Mac High Sierra Security Update 2019-002 Warning for NVIDIA

[Dwaine Maggart]

Not that anyone will see this in time, but just a heads up that the Apple Mac High Sierra Security Update 2019-002, which was released 3-25-2019, currently has no NVIDIA web driver available.

What this means is that people using MacPro Towers with NVIDIA cards should NOT install this High Sierra OS update, until you've verified there is an NVIDIA web driver available for it.

The build ID after the update is 17G6029.

Currently, the last version that has an NVIDIA web driver is 17G5019.

The community seems hopeful that NVIDIA will release a 17G6029 web driver in the near future.

If you install this update before an available web driver, you'll lose CUDA support.

If you are using an NVIDIA card that does not have a MacVidCards BIOS update to drive your display, you will lose your video after the update. But I assume people doing that have been through this update process in the past and know what to do.

387.10.10.10.40.123 has been released now by nvidia rectifying this situation.

However, for future reference, if this happens to someone you can run my simple nvidia web driver updater - https://github.com/Benjamin-Dobell/nvidia-update

It'll patch the latest available nvidia drivers such that they will work with your system. However, just to be clear, unfortunately this won't help with the lack of nvidia web drivers for Mojave. Apple have fundamentally changed the way the OS interacts with graphics drivers and nvidia's High Sierra drivers are incompatible.

[Dwaine Maggart]

Thanks for the heads up. Pretty fast response from NVIDIA. Bad luck for me that I updated during the gap.

Interesting updater you have, thanks for the link to that.

FYI, in case anyone is interested...

I had a horrible past two days trying to install the latest High Sierra Security Update 2019-002. I had an issue with a driver (or something, I'm not sure) that prevented my computer from shutting down or restarting, which I was able to bypass by using "reboot" or "shutdown" via a remote login to my Mac Pro (via the command line).

I ended up downloading and reinstalling the full High Sierra OS (10.3.6) and then applied the 2019-002 update.

The update brought my system build to 17G6030, different than the typical 17G6029 reported by everyone else I saw who mentioned it. Of course, the newest "123" NVIDIA driver installer wouldn't work. For some reason, however, the "WebDriver-387.10.10.15.15.108.pkg" version did install.

It might be worth noting that this particular version may be something of a canonical version. I've heard others mention that it worked for previous security updates (prior to new web drivers being released).

Also, I don't see any note about Apple having revised the 2019-002 High Sierra update, but something happened as I have a newer build...

Hope this might help someone.

Rule with any os updates
Never be the 1st.......

I read in another forum that Apple changed security update 2019-002. It now results in build number 17G6030. Probably Nvidia will have to release also a new update to the web driver.

So again: don't install 2019-002 until a web driver higher than 387.10.10.10.40.123 is available.

Just another warning that this also affects Sierra 10.12.6.

This morning I installed Security Update 2019-002, after having waited after it showed up a last week in my MAS updates. As always, I double-checked the NVIDIA site to see if they had a new driver for it. Seeing that they released one on March 27, I assumed it would be ok to do the update.

The new driver is for 10.12.6 build 16G1917. But it turns out, as another person mentioned, it seems that Apple changed the Security Update in the last day or so, so that the resulting build number after the Security Update is 16G1918, which renders the "new" NVIDIA driver invalid for installation.

[Dwaine Maggart]

The link Benjamin provided above, appears that it has the capability to make the existing NVIDIA driver work with new minor OS updates like this. Have you tried that?

Nvidia has published web driver 387.10.10.10.40.124 which is compatible with the 'new and improved' security update 2019-002 (High Sierra build number 17G6030).

I'm curious about Benjamin's script above - does this negate the need to take out your Nvidia card, replace with old ATI card, update OSX, update Nvidia drivers and switch the cards out again?

I find this the most complete and best list to track down the nVidia web driver that meets your Mac build:

http://www.macvidcards.com/drivers.html

I don't ever do an update before I consult this list to make sure I'm covered.

More/faster up to date list as its even more critical fir hackintosh users.
https://www.tonymacx86.com/nvidia-drivers/

This mess is why I dumped OSX completely this past year and moved to windows/linux!

This mess is why I dumped OSX completely this past year and moved to windows/linux!

You will be sorely missed.. snik snik.... hope you are well.

Come back if you have something usefull to add. Or not.

P.s. check the forums on how many video driver issues there are as well on windows and linux. You may be surpriced...

