[SUCCESS] Gigabyte Designare Z390 (Thunderbolt 3) + i7-9700K + AMD RX 580

[hamzab]

The Easy Bootable Backup procedure might look intimidating, but it's very straightforward. Quite often questions like the ones you asked arise from a sense of "oh, that looks too complicated, so let me find a simpler way".

The choice is ultimately yours. The first time your system becomes corrupted, unbootable, or encounters random crashes, you will ask yourself why you couldn't just boot from the backup disk in less than 60 seconds.

Apologies if this sounds harsh. It meant to sound harsh. Notice how many sudden problems have been reported in this thread and the days upon days of frustration that has ensued.

Do you plan to reinstall macOS ten times over the next year? And re-license your apps every time?

You might have to because there are no guarantees with a Hackintosh. Things can and do go south at very unexpected times. Even an update from 10.15.4 to 10.15.5 in the future may cause problems.

A SATA SSD today is extremely cheap and allows you to get up and running in under 2 minutes -- because a bootable backup is something very special.

Thanks, and thank you for being harsh. I'll get this all installed and will order a 1TB cheap SSD drive as a backup, as my (unfortunately) OS X drive is a 1TB one!

I wasn't aware it backed up everything including Apps, that'll make life a lot easier.

 

[CaseySJ]

Thanks, and thank you for being harsh. I'll get this all installed and will order a 1TB cheap SSD drive as a backup, as my (unfortunately) OS X drive is a 1TB one!

I wasn't aware it backed up everything including Apps, that'll make life a lot easier.

Although the following option may not be suitable for everyone, this what I personally do:

• I use a relatively small 256GB main NVMe disk containing macOS and applications.
• I use a bigger 1TB or larger Home disk.
• I separate my System and Home folders to different physical disks and apply different backup schemes to each.
  • The paragraph below from Post #1 should be considered -- including the linked article.
• This allows me to make relatively frequent System disk backups to a cheap 256GB SATA SSD using Carbon Copy Cloner.
• My Home folder gets backed up to a 24TB Netgear ReadyNAS using Acronis True Image 2020 for Mac.

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[hamzab]

Although the following option may not be suitable for everyone, this what I personally do:

• I use a relatively small 256GB main NVMe disk containing macOS and applications.
• I use a bigger 1TB or larger Home disk.
• I separate my System and Homefolders to different physical disks and apply different backup schemes to each.
  • The paragraph below from Post #1 should be considered -- including the linked article.
• This allows me to make relatively frequent System disk backups to a cheap 256GB SATA SSD using Carbon Copy Cloner.
• My Home folder gets backed up to a 24TB Netgear ReadyNAS using Acronis True Image 2020 for Mac.

---

View attachment 461404

Thanks Casey. I've already ordered a 1TB SSD (they're quite cheap, around £90 which is how much a 1TB spinning drive used to be around 4-5 years ago so not bad at all)

Whilst you're here, if you don't mind I had a few quick questions.

• For installing 10.15.4 as a fresh install, I'm on the SMBIOS step of the config.plist file that's in the USB. Should I choose iMac Pro 1,1, now, or should I follow the guide and use iMac 19,1 for now, and change it to iMac Pro 1,1 later? I'm just worried that I'll have to generate new serials etc if I change the iMac type later on and therefore mess up iMessage (which I use quite a fair bit), or, does changing the iMac type later on not change the serial etc?

• What SMBIOS setting for iMac type are you currently using if you don't mind me asking?

