Success High Sierra 10.13.4: ASRock Z270 TAICHI, i7-7700k, GeForce GTX 1060

NickElsey · Apr 15, 2018

Nick Elsey's High Sierra mATX:
ASRock Z270 TAICHI - i7-7700k - GeForce GTX 1060
View media item 189922

Couple of Hitachi SATA 2 Tb drives
Keyboard
Mouse
Monitor

Comments

This was a rebuild of the same hardware from my first Hackintosh build. I have a Mid-2012 Mac Pro workstation (fully loaded at the time), but it was getting a bit old and slow, so thought I'd give this as go.

This build was a bit more problematic than the first attempt, due to some issues with High Sierra 10.13.4 - but all were resolved (see below).

Installation Notes

UEFI Settings
I used the the following as my starting point.

To access UEFI Setup, press and hold Delete on a USB Keyboard while the system is booting up
Press F6 to get into Advanced Mode

I changed the following settings:

Advanced > Chipset Configuration > VT-d: Set to Disabled
Advanced > USB Configuration > XHCI Hand-off: Set to Enabled
Boot > CSM: Set to Disabled

UniBeast Phase - Preparing the USB

First call out is that you need to format the USB Stick as GUID Partition Map since we're going to be booting in UEFI Boot Mode (see the troubleshooting notes).
View media item 189923
In Unibeast, don't select any graphics options

After UniBeast completes, but before you safely eject the USB drive:

Created a /postinstall folder on the Install macOS High Sierra volume of the USB drive and copied EFI Mounter (download from https://www.tonymacx86.com/resources/efi-mounter-v3.280/
Reviewed the recommendations in this articleand specifically did the following:
- Updated apfs.efi to version 748.57.19
- Edited /Volumes/EFI/EFI/CLOVER/Config.plist and applied the fix for USB 3.0 drives (not sure if this step was necessary)
- Installed FakeSMC.kext in /Volumes/EFI/EFI/CLOVER/kexts/Other.
Applied the work around for 10.13.4 not finding Unibeast installer as per this article

Booting UniBeast and installing macOS High Sierra
Important -

For this phase, you must insert the USB stick into one of the USB 3 ports on the rear of the machine. If you use the extension ports on the front of the case (i.e. connected to the motherboard via the USB 3 header), macOS installer was unable to find the USB drive after the first reboot.
During this phase I also removed the Gigabyte GeForce GTX 1060 graphics card and used on the onboard DisplayPort connection

My earlier attempts ran into a couple of roadblocks:

Unable to find the Unibeast installer after booting from the USB stick
macOS installer fails part way through loading with the prohibited symbol

Both of these were resolved by the steps outlined in the UniBeast Phase - Preparing the USB above.

During the installation of macOS, it said that a software update to 12.7.2 was required. I let it proceed - no issues here.

At the end of this phase, I had macOS running. At this stage, the following things were not yet working:

Audio drivers
iMessage
Front USB ports

All the other hardware (WiFi, Ethernet, Bluetooth, rear USB) were working fine

MultiBeast Settings
After successfully installing and booting into High Sierra 10.13.4, I configured the MultiBeast settings as follows:

Drivers- selected the following:
- Audio > Realtek ALCxxx > ALC1220
- Audio > Realtek ALCxxx > 100 / 200 / 300 Series Audio Support
- Misc > Select Fake SMC Plugins
- Misc > Select Fake SMC HWMonitor Application
- Network > Intel > IntelMausiethernet v2.3.0
- USB > Increate Max Port Limit 200 Series
Bootloaders- selected the following:
- Clover 2.4 UEFI BOOT MODE + Emulated NVRAM
Customize- selected the following:
- Graphics Configuration:
  - NVIDIA WEB drivers boot flag
  - NVIDIA Graphics fix up
- System Definitions:
  - iMac > iMac 18,3

Installed the drivers and quit MultiBeast.

Graphics Card and NVIDIA Driver Install
NVIDAA Web Drivers are required to get the fully acceleration from the graphics card.

Installed NVIDIA Web Driver 387.10.10.10.30.103 for High Sierra 10.13.4
Shutdown the machine
Installed the graphics card
Powered up (and prayed). Worked. Yay!

Final Installation Tasks

Installed KextBeast
Installed AppleALC.kext via KextBeast
Installed Clover Configurator and used it to get audioworking
- Mount EFI partition
- Open /Clover/Config.plist
- Changed the following settings:
  - Devices > 1. Audio / Inject: Set to 11
  - ACPI > Patches > Added change HDAS to HDEF
- Saved Config.plist rebooted and confirmed audio working OK
Copied EFI Mounter to my /Applications folder
Fixed iMessage as per this guide
Run Clover Configurator and leave on the SMBIOS screen
- Open Terminal.app and run uuidgen.
- Paste the output in the SmUUID field in Clover Configurator (next to the Serial Number).
- Copy the value in the Serial Number field
- Go to the RtVariables screen on the left
- Paste your serial number into the MLB field, and then add 2 random characters or digits to the end
- Enter a value for the ROM field - I'm using Ethernet so I selected UseMacAddr0 from the drop-down.
- File > Save config.plist and Quit Clover Configurator.
- Rebooted and confirmed iMessage worked OK

What's Working

Samsung 960 EVO M.2 disk
SATA disks
NVIDA Graphics
USB 3.0 ports
Audio
Onboard Ethernet
WiFi
Bluetooth
iMessage

Benchmarks
Benchmarks from Geekbench 4

CPU Single-Core Score: 5,800
CPU Multi-Core Score: 20,928
GPU Compute (OpenCL): 100,914

Update - June 2019
In preparation for an upgrade of this machine to Mojave, I replaced the NVIDIA GTX 1060 graphics card with a Sapphire Radeon Pulse RX 580 8GB GDDR5 (Amazon, Newegg). Mojave requires a metal compatible GPU (which the 1060 is not) and there are no NVIDIA drivers available for Mojave yet. I've been using this card without issue in my 2012 MacPro for a while, and I managed to find a reasonably priced used one on eBay.

No issues to report with the installation - the power cable is the same, so it was a straight swap. Once booted back into macOS, I went into the NVIDIA control panel (in System Preferences), uninstalled the NVIDIA driver and rebooted. All good. Here's the Geekbench scores for the RX-580:

OpenCL Score: 138,513
Metal: 139,905

So about 37% faster than the GTX 1060.

Second M.2 SSD
I also recently installed a second M.2 disk - the Samsung 970 Pro NVME M.2 (part MZ-V7P512BW). I used this as a secondary disk, so I can't confirm that this will work as a boot disk.

Be careful not to buy the Samsung 970 Evo Plus drive - this does not work in macOS (causes random panics).

Jhaberman · Jun 17, 2018

Can you upload your EFI folder?

i2023u · Jul 12, 2018

Yes EFI please

vigilian · Nov 2, 2018

did you manage to make the wifi from the board work?
and also both ethernet chipset ? 1 x Giga PHY Intel® I219V, 1 x GigaLAN Intel® I211AT
on my fatality professional gaming only one works, and of course not the aquantia.

NickElsey · Nov 3, 2018

vigilian said:
did you manage to make the wifi from the board work?
and also both ethernet chipset ? 1 x Giga PHY Intel® I219V, 1 x GigaLAN Intel® I211AT
on my fatality professional gaming only one works, and of course not the aquantia.

No - could not get onboard WiFi working. I installed the TP-Link Archer T9E AC1900 card and used that for WiFi (worked out of the box, no drivers needed).

I'm using one of the onboard Ethernet ports - sorry, not sure which one it is.

vigilian · Nov 22, 2018

it seems strange because both of the ethernet port should be working and only one is working. (without talking about the aquantia of course)

Also did you have a problem with hdmi and display port connection at boot ?

Stork · Nov 22, 2018

vigilian said:
it seems strange because both of the ethernet port should be working and only one is working. (without talking about the aquantia of course)

Also did you have a problem with hdmi and display port connection at boot ?

The other port (non working) probably uses a different Ethernet chipset. My Hector systems uses two Ethernet drivers for that reason. Check your User Manual for the motherboard's Ethernet chipsets (usually in the first dozen pages) and the illustrated diagram, top view, of the motherboard.

vigilian · Nov 22, 2018

yes I know, one is the intel 210, the other one is 209 ... But normally the drivers from multibeast are for both no?

Stork · Nov 22, 2018

vigilian said:
yes I know, one is the intel 210, the other one is 209 ... But normally the drivers from multibeast are for both no?

The MultiBeast Features document, which came with MultiBeast, is your best friend.

vigilian · Nov 28, 2018

That's what I meant -> from what I've read it is those models that IntelMausiEthernet covers....

Ok, I found it, the AppleIGB was the one for the i21. Thanks.

Still no WiFi but strangely I can get the Bluetooth working.

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