# Any Advice on Mac Pro 5,1 going to Catalina?



## DocMidi657 (Aug 4, 2021)

Hi Guys,
I have recently acquired a Mid 2012 Mac Pro 2 X 3.016 GHZ 6-Core with 64gigs of RAM with an ATI RADEON HD 5770 1024MB Video Card . It's running High Sierra and I wanted to take it to Catalina. I thought I would go the DOS DUDE PATCH route today but I saw in DOS Dude's comments/read me before installing this info... "AMD/ATI Radeon HD 5xxx and 6xxx series graphics acceleration: Currently, it is not possible to achieve full graphics acceleration under Catalina on any machines that use a Radeon HD 5xxx or 6xxx series GPU. If you have a machine with one of these GPUs installed, I'd advise upgrading it if possible or not installing Catalina. Running Catalina without full graphics acceleration will result in extremely poor system performance".

Can someone suggest any options or suggest a video card I can purchase to get this Mac to Catalina (as unless I am reading this wrong) my video card will not work with the DosDude Catalina Patcher?

Thanks so much!
Dave


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## kgdrum (Aug 4, 2021)

DocMidi657 said:


> Hi Guys,
> I have recently acquired a Mid 2012 Mac Pro 2 X 3.016 GHZ 6-Core with 64gigs of RAM with an ATI RADEON HD 5770 1024MB Video Card . It's running High Sierra and I wanted to take it to Catalina. I thought I would go the DOS DUDE PATCH route today but I saw in DOS Dude's comments/read me before installing this info... "AMD/ATI Radeon HD 5xxx and 6xxx series graphics acceleration: Currently, it is not possible to achieve full graphics acceleration under Catalina on any machines that use a Radeon HD 5xxx or 6xxx series GPU. If you have a machine with one of these GPUs installed, I'd advise upgrading it if possible or not installing Catalina. Running Catalina without full graphics acceleration will result in extremely poor system performance".
> 
> Can someone suggest any options or suggest a video card I can purchase to get this Mac to Catalina (as unless I am reading this wrong) my video card will not work with the DosDude Catalina Patcher?
> ...


You have to upgrade to a Metal capable video card which are very expensive now,I found a Radion RX580 which is a great card.
After waiting for several weeks I lucked out and found the RX580 in March from OWC,they only had 2 open box suddenly available when I purchased. About two or three weeks later they got more in stock but raised the price considerably,I think more than $200 more than what I paid.
Then OWC ran out I think in April and I don’t think they have had anymore since. You can find Metal capable cards on EBay but you must shop carefully and try to buy from a trusted seller/store. Myself I upgraded to Mojave, the challenge of upgrading to Catalina with a 5,1 really doesn’t tempt me,lol


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## Karmand (Aug 4, 2021)

HI. Here's what I did. 5700xt video card in an EGPU, 580 video card inside mac, Titan thunderbolt card, Open Core - Flashed to latest firmware - Open Core - installed Catalina. I have three bootable partitions. Mojave, Catalina (music), Catalina (Video) I've beefed up the ram to 64GB, added a NVMD riser card that fits 4 NVMEs. I run samples on one, Video files, renders on another. There are plenty of tutorials on how to upgrade with OpenCore from Mojove to Catalina - my additions were thunderbolt card and NVMSs....


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## Vik (Aug 4, 2021)

Karmand said:


> HI. Here's what I did. 5700xt video card in an EGPU, 580 video card inside mac, Titan thunderbolt card, Open Core - Flashed to latest firmware - Open Core - installed Catalina. I have three bootable partitions. Mojave, Catalina (music), Catalina (Video) I've beefed up the ram to 64GB, added a NVMD riser card that fits 4 NVMEs. I run samples on one, Video files, renders on another. There are plenty of tutorials on how to upgrade with OpenCore from Mojove to Catalina - my additions were thunderbolt card and NVMSs....


How much did that cost you (in tine and money? Any idea?


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## DocMidi657 (Aug 4, 2021)

kgdrum said:


> You have to upgrade to a Metal capable video card which are very expensive now,I found a Radion RX580 which is a great card.
> After waiting for several weeks I lucked out and found the RX580 in March from OWC,they only had 2 open box suddenly available when I purchased. About two or three weeks later they got more in stock but raised the price considerably,I think more than $200 more than what I paid.
> Then OWC ran out I think in April and I don’t think they have had anymore since. You can find Metal capable cards on EBay but you must shop carefully and try to buy from a trusted seller/store. Myself I upgraded to Mojave, the challenge of upgrading to Catalina with a 5,1 really doesn’t tempt me,lol


TAHNKS SO MUCH KGDRUM!


