OpenCL was totally underwhelming at around 22K.

OpenCL result, seriously disappointing.

I seem to recall something about OpenCL being dropped by Apple, but I am not sure that is correct.

The Metal test result was good at 152K. That is close to 3 times the RX 580 and double the Vega 56 score, for cards I am using in other systems.

Way short of the RX 6900XT Metal score (224K) but that is to be expected.

RX 6700 XT Metal test result in macOS Ventura.

It might improve if I change the SMBIOS to iMacPro1,1 or MacPro7,1. Just happens that the AMD Hack I am testing the card in uses the iMac20,1 SMBIOS, from when I was playing with the APU.

 

[craighazan]

I recommend the iMacPro SMBIOS for the 6700XT. I think I read in the graphics section on the OpenCore site that iMacPro1,1 ‘expects’ a dGPU to be present. But iMac SMBIOS, (like 20,1 used with NootedRed), expects a iGPU to be present.

 

[ExtremeXT]

1. As the card I replaced was a RX 5700 XT, which is a Navi 10 card, the config.plist already contained the agdpmod=pikera boot argument.
   1. If you are updating from an older card Polaris or Vega series you would need to add this boot argument to your config.plist, otherwise you could end up with a black screen issue.

That boot argument is not some black magic that avoids the black screen, it patches AGDP (Apple Graphics Device Policy, hence AGDPMod) to not check for board-id, since Apple added a board-id (basically SMBIOS) check to Navi GPUs. This is only needed on non-MacPro7,1/iMacPro1,1 SMBIOSes. NootRX already checks for this and applies it if needed.

View attachment 572810

The decoder here is failing because AMDRadeonVA2Driver loads the AMD decoder/encoder only works on MacPro7,1/iMacPro1,1 SMBIOSes, else it loads the Intel one for QuickSync.

I ran a few Geekbench tests on the system, OpenCL was totally underwhelming at around 22K.

View attachment 572816 OpenCL result, seriously disappointing.

I seem to recall something about OpenCL being dropped by Apple, but I am not sure that is correct.

Yes, OpenGL and OpenCL are deprecated in macOS.

The Metal test result was good at 152K. That is close to 3 times the RX 580 and double the Vega 56 score, for cards I am using in other systems.

Way short of the RX 6900XT Metal score (224K) but that is to be expected.

View attachment 572814 RX 6700 XT Metal test result in macOS Ventura.

It might improve if I change the SMBIOS to iMacPro1,1 or MacPro7,1. Just happens that the AMD Hack I am testing the card in uses the iMac20,1 SMBIOS, from when I was playing with the APU.

Our tester's 6700 XT got a score of 173K for Metal, check if you have any apps in the background, but benchmarks don't really show real-world performance.

 

[craighazan]

@ExtremeXT thanks for joining us here on tmx86, you’re Noot experience will be greatly appreciated.

 

[Edhawk]

@ExtremeXT thanks for your reply.

1. I have removed the agdpmod boot argument.
   1. You are correct it isn't required with NootRX.kext.
2. Changed SMBIOS from iMac20,1 to MacPro7,1, this works but no change to GeekBench scores.
3. I tried using iMacPro1,1 SMBIOS, but this gave black screen after short Apple Progress bar, system was running but no display working with this SMBIOS for my system.
   1. Only change to config.plist was replacing the MacPro7,1 data with the iMacPro1,1 data.
   2. Did the usual Nvram Reset after making the SMBIOS changes.
4. Thanks for confirming OpenCL was depreciated.
5. Not sure how to make up 20K in the Geekbench app, but will give it a try!
   1. No apps running when GB testing undertaken, just AMD Power Gadget (APG) in the Menu bar.
   2. I shut APG down on a couple of tests and it made no difference to the GB Metal scores.
   3. Had a look in Activity monitor and nothing running while using any significant processes.

 

[Edhawk]

Latest GeekBench 6 Metal score is just under 160K, so getting better using the MacPro7,1 SMBIOS, plus a few other graphics related tweaks in the config.plist and bios.

• Enabled Above 4G Decoding, removed npci=0x3000 boot argument.
• Enabled Resize Bar in bios and changed config entry from -1 to 0.
• Booted with Patch #20 Enabled and patch #21 disabled (default AMD kernel patch settings).
• Disabled AlGreys' patch #20 & Enabled Shaneee's patch #21, which gave the better GB Metal score.

 

[pastrychef]

Latest GeekBench 6 Metal score is just under 160K, so getting better using the MacPro7,1 SMBIOS, plus a few other graphics related tweaks in the config.plist and bios.

View attachment 572841

• Enabled Above 4G Decoding, removed npci=0x3000 boot argument.
• Enabled Resize Bar in bios and changed config entry from -1 to 0.
• Booted with Patch #20 Enabled and patch #21 disabled (default AMD kernel patch settings).
• Disabled AlGreys' patch #20 & Enabled Shaneee's patch #21, which gave the better GB Metal score.

That's a nice score. Kicks my M1 Max's butt.