I just noticed this.. do you know if there's a way to make the changes permanent? So that I don't have to keep on entering the commands in Safe Mode. I just installed a Security Update for High Sierra and I had to type in those commands all over again...
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MBP 1,1-10,2 Force 2011 MacBook Pro 8,2 with failed AMD GPU to ALWAYS use Intel integrated GPU (EFI variable fix)
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Hi, I just got n MBP 2011 15 inch from friend and reinstalled itin High Sierra. Now I get the same problem. Does it make sense to reinstall an older version of Sierra or El Capitan?? Thank you.If you don't have time to read my story (which also describes some interesting technical approaches) just scroll down this thread until a "100% WORKING SOLUTION" text
Discrete AMD GPU of my 2011 MacBook Pro 8,2 has finally failed because of the reasons mentioned here ( http://logicboardmac.blogspot.ru/ ) and there ( https://www.macrumors.com/2015/02/19/2011-macbook-pro-repair-program-apple/ ) . It has been working perfectly for 6 years under quite a high load, even tried SETI@HOME mining at background! So I was confident that my MBP is not affected by bad solder / bad soldering quality and didn't want to bring it to Apple for a free repair program - partially because couldn't find the time to pause my important software projects, partially because I was afraid that Apple might give me a less reliable logic board or refuse a free repair because of the several unrelated repairs that I did manually by myself earlier to save money: changed thermal paste a few times, replaced the internal battery 2 times, replaced a keyboard with broken buttons, etc. But it finally broke down last week: laptop's screen image became distorted, it refused to boot OS X (always freezing half-way), and - Apple free repair program has already ended! I know there are affordable solutions like $50 BGA resoldering at unofficial local repair shop and that its possible to get a new replacement HD 6750M chip from AliExpress for $35 or cheaper ( http://www.aliexpress.com/item/DC-2...0028-216-0810028-BGA-Chipset/32764872143.html or https://www.aliexpress.com/item/DC-2015-New-216-0810001-216-0810001-Graphic-Chipset/32718112928.html , because don't know if this is true - https://www.rossmanngroup.com/board...0604-replace-216-0810005-gpu-with-216-0810028 ) to guarantee a successful repair, so the total price of repair would be either $50 or $50+$35=$85 - less than $100 in any case. But I don't like investing money to the old computers, so I have thought - what if there is some hack to force MBP to use integrated graphics ALL THE TIME, even while booting ? And then started to explore the possible solutions...
===
First of all, it is possible to successfully boot a MBP to OS X while still using the failed GPU, after you remove the AMD drivers by booting in command line mode (CMD+S) and entering these commands:
1) fsck -fy (to check a disk)
2) mount -uw / (mount a root filesystem with read/write permissions)
3) sudo mkdir /AMD_Kexts/ (make a directory to store the AMD drivers in case you'll need them in future)
4) sudo mv /System/Library/Extensions/AMD*.* /AMD_Kexts/ (move the AMD drivers)
5) sudo rm -rf /System/Library/Caches/com.apple.kext.caches/ (remove the AMD drivers cache)
6) sudo mkdir /System/Library/Caches/com.apple.kext.caches/ (just in case OS X will be dumb and will not recreate this directory, I am creating it for OS X)
7) sudo touch /System/Library/Extensions/ (to update the timestamps so that new driver caches - without AMD drivers - will be definitely rebuilt)
8) sudo umount / (umount a partition to guarantee that your changes are flushed to it)
9) sudo reboot
The degree of your inconvenience while doing these steps - strongly depends on how heavily a screen's image is distorted in your case. In my case it was even more difficult because the OS X partition became a "read-only" partition (because of too many emergency shutdowns I did while desperately trying to boot OS X with a failed GPU) so I had to remove a hard drive from MacBook Pro and (using a USB to SATA 2.5" adapter taken from my portable HDD) attached it to a computer with Linux, then followed these instructions:
https://superuser.com/questions/961401/mounting-hfs-partition-on-arch-linux (1st answer) - carefully executed a number of commands, calculated a sizelimit for my parition layout, and finally ran sudo mount -t hfsplus -o force,rw,sizelimit=YOURNUMBER /dev/sdb2 /mnt to mount this HFS+ partition to /mnt directory in read-write mode. Then I performed these "1)-7)" steps you see above, and also repaired a filesystem by running sudo fsck.hfsplus -f /dev/sdb2 before unmounting a partition with sudo umount /mnt and putting a hard drive back to MBP...