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## DocMidi657 (Aug 4, 2021)

Karmand said:


> HI. Here's what I did. 5700xt video card in an EGPU, 580 video card inside mac, Titan thunderbolt card, Open Core - Flashed to latest firmware - Open Core - installed Catalina. I have three bootable partitions. Mojave, Catalina (music), Catalina (Video) I've beefed up the ram to 64GB, added a NVMD riser card that fits 4 NVMEs. I run samples on one, Video files, renders on another. There are plenty of tutorials on how to upgrade with OpenCore from Mojove to Catalina - my additions were thunderbolt card and NVMSs....


TAHNKS SO MUCH Karmanda!


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## DocMidi657 (Aug 4, 2021)

Karmand said:


> HI. Here's what I did. 5700xt video card in an EGPU, 580 video card inside mac, Titan thunderbolt card, Open Core - Flashed to latest firmware - Open Core - installed Catalina. I have three bootable partitions. Mojave, Catalina (music), Catalina (Video) I've beefed up the ram to 64GB, added a NVMD riser card that fits 4 NVMEs. I run samples on one, Video files, renders on another. There are plenty of tutorials on how to upgrade with OpenCore from Mojove to Catalina - my additions were thunderbolt card and NVMSs....


THANKS SO MUCH Karmand!


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## Karmand (Aug 5, 2021)

People asked how much and how long? Updating my MacPro 2012 Catalina and Open Core with 4 NVMes and Max Ram, Fast Video Cards.​--Dual M.2 NVMe Bifurication Riser Controller - Support for Non-Bifurification MoBo SI-PE 281.00
--Three NVMEs - 1 2TB Mid 200.00s [email protected] 179-229.00
-- 32 GB ram upgrade I forget the price but it increased it to 64GB - now we can do 96GB, but even when loading all BBCSO & SpitFire SSO it's taking up 40GB or so with VEP7
--Safire 580 Video Card these are cheaper and good enough for music - with Open Core you get the boot screen so no flashing needed.
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Not applicable for Music Production:
5700XT Safire version (not applicable to Music only Video) around 497.00
Razor EGPU (not applicable to Music only Video) 450.00
Titan Ridge Thunderbolt Card - FLASHED from Andrew on Ebay - with instructions on how to do Open Core etc... 179.00
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--How long? I already had the 580 video card - that was working, but after loading open core the boot screen worked with it - bonus joy
--flashing Firmware to load Mojave was easy 15 minutes Youtube tutorials all over the place - but you don't really need to load that one in first - but it's good to do because then you can always boot backwards to Mojave and original video card.
--OPEN CORE: 3-4 hours why? Because I was learning - watched videos, But Andrew's instructions were best. So it takes many boots to make it work; take your time.
Installing Catalina 40 minutes - seemed slow, but I did it twice - one for Music one for Video - it runs a cleaner system when I have to have that stupid Adobe CC for some work related video stuff. 
--WHEN installing OPEN CORE - you need to follow the instructions booting into recover to switch off a security thing - just follow along the instructions; it works. I've done this three times and it is now fast for me to do this. ALSO- do NOT load Open Core on your HD - place it on a USB stick and put it in the front USB ports, so you can boot into your mac normally without OpenCore at any time - then you won't have the problem with OpenCore embedded on you main Hard Drive. When you read Andrew's instructions you'll understand why later.
Now I see the boot loader screen, I can boot to any of the three installs and the associated recovery drives.
PM me if you want the Open Core instructions I followed... cheers.


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## Dewdman42 (Aug 5, 2021)

I’m running Catalina on my 5,1 and love it. Don’t bother without a metal gpu though, I favor the rx580 as do many but yes they have become very expensive. Poke around on the macrumors forum to find out other alternatives.

Dos Dude’s patcher is the easiest way to install Catalina and I would not hesitate to use that. I chose the OpenCore route because I wanted to learn OpenCore and be ready for the future with Big Sur and beyond but as it turns out apple has broken Big Sur on the 5,1 even with open core you can’t go past version 11.2.3 of Big Sur so unless the open core community figures out a work around that will be the end of the line.

Dos dude did not do a Big Sur Patcher but he has already stated he plans to try to make a Monterrey Patcher so maybe that will work more we shall see; but anyway if you never go past Catalina Dos Dude’s Patcher is the easiest way to go.