• I also saw this quoted post from yourself on page 508 (link #5,082 - I've copied the contents of it below) which states Vega users like me should go for the iMac Pro 1,1 SMBIOS setting. Unfortunately, I can't find the post, which leads me to believe it may have been superseded by newer advice from yourself? Here's the quoted post from you:

More recent experience has shown that Vega owners who use Pro video applications (Final Cut, Premiere, DaVinci Resolve, etc.) and various Pro audio applications will realize noticeably better performance by doing the following:

• Disabling iGPU in BIOS.
• Setting SMBIOS to iMacPro1,1. The actual iMac Pro uses discrete graphics only and has no built-in iGPU.
• Applying an appropriate Vega fan/power curve.
• Removing the following WhateverGreen parameters from Devices --> Properties:
  • device-id
  • AAPL,ig-platform-id
• Keeping the WhateverGreen parameter: framebuffer-patch-enable

Lastly, as I'm following the mini guide, and we copied a whole load of Kexts etc to the Clover folder as per the guide, I don't need to do anything in Multibeast right? Sorry I'm a complete noob and have always used Multibeast so it seems a bit alien to me by not using it haha!

 

[CaseySJ]

Thanks Casey. I've already ordered a 1TB SSD (they're quite cheap, around £90 which is how much a 1TB spinning drive used to be around 4-5 years ago so not bad at all)

Whilst you're here, if you don't mind I had a few quick questions.

• For installing 10.15.4 as a fresh install, I'm on the SMBIOS step of the config.plist file that's in the USB. Should I choose iMac Pro 1,1, now, or should I follow the guide and use iMac 19,1 for now, and change it to iMac Pro 1,1 later? I'm just worried that I'll have to generate new serials etc if I change the iMac type later on and therefore mess up iMessage (which I use quite a fair bit), or, does changing the iMac type later on not change the serial etc?

It's better to choose a permanent one now if possible. If you know that iMacPro1,1 would be best suited to your needs, it's preferably to choose it at this time.

• What SMBIOS setting for iMac type are you currently using if you don't mind me asking?

I'm using iMac19,1 on both of my Designare Z390 systems, and iMacPro1,1 on my Asus X99 Deluxe II. This is also listed in my signature below.

• I also saw this quoted post from yourself on page 508 (link #5,082 - I've copied the contents of it below) which states Vega users like me should go for the iMac Pro 1,1 SMBIOS setting. Unfortunately, I can't find the post, which leads me to believe it may have been superseded by newer advice from yourself? Here's the quoted post from you:

More recent experience has shown that Vega owners who use Pro video applications (Final Cut, Premiere, DaVinci Resolve, etc.) and various Pro audio applications will realize noticeably better performance by doing the following:

• Disabling iGPU in BIOS.
• Setting SMBIOS to iMacPro1,1. The actual iMac Pro uses discrete graphics only and has no built-in iGPU.
• Applying an appropriate Vega fan/power curve.
• Removing the following WhateverGreen parameters from Devices --> Properties:
  • device-id
  • AAPL,ig-platform-id
• Keeping the WhateverGreen parameter: framebuffer-patch-enable

Based on the performance chart from Peter Paul Chato, in which he used a Radeon VII (R7), iMacPro1,1 may be your best bet if video editing is a priority for this system.

Lastly, as I'm following the mini guide, and we copied a whole load of Kexts etc to the Clover folder as per the guide, I don't need to do anything in Multibeast right? Sorry I'm a complete noob and have always used Multibeast so it seems a bit alien to me by not using it haha!

Correct. But a new UniBeast/MultiBeast is expected that will actually support for some of the idiosyncrasies of this board.

 

[hamzab]

It's better to choose a permanent one now if possible. If you know that iMacPro1,1 would be best suited to your needs, it's preferably to choose it at this time.

I'm using iMac19,1 on both of my Designare Z390 systems, and iMacPro1,1 on my Asus X99 Deluxe II. This is also listed in my signature below.

Based on the performance chart from Peter Paul Chato, in which he used a Radeon VII (R7), iMacPro1,1 may be your best bet if video editing is a priority for this system.