===
This gave me a MBP which could boot to OS X although STILL using a broken AMD GPU: so it screen's image is very distorted (could browse the Internet but quite inconvenient to read a text), Launchpad is super laggy, and you can't switch to Integrated GPU using gfxCardStatus because: without AMD drivers (which we had to remove to successfully boot to OS X) Macbook Pro thinks its' internal screen is External Display and gfxCardStatus tells it is impossible to switch because External Display is using AMD GPU. Somewhere I found a suggestion that it is possible to rebuild a gfxCardStatus from the source code - https://github.com/codykrieger/gfxCardStatus - with removed or commented out 156-166 lines in the ./gfxCardStatus/Classes/GSProcess.m to make it to ignore the external display:
// find out if an external monitor is forcing the discrete gpu on
CGDirectDisplayID displays[8];
CGDisplayCount displayCount = 0;
if (CGGetOnlineDisplayList(8, displays, &displayCount) == noErr) {
for (int i = 0; i < displayCount; i++) {
if ( ! CGDisplayIsBuiltin(displays))
[list addObject:[NSDictionary dictionaryWithObjectsAndKeys:
Str(@"External Display"), kTaskItemName,
@"", kTaskItemPID, nil]];
}
}
So I rebuilt a gfxCardStatus using the instructions from the last reply of this issue -
https://github.com/codykrieger/gfxCardStatus/issues/229
(also had to download a MacOSX10.11.sdk from here - https://github.com/phracker/MacOSX-SDKs/releases - unpack and copy it to XCode's /Applications/Xcode.app/Contents/Developer/Platforms/MacOSX.platform/Developer/SDKs/MacOSX10.11.sdk - because of the Apple's stupidity the latest XCode for El Capitan does not include SDK for El Capitan!) However, it still didn't work - gfxCardStatus only pretended that it has switched to Integrated GPU, while in reality OS X did not let it switch! Even after I edited ./gfxCardStatus/Classes/GSGPU.m file to enable the mysterious "Nuke it from orbit switching" option, it still couldn't switch...
===
Then I discovered this interesting repository - https://github.com/0xbb/gpu-switch - which is partially similar by its' source code to gfxCardStatus but also has the "Login Hooks" (install_hooks.sh) to "automate the switching process for login/logout". Sadly it didn't work for me... However, there is a very interesting gpu-switch text file right at the root of this repository, which describes the EFI variables!
https://github.com/0xbb/gpu-switch/blob/master/gpu-switch
After studying it and also reading this issue's comments - https://github.com/0xbb/gpu-switch/issues/11 - I became confident to try this solution, but found out that my MacBook Pro 2011 8,2 with OS X El Capitan 10.11.6 is in a VERY problematic situation:
1) rEFInd is not installed, and to install it - must disable SIP protection. But I cannot boot to Recovery mode (Command+Option+R) or to OS X Installation DVD/USB (hold Option), (to disable SIP), because they freeze while booting! - although I removed AMD kexts from my system, of course these recovery tools are using AMD kexts integrated to their design. Also cannot use Rootfool hack ( https://github.com/gdbinit/rootfool ) to disable SIP during runtime, because it works only at OS X version older than 10.11.4
2) Tried overheating my Macbook Pro on purpose (forcing CPU usage to 100% and putting it to a tightly closed bag) to force it to shutdown from overheating and then quickly reboot so that Integrated graphics will be enabled during the boot time - making it possible to boot to Recovery. But because of the wonderful high end thermal paste I have applied not so long ago - cannot overheat it even after waiting for a long time! At this point I thought that could either: a) remove AMD kexts from Installation media, or b) to connect MBP's hard drive to a Linux machine again and run a bunch of chmods to remove the SIP flags from the directories mentioned here ( http://apple.stackexchange.com/questions/193368/what-is-the-rootless-feature-in-el-capitan-really ) which could potentially make a system unbootable, or c) to try installing rEFInd to HFS+ partition directly from a Linux machine with root rights because it will bypass SIP --- but have not explored these options, although some of them might have worked...
