Running FreeBSD 11 on an imac with ATI graphics

R

rdeiriar

I inherited an oldie at work today, an imac 27 inch core i5 (Model number 11.1) and want to share a few tips in order to get FreeBSD 11.1 running on it

This model has an early UEFI Bios, an ATI Mobility Radeon 4850 graphics card and a nasty video firmware bug that made it useless with everything i threw at it (FreeBSD 11.1, Ubuntu-16.04.3 Desktop and Server, Debian 9) with variations of the same failure, namely, a blank display (FreeBSD at least displayed the console, the Linuxes (Kernels 4.4, 4.13 and 4.14) went blank immediately after boot)

Getting Xorg to run on the integrated display (the whole point of reusing this computer) seemed impossible, the driver insisted in getting the internal and external outputs mixed up, then i remembered reading, many years ago, the following piece of advice

'An Intel based Mac loads a fairly complete legacy BIOS if it boots from an MBR disk'

And, for some reason, this BIOS does not trigger (or fixes ?) the bug that mixes up the display ports. Thus, the solution, as in my case i did not intended to dual boot OS X, was to wipe the disk, UEFI partition included, and do an MBR style install following these instructions

http://daemon-notes.com/articles/system/install-zfs/begin

Skipping the part about building a ZFS mirror

Then i installed the system directly from /usr/freebsd-dist, rebooted, and ... after installing xorg and xf86-video-ati i have a fully functional desktop, hardware acceleration included.

If anyone is interested, i can do a detailed writeup of the procedure

Of note, an easier way could be to use the installer, selecting to manually create an MBR partition and ignore the warnings about the system not being MBR-bootable.

I understand that other ATI equipped Macbook's and iMacs have the same problem, an MBR based install should help on these as well
 
I ma running FreeBSD on the same iMac (dual boot for now) and works without problems except sound. It works from the speaker or from the headphones but not both. If I have settings that works both than when I connect headphones I hear frpm the speakers and the headphones.
 
Recently inherited an iMac 27 inch with the same graphics card 4820 mobility, I’ve been pulling my hair out. Like you I’ve thrown Ubuntu, kubuntu, neon. I couldn’t get anything to work. Boot to a blank screen. FreeBSD 14 install was a breeze. Getting the graphics to work isn’t getting anywhere. I got an xserver to start…then goes to a blank scree and is dead. Reviewing Xorg log server has started correctly, but I still only have a blank screen. I knew there was areason. I always hated proprietary Macintosh computers. This was willed down to me by my late father I thought well since I had the hardware I’d put something different on it. I tried Ubuntu, kubuntu and neon or any of the others that I tried, and finally got the freebsd14 to easily install. I got the same problem now. Xserver starts and ends up on a blank screen. When I tried to set it up as an mbr install i got the same error message and backed off. So now I have a xserver that starts up. just goes to a blank screen. You offered to put in some details on how you got it to work and I would appreciate hearing how you did it because I’m about ready to put this machine in the trashcan. I have never liked Mac’s mostly because of their proprietary hardware.

I’ll be glad to throw more details up….but I’ve already allotted more time to this and I’m ready to go and desecrate Jobs grave for this piece of junk hardware. It boots from Uefi. FreeBSD installs have always been relatively easy for this retired old surgeon, but I’ve reached edge of my self taught knowledge. Thanks
 
Drdave said:
fernandel said:
I ma running FreeBSD on the same iMac (dual boot for now) and works without problems except sound. It works from the speaker or from the headphones but not both. If I have settings that works both than when I connect headphones I hear frpm the speakers and the headphones.
Click to expand...
If you have time Could you send me your configuration for. Xsever rc.conf and .xinitrc.. thanks.
Click to expand...





Drdave said:
conf.d files and rc.conf ,and .xinitrc. Thanks drdave
Click to expand...
 
Drdave welcome to The FreeBSD Forums.

forums.freebsd.org

Introduce yourself, tell us who you are and why you chose FreeBSD

Who's new to FreeBSD? Did you migrate from another OS and what was your reason?
forums.freebsd.org forums.freebsd.org

Drdave said:
desecrate
Click to expand...

forums.freebsd.org

Off-Topic

Have some non-FreeBSD related questions, or want just to chit-chat about anything that is not related to FreeBSD? This is the forum for you. Note: this is NOT a forum for technical questions about non-FreeBSD operating systems!
forums.freebsd.org forums.freebsd.org
 
bakul said:
Try adding kld_list="i915kms acpi_video" to /etc/rc.conf and pkg install drm-510-kmod gpu-firmware-amd-kmod
Click to expand...
I tried that unsuccessfully. Isn’t i915 an intel driver.? Im sure you know it says it’s a Radeon card. I ## everthing else that I’ve tried in rc.conf and changed the driver setting in 10-monitor.conf to i915.It’s more than anything the limit of my knowledge. I’m not stupid but I haven’t ever taken a computer course and I am self taught.

If I could see how someone did it successfully, look at their configuration files it would sure be easier! Since I know it can be done at least by two people on this form. I’ll keep on trying until it works. Thanks. Perhaps using a minimal X windows installation to just get a working and then go on from there. I’ll have to look at that tomorrow.
 
Drdave said:
… changed the driver setting in 10-monitor.conf to i915. …
Click to expand...

True, that won't help for an iMac that does not use Intel graphics.

Drdave said:
… iMac 27 inch with the same graphics card 4820 mobility, …
Click to expand...

Are you certain that it's mobility?

For the iMac11,1 in the opening post, EveryMac.com shows ATI Radeon HD 4850 (not Mobility).
 

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I should’ve asked this first. What is the model number? That’ll tell us which graphics chip was used on it.
 
I’m sure it’s a radian car not an Intel. Everything It had has been radian. Just to see if someone was spoofing me I did try it with the Intel driver and of course it didn’t work. I tried it with the MBR installation. But that led .mE to a rabbit All that to me a few hours to get out of and reinstall
 
You can sudo pkg install dmidecode and then do sudo dmidecode|grep -A8 '^System Info'. Report what "Product Name" line looks like.

Sorry for confusing you! There are two other graphics drivers: amdgpu and radeonkms. You can try something like sudo sysrc kld_list+=radeonkms.ko & reboot. You may still run into some other issues but see how far you get with this....
 
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