EFI for ASUS TUF 504 GD

Configurations working with macOS Catalina 10.15.x

Prerequisites

• 16GB+ USB Flash Drive – Catalina installer is slightly larger than 8GB and so a 16GB or larger flash drive is required.
• Computer running macOS – Access to a macOS is needed to create a flash drive installer of Catalina. If you don’t have an existing hackintosh or a Mac the alternative is to install macOS with a virtual machine on windows or borrow a Mac from friend or family.

Step 1: Download - get a copy of macOS Catalina

To begin the setup of a Hackintosh we first need a clean copy of Catalina, which can be downloaded from the App Store or macOS catalina 10.15.6

Step 2: Installer – Create the macOS Catalina flash drive

Part 1: Formatting the USB Drive

To get a working Catalina installer onto a USB flash drive it must first be formatted into a scheme that allows for an EFI Partition.
In order to create a bootable macOS installer the USB flash drive must be formatted as Mac OS Extended (Journaled) which will add a second hidden EFI partition needed to create a boot loader.

1. Insert a USB Flash Drive.
