[GUIDE] Catalina, Big Sur, Monterey, Ventura, Sonoma, Sequoia, Tahoe on HP EliteDesk 800 G4/G5 Mini - The perfect MacMini8,1 Hackintosh

[Takiller]

I am currently using the Moshi USB-C 24 bit / 192 kHz in Tahoe and it is sounding great 😆

 

https://us.moshi.com/products/usb-c-digital-audio-adapter?pr_prod_strat=e5_desc&pr_rec_id=da39d5c8e&pr_rec_pid=6878036918410&pr_ref_pid=6878053171338&pr_seq=uniform&variant=41287794589834

[Takiller]

Good day my fellow people,

 

I would like to share my new Apple Music discoveries with Tahoe in my HackMini with only iGPU (UHD630). I am currently subscribed to apple music, as I am a music fanatic and not just any music but quality music 😀.

In all the Apple releases up to Sequoia, I was able to stream music with no issues but with no DRM (lossless) support of course and all changed with Tahoe. 

 

In Tahoe beta 1, where AppleHDA was still alive music was streaming with no sound output (like mute was on) and yet my downloaded music was producing sound just fine. There was also normal behavior with YouTube in Safari, which meant the issue was only with apple music streaming.

Fortunately enough this was not the first time I encountered this issue, as this strange behavior also occurred with my laptop on MateBookPro16,4 and was resolved by changing my SMBIOS to MacPro7,1 but wait as not only streaming music with sound came back, there was also a cherry on top (DRM lossless music streaming became alive) 😆

 

So to cut the long story short coming back to our HackMini, this is what I did to replicate the same scenario moving from MacMini8,1 to MacPro7,1:

 

1. In USBPorts.kext info.plist, replace the two Macmini8,1's with MacPro7,1 and credit to our one & only @deeveedee ❤️

2. Disable the no board check patch in Booter

3. Change the SMBIOS in Platforms to MacPro7,1

4. Reboot with the modified EFI and don't forget to reset NVRAM

 

That's it folks and welcome to Apple Music DRM lossless streaming in our HackMini. I am currently on beta 3, where there's no more AppleHDA and I am enjoying my Hi-res music via my Moshi USB-C 24bit/192kHz DAC. 

 

Enjoy good music,

 

 

Edited July 10, 2025 by Takiller
By the way this MP7,1 SMBIOS in our HackMini also enables DRM lossless music streaming in the previous Apple releases as I have also tested it in Sequoia and even Monterey

[deeveedee]

@Takiller This is a very clever solution.  This is the first that I have seen someone use MacPro7,1 SMBIOS for an iGPU-only hack (no dGPU).  That doesn't mean others haven't tried it - I just haven't seen it.  I haven't found it necessary to change SMBIOS from MacMini8,1 -> MacPro7,1 for my limited tests of playing purchased songs from the Apple Music Store, but I see that your use case is different - you are subscribed to Apple Music and streaming it.

 

Do you (or anyone else) know why changing the SMBIOS from MacMini8,1 -> MacPro7,1 on a hack without a dGPU would fix Apple Music streaming?

 

EDIT: I added your Apple Music streaming solution to Known Issues.

 

EDIT2: I examined AppleGraphicsPowerManagement.kext (in /System/Library/Extensions) and see that MacPro7,1 (Mac-27AD2F918AE68F61) does not have an AGPM entry for iGPU.   There are only dGPU entries.

Spoiler

 

 

I'm not sure if it makes a difference for iGPU power management, but it probably can't hurt to create your own DAGPM.kext with AGPM entry for iGPU.  I have created a DAGPM kext (attached) if you want to try it.  You would add this kext to your EFI/OC/Kexts folder and add the Kernel > Add entry for DAGPM.kext to your OC config.plist.

 

If you want to confirm that your DAGPM.kext is adding the power management properties, inspect IORegistry to compare with and without DAGPM.kext.

Spoiler

 

 

EDIT3: Note that for those who want to try SMBIOS MacPro7,1 with their RX 560x-equipped EliteDesk 800 G4/G5 Mini, AppleGraphicsPowerManagement.kext does not have a MacPro7,1 AGPM entry for Device67ff (the Device ID for RX 560x).  You would need to add this to a DAGPM.kext.

 

DAGPM.kext.zip

Edited July 12, 2025 by deeveedee

[Takiller]

@deeveedee apologies for the late response, as I was away from my hacks for a while and thanks for the power management heads up. I will definitely give it a try, do the comparison and report back the outcome.