But you need metal gpu

You also upgrade it to Mojave first in order to get the required firmware update, but you’ll need metal card for that too.


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## DocMidi657 (Aug 6, 2021)

Dewdman42 said:


> I’m running Catalina on my 5,1 and love it. Don’t bother without a metal gpu though, I favor the rx580 as do many but yes they have become very expensive. Poke around on the macrumors forum to find out other alternatives.
> 
> Dos Dude’s patcher is the easiest way to install Catalina and I would not hesitate to use that. I chose the OpenCore route because I wanted to learn OpenCore and be ready for the future with Big Sur and beyond but as it turns out apple has broken Big Sur on the 5,1 even with open core you can’t go past version 11.2.3 of Big Sur so unless the open core community figures out a work around that will be the end of the line.
> 
> ...


Tahnsk so much DewdMan


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## DocMidi657 (Aug 6, 2021)

DocMidi657 said:


> Tahnsk so much DewdMan


Hey Dewdman...can you tell me about the Mohave Fiirmware update? I ordered a used metal card which won't be here for a few days. What I did was ran DosDude Catalina Patcher on it from High Sierra while I am waiting for the video card to arrive. It boots and actually works fairly well while I am waiting for the card to arrive. Did I mess things up not going to Mohave first?


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## Dewdman42 (Aug 6, 2021)

Go to About This Mac and hit the System Report button and tell me what it says you have for Boot ROM Version. It should be 144.0.0.0.0. If its lower then that that I highly advise you to downgrade to High Sierra and upgrade to Mojave in order to get the firmware. You essentially skipped Mojave, which has the firmware update bundled in it. 

144.0.0.0.0 is the last firmware that was released for the 5,1 and sooner or later you may run into some issue if you don't have it. 

Mojave is the last officially supported version of OSX on this computer. If all else fails you can go back to Mojave and just run that for a few years until ARM takes over everything, but I do find Catalina a little better personally, but not that much better...Mojave is fine too.


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## DocMidi657 (Aug 6, 2021)

Dewdman42 said:


> Go to About This Mac and hit the System Report button and tell me what it says you have for Boot ROM Version. It should be 144.0.0.0.0. If its lower then that that I highly advise you to downgrade to High Sierra and upgrade to Mojave in order to get the firmware. You essentially skipped Mojave, which has the firmware update bundled in it.
> 
> 144.0.0.0.0 is the last firmware that was released for the 5,1 and sooner or later you may run into some issue if you don't have it.
> 
> Mojave is the last officially supported version of OSX on this computer. If all else fails you can go back to Mojave and just run that for a few years until ARM takes over everything, but I do find Catalina a little better personally, but not that much better...Mojave is fine too.


Hi Dewdman..I have this for Boot rom version...Boot ROM Version:MP51.0087.B00


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## Dewdman42 (Aug 6, 2021)

That’s not the boot rom version look again


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## DocMidi657 (Aug 6, 2021)

Dewdman42 said:


> That’s not the boot rom version look again


Here's a screen grab..is there another place I should be looking?


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## Dewdman42 (Aug 6, 2021)

This is mine:







make sure yours is 144.0.0.0, comes with the Mojave updater.


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## Dewdman42 (Aug 6, 2021)

See this thread: https://forums.macrumors.com/threads/mp5-1-bootrom-thread-144-0-0-0-0.2132317/

Your mac's firmware is WAYYY out of date.

You may have to do more then simply upgrade to Mojave, I suggest you go to that thread and ask about the best way to get from your firmware to 144.0.0.0.0


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## Dave Connor (Aug 6, 2021)

Question, If you get a metal card but don’t upgrade your system (I’m running Mountain Lion 10.8.5) is there any problem with that? I just bought a 32 inch monitor and the 5770 card doesn’t really support the higher resolutions.


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## Dewdman42 (Aug 6, 2021)

check elsewhere I'm not sure if Mountain Lion supports Metal or not.


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## Dewdman42 (Aug 6, 2021)

also be advised that when you go to a new Metal card you will lose the boot screen.


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## Dave Connor (Aug 6, 2021)

Looks like El Capitan is the earliest OS that supports metal.

Thanks.


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## pranic (Aug 6, 2021)

Dewdman42 said:


> also be advised that when you go to a new Metal card you will lose the boot screen.


This is one of the primary things that turned my MacPro3,1 into a Linux server in the end, unfortunately. Other than being a bit of a power-hungry system, it does give me a playground with 24 cores and 128G of RAM which is great for containers and virtualization. I just do miss having the old radiator under my desk though.


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