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Wondering if my Dell XPS 8940 will accept a Catalina install

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I also picked up an MSI Radeon rx 560 aero ITX 2G O. After some back and forth with MSI, AMD and Dell, I found there are 2 BIOS’s on this card, legacy and UEFI. Most machines should choose which one to load, but my XPS 8940 is loading the legacy BIOS off the graphics card before anything and then just black screens. Might just pack it in and buy a Mac Pro!
 
westtech77 said:
I also picked up an MSI Radeon rx 560 aero ITX 2G O. After some back and forth with MSI, AMD and Dell, I found there are 2 BIOS’s on this card, legacy and UEFI. Most machines should choose which one to load, but my XPS 8940 is loading the legacy BIOS off the graphics card before anything and then just black screens. Might just pack it in and buy a Mac Pro!
Click to expand...
thats the one i have...how strange that you are having these issues...have you tried installing with a hdd that isnt the dell one? is there some setting on the dell mb bios that needs to be changed?
 
namio said:
thats the one i have...how strange that you are having these issues...have you tried installing with a hdd that isnt the dell one? is there some setting on the dell mb bios that needs to be changed?
Click to expand...

yeah I think the difference being, your XPS 8930 to my XPS 8940. Totally different bios, so not sure what to do. I’ve tried numerous variations of settings in the bios, can’t seem to get windows or the motherboard to recognize it for anything. The card does work in other pcs, so it is the dell thags clunking out
 
i have an 8930 and i just recently got a 8940 - i am referring to the xps 8940 - comet lake
 
namio said:
i have an 8930 and i just recently got a 8940 - i am referring to the xps 8940 - comet lake
Click to expand...
That’s bizarre. You were able to just plug and play with your setup? No bios changes?
 
I made bios changes

see this guide for the 8930 by dandelion clock (#4 for BIOS settings) most importantly make sure you have SATA set to AHCI, it is set on RAID by default - the only thing I did different was disabled Virtualization, VT

www.tonymacx86.com

[Guide] Dell XPS 8930 Big Sur 11.4 (upgraded from Catalina 10.15.7), RX580/UHD630, OpenCore

Update 06/04/2021: I updated to OC 0.6.9 and then Big Sur to 11.4 smoothly under System Preferences. See attached files. Update 01/21/2021: I upgraded to OC 0.6.5 then upgraded to Big Sir by downloading in the mac App Store. Things seem to be running smoothly without problem, but I haven't...
www.tonymacx86.com www.tonymacx86.com

I removed completely the NVIDIA card and put the MSI 560 in - changed the bios setting from auto to Radeon when the card was in, but you can leave it at auto

I removed the killer wifi card and replaced it with a osx compatible one

i originally installed the dell sensors SMC kexts in the EFI folder but they were causing kernel panics when i tried to connect anything with bluetooth, when i removed the dell sensors, no more problems

the ethernet kext you need is realtek 811

i have been unable to get on board audio to work so i have given up on that and i am using a focusrite usb interface which works great

i removed the dell nvme drive and replaced it with a samsung nvme - if you look at dandelionclocks guide, he talks about having to format the dell drive with ubuntu - for me it was easier to replace it

pretty much everything worked straight away after i had made the opencore EFI folder and changed the config plist per recommendations (caveat, no onboard audio, no card reader, didnt even mess with the internal graphics)

these are the kexts i used

EFI/OC/kexts/
  • AppleALC
  • Realtek8111
  • Lilu.kext
  • USB-Map.kext (Build your own)
  • VirtualSMC.kext
  • Whatevergreen.kext
EFI Drivers: for opencore 0.64 (opencanopy not need for initial set up but the other 2 are)
  • HfsPlus.efi
  • OpenCanopy.efi
  • OpenRuntime.efi
 