 

Honestly speaking I did not know that MP7,1 was going to enable DRM, it was purely just trying it out and see what will happen. Thanks to Tahoe for causing all the audio issues, as there were no any other reasons for me to try MP7,1 in especially my laptop and that was where it all started. 

 

I wonder if there are any hidden treasures out there for our hacks, especially in these last days and I wish us all the best to find all of them 🤔

Edited July 14, 2025 by Takiller
I think it all has to do with the Terminator 2 (T2) chip, as I don't think MP7,1 is equipped with the T2 chip and its audio management is direct.

[Takiller]

As you have mentioned there was no DAGPM entry in IORegistryExplorer without the kext and after installing the kext the DAGPM is now present.

[deeveedee]

@Takiller All currently supported Macs (including MacPro7,1) have T2.  The last non-T2  (which is no longer officially supported by Tahoe) was iMac19,x.

 

I was reading RestrictEvents.kext documentation and see that the kext has options for MacPro7,1: specifically, hackintoshes using SMBIOS MP7,1 may need to use RestrictEvents NVRAM properties revpatch=pci and revblock=pci to suppress Memory/PCI warnings.  That may require a bit of experimentation for those who are interested.

[Takiller]

1 minute ago, deeveedee said:

@Takiller All currently supported Macs (including MacPro7,1) have T2.  The last non-T2  (which is no longer officially supported by Tahoe) was iMac19,x.

 

I was reading RestrictEvents.kext documentation and see that the kext has options for MacPro7,1: specifically, hackintoshes using SMBIOS MP7,1 may need to use RestrictEvents NVRAM properties revpatch=pci and revblock=pci to suppress Memory/PCI warnings.  That may require a bit of experimentation for those who are interested.

My fault then, as I thought the culprit was the T2 chip and MP7,1 did not have one 🤣

 

I am always interested in trying out any possibilities that might improve our HackMini 😁

[deeveedee]

@Takiller You may be right about the T2 being the 'culprit' but it's not because the MP7,1 doesn't have one.  It may be that MP7,1 doesn't use T2 for Music DRM.  I'd still like to know for certain why a change to MP7,1 "fixes" Music streaming DRM issues.  

 

Also, have you experimented with video with SMBIOS=MP7,1.  Are you able to stream DRM-protected video (like Amazon Prime Video for example)?  I have my doubts, but am open to pleasant surprises.

Edited July 14, 2025 by deeveedee

[ird]

 

5 hours ago, Takiller said:

@deeveedee apologies for the late response, as I was away from my hacks for a while and thanks for the power management heads up. I will definitely give it a try, do the comparison and report back the outcome.

 

Honestly speaking I did not know that MP7,1 was going to enable DRM, it was purely just trying it out and see what will happen. Thanks to Tahoe for causing all the audio issues, as there were no any other reasons for me to try MP7,1 in especially my laptop and that was where it all started. 

 

I wonder if there are any hidden treasures out there for our hacks, especially in these last days and I wish us all the best to find all of them 🤔

 

T2 = Terminator 2 chip, at least I've heard that for the first time and that's bang on! There coudn't be a more fitting description for T2, most probably, being the reason for iMac19,x being 'terminated' from the Tahoe supported list.

 

1 hour ago, deeveedee said:

@Takiller You may be right about the T2 being the 'culprit' but it's not because the MP7,1 doesn't have one.  It may be that MP7,1 doesn't use T2 for Music DRM.  I'd still like to know for certain why a change to MP7,1 "fixes" Music streaming DRM issues.  

 

Also, have you experimented with video with SMBIOS=MP7,1.  Are you able to stream DRM-protected video (like Amazon Prime Video for example)?  I have my doubts, but am open to pleasant surprises.

 

Re:RestrictedEvents, I experimented with MacPro7,1 SMBIOS during my AMD hackintosh days and AFAIR it was for purely cosmetic reasons. The Mac would throw and error about RAM slots during the startup that it suppressed. I do not believe it interacts with DRM support in any way (I could be wrong as things might have changed now).

 

Also, while this info could be limited only to video DRM, I'd  think a similar concept might apply to audio DRM. While I was debugging iMac19,x DRM issues with iGPU not being in headless mode, I learned that the DRM keys for non-dGPU (iGPU) cases are burnt in apple provided firmware ...which obviously doesn't exist for hacks. However, for dGPUs Macs, the encryption is handled by AMD GPUs in their own firmware. The theory is that this firmware is common for AMD GPUs (mac/non-macs) and is available in the drivers that AMD ships on Macs bundled by Apple in macOS and hence DRM works. Now, if the audio is routed through the digital path (i.e., displayport or HDMI) then I can see that it's the GPU that completely offloads DRM and even audio DRM may work. This is just a speculation based on experience and could turn out to be completely wrong.