This mess is why I dumped OSX completely this past year and moved to windows/linux!

You will be sorely missed.. snik snik.... hope you are well.

Come back if you have something usefull to add. Or not.

P.s. check the forums on how many video driver issues there are as well on windows and linux. You may be surpriced...

What I wanted to add is that it's definitely an option to leave the OSX environment for a more stable system. Mac Pro with 980 or 1080 was a complete nightmare with kernel panics and random reboots. Same thing with Macbook Pro laptop's still using Nvidia cards. Apple traps you in their ecosystems with all kind of conveniences but it's defiantly possible to get out albeit difficult. Windows has had 0 crashes in a year thus far.

Again nothing usefull added to the topic of the post other then your personal struggle with different OSes. There are lots of boring X is better then Y is better then Z forums where you will be very happy. But tnx anyway.

Again nothing usefull added to the topic of the post other then your personal struggle with different OSes. There are lots of boring X is better then Y is better then Z forums where you will be very happy. But tnx anyway.

The usefulness of the content of my comments is subjective, but you replying to them and acting like a ********* is not.

Ok sorry you are right this " This mess is why I dumped OSX completely this past year and moved to windows/linux!" is indeed looking back extremely usefull for Mac users to handle Secutity updates in relation to Nvidia cards. How could i have been so mistaken. Much better then the rest of us ACTUALY trying to help and provide correct build info or link to proper info.

Ok sorry you are right this " This mess is why I dumped OSX completely this past year and moved to windows/linux!" is indeed looking back extremely usefull for Mac users to handle Secutity updates in relation to Nvidia cards. How could i have been so mistaken.

Good to see you gained some insight in the matter at hand. Glad to be of help.

I think that leaving is something a lot of us are considering, and may be the only way Apple pays us any attention. I have a Mac Pro 5,1 that I've upgraded with SSDs, USB3, 32GB RAM and a GTX 1080. I don't begrudge Apple for not giving me tech support on a machine that's from 2012, but the idea that they won't allow another company to provide drivers for hardware that works is so infuriating and obnoxious that if there was a better alternative for me I'd switch too.

If you need a lot of power and want the freedom to upgrade as you see fit, Apple hasn't had a viable option in years. The form factor of the trashcan means I'd have to get an eGPU and an external blackmagic box to connect to my grading monitor (I use a blackmagic pcie card now). Same with an iMac.

No idea what's going to happen in the fall when they release High Mojave or whatever, and I still can't update past High Sierra without replacing my fantastic graphics card and software companies start to move on from my OS.

What I want from Apple is a new tower that runs OSX natively that I can put my own cards in and get driver support. That's it.

Ok, DR16 run on High Sierra only. But with 10.13.x no multiple GPU support for Nvidia cards possible anymore. On our old HPz800 with 3xTitans DR16 run's fine. So you have to switch complete to AMD or it's time to say goodbye to Apple?! - what a shame.

But with 10.13.x no multiple GPU support for Nvidia cards possible anymore.

Now where did you get that from. Not true

Now where did you get that from. Not true

Ok ... maybe we are to stupid, but we tried it also with lot's of egpuio hacks and tech support. But never it was possible to connect our multiple Nvidia GPU's in a PCI expander with 10.13.x. On 10.12.x no problem at all. With AMD it works fine in High Sierra and Mojave too.

A lot of colleagues have this issue. So i like to know how you do that?! Thanks!

Btw: from arstechnica f.e "Apple has a support page dedicated to eGPUs, and it lists the enclosures and graphics cards that are currently supported. Currently, only AMD graphics cards are supported—you're in for a rough ride if you're hoping to hook up an NVIDIA GPU."

https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT208544

Aha , you talk E-GPU. Different beasts different requirements , never played with it. Dont need it.
You did not specify egpu in your original post just that dual nvidia gpus does not work under high sierra and THAT is not correct.
E.g. in intel based hackintosh 10.13.6 , or for that matter a Mac Pro tower with enough pcie slots zero issues. Even in high siera based vm’s no probs. So the OS supports it. Likely there is some thunderbolt egpu limit.


EDIT: apologies, i checked my logs and aparantly i split of my dual gpu systems to spread the gpus over a few other boxes as did not really needed the dual gpu performance. I could have sworn i did that AFTER the move to high sierra but in fact i did that before high sierra.
I just dropped an extra 980ti in one of my single 980ti systems and it boots and seems to work, but resolve plays at 50% of the speed. So 24fps clips without grades played at around 10.
Super weird.
So maybe there is indeed something there.

