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An explicit definition of "boot screen" and its implications?

tjod

tjod

macrumors newbie
Original poster
Apr 6, 2019
11
1
New member here, with ...

Basic question: I see the term "boot screen" a lot in reference to video cards, but can't seem to locate an explicit definition.

Could someone explain:
  • what exactly is meant by "boot screen" ?
    and, perhaps more importantly
  • what are the effects and implications of not having a boot screen?

    i.e. what do we give up without a boot screen?
I suspect that not having a boot screen might carry with it other implications in the way we boot our MacPro, e.g. Single user mode (Cmd-S) , reinstall over internet (Cmd-R), Option key on boot?

This is all in aid of possible purchase of a replacement video card. I'm trying to decide if a new card is justified given what the restrictions might be vs. the current card.

Thanks!

Running MacPro5,1,
128 GB RAM,
AMD Radeon HD 7xxx 3 GB
2 x 2.4 GHz Quad-Core Intel Xeon
 
No GPU besides original Apple Mac Pro GPUs from 2008 to 2012 (HD 2600XT, 8800GT, Quadro FX 5600, GT120, HD 4870/5770/5870) or 3rd party Mac EFI cards like Sapphire HD 7950 Mac Edition, eVGA GTX 680 Mac Edition, NVIDIA Quadro 4000/K5000 Mac Edition or self-flashed/MVC flashed cards have what is usually called boot screens - this is not the correct term and the correct denomination is pre-boot configuration support.

Mac Pro 1,1 to 5,1 EFI supports UGA (MacPro1,1 and MacPro2,1) or UGA over GOP (MacPro3,1), Apple GOP flavor that is slightly incompatible with UEFI GOP (MacPro5,1) and a GPU that have pre-boot configuration support will support/work with:
  • Single user support*,
  • EFI shell support*,
  • Verbose boot,
  • Startup Manager, the new name for the BootPicker/BootSelector,
  • FileVault support** (for macOS versions before Mojave),
  • GPU OK backplane diagnostic LED when the GPU is an Apple OEM GPU,
  • AHT and ASD support.***
* Single user and EFI shell support can be used blindly with a card that doesn’t have pre-boot configuration support, but it’s extremely difficult to use it this way.

** You can type your FileVault password blindly, some people using macOS versions before Mojave do it without much trouble.

*** MacEdition GPUs fail AHT/ASD when the GPU sensors are checked, so, for AHT/ASD complete tests, you need an AppleOEM GPU.

MacPro6,1 has GOP pre-boot configuration support.

Any card that has native macOS drivers has Recovery support. MacPro5,1 does not have Internet Recovery, only Mac Pro late-2013 and newer have Internet Recovery.

Nvidia cards that need web drivers, like Maxwell and Pascal generation GPUs, doesn't have any pre-boot configuration support, Recovery support or createinstallmedia USB installer support.

AMD cards that have native macOS drivers don't have pre-boot configuration support but have Recovery and createinstallmedia USB installer support and work after the drivers are loaded by Recovery or when the createinstallmedia USB installer is fully loaded.

Edited to add a note about EnableGop:

With the EnableGop injected to the MacPro own BootROM or to the GPU firmware, the PC GPU will provide everything from the list above, except AHT/ASD GPU sensor reading support, so, AHT/ASD will fail when the GPU sensors are tested, exactly like a MacEditon GPU behaves.
 
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Thanks, that's good info that clears up a lot.

Followup ... When looking at vendors/distributors specification listings for cards online, is there some key phrase or term to look for to determine if there will be a boot screen and if the card can use or has MacPro compatible drivers?
 
tjod said:
Thanks, that's good info that clears up a lot.

Followup ... When looking at vendors/distributors specification listings for cards online, is there some key phrase or term to look for to determine if there will be a boot screen and if the card can use or has MacPro compatible drivers?
Click to expand...
No current video card has pre boot configuration support for Macs. NVIDIA RTX cards has UGA support but no driver support for macOS, so forget them unless you want to exclusively run Windows.

Apple has a list of suggested cards that have macOS support, you can read the Apple Support article here: Install macOS 10.14 Mojave on Mac Pro (Mid 2010) and Mac Pro (Mid 2012).

The Apple third-party graphics cards list identifies specific cards that are compatible:
  • MSI Gaming Radeon RX 560 128-bit 4GB GDDR5
  • SAPPHIRE Radeon PULSE RX 580 8GB GDDR5
  • SAPPHIRE Radeon HD 7950 Mac Edition
  • NVIDIA Quadro K5000 for Mac
  • NVIDIA GeForce GTX 680 Mac Edition
The three cards listed in bold above have pre-boot configuration support (aka Mac EFI).

The list also identifies cards that might be compatible, none of which have pre-boot configuration support (aka Mac EFI):
  • AMD Radeon RX 560
  • AMD Radeon RX 570
  • AMD Radeon RX 580
  • AMD Radeon Pro WX 7100
  • AMD Radeon RX Vega 56
  • AMD Radeon RX Vega 64
  • AMD Radeon Pro WX 9100
  • AMD Radeon Frontier Edition
 
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This is my current card, with 3 GB:
SAPPHIRE Radeon HD 7950 Mac Edition

Considering :
XFX Radeon RX 580 GTS - with 8 GB (I'm mainly interested in more video memory.