Last edited:
namio said:
I made bios changes

see this guide for the 8930 by dandelion clock (#4 for BIOS settings) most importantly make sure you have SATA set to AHCI, it is set on RAID by default - the only thing I did different was disabled Virtualization, VT

www.tonymacx86.com

[Guide] Dell XPS 8930 Big Sur 11.4 (upgraded from Catalina 10.15.7), RX580/UHD630, OpenCore

Update 06/04/2021: I updated to OC 0.6.9 and then Big Sur to 11.4 smoothly under System Preferences. See attached files. Update 01/21/2021: I upgraded to OC 0.6.5 then upgraded to Big Sir by downloading in the mac App Store. Things seem to be running smoothly without problem, but I haven't...
www.tonymacx86.com www.tonymacx86.com

I removed completely the NVIDIA card and put the MSI 560 in - changed the bios setting from auto to Radeon when the card was in, but you can leave it at auto

I removed the killer wifi card and replaced it with a osx compatible one

i originally installed the dell sensors SMC kexts in the EFI folder but they were causing kernel panics when i tried to connect anything with bluetooth, when i removed the dell sensors, no more problems

the ethernet kext you need is realtek 811

i have been unable to get on board audio to work so i have given up on that and i am using a focusrite usb interface which works great

i removed the dell nvme drive and replaced it with a samsung nvme - if you look at dandelionclocks guide, he talks about having to format the dell drive with ubuntu - for me it was easier to replace it

pretty much everything worked straight away after i had made the opencore EFI folder and changed the config plist per recommendations (caveat, no onboard audio, no card reader, didnt even mess with the internal graphics)

these are the kexts i used

EFI/OC/kexts/
  • AppleALC
  • Realtek8111
  • Lilu.kext
  • USB-Map.kext (Build your own)
  • VirtualSMC.kext
  • Whatevergreen.kext
EFI Drivers: for opencore 0.64 (opencanopy not need for initial set up but the other 2 are)
  • HfsPlus.efi
  • OpenCanopy.efi
  • OpenRuntime.efi
Click to expand...
Hey there, I am finally back at trying to sort this out. Turns out someone sold me a broken video card. I've gotten a new MSI ITX RX560 and am able to get to the installer for macOS Catalina and Big Sur, however it black screens about 50% of the way, and then halts the system. I don't even get a log out put to see what could actually be the issue unfortunately.

I have the following:

EFI/OC/kexts/
  • AppleALC
  • Realtek8111
  • Lilu.kext
  • VirtualSMC.kext
  • Whatevergreen.kext
EFI Drivers: for opencore 0.6.7
  • HfsPlus.efi
  • OpenRuntime.efi
  • 1614722706863.png
Any ideas what might be going on here?
 

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  • config.plist
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namio said:
its possible, i have one and its working great after a bit of work - (with a few caveats)

i havent tried to get internal graphics working because i added a radeon rx560 and try as i might, i cant get the onboard audio working (i am using a usb focusrite interface for sound now and that is great) - the network card that comes with it needs to be replaced with a mac os compatible one if you want wifi/bluetooth (which i did)

catalina works but i decided to move up to big sur
Click to expand...
Hi Namio, I have a Dell G5 5000 Gaming Desktop, almost the same desktop as yours, can you get shutdown and restart working, I have everything working, audio, bluetooth, wifi but not shutdown, sleep and restart. If you could share your EFI folder that would be great.
* If you want audio working, remove AppleALC.kext for VooDooHDA.kext
Thanks

CPU: i7-10700f
HD: SSD 250G
MEM: 32 Gig Ram
GPU: AMD Radeon RX 5700 XT
COMM: Killer E2600 Ethernet Realtek
WIFI: ALC3861
3 Displays: 2xDisplayPort, 1xHDMI
 
Last edited:
namio said:
these are the kexts i used

EFI/OC/kexts/
  • AppleALC
  • Realtek8111
  • Lilu.kext
  • USB-Map.kext (Build your own)
  • VirtualSMC.kext
  • Whatevergreen.kext
Click to expand...

Would you mine posting your USB-Map.kext so i could take a look at it? pretty please?
 
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