Recent Posts

Hope they don't block unsigned fw upgrades liek it's on modern macs.

Another amazing find! This new firmware fixes a bug causing all MVC flashed cards from Maxwell and Pascal series to stay on PCIe 1.1 when resuming from standby under Windows. It only worked on clean boot before, now I've resumed from standby on my Windows 7 and it remained on PCIe 2.0 

Another firmware update and it seems they've patched Spectre Variant 3a and 4:

Spectre and Meltdown mitigation detection tool v0.39+                       
                                                                                                                       
Checking for vulnerabilities on current system                                                                         
Kernel is Linux 2.6.32-754.el6.x86_64 #1 SMP Tue Jun 19 21:26:04 UTC 2018 x86_64                                       
CPU is Intel(R) Xeon(R) CPU           X5675  @ 3.07GHz                                                                   

Hardware check
* Hardware support (CPU microcode) for mitigation techniques
  * Indirect Branch Restricted Speculation (IBRS)           
    * SPEC_CTRL MSR is available:  YES                     
    * CPU indicates IBRS capability:  YES  (SPEC_CTRL feature bit)
  * Indirect Branch Prediction Barrier (IBPB)                                                                                   
    * PRED_CMD MSR is available:  YES                                                                                           
    * CPU indicates IBPB capability:  YES  (SPEC_CTRL feature bit)                                                             
  * Single Thread Indirect Branch Predictors (STIBP)                                                                           
    * SPEC_CTRL MSR is available:  YES                                                                                         
    * CPU indicates STIBP capability:  YES  (Intel STIBP feature bit)                                                           
  * Speculative Store Bypass Disable (SSBD)                                                                                     
    * CPU indicates SSBD capability:  YES  (Intel SSBD)                                                                         
  * Enhanced IBRS (IBRS_ALL)                                                                                                   
    * CPU indicates ARCH_CAPABILITIES MSR availability:  NO                                                                     
    * ARCH_CAPABILITIES MSR advertises IBRS_ALL capability:  NO                                                                 
  * CPU explicitly indicates not being vulnerable to Meltdown (RDCL_NO):  NO
  * CPU explicitly indicates not being vulnerable to Variant 4 (SSB_NO):  NO
  * Hypervisor indicates host CPU might be vulnerable to RSB underflow (RSBA):  NO
  * CPU microcode is known to cause stability problems:  NO  (model 0x2c family 0x6 stepping 0x2 ucode 0x1f cpuid 0x206c2)
  * CPU microcode is the latest known available version:  YES  (you have version 0x1f and latest known version is 0x1f)
* CPU vulnerability to the speculative execution attack variants
  * Vulnerable to Variant 1:  YES
  * Vulnerable to Variant 2:  YES
  * Vulnerable to Variant 3:  YES
  * Vulnerable to Variant 3a:  YES
  * Vulnerable to Variant 4:  YES

CVE-2017-5753 [bounds check bypass] aka 'Spectre Variant 1'
* Mitigated according to the /sys interface:  YES  (Mitigation: Load fences)
* Kernel has array_index_mask_nospec:  NO
* Kernel has the Red Hat/Ubuntu patch:  YES
* Kernel has mask_nospec64 (arm64):  NO
> STATUS:  NOT VULNERABLE  (Mitigation: Load fences)

CVE-2017-5715 [branch target injection] aka 'Spectre Variant 2'
* Mitigated according to the /sys interface:  YES  (Mitigation: Full retpoline)
* Mitigation 1
  * Kernel is compiled with IBRS support:  YES
    * IBRS enabled and active:  NO
  * Kernel is compiled with IBPB support:  YES
    * IBPB enabled and active:  YES
* Mitigation 2
  * Kernel has branch predictor hardening (arm):  NO
  * Kernel compiled with retpoline option:  YES
    * Kernel compiled with a retpoline-aware compiler:  YES  (kernel reports full retpoline compilation)
    * Retpoline is enabled:  YES
> STATUS:  NOT VULNERABLE  (Full retpoline + IBPB are mitigating the vulnerability)

CVE-2017-5754 [rogue data cache load] aka 'Meltdown' aka 'Variant 3'
* Mitigated according to the /sys interface:  YES  (Mitigation: PTI)
* Kernel supports Page Table Isolation (PTI):  YES
  * PTI enabled and active:  YES
  * Reduced performance impact of PTI:  YES  (CPU supports PCID, performance impact of PTI will be reduced)
* Running as a Xen PV DomU:  NO
> STATUS:  NOT VULNERABLE  (Mitigation: PTI)