From your info above, it looks like it would be a direct replacement, possibly with the exception of the power connectors which are not apparent in the specs or photos?
 
tjod said:
This is my current card, with 3 GB:
SAPPHIRE Radeon HD 7950 Mac Edition

Considering :
XFX Radeon RX 580 GTS - with 8 GB (I'm mainly interested in more video memory.

From your info above, it looks like it would be a direct replacement, possibly with the exception of the power connectors which are not apparent in the specs or photos?
Click to expand...
XFX are know for Mac incompatibilities, stick to the Apple list or cards that are known to be totally compatible. The best card you can buy for a MP5,1 today is Sapphire Pulse RX-580.
 
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These cards can also be EFI flashed and are also Metal supported.
R9 280X ( MSI & Gigabyte brands are 2 slots wide = can still use PCIe slot 2.
HD 7970 ( Sapphire Dual-X 7970 is 2.5 slots wide but allows slim M.2 M type adaptors to be installed.)
"possibly " R9 270X
( XFX cards may not be reference cards )
 
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tsialex said:
XFX are know for Mac incompatibilities, stick to the Apple list or cards that are known to be totally compatible. The best card you can buy for a MP5,1 today is Sapphire Pulse RX-580.
Click to expand...

Thanks for the recommendation. Might be good to stay withing the brand I have now as well.
[doublepost=1554661797][/doublepost]Thanks! Will add to considerations.

MIKX said:
These cards can also be EFI flashed and are also Metal supported.
R9 280X ( MSI & Gigabyte brands are 2 slots wide = can still use PCIe slot 2.
HD 7970 ( Sapphire Dual-X 7970 is 2.5 slots wide but allows slim M.2 M type adaptors to be installed.)
"possibly " R9 270X
( XFX cards may not be reference cards )
Click to expand...
 
280X and 7970 aren't going to offer you anything appreciable performance-wise over the 7950 Mac Edition you already have (they're not being manufactured anymore either so you'd be looking at the used market).

Your 7950 is Metal compatible (and therefore Mojave compatible) and can show boot screens so unless you're seeking higher performance then just stick with that.

If you want to upgrade for better performance then just buy a Sapphire RX 580 and accept the loss of boot screens. I was one of the diehard holdouts on giving them up but even I have come around. It sucks to lose FileVault but my cMP isn't in a location where it's likely to be stolen or tampered with.
 
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tsialex said:
A GPU that has UGA pre-boot configuration support has:

- Single user support
- Verbose boot
- Boot picker/selector
- FileVault support (for macOS versions before Mojave)
Click to expand...

Is FileVault supported by GPU without "Boot Screen" in Mojave?
 
tsialex said:
- FileVault support (for macOS versions before Mojave)
Click to expand...
I still find humor in that if you are using an unsupported machine, like a MP3,1 for example, you can still use FileVault with an appropriate GPU that has a boot screen while in Mojave.
I'm surprised nobody has created a bypass for the system check to allow it on the MP5,1.
 
Pentaxer said:
Is FileVault supported by GPU without "Boot Screen" in Mojave?
Click to expand...
No, you need pre-boot configuration support to unlock the main disk.
[doublepost=1554719605][/doublepost]
Ludacrisvp said:
I still find humor in that if you are using an unsupported machine, like a MP3,1 for example, you can still use FileVault with an appropriate GPU that has a boot screen while in Mojave.
I'm surprised nobody has created a bypass for the system check to allow it on the MP5,1.
Click to expand...
Apple did a half assed job with this, no doubt.
 
Ludacrisvp said:
I'm surprised nobody has created a bypass for the system check to allow it on the MP5,1.
Click to expand...

There are a couple of workarounds. Dosdude1's Mojave patcher (meant for getting Mojave installed on Macs Apple dropped from official compatibility) removes the check from the installer. This allows you to encrypt your boot drive prior to the Mojave install. What you end up with though is only quasi-FileVault. You create a disk password at the time of encryption and that is the password you must enter at every boot. Then after macOS boots you must login as whatever user.

A user confirmed a week or two ago that if you temporarily boot your cMP's Mojave disk on another supported Mac model (either in a USB enclosure or via Target Disk), you can then enable FileVault, let it encrypt and then move the drive back to your cMP. That would get you the true FileVault experience (where you choose user>enter user password prior to boot).

Obviously either of these methods are unsupported (so could cause unforeseen issues in the future) and you would need a boot screen-capable GPU. But it is possible to have FV on the cMP in Mojave. I would consider it but don't want to give up my RX 580--it's a really nice card for the cMP.
 
Hello,

I just posted my own experience to install Mojave with RX580, trying to understand why "no pre-boot" (called black screen). I'm concerned by FileVault problem too.