3) Wanted to boot a Linux LiveCD to edit the EFI variables from there, but no matter what I did: tried booting straight without GRUB option modifications, tried editing GRUB boot options (with "e" key) to add nomodeset / remove quiet splash / or both in every combination , or like suggested in this article ( https://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/MacBookPro8,1/8,2/8,3_(2011) ) also add i915.modeset=0 radeon.modeset=0 or radeon.modeset=0 i915.modeset=1 i915.lvds_channel_mode=2 ; and then pressed Fn+F10 or Shift+Ctrl+Fn+F10 to boot with these options: but the Linux boot process always failed at different boot stages, no matter what popular user-friendly Linux distribution or what version of it I am trying: tried many releases of Ubuntu / Lubuntu / Fedora , even the old "AMD64 Mac" and "Alternate AMD64 Mac" images, but they always failed - either at the very beginning of boot process (black screen, or a black screen with a blinking or stuck _ character at the left upper corner) or failed at the very end of it - right before it is supposed to show a graphical desktop environment...
Later, totoe_84 wrote that he was able to boot Ubuntu in graphical mode using the following setup for GRUB:
- To disable the AMD graphics card I added the following lines after set gfxpayload=keep
outb 0x728 1outb 0x710 2outb 0x740 2outb 0x750 0
(based on https://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=2157775 )
- Next I added the following after quiet splash
i915.lvds_channel_mode=2 i915.modeset=1 i915.lvds_use_ssc=0
===
Then I remembered that there are not-mainstream Linux distributions for advanced users, which have a LiveCD without any graphical interface: you are dropped to a pure console and you are supposed to install the system along with only those graphical interfaces and software packages / groups of packages which you explicitly select. For example: Arch Linux (https://www.archlinux.org/) and Gentoo Linux (https://gentoo.org/) . Because their LiveCD does not have a graphical interface, they could be booted without a problem to a pure Linux console and there you could edit the EFI variables ! So here is a...
===
=== 100% WORKING SOLUTION
===
=== Force your MBP to ALWAYS use Intel integrated GPU (EFI variable fix)
===
=== to make it great again !
===
1) Create the Arch Linux LiveCD/LiveUSB :
You need a working computer for that and a spare CD/DVD/USB drive. After downloading archlinux-2017.03.01-dual.iso (see the links below) you have to check the integrity of the .ISO file to see if it is not corrupted (avoid I/O error, printf: not found, chattr: not found, etc). After checking the integrity of archlinux-2017.03.01-dual.iso and everything is OK, then you can generate an ArchLinux boot disk.
archlinux-2017.03.01-dual.iso
MD5:
1d25235e7cebe45f93452fbc05a0fb66 archlinux-2017.03.01-dual.iso
SHA1
f426866ca632a35a3eeae8e4080cff25ec8da614 archlinux-2017.03.01-dual.iso
Official website ArchLinux (only Torrent) - See MD5 and SHA1 hash numbers:
https://www.archlinux.org/releng/releases/2017.03.01/
The MD5 and SHA1 of the official ArchLinux website are the same as the mirrors Virtapi.org and Belnet.be. The archlinux-2017.03.01-dual.iso on Virtapi.org and Belnet.be are legitimate.
Virtapi.org:
http://archive.virtapi.org/iso/2017.03.01/
http://archive.virtapi.org/iso/2017.03.01/archlinux-2017.03.01-dual.iso
http://archive.virtapi.org/iso/2017.03.01/md5sums.txt
http://archive.virtapi.org/iso/2017.03.01/sha1sums.txt
Belnet:
http://ftp.belnet.be/pub/archlinux.org/iso/2017.03.01/
http://ftp.belnet.be/pub/archlinux.org/iso/2017.03.01/archlinux-2017.03.01-dual.iso
http://ftp.belnet.be/pub/archlinux.org/iso/2017.03.01/md5sums.txt
http://ftp.belnet.be/pub/archlinux.org/iso/2017.03.01/sha1sums.txt
Check for archlinux-2017.03.01-dual.iso integrity (Mac OS):
Boot in Safe Mode (press SHIFT key at boot) -> no freeze Mac OS -> El Capitan or Sierra.
