Hi guys,

I really hope that someone can help me.

I'm trying to update my Mac Pro (Mid 2010) running on Mac OS Sierra 10.12.6 to High Sierra 11.12.6.
The OS is booting from a SSD mounted to a Sonnet Tempo SSD Pro Plus Dual PCIe 2.0 Card.

When I try to do the regular update, it simply shuts down when trying to update the firmware (for APFS formatting) and boots Sierra again. After googling I found a way to avoid the formatting by disabling it via the Terminal. I get an error saying "Installation on this volume is not possible, because computer is missing firmware partition."

Does anyone know what steps I have to do to update to High Sierra?

 

Manually update your firmware before trying to install the OS upgrade.

I am 100% certain there are some videos or guides somewhere because I have a mostly computer illiterate friend who boosted his old MP5,1 to MacOS 10.13 Which would be High Sierra. If you want to get into MacOS 11 Big Sur you can use modded FM but the risk of bricking increases, you are better off with something like OpenCore & injecting the firmware.

 

I can't really find a video where they go from Sierra to High Sierra and do a firmware update. I'm pretty computer illiterate myself.. lol

 

I'm not a Mac user, but maybe this will help you:

How to Upgrade to High Sierra Mac OS X 10.13

How to Upgrade to macOS High Sierra
https://setapp.com/how-to/how-to-upgrade-macos-high-sierra

 

Thanks, but this is just a video for the normal installer. Mine wants to do a firmware update first, which doesn't work.

 

Maybe this will help:
https://www.imore.com/how-upgrade-your-older-mac-pro-firmware

 

if you have a "metal compliant" gfx card you could try installing Mojave. mine is high Sierra but it came that way used. you mention the 3rd party pcie card, and maybe that is even the issue.

 

No, I don't have a metal-compliant GPU, that's why I want to update to High Sierra only. I managed getting the firmware update to work, but now I get stuck in the High Sierra installer, still saying "You may not install this volume because the computer is missing a firmware partition.". There must be a way to manually do that and prepare the SSD without having to format the whole thing.

 

Translated from German into English.

Hello marie_f, this is an unusual message, especially if you have already reset the Mac twice. How exactly did you go about resetting? Did you do this through Internet Recovery Mode or through normal recovery?

I would advise you, if you have all your data safe in a backup, to reset the Mac to its original state and then upgrade from there to High Sierra. You can get back to the original state by pressing the Shift key, Option key, ⌘ and R when starting the Mac and holding them down until you get into recovery mode. From there it is best to delete the hard drive once and then reinstall macOS.

You can find out more here: Reinstall macOS using macOS Recovery - Apple Support Here is the information about recovery mode: Information about macOS recovery - Apple Support And here's everything you need to back up your data: Back up a Mac with Time Machine - Apple Support I hope this helps you. Regards!

Use macOS Recovery to reinstall the Mac operating system.
https://support.apple.com/de-de/HT204904

 

" There must be a way to manually do that and prepare the SSD without having to format the whole thing"

I only got mine very recently. it arrived with 1tb internal ssd, 64gb ram, high Sierra. but needs gfx upgrade still. So it is stuck at Logic 10.4.
Which is annoying enough that I don't use it frequently.

so you have just Sierra running. what is the hardware overview like? (no serial)
drive info, partitions, etc. would help someone get it to work... wiping stuff is a last resort.
but you have to be methodical. other computers and pen drives can be helpful. maybe Parted?
stuff like this is always easier, when you aren't already screwed.

 

Last edited: Sep 22, 2021

@musicislife
OP Can't be done, afai remember.
Hardware 5.1 can only got to Sierra I am thinking. I 'll have to check.
Whereas hardware 7.1 in a MBP, not a Mac Pro as yours, went further. I think!
All off the top of my head, via 'memory'. lol

 

more gpu stuff instead. radeon 5870

 

Last edited: Sep 22, 2021

Yes same here. Maybe I'll do the gfx update in the future or buy a M1 at some point but for now, I just want High Sierra to work.

Here's the hardware info.

 

No it works with High Sierra and then from Mojave on you'd need a metal-compatible GFX.

 

How to Upgrade Your Mac Pro 5,1 to the Latest Firmware / Boot ROM Version 144.0.0.0.0
https://www.usedmacs.us/?name=How-t...M-Version&art=how_to_mac_pro_firmware_upgrade

 

Oh.
And I just remember when I was making bootable clones, I had to go back to El Cap installer to be able to jump beyond to Sierra via online install.

 

It says on there "If your Boot ROM version is 138.0.0.0.0 or higher, or MP51.0089.B00 your Mac Pro has already been upgraded to the highest version that is available from the OS X High Sierra installer"

Mine already is the MP51.0089.B00.

 

Which means it was done before.
So maybe is your update, or even was that prior update before you had it, a legit update?
Or facilitated by some torrent help? lol
Coz the eventual updates need to be legit with your mac account, don't they?
Is the HS update legit?

 

Absolute legit. As a matter of fact I got it from Apple Service Customer chat myself. I think the problem is somewhere between the SSD firmware and/or formatting, the Tempo PCIe card and/or my whole BootROM in general. Unfortunately this seems to be very specific, especially with the Mac Pro 5,1, so I can't really find one solution/forum thread about it.

 

As a Windows user, I've just learned a lot about Mac.

macOS Mojave 10.14 can update Sierra
https://apps.apple.com/de/app/macos-mojave/id1398502828?mt=12