Reading this last comment, I was thinking about the real need of FileVault : my data. MacOS, apps, Library... no mind about crypting that. So, a first volume for all that, no FileVault, and a second one, crypted, to relocate /users. I will try this night.

For "black boot screen", no idea... in case of corrupted main disk, have to disconnect this one, connect a bootable other one, boot, connect (USB enclosure) the faulty one.... pfffffff.... hoping Catalina will finally accept to be installed on my marvellous cMP and, why not, solve this problems ? (and why not, allow to not boot first on Windows, to activate Thunderbolt card...)
 
Hello, here is the result. This "two volumes" installation is running well for now; time will say more. Black pre-boot screen is not solved (no except about that). Fonts seem to be "sweetless" than under HighSierra (compatibility beetwen Sapphire and my screen?). So, use a GTX680 instead of Sapphire is perhaps not mandatory; ok for bootscreen (and FileVault?), but 50% less performance. Lightroom generating pdf album will be a good test.
 
garibaldo said:
@tsialex I´m running High Sierra with Dosdude´s patch, and nVidia´s 1060, for photo manipulation and video editing and grading, using Photoshop and Davinci Resolve... Thanks!
Click to expand...
Maxwell and Pascal NVDIA GPUs are not supported anymore after High Sierra and seems that you can't even install NVDIA Webdrivers again, certificates for the installer are expired, if you need to do it today.

You can move from dosdude's hacked installs to native OpenCore installs and have BootPicker, without changing your GPU, but you will be limited to High Sierra. Please note that High Sierra OpenCore support is not perfect since the developers focus is BigSur/Monterey.

You can buy a modern flashed AMD GPU (Polaris and newer) - if you need, look at MVCEurope - there are lot's of treads that can help you on the Mac Pro forum, start with the stickie threads.
 
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tsialex said:
Maxwell and Pascal NVDIA GPUs are not supported anymore after High Sierra and seems that you can't even install NVDIA Webdrivers again, certificates for the installer are expired, if you need to do it today.

You can move from dosdude's hacked installs to native OpenCore installs and have BootPicker, without changing your GPU, but you will be limited to High Sierra. Please note that High Sierra OpenCore support is not perfect since the developers focus is BigSur/Monterey.

You can buy a modern flashed AMD GPU (Polaris and newer) - if you need, look at MVCEurope - there are lot's of treads that can help you on the Mac Pro forum, start with the stickie threads.
Click to expand...
Do you think this certificates problem could be solved sometime soon?
I will study this Open Core option, to buy a new card, from Erope it is not a option, now...
Maybe flash one of my cards, here in Brazil? would you know if it is possible?
Thank you very much!
 
garibaldo said:
Do you think this certificates problem could be solved sometime soon?
Click to expand...

Do you think that NVIDIA will be eager to help? I don't think so, they left this time-bomb ticking, it's not like they didn't knew that the certificates/notarization would expire yesterday.

garibaldo said:
I will study this Open Core option, to buy a new card, from Erope it is not a option, now...
Maybe flash one of my cards, here in Brazil? would you know if it is possible?
Thank you very much!
Click to expand...

I'm almost sure that you can't have a GPU flashed locally, only in the US or Europe.
 
tsialex said:
Do you think that NVIDIA will be eager to help? I don't think so, they left this time-bomb ticking, it's not like they didn't knew that the certificates/notarization would expire yesterday.



I'm almost sure that you can't have a GPU flashed locally, only in the US or Europe.
Click to expand...
There is a thread about this problem with webdrivers...
Just mentioned your view there...
Thank you once again...
 
tsialex said:
Maxwell and Pascal NVDIA GPUs are not supported anymore after High Sierra and seems that you can't even install NVDIA Webdrivers again, certificates for the installer are expired, if you need to do it today.
Click to expand...
Read the other thread about this issue, @tsialex lotta weeds but nothing as definitive as what you say. Just booted into osx and the screen started flashing at me with my desktop image. Scared the shizz out of me... got it to boot as normal.

Does "signed" mean it needs a dynamic connection to an outside server?

So are we saying this one is on nVidia? Or is it more complex than that?
 
paulcons said:
Read the other thread about this issue, @tsialex lotta weeds but nothing as definitive as what you say. Just booted into osx and the screen started flashing at me with my desktop image. Scared the shizz out of me... got it to boot as normal.

Does "signed" mean it needs a dynamic connection to an outside server?
Click to expand...
Not exactly. Gatekeeper and XProtect both constantly update itself remotely, so a list of revoked certificates are always available and any app that was signed with a revoked certificate is then blocked.
paulcons said:
So are we saying this one is on nVidia?
Click to expand...
Correct.
paulcons said:
Or is it more complex than that?
Click to expand...
NVIDIA signing certificates leaked some time ago, it's public since at least early March if remember correctly, and were revoked after they started to be misused.

NVIDIA could already have a re-signed WebDriver-387.10.10.10.40.140 available long before Gatekeeper and XProtect started to block the Webdrivers.
 
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