Correct. But a new UniBeast/MultiBeast is expected that will actually support for some of the idiosyncrasies of this board.

thank you Casey. Tbh I’m a light video editor and mainly use the Mac for browsing, heavy usage of office apps, ripping videos / old blu rays to my NAS so I can watch downstairs on my smart TV and other general stuff. Gaming is done only via windows.

in the future I want to get better at audio production, lightroom / photo / video editing, UX design and potentially some light front end coding (nothing too serious). If you don’t mind me asking, if you were doing the above, what iMac setting would you go for?

I completely understand that YMMV however I just want to know the main efficiency and power differences between iMac 19,1 and iMac Pro 1,1 (I.E iMac Pro is better for video editing but what is iMac 19,1 better for?)

 

[RuleBreaker01]

Hi Casey! I activated native NVRAM, but afterwards I wanted to clear the NVRAM with

sudo nvram -c

Usually this worked but right now I got the message:

nvram: Error clearing firmware variables: (iokit/common) not permitted

I would like to clear it, make it clean without the testvar Hello in it...

Any idea?

 

[CaseySJ]

thank you Casey. Tbh I’m a light video editor and mainly use the Mac for browsing, heavy usage of office apps, ripping videos / old blu rays to my NAS so I can watch downstairs on my smart TV and other general stuff. Gaming is done only via windows.

in the future I want to get better at audio production, lightroom / photo / video editing, UX design and potentially some light front end coding (nothing too serious). If you don’t mind me asking, if you were doing the above, what iMac setting would you go for?

I completely understand that YMMV however I just want to know the main efficiency and power differences between iMac 19,1 and iMac Pro 1,1 (I.E iMac Pro is better for video editing but what is iMac 19,1 better for?)

For all scenarios that don't involve heavy video editing I would choose iMac19,1 hands down. This SMBIOS most closely mimics the hardware components of this system, namely:

• Real iMac19,1 supports 9th Generation Intel Core CPU with Intel UHD 630 iGPU.
  • iMacPro is based on older Intel Xeon, and Xeon does not have iGPU.
• Real iMac19,1 has no T2 chip. Neither does any Hackintosh.
  • iMacPro has T2 chip.
  • In the past Sidecar did not work on any SMBIOS with T2 chip, but I believe recent versions of WhateverGreen have sidestepped this problem.
• Real iMac19,1 has single Thunderbolt 3 Titan Ridge controller with two Thunderbolt ports.
  • iMacPro has dual Thunderbolt 3 controllers and four Thunderbolt ports.
• Real iMac19,1 is based on Z390 chipset if I recall correctly.
  • iMacPro is based on X299 chipset.

While some or all of these differences may not be consequential (because macOS adjusts itself to whatever hardware it detects), historically we have selected an SMBIOS based on the closest genetic relative. We might not find an identical twin, but we can choose the closest first cousin.

 

[RuleBreaker01]

Hi Casey! I activated native NVRAM, but afterwards I wanted to clear the NVRAM with

sudo nvram -c

Usually this worked but right now I got the message:

nvram: Error clearing firmware variables: (iokit/common) not permitted

I would like to clear it, make it clean without the testvar Hello in it...

Any idea?

F11 at Clover Boot Menu did the trick thanks...

 

[egroys]

@CaseySJ For your list, if applicable!

UAD LUNA with an Apollo x16 and Apollo Twin MK2 are running great, save for a few software bugs.

LUNA is dependent on the hardware so its good to see patched firmware and full nodes working like they should. Not to mention I love the software.

I haven't downloaded LUNA yet - console and everything UAD works perfectly for me but I have no thunderbolt node because my card isn't patched. Do you think it will matter?

 

[oregon6305]

@CaseySJ - Hi Casey well interestingly enough I updated from Catalina Version 10.15.1 (19888) to Version 10.15.4 and something really interesting ... on one of my sites Investing.com the graphics icon that changes the picture from the site to a full-blown picture on my Acer screen was working on V10.15.1 .. but suddenly on V10.15.4 it no longer goes from the site to a full-blown picture on my Acer screen. No display changes were made nor another app changes .... ANY IDEAS ? Had to revert back to V10.5.1 for trading