Apologies for the noise i generated by my mistake.

EDIT2: aparantly you can get multi gpu to work with a specific nvidia driver version forced. (but that driver may or may not work with DR16) See this post. When i have some time some day i may play with it but atm no dual gpu requirement. But that may change. But obviously we are all getting realy tired and pissed by this apple nvidia situation.......
https://www.tonymacx86.com/threads/solv ... st-1854853

For over a year I am getting an error message every time I start up my Mac.

CUDA hasn't worked in over a year, and I turned it off in DVR.

"NVIDIA driver outdated - update it - no newer driver available"

I have had a few updates (about six), but every time I update the same error message comes up.

Looks like we are left holding the bag because Apple and Nvidia as quarreling.

New Mac web driver released. 387.10.10.10.40.127 Also a Cuda update.
Working fine on my GTX1060 6GB Hackintosh. Resolve 15.3 working reliably too!

Again nothing usefull added to the topic of the post other then your personal struggle with different OSes. There are lots of boring X is better then Y is better then Z forums where you will be very happy. But tnx anyway.

The usefulness of the content of my comments is subjective, but you replying to them and acting like a ********* is not.

Actually this is very useful to me because I'm thinking of making the switch myself due to Apple dropping Open GL and Open CL and no Nvidia support. Apples walled garden has just grown a little too high for me.

So Karel, how are finding the switch so far, are there things I should look out for?

New Mac web driver released. 387.10.10.10.40.127 Also a Cuda update.
Working fine on my GTX1060 6GB Hackintosh. Resolve 15.3 working reliably too!

Tnx for the headsup.
Installed and zero issues. Running smooth like a baby here as well.

NVidia web drivers are available for High Sierra 10.3.6 Security Update 2019-003. Everything working fine.

With the latest Nvidia drivers, only the last card in multiple GPU configuration is accelerated. I have 3 Cards 2x 980TI and one 720 I use to drive a projector. Only one of the 980Ti is running at speed. The other two has screen tearing and corruption when you move a window in Finder. The one running at speed is also slow, getting 54fps in Cinebench compared to 64 fps before. Tried an old AMD Radeon 7950 I still had and it did 96 fps. The 980ti is a much faster card than the AMD so it just shows how poor these drivers are. Did a test in Windows and I get 147fps on the 980ti compared to the 54fps in OSX High Sierra with Drivers 387.10.10.10.40.128 Playback in Resolve also not as smooth as it used to be on the same projects.

I had originaly a 2x980ti (both overclocked) setup but moved to 1.
Try removing all other cards and see how the 980ti then performs. Solved all my issues and still get 17.5 fps on 6xNR in candle test. All good.
2x980ti and the graphics grind to a halt and in Resolve i get half the speed from a single card.
Thats since High Sierra. Sierra dual gpu was no issues.
Had to upgrade unfortunately for DR16 otherwise i would have happy stayed on Sierra.

Thats since High Sierra. Sierra dual gpu was no issues.
Had to upgrade unfortunately for DR16 otherwise i would have happy stayed on Sierra.

I've just discovered this same problem. I'm using a PCIe eGPU via Slot 2 with a Cyclone PCIe2-427 backplane.

In Sierra, I can have two 1080 Ti running - 1 x MacVidCard in Mac Pro 5,1 and 1 x eGPU in backplane - and it's great. Stable & fast. But in High Sierra I can only have one GPU. As soon as I add another with the eGPU - either GTX980 or GTX1080 Ti - the MacOS GUI and Resolve become unusable.

Is there any workaround yet that anyone knows of?

[Dwaine Maggart]

Yes. Use a single GPU.

Also, Resolve 16 is not supported in High Sierra. Mojave is minimum supported.

If you want to continue to use your 5,1 MacPro, it might be time to start considering replacing the NVIDIA GPU's with Mojave compatible AMD GPUs.

While that will be needed sooner or later, our two MacPro 5.1 seats with Nvidia cards run fine with 16 under High Sierra.

While that will be needed sooner or later, our two MacPro 5.1 seats with Nvidia cards run fine with 16 under High Sierra.

I managed to get DR16 with Dual 1080Ti running on 10.13.6 to be stable as well.

Used the Dobell script to install NVidia driver 378.10.10.10.125.106. Been working great.