CVE-2018-3640 [rogue system register read] aka 'Variant 3a'
* CPU microcode mitigates the vulnerability:  YES
> STATUS:  NOT VULNERABLE  (your CPU microcode mitigates the vulnerability)

CVE-2018-3639 [speculative store bypass] aka 'Variant 4'
* Mitigated according to the /sys interface:  YES  (Mitigation: Speculative Store Bypass disabled via prctl)
* Kernel supports speculation store bypass:  YES  (spec_store_bypass)
> STATUS:  NOT VULNERABLE  (Mitigation: Speculative Store Bypass disabled via prctl)

CVE-2018-3615/3620/3646 [L1 terminal fault] aka 'Foreshadow & Foreshadow-NG'
> STATUS:  VULNERABLE  (your CPU is known to be vulnerable, and your kernel doesn't report that it mitigates the issue, but more thorough mitigation checking by this script is being worked on (check often for new versions!))

Need more detailed information about mitigation options? Use --explain
A false sense of security is worse than no security at all, see --disclaimer

i am still using 10.9 and am not planning to upgrade anytime soon on MacOS.
is it difficult to flash a r9 280x or 280 for 5.0 GT/s with a Gigabyte Windforce Edition?
am trying to find a viable route withouth spending the 200 Euro requested for the flashed editions on Ebay. 100 Euro + should be enough atm.

It seems resistor mod will be the thing of a past. It works both under macOS and Windows.

It also supports upgrading mac EFI without EFI GPU card but screen remain black.

https://forums.macrumors.com/threads/new-mp5-1-bootrom-138-0-0-0-0-on-mojave-dp7-pb6.2132317/

Hello , i am quite new to this forum but already an average MacUser (since 2004) .

I have a one-two question regarding flashing R9 280x:

- if i would buy off Ebay an unflashed Gigabyte R9 280x (used, as new they don't seem anymore available) could i be able to flash Mac EFI for Bootscreen in any case or would this be a lottery depending on which Rev. (1.0 or 2.0 or whatsoever) i would get?

- if i would be able to flash succesfully a Mac EFI Rom, would that automatically give me Full 5.0 GT Linkspeed or would i need to do further steps?


I am using a MacPro 5.1 and have a MacPro 1.1 with Bootcamp (Windows 7) also available.


Tips and Suggestions are very welcome, thanks!

Hi there

I've got crazy problem with my HIS IceQ Radeon 7950 3GB.

At beginning I wish to say I've successfully done flash MIS 7850 and PowerColor 7950.

So with IceQ problem is.... fans full on (because I guess in Windows it is say no reading temperature which shows 0 degree) - but I got Apple Boot Logo and works great in macOS and Windows - just fans full on - no matter if with UEFI or without.

Then I got BIOS from...... my other IceQ (same looking and same model) but with little bit different CRC checksum - and... fans become quiet on this BIOS - ....... BUT it does not boot to macOS - and to be more crazy - it is booting to Windows! And again - does not matter if with or without UEFI.

At the moment I've stuck with BIOS switch 1: Apple Boot Logo and fans full on and BIOS switch 2: quiet fans BUT able to boot to Windows only.

I've downloaded even official BIOS from https://www.techpowerup.com/vgabios/135633/his-hd7950-3072-121205       no success

Still, no luck there?

Mac Pro 4,1 flashed to 5,1 - Radeon 7950 flashed to Mac - Mojave Beta 1 works PERFECT without any modifications

OK, I'm still on HS, 10.13.6 because I have an MVC flashed GTX 1080. However, I just updated the FW to V 138.0.0.0.0.

Even though I have an EFI card, the progress bar is no longer shown during the update process. However, since HS, I get rolling text before the appearance of the Apple. That text remained on screen longer than usual, and showed activity during the upgrade.

My GPU still shows 2.5 GT/s which I believe to be purely cosmetic. Both Cuda-Z and OceanWave tell me differently, as they always have.

AND, it's reassuring to know that if I had wanted, I could have installed Mojave. I guess the GTX 1080 is recognized as a Metal capable card by Mojave.

Lou