HighSierra maybe freeze at boot time (Safe Mode). There were changes in the HighSierra in relation to the AMD kexts loaded during the Safe Mode. More tests are needed.
File downloaded -> /Users/Your_User/Downloads/archlinux-2017.03.01-dual.iso
Finder -> Applications -> Utilities -> Terminal:
MD5:
Code:cd Downloads/ md5 archlinux-2017.03.01-dual.iso MD5 (archlinux-2017.03.01-dual.iso) = 1d25235e7cebe45f93452fbc05a0fb66
SHA1:
Code:cd Downloads/ shasum archlinux-2017.03.01-dual.iso f426866ca632a35a3eeae8e4080cff25ec8da614 archlinux-2017.03.01-dual.iso
Or try the simplest way - No needed ArchLinux - Only MacOS:
1 - Boot Single User (press Command + S) at boot (If you have MacOS installed on your hard drive).
2 - If you have a blank HD, then use the USB stick/Pendrive with the MacOS installer (El Capitan, Sierra or HighSierra).
2.1 - Press Option key at boot, Position the mouse on the MacOS installer icon.
2.2 - Press Command + S and keep holding these two keys.
2.3 - Click the MacOS installer icon -> continue holding the Command + S keys until you finish the MacOS installer Single User boot .
Enter these commands (change gpu-power-prefs to Intel GPU and boot verbose):
Code:nvram fa4ce28d-b62f-4c99-9cc3-6815686e30f9:gpu-power-prefs=%01%00%00%00 nvram boot-args="-v" reboot
If you've chosen the Arch Linux route, please continue reading:
Then you could either simply burn this ISO to CD/DVD (which later could be either inserted to MBP's SuperDrive or External DVD Drive connected to MBP by two USB cables) or create a bootable USB: use the great detailed instructions from this page, https://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/USB_flash_installation_media
2) Boot to it: insert this CD/DVD/USB to Macbook Pro, hold Option key while booting, choose "EFI boot" (that is your bootable installation media), press "e" key to edit the GRUB options of the Arch Linux archiso x86_64 UEFI CD menu entry while it is selected at the main screen, add nomodeset to the end of this line and press Enter. If everything is done correctly, you will find yourself at the Linux console!
3) Edit EFI vars: looks like efivarfs filesystem is mounted by default! So you can already cd /sys/firmware/efi/efivars and ls to explore this directory and see if there is a "gpu-power-prefs-..." variable (where ... is UUID of this variable). If there is such a variable, its better to remove it with rm. In my case the efivarfs has been mounted by default with read/write permissions, but if you are getting the "operation not permitted" message while attempting to rm, it means that in your case efivarfs has been mounted as read-only and you need to remount it with read-write permissions and try again (credits to totoe_84 for this valuable addition) :
*) cd /
*) umount /sys/firmware/efi/efivars/
*) mount -t efivarfs rw /sys/firmware/efi/efivars/
*) cd /sys/firmware/efi/efivars/
If your screen is so distorted that it is difficult to see the letters, just start typing the rm gpu-power-pre and then press TAB key for autocompletion. In my case there were not such a EFI variable, only "gpu-active-..." and maybe somehow related "gfx-saved-config-restore-status-..." . Then I looked again at that gpu-switch text file (mentioned above, https://github.com/0xbb/gpu-switch/blob/master/gpu-switch),
and entered THESE COMMANDS:
*) chattr -i "/sys/firmware/efi/efivars/" <----- skip this command
Actually a gpu-switch script had "${sysfs_efi_vars}/${efi_gpu}" but I didnt have a "gpu-power-prefs-..." variable - so, partially by mistake, I didn't add that efi_gpu suffix and entered this incomplete path accidentally
*) printf "\x07\x00\x00\x00\x01\x00\x00\x00" > /sys/firmware/efi/efivars/gpu-power-prefs-fa4ce28d-b62f-4c99-9cc3-6815686e30f9
Did not have a EFI "gpu-power-prefs-" variable so I thought that it will be OK to create a new one with a random UUID - in this case, taken directly from a gpu-switch script
*) chattr +i "/sys/firmware/efi/efivars/gpu-power-prefs-fa4ce28d-b62f-4c99-9cc3-6815686e30f9"
http://www.tecmint.com/chattr-command-examples/ - chattr (Change Attribute) is a command line Linux utility that is used to set/unset certain attributes to a file in Linux system to secure accidental deletion or modification of important files and folders, even though you are logged in as a root user.