 

PS: if iGPU is not headless, then macOS by-default routes video decode to it and DRM fails (at least video is for sure) for reasons above.

[deeveedee]

@ird Correct - RestrictEvents has nothing to do with DRM.  I mentioned it only to suppress the MP7,1 PCI/RAM warnings as documented in the RestrictEvents ReadMe.  More discussion about MP7,1 is here.

 

I still don't understand why a change from MM8,1 to MP7,1 would "fix" Music DRM for our HackMini8,1 that has only iGPU (no dGPU) as is the case with @Takiller.  Again, my only thought is that for some reason, MP7,1 doesn't use T2 for Audio DRM.  I'm a novice with regard to DRM, so I welcome the expertise from you and others.

Edited July 15, 2025 by deeveedee
Corrected RestrictEvents ReadMe link

[Takiller]

6 hours ago, deeveedee said:

@Takiller You may be right about the T2 being the 'culprit' but it's not because the MP7,1 doesn't have one.  It may be that MP7,1 doesn't use T2 for Music DRM.  I'd still like to know for certain why a change to MP7,1 "fixes" Music streaming DRM issues.  

 

Also, have you experimented with video with SMBIOS=MP7,1.  Are you able to stream DRM-protected video (like Amazon Prime Video for example)?  I have my doubts, but am open to pleasant surprises.

I have not tried it on Amazon, as I unfortunately am not subscribed to it and Apple TV is not working. I will give Netflix a try though 😆

[deeveedee]

@Takiller Amazon Prime Video App does not work with MP7,1 (nor did it work with MM8,1), but Amazon Prime Video does work in Firefox browser when using SMBIOS MM8,1 and MP7,1.

 

EDIT: One thing I forgot to report - when I authorized the Amazon Prime Video App while testing SMBIOS MacPro7,1, Amazon Prime recognized my hack as an iPad.  I don't know if this is normal for Macs.

Edited July 17, 2025 by deeveedee

[ird]

14 hours ago, deeveedee said:

@Takiller Amazon Prime Video App does not work with MP7,1 (nor did it work with MM8,1), but Amazon Prime Video does work in Firefox browser when using SMBIOS MM8,1 and MP7,1.

 

Firefox does not use HW accelerated DRM AFAIK. The decryption and decoding happens in SW. Firefox should, thus, work for most servcies that support it regardless of the actual HW DRM situation.

[deeveedee]

Flawless OTA incremental upgrade from Tahoe Beta 3 -> Beta 4 using the OC EFI attached to Post #1. No issues, including no issues with FileVault which was disabled before the upgrade and remained disabled after the upgrade.

 

I am using VoodooHDA.kext for audio, so there were no additional operations required for working audio.  VoodooHDA.kext 3.0.2 was installed in /Library/Extensions with csr-active-config = <01000000> before the upgrade and remained that way after the upgrade.  In my opinion, VoodooHDA.kext is the easiest audio solution for our hacks running Tahoe.  Just install it once and then forget it.

 

 

EDIT: After installing macOS beta versions, our hacks are automatically enrolled in Apple's product improvement program.  After installing/upgrading Betas, I disable "Share Mac Analytics" in System Settings > Privacy & Security:

 

Change slider to "off" to disable sharing of Mac Analytics

Edited July 24, 2025 by deeveedee

[deeveedee]

According to the issue posted here, a fix for the Tahoe FileVault issue is the use of apfs_aligned.efi.

 

If you want to test FileVault with Tahoe, the EFI changes necessary to implement this fix are as follows:

 

• OC/config.plist
  • Change UEFI > APFS > EnableJumpstart = False (from True)
  • Add UEFI > Drivers > apfs_aligned.efi
    Spoiler

    

     

• OC/Drivers
  • Add apfs_aligned.efi from https://github.com/acidanthera/OcBinaryData/blob/master/Drivers/apfs_aligned.efi

 

After rebooting with this change to your OC EFI, you should see the following message (unless Acidanthera allows us to hide this):

 

apfs.efi: LocateProtocol (AppleLogging) succeeded

[deeveedee]

This HackMini8,1 continues to be the easiest hack to maintain.  The OTA incremental upgrade to macOS Tahoe Beta 5 was smooth and effortless.  I'm using VoodooHDA.kext with csr-active-config = <01000000>, so audio continues to work without any patching.  I installed VoodooHDA.kext in macOS Tahoe Beta 2 and haven't touched it since then.

