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User profile for user: dncollins
dncollins Author
User level: Level 1
10 points

Firmware Update for Mac Pro 5, 1?

Greetings,

I have a Mac Pro (2010, family 5,1) - I believe its OS, High Sierra, may be in need of refreshment.

Going into Recovery mode, I select "reinstall Mac OS" and it proceeds to the point of selecting High Sierra (which this unit has been running for some time now).

At this point I am met with the instruction that the Mac Pro is in need of a firmware update, and proceeded to spell out a procedure where this would be done physically apart from the OS install (I was under the impression that firmware updates were bundled with the new OS upgrade).

The initial instruction stated to click on the "shutdown" button, with the followup being to press and hold the power button until the grey task bar appeared (like old school!) - clicking on shutdown yielded nothing - the unit just sat there.


So at this point my simple question is: is there a list of actual firmware updates for this Mac Pro model, and if so, where?


Many thanks for the consideration,

dncollins

Posted on Sep 3, 2021 3:43 PM

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User profile for user: Grant Bennet-Alder
Grant Bennet-Alder
User level: Level 10
133,297 points

Sep 3, 2021 6:33 PM in response to dncollins

The old way of doing firmware updates was to do it at the front of a major software upgrades, and require manual intervention. Your computer is old, so you need to do this one the old way.


When you click on the on-screen shutdown button, it pre-places the firmware updater on the boot drive, sets it as the default startup partition, then does a software Shutdown.


Wait for it to finish and shut off the power indicator under software control.


When you press and hold the physical front-panel Power button to start again, the software started is exactly the firmware updater, unless you don't hold the power button, in which case it falls through into a "Normal" startup.


You release the button when the long beep is done, as I recall.

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User profile for user: dncollins
dncollins Author
User level: Level 1
10 points

Sep 3, 2021 6:44 PM in response to Grant Bennet-Alder

Hello Grant,

Thank you very much for your kind response. Yes, your description is what I always remembered what to do back when such operations had to be executed. At the point of your description, "When you click on the on-screen shutdown button, it pre-places the firmware updater on the boot drive, sets it as the default startup partition, then does a software Shutdown" that is what I do, though the word "Shut Down" hardly looks like a button - the results are ...nothing. It still sits in that pre-installation-warning panel, and does nothing (I let it sit like that for 90 minutes, no shutting down).

Since that did not work, I did a manual search for compatible firmware updates, came to EFI firmware Update 1.5 as the most recent for the 2010 Mac Pros.

Downloading and running it as an install proved fruitless, as it generated an error message of not being compatible with this machine (I take that as being to old a firmware patch for where this unit is). So I am still "in limbo" regarding the boot-up opportunity, though the High Sierra OS appears completely fine


Thank you again for your kind response.

DnCollins

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User profile for user: dncollins
dncollins Author
User level: Level 1
10 points

Sep 3, 2021 7:51 PM in response to Grant Bennet-Alder

Hello again, Grant.

The boot drive in the Mac was a 2.5" SSD - I can try the process again with the cloned drive, which is an SSHD to see if that makes a difference. Or, I can even try an empty standard SATA, just something that compels the completion of the firmware updating. I'll let you know what happens.

Thank you for the suggestion.

DC

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Firmware Update for Mac Pro 5, 1?

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