...
Syntax of chattr ---> chattr [operator] [flags] [filename]
...
A file is set with ‘i‘ attribute (+i as you see in this command) ---> cannot be modified (immutable). Means no renaming, no symbolic link creation, no execution, no writable, only superuser can unset the attribute.
...
Operator
This chattr command is supposed to lock a file to make it accessible only by "superuser" - and so that, while booting, your EFI will have no chance to screw up your gpu-power-prefs-... variable under any circumstances
- + : Adds the attribute to the existing attribute of the files.
- – : Removes the attribute to the existing attribute of the files.
- = : Keep the existing attributes that the files have.
*) cd /
Could not unmount efivars if you are inside this directory, so change to the root directory
*) umount /sys/firmware/efi/efivars/
Guarantees that your EFI variables are flushed to efivarfs filesystem, please unmount it safely before rebooting)
*) reboot
===> IF YOU DID EVERYTHING CORRECTLY, MOST LIKELY THAT YOUR MACBOOK PRO IS NOW USING INTEGRATED GRAPHICS WHILE BOOTING, AFTER BOOTING, AND IS WORKING GREAT AGAIN !
In the future maybe you could need to re-apply this solution if you would have to reset your PRAM / NVRAM / SMC because of some other problems, so remember this solution somewhere... Funny thing: now you can't switch to Discrete GPU even using gfxCardStatus, it is forever stuck at Integrated
I spent two working days to discover this solution, and really hope that it will work flawlessly for every MBP owner with a broken discrete GPU. Good luck!
=== NEWS ! YOU COULD ALSO FOLLOW THESE GUIDES FOR THE EXTRA IMPROVEMENTS : ===
Follow the MikeyN Guide - page 35 - #875 - to move the AMDRadeonX3000.kext from the /System/Library/Extensions directory and do not freeze Macbook Pro (at 75% progress bar or "IOConsoleUsers: gIOScreenLockState 3" message).
Rename old AMDRadeonX3000.kext and move new AMDRadeonX3000.kext after update - Page 57 - #1425
Shutdown or Restart Macbook Pro - avoid black screen freeze - Update 2 - Page 57 - #1425
Close the Lid - Sleep - Waking - Page 43 #1066 - Page 50 #1243
It have no sense. GPU will never work. High Sierra have killed it.
So repair it as described.
Is this method still working today, 2021, for 10.14.6?
This macos doesn't work on A1286 without special tools
It seems the last good version is 10.12.6 Sierra
The 10.13 is the version and the reason why U R here
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I've had to use this twice to get around the failed GFX issue in a Late 2011 macbook pro. This last time after I had to upgrade the OS from Yosemite to High Sierra (last OS upgrade ever to be done on this macbook). Went through hell getting past the SIP, eventually got it disabled, and had a USB drive with High Sierra. This post and others helped me give this macbook a final update. Thank you OP
Hi folks! I have well known MBP late 2011 15.6" (High Sierra). Have replaced mainboard in 2016 using Apple warranty program. A year ago I used to resolder dGPU by myself (I'm electronics engineer and worked at the big electorinics factory at those time). But a few weeks ago time-bomb was activated again. And I had seen classical green stripes on my screen. Unfortunately now I work in another company and haven't access to the equipment that allows me to resolder dGPU again. And I decided to turn off AMD graphics adapter as a temp solution. I followed instructions to reset NVRAM variable and then move AMD kext files to backup folder. And everything worked fine, except the wake up to sleep ability and problems with backlight-keyboard. So I decided to try advice that I found on this forum. Most likely I did something wrong. And in addition to problems above I've lost all backlight of my screen. To repair this problems I don't know why I decided to reset NVRAM. And now my Mac has became almost bricked. Of course green stripes returned to my screen. And now I can't boot in Recovery mode (bacause system again tries to access to dGPU) and can't boot in single-user mode to reset NVRAM variable. System says that "Mac OS version not yet set". I think this is due to some system kext files were replaced. So I will be very very grateful if you can help me to solve this problem.
