Apple Your Bios!

[aquamac]

OK Editing your Motherboards DMI Walkthrough! Direct Method.



The software for doing this is designed for AWARD bioses, but it worked fine with my "Asus P5E3 Premium wifi@n AMI bios" and a number of others have had success too. I changed my mac to look like a MacPro1,1 as it was a Quad Core that would be the most similar to my hack.

By editing the flash rom on your Motherboard (the DMI info) you can get your system closer to being a real mac. Programs like Geekbench will pick up the info and report your computer as being, say, a real "MacPro1,1" . This is in conjunction with your AppleSMBios.

As suggested by Jedric over at Insanely mac, you can take a look at other peoples Mac Pro computer info at the "Geekbench" site to see what info is reported by a real Apple computer.

Disclaimer: If you b*****r up your motherboards bios it's not my fault. Having said that, providing you don't get too ambitious you should be fine.



1. Create a windows boot floppy disk (right click the floppy drive in windows and choose Create MS Dos boot disk)

2. Download a program called DMICFG here:

rapidshare.com/files/154979093/DMICFG.EXE.zip.html

3. Unzip the program and place the program DMICFG.EXE onto the floppy boot disk you made earlier.

4. Go into your bios and set your motherboard to boot from whichever device (I am using a USB floppy disk here) you placed your boot files, or press F8 during boot and select your floppy, if your board supports a boot menu.

5. Restart your computer and the floppy should whirr into action and get to the A:/ prompt.

6. Type in: DMICFG

7. You should arrive at your computer DMI Screen for Editing (wait a while as on a floppy it takes around 10-15 secs to get there).

8. The following info will vary from bios to bios, but should be essentially the same.

8a: First screen:

(On my bios, you press enter to edit and F10 to save directly to your bios)

Bios (Bios Information)

Vendor Name: You cannot change the first piece of info which says "American Megatrends Inc." (on my bios - as it is read only)

Bios Version: 0605 (I changed this to: MP11.88Z.005D.B00.0709141354)

8b: Second Screen:

System (System Information)

Manufacturer Name: Changed "Asutek blah blah" to "Apple Computer Inc."
Product Name: Changed "Asus P5E3 Premium wifi@n" to "MacPro1,1"
Version: Changed to "Mac Pro"
Serial Number: "Enter your apple 11 digit serial here"

8c: Third Screen:

Baseboard:

Baseboard Information:

Manufacturer: Null
Product: Null
Version: Change to "Apple Inc. Mac-F4208DC8 PVT"
Serial Number: Enter your apple 11 digit serial here.

: Fourth Screen:

Chassis: (does not seem to be reported anywhere)

Manufacturer:
Serial Number:

In each section you must Press F10 to save your changes before you can move onto the next section (It might be a different key on your board).

9. Power down and then reboot. Check out System profiler and Geekbench to see what changes you made. You will probably have to revisit DMICFG a few times when you have got the hang of it. Here are some of the results you can achieve with this hack:








(Tinkertool System)



Your luck may be fine, or not, by doing this. But make sure you keep a note of the original settings!!!!!!! just in case you want to go back.

Thanks go to Originalmacnut & Jedric at Insanely Mac for the idea of doing this.

Check out OMN's new forums here as well:

omnsdsdtfix.proboards.com/index.cgi?

[originalmacnut]

Aqua,

If you Open MMTOOLS, Load your Bios.

Look for a string called SMBIOS ( DMI table )
Extract that to a file of your liking.
Open the File you just extracted with hex editor, At the very top you will see the Name ( Mine is American yada yada )
Be very careful here, Add in the Apple info you want, once done the string will still be smaller than the original.
Just hit the space bar till you reach the end of the line in the name.

Now you have a Bios that Says Apple Inc. Or Apple Computer Inc.
Once done, save the file before leaving hex editor.
Now, back in MMTOOLS, load the file you just modded, select SMBIOS again, and click on the replace. Now hit the replace button and save the rom.

If you need me too, I can take a screen shots Step by step.

Hope this help you out, I'm going to add this steps to Insanelymac also.
Thanks,
-Omn


Awe, I see the Flaw is the 11 digit serial in mine,
Thanks for posting that

[aquamac]

OMN,

I am trying to do this with Crossover (No windows) but I am not sure if I can see how to extract the SMBIOS bit. Eactly how do you do that? Do I have all the buttons



Exactly how do you save that section?

[originalmacnut]

There Should have been a extract button underneath ( in uncompressed form )
But I don't see the button at all?

[shaanky98]

Guys I would like to do this as well but first I would like to find out if the Serial number has to be a real one?

[aquamac]

Well I did this in windows and there was, but I edited the bios here:



But it still shows American Megatrends INC.

Any Ideas?

Shanky,

Does not have to be a real one as long as it is 11 digits long. Also, don't forget to de-authorize your computer beforehand in itunes otherwise you will lose a computer out of your 5 allowed.

[originalmacnut]

Sorry Aqua,
I'm not sure about that now. I know it worked on mine, but I guess every MB can be different.
I'm sorry that it didn't work.

[originalmacnut]

Man,

I need to take that how-to down. I didn't do it in Hex, well I did, but not with MMTOOL.
I had opened the whole Bios in hex and edit the Vendor.

Sorry about that confusion with SMBIOS and the Bois Vendor.

[aquamac]

No worries OMN,

It was using crossover that stumped me, as the button is missing. In the end I booted my sons vista box and that had the button. However that particular hack does not seem to work on the Asus board. There must some other part of the rom somewhere that my board is reading that info from.

[originalmacnut]

Oaky,
I'll do some searching and see if I can find what the Vendor string location in the bios is for ASUS

*edit*
No it's the name location for the Vendor.

Here is a ASUS P5Q-EM
that I have Modded the bios vendor on.
Hope this helps,

[originalmacnut]

I just noticed the error

When you use the SMBIOS ( DMI TABLE )
You add the name after the 2 yy in the hex table.
The 2 yy have to be there, that's the header table for the Vendor.

Hope that works for you
-Omn

[aquamac]

Did yours have the 2yy's in anyway beforehand? Mine did not. Also, how would you enter them with the dots over the top?

[originalmacnut]

I just thought of something, I think I am misunderstanding what you guys are wanting to do.

Are you wanting to change the Boot post screen that says
American Awards
P43twins1600 v1.80

?

If so, that's located in a different part of the bios, I think it's in the Post ISO part of it.
and those are controls by Registry keys. I can edit that part with AMCBCP, but not found what part it is changing in Hex yet.

Just noticed, going to delete that last pic. Has my real serial from my Mac in it.

[originalmacnut]

Hey Aqua,

I have to be missing something anyways. No matter what I do, I can't get it to read as a Mac.
Here's my bios if you have time.
rapidshare.com/files/155223180/P43T1618.rom.zip.html

It can be opened with all of the Known ami tools.

[aquamac]

Hi OMN,

I was trying to change the American Megatrends Inc to Apple Inc that is shown at the bottom of Geekbench.

I will take a look at your bios later.