My High Sierra Hackintosh - Asrock z77 Extreme4 & Nvidia 970

about this mac

Note: This guide will work for High Sierra, Mojave and Catalina. Mojave and Catalina do not support Nvidia GPUs, you will need to use a Metal GPU. More information at bottom of post regarding Mojave and Catalina.

Hardware (that matters)

You need to have mostly the same hardware for this to work.

Installation

Bios update

Download the latest Asrock Z77 Extreme4 bios and flash it (2.90 at the time of this guide)

macOS bootable USB

  • You need access to a computer running macOS and a 10gb+ USB drive
  • Download High Sierra from the app store
  • Use Disk Utility to erase the USB drive and format with Mac OS Extended (Journaled) and (if asked) GUID Partition map scheme
  • Use the tonymacx86 High Sierra Unibeast tool to flash the installer to the USB
  • Options: UEFI boot mode on Bootloader Configuration, no selection on Graphics Configuration

Installation

  • Boot from the USB
  • turn on computer, f11 during inital spalsh screen to select USB drive
  • At the Clover boot screen choose Boot macOS Installer from USB
  • Run through the installation, format your drive with Mac OS Extended (Journaled) and GUID Partition map scheme (if asked)

Congrats you should have a semi working installation at this point!

Resolution fix

My screen at this point had super low resolution. To fix, I disabled CSM in bios.

Ethernet fix

  • Download IONetworkingFamily.kext -- This is the most reliable source I could find, if the link is dead please contact me and I will rehost it!
  • Also download KextBeast
  • Place both KextBeast and IONetworkingFamily.kext on the desktop and follow the KextBeast instructions to install the kext to /System/Library/Extensions
  • Reboot

Enabling bluetooth for Airpods, Magic Keyboard/Mouse, Handoff

The $10 ASUS USB-BT400 USB Bluetooth adapter works well for me. No need for an expensive PCI bluetooth like some enthusiasts claim. My Airpods, Magic Keyboard/Mouse, and Handoff from my iPhone work beautifically.

Audio Fix

  • Clover Configurator setup
    • Download Clover Configurator and mount your EFI partition and select your clover plist
    • Mount EFI tab > Mount your EFI partition on your hard disk (Not usb!!)
    • Home screen button > select your config.plist in EFI/CLOVER/
  • Kexts Installer tab > Select the Lilu and AppleALC (Realtec ALC898 audio fix) kexts and OS Version of 10.13 and press download -- Boot tab > Select nvda_drv=1 (deselect nv_disable=1 if applicable)
  • Restart and you should have full audio!

Nvidia Graphics Fix

  • Clover Configurator setup
    • Download Clover Configurator and mount your EFI partition and select your clover plist
    • Mount EFI tab > Mount your EFI partition on your hard disk (Not usb!!)
    • Home screen button > select your config.plist in EFI/CLOVER/
  • Install the latest nvidia drivers with nVidia update and install the latest mac CUDA drivers (At the time of this guide, I used 5.3.0.0)
  • Boot tab > Select nvda_drv=1 (deselect nv_disable=1 if applicable)

Bootloader fix - Boot without USB

At this point, your installation probably doesn't work without the bootable USB.

  • Download and flash a Linux live USB distro to another USB drive, I used Alt Linux Rescue
  • Make sure only your macOS hard drive is plugged in for simplicity
  • Boot into a linux shell
  • Add a bios entry for Clover with efibootmgr -c -L “Clover UEFI” -l “\EFI\CLOVER\CLOVERX64.EFI”
  • Make it the first bios entry with efibootmgr -o 0000
  • If you screw this up, no biggie, just do a CMOS reset and try again! You can always fall back to booting from your macOS bootable USB

Congratulations you should have a mostly working Hackintosh now!

Mojave/Catalina upgrade guide

  • Only thing missing is Nvidia drivers because Apple and Nvidia have some beef and there isn't a driver made. So when/if(?) Nvidia releases them then this guide should work.
  • You can use a Metal supported GPU instead of Nvidia. I personally have used a AMD Radeon RX 560 GPU to install Mojave and Catalina successfully (via the AppStore and clean installs) using this guide.

To-Do

  • Figure out why some USB ports don't work (Needs a missing Kext)
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