P.S. Sorry for my English, it's not my native language.
P.S. Sorry for my English, it's not my native language.
If I were you,
1. I would downgrade macos to version 10.12.6
For example, on another drive and computer.
2. Make changes to NVRAM in any way.
3. The first boot with the left shift, then turn off it in the usual way through the menu Apple / Shut Down
4. Open the back cover and unsolder the R8911 resistor.
The work is done, no kexts need to be removed.
Everything will work.
Precautionary measures
- do not reset NVRAM
- do not install High Sierra and do not start.
After all, it was because of that dGPU burned down.
Apple's stupid idea to reduce the load on the processor by transferring some functions to dGPU in order to further increase the i7 clock frequency that High Sierra provided, led to a failure, dGPU cannot withstand.
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Very surprisingly my own 8.2 just keeps running, 100% stock on High Sierra.
![Screen Shot 2021-09-28 at 03.21.23.png]( "Screen Shot 2021-09-28 at 03.21.23.png")
Only thing I've ever done is limit the dGPU usage in SW. Now gSwitch 1.9.7 as this works with High Sierra. I rather expected it to die years ago...
Q-6
Only thing I've ever done is limit the dGPU usage in SW. Now gSwitch 1.9.7 as this works with High Sierra. I rather expected it to die years ago...
Q-6
This is a solution, however
- neither DVD nor Internet, LAN, or USB flash drive can be used as download sources ...
- a damaged chip consumes battery power and heats up the processor
It's likely an exception to the rule and owes me nothing after over ten years of use. If the dGPU was going to fail in this 2011 MBP it would have done years back when it was being pushed hard.
Clearly some of the ill fated 15" MBP's must have some differnce as they continue to run today irrespective of use...
Q-6
Forgive me for not reading the entire thread, but what’s the update on softwares that disable the dgpu. I am not one to play around with the terminal, as using a sudo command seemed to have caused my dgpu to fail(the GPU failed after using a sudo command). I know there was “switch GPU”. Is there anything similar to the latter that actually works with El Capitan?
gSwitch 1.9.7 works with High Sierra or try gfxCardStatus Which is for earlier versions of macOS
Q-6
Do any of the above fix the dgpu from causing discolorations and graphic distortions(lines and other glitches)? I just rather not use the terminal.
No not that I'm aware and still I run a 15" 2011. Both of the App's simply suppress the OS from switching to the dGPU.
Just note the dGPU is not fully disabled, so may still fail if a weak chip. By default the dGPU will engage on hard restart/cold boot. As the App loads either will force the system to switch to the integrated Intel GPU.
If you want to fully disable the dGPU you have to resort to Terminal and or hardware modifications. That said 10.3 years on and this 2011 MBP is running better than the day it left the factory...
n.b. if your seeing graphical distortion, very likely the dGPU in your MBP is very close to complete failure. Mine is still good, equally I've taken precautions to keep the usage of the dGPU minimal.
Q-6
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As said my 15" 8.2 MBP is 100% working with just the dGPU limited by gSwitch 1.9.7 Maybe a language barrier? equally the notebook works as intended by Apple after 123 months of use.
To be honest if this MBP was going to fail due to the dGPU, it would have done so a long time ago. So just maybe some are better than others? I don't know, but if this one dies It owes me nothing...
Q-6
My 2011 MBP finally died the other day. 
I had been keeping it alive for quite a while with the nvram commands in this thread. It was beyond too old, and had a lot of out of date software. Now I'm left with the choice of getting a too-small MBA or a crappy 15" Windows laptop. I want a 16" MBA, they just don't make one.
I had been keeping it alive for quite a while with the nvram commands in this thread. It was beyond too old, and had a lot of out of date software. Now I'm left with the choice of getting a too-small MBA or a crappy 15" Windows laptop. I want a 16" MBA, they just don't make one.My 2011 MBP finally died the other day.
I hear ya. My 15" 2011 MBP is still going after the nvram/kext fixes, and even running High Sierra. But it was long in the tooth so finally decided to get a new 14" MBP. I miss the bigger 15" screen a little bit, and the bigger keyboard, but all in all the 14" is a nice machine.
