This is doing my head in. Someone please help!!

[Kingzone]

[SOLVED] This is doing my head in. Someone please help!!

Trying to install El Cap on a new build with UniBeast 6 / Clover

My problem is with my graphics card, a EVGA Nvidia GTX 550 Ti.

I have installed El Cap using the 550 with the boot arg nv_disable=1. The installation goes well and I am able to boot from my SSD into El Cap although with no graphics acceleration. So now I install the newly released El Cap update 10.11.3 and all goes well. Now time to install the Nvidia Web Drivers. Download and install making sure that the correct drivers are ticked (see below)

Web driver installed but not yet re-booted.



Now re-boot and at clover boot screen insert the following: nvda_drv=1



When the machine re-starts the boot process continues until the monitor turns off with a 'no signal' message and then 30 seconds later reboots.

I then have to insert nv_disable=1 in order to get back to the desktop, when I do the Nvidia manager shows that the Web drivers are not enabled (see below)



What ever I do I cannot enable the Nvidia Web Driver I either get a black screen (no signal) or have to boot with no acceleration.

This is my first time installing with clover. I have never had this problem with many Chimera / Yosemite installations.

I can't seem to find out if the GTX 550 Ti is natively supported under OS X El Capitan

 

[tonymacx86]

I have the 550 Ti and it's a weird one. Since it's a Kepler it is supposed to work without the web drivers, however with El Capitan it's needed the drivers for better compatibility.

If you could try using an alternate port on the 550Ti it might work better- which one are you using? HDMI or DVI?

 

[Kingzone]

I have the 550 Ti and it's a weird one. Since it's a Kepler it is supposed to work without the web drivers, however with El Capitan it's needed the drivers for better compatibility.

If you could try using an alternate port on the 550Ti it might work better- which one are you using? HDMI or DVI?

Thanks for the prompt reply. I'm using one of the two DVI ports. I've only got a VGA 21" monitor in the workshop but I am using an active DVI to VGA adaptor.


I do have a 27" DVI monitor in the office so I could try that directly into the 550's DVI ports.

I'll try with the DVI monitor tomorrow and report back.

 

[ammulder]

It would be great to try the straight DVI monitor, but also a different DVI port if the monitor has more than one.

What SMBIOS system definition are you using? You may need the AppleGraphicsDevicePolicy fix, depending.

 

[Kingzone]

Before I did any of the above I ran the machine using the onboard graphics. The machine booted and ran fine without any issues whatsoever.

So I have decided to do a re-install, so I will proceed as follows.

• Fresh install using my 27" monitor connected to the onboard graphics via DVI (this monitor has DVI only) with BIOS set to CPU graphics (the GTX 550 Ti removed from the machine)
• Install El Capitan and run Multibeast and install Audio and Network drivers ETC until I have a working system
• Install the El Capitan 10.11.3 update
• Install Nvidia Web Drivers 346.03.05 and set to run on Nvidia driver.
• Shut down
• Re-start and go directly to BIOS and change graphics to PCIe. Save settings and shut down
• Install EVGA GTX 550 Ti and connect monitor
• Start-up and at clover boot screen go to settings and add boot argument nvida_drv=1 then continue to boot to OS

Is this the correct way??

Now a couple of questions......

1 - As I have marked the web drivers for use in the Nvidia control panel before the final shut down do I need to add the nvda_drv=1 boot arg? if so does this have to be added somewhere else?

2 - Looking at my machine specification.......

Asus H97M E
Intel i5-4460
12Gb RAM
SSD
EVGA GTX550 Ti
Apple BCM94360BC PCIe WiFi/BT4.0 card

.......what would the experts say was the best system definitions to set with Multibeast?

If this in not the correct procedure please let me know and if anyone can give me any further hints and tips for getting the GTX 550 Ti to work correctly I will be pleased to hear them.

Thanks

Kingzone

 

[ammulder]

You procedure looks OK.

I don't know whether a GTX 550 would require inject nvidia=true and/or the Web drivers, but those are two variables to consider.

Normally it's a good idea to start with MacPro3,1 unless you have a specific need otherwise. That's the "old faithful" of system definitions.

 

[Kingzone]

So, after a few days of testing I decided to ditch the GTX 550 Ti and replace it with an Asus Geforce GT 740

I performed a fresh install of El Cap as detailed in an earlier post. Having done a little research I decided to use the iMac 14,2 system definition.

The installation went ahead as usual. I installed my audio, network drivers, system definition and Clover bootloader (UEFI boot mode) ETC

I then updated the system to 10.11.3 and installed the Nvidia Web Drivers. I then downloaded and ran Clover Configurator and set the config.plist (EFI -> EFI -> CLOVER -> config.plist.) with the two following boot flags: nvda_drv=1 and InjectNvidia=False. I made sure that the web driver was selected in the Nvidia control panel and then re-booted.

The machine seemed to boot fine so I looked at the Nvidia control panel only to find that the system was still using the OS X Default Graphics Driver. No matter what I try I can't make this combo work with the Nvidia Web Drivers.

This is a screen shot of my config.plist



This is after the reboot, the default drivers are still being used



This shows my new GT 740 being correctly identified



And here in the hardware list



My card has the Kepler architecture and as such needs the Web Drivers for full compatibility so I need nvda_drv=1 to turn on the web drivers and InjectNvidia=False for the Kepler based card. Both of these setting can be seen in the screenshot of my config.plist so why is the system reverting to the default drivers????

Could my System Definition, iMac 14,2 be responsible?? if so how do I change it to the more standard Mac Pro 3,1?

 

[ammulder]

Some machines don't correctly report the state of the Nvidia drivers.

The giveaway if it's just reporting wrong is that if you select to use the Nvidia driver in the control panel or status bar tool and it doesn't ask you to reboot, then you're already using them.

 

[Kingzone]

Some machines don't correctly report the state of the Nvidia drivers.

The giveaway if it's just reporting wrong is that if you select to use the Nvidia driver in the control panel or status bar tool and it doesn't ask you to reboot, then you're already using them.

This is exactly what is happening, it's not asking for a re-boot so, problem solved.

Thank you for your expert help and advice.