 

 

GB6 CPU Benchmark

Spoiler

 

[deeveedee]

Effortless upgrade from Tahoe Beta 5 -> Beta 6.  UHD630 graphics performance continues to be excellent for everyday office tasks.  I'm still using VoodooHDA.kext with csr-active-config = <01000000>, so audio continues to work without any patching.  I installed VoodooHDA.kext in macOS Tahoe Beta 2 and haven't touched it since then.  Audio just works and behaves as though it's natively supported by macOS Tahoe.

 

Incremental OTA Upgrade Tahoe Beta 5 -> Beta 6

Spoiler

 

 

About This Hack

Spoiler

 

[deeveedee]

HP has released new BIOS updates for the HP EliteDesk 800 G4 and G5 Minis.

• HP EliteDesk 800 G4 Mini: Version 02.31.00 Rev A, August 10, 2025
• HP EliteDesk 800 G5 Mini: 
  • Version 02.23.00 Rev A (R21), August 10, 2025
  • Version 02.31.00 Rev A (Q21), August 10, 2025

I still don't understand HP's BIOS versioning for the G5 Mini and the difference between R21 and Q21.

 

EDIT: For what it's worth, ChatGPT says that HP EliteDesk 800 G5 Mini should always be updated with BIOS family R21 and that Q21 should never be used on the G5 Mini.

Edited August 16, 2025 by deeveedee

[ird]

7 hours ago, deeveedee said:

HP has released new BIOS updates for the HP EliteDesk 800 G4 and G5 Minis.

• HP EliteDesk 800 G4 Mini: Version 02.31.00 Rev A, August 10, 2025
• HP EliteDesk 800 G5 Mini: 
  • Version 02.23.00 Rev A (R21), August 10, 2025
  • Version 02.31.00 Rev A (Q21), August 10, 2025

I still don't understand HP's BIOS versioning for the G5 Mini and the difference between R21 and Q21.

 

EDIT: For what it's worth, ChatGPT says that HP EliteDesk 800 G5 Mini should always be updated with BIOS family R21 and that Q21 should never be used on the G5 Mini.

 

What's more interesting is that HP's own release notes say it's the same update for both G4 and G5!

 

Quote

 

PRODUCT TYPE(S):
Desktops
HARDWARE PRODUCT MODEL(S):
HP EliteDesk 800 95W G4 DM
HP EliteDesk 800 65W G4 DM
HP EliteDesk 800 35W G4 D
HP EliteDesk 800 G5 DM

 

 

https://support.hp.com/soar-attachment/159/col121325-vc-350988-1-vc-350988-1_sp161583_releasedoc.html

 

 

[hiphopboy]

17 hours ago, deeveedee said:

HP has released new BIOS updates for the HP EliteDesk 800 G4 and G5 Minis.

• HP EliteDesk 800 G4 Mini: Version 02.31.00 Rev A, August 10, 2025
• HP EliteDesk 800 G5 Mini: 
  • Version 02.23.00 Rev A (R21), August 10, 2025
  • Version 02.31.00 Rev A (Q21), August 10, 2025

I still don't understand HP's BIOS versioning for the G5 Mini and the difference between R21 and Q21.

 

EDIT: For what it's worth, ChatGPT says that HP EliteDesk 800 G5 Mini should always be updated with BIOS family R21 and that Q21 should never be used on the G5 Mini.

 

updated it, still booting ok  long time no update the BIOS

[deeveedee]

Flawless upgrade from Tahoe Beta 6 -> Beta 9 using posted EFI attached to Post #1.  The OTA upgrade downloaded the full installer for the upgrade from Beta 6 -> Beta 9.  I continue to use VoodooHDA.kext for audio after installing it in Tahoe Beta 2.  I have not had to touch audio since Beta 2 (no reinstallation of any kexts, no application of patches) and audio continues to work fine for me.  I see no reason to install AppleHDA at this time.

 

 

OTA Upgrade

Spoiler

 

Edited September 4, 2025 by deeveedee

[hiphopboy]

Anybody install this bootloader on ssd nvme ?

[deeveedee]

@hiphopboy I think most people are using NVMe SSDs.

[hiphopboy]

41 minutes ago, deeveedee said:

@hiphopboy I think most people are using NVMe SSDs.

 

On my installation on the steps 17 minutes just freeze on it, not going on, i don't know why, does i need the nvme_fix kext or not ? Now still the using that kext

Edited September 9, 2025 by hiphopboy

[deeveedee]

Are you using an EliteDesk 800 G4/G5 Mini that is the topic of this thread?  If so, read the Known Issues.  If not, research the NVMe SSDs that are compatible with macOS.  There are NVMe SSDs that do not work with macOS.