But if there had been a 14" MBA available I might have bought that instead.
Well this finally hit my 15" MacBook Pro (again). My computer won't boot and keeps locking up right before the chime sound with an all black screen. I am sure it is the AMD Radeon HD 6750M that has failed.
I was going to go ahead and give the steps quoted in post #2,908 a try.
Three quick questions:
1) What is the best OS to keep the laptop on? Obviously, I would prefer to be using High Sierra, but I can downgrade to an older OS if it is more stable with the workarounds.
2) The computer has, for a while, had graphical issues (mainly replacing some colors with red). Will all the graphical glitches disappear after disability the AMD GPU, or does disability the GPU just allow you to boot and use your system?
3) Are the steps in post #2,908 really all that is needed to fix this? That seems shockingly simple….
I was going to go ahead and give the steps quoted in post #2,908 a try.
Three quick questions:
1) What is the best OS to keep the laptop on? Obviously, I would prefer to be using High Sierra, but I can downgrade to an older OS if it is more stable with the workarounds.
2) The computer has, for a while, had graphical issues (mainly replacing some colors with red). Will all the graphical glitches disappear after disability the AMD GPU, or does disability the GPU just allow you to boot and use your system?
3) Are the steps in post #2,908 really all that is needed to fix this? That seems shockingly simple….
Best option is:
Permanently Disable 2011 15"/17" MacBook Pro Dedicated GPU - gMux IC Bypass
UPDATE: The solution detailed below is more or less out of date at this point, as I have recently developed a custom gMux IC firmware that not only permanently disables the AMD GPU, but also retains full native software-controlled display backlight brightness. Documentation explaining the...
forums.macrumors.com
Best option is:
Permanently Disable 2011 15"/17" MacBook Pro Dedicated GPU - gMux IC Bypass
UPDATE: The solution detailed below is more or less out of date at this point, as I have recently developed a custom gMux IC firmware that not only permanently disables the AMD GPU, but also retains full native software-controlled display backlight brightness. Documentation explaining the...
Are you referring to the hardware modification or the firmware modification “update” link provided in that post?
Hi, the most effective system that i used (on the macbook 17 late 2011) is this:
1) prepare the install setup of catalina (using the dosdude1 patch): http://dosdude1.com/catalina/ in an usb pendrive.
2) SMC reset and than nvram reset Command + alt + p + r
3) click on "command" "S" at the boot, and than type:
nvram fa4ce28d-b62f-4c99-9cc3-6815686e30f9:gpu-power-prefs=%01%00%00%00
reboot
(note: your keyboard will be in US format)
4) now press alt at the boot and select the usb pen to boot (with the catalina setup). When you are at the setup select the terminal and you write: csrutil disable
5) reboot and start again with the catalina setup
6) install catalina
The great thing is that normally catalina doesn't use amd gpu.
Don't install the dosdude dgpu disabler.
Everything will works: updates, stop/sleep/wake and bitghtness control
And it is very easy without HW mod
1) prepare the install setup of catalina (using the dosdude1 patch): http://dosdude1.com/catalina/ in an usb pendrive.
2) SMC reset and than nvram reset Command + alt + p + r
3) click on "command" "S" at the boot, and than type:
nvram fa4ce28d-b62f-4c99-9cc3-6815686e30f9:gpu-power-prefs=%01%00%00%00
reboot
(note: your keyboard will be in US format)
4) now press alt at the boot and select the usb pen to boot (with the catalina setup). When you are at the setup select the terminal and you write: csrutil disable
5) reboot and start again with the catalina setup
6) install catalina
The great thing is that normally catalina doesn't use amd gpu.
Don't install the dosdude dgpu disabler.
Everything will works: updates, stop/sleep/wake and bitghtness control
And it is very easy without HW mod
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I just got the 13" MBA from Amazon for $1149. I really don't need much power, as I do computationally heavy stuff on my custom built Windows 10 machine, but I really wanted to have a Mac available, and the MBA is great for occasional use traveling and Mac-specific tasks. I just wish that they made a 15" or 16" MBA, I would have paid probably $1449 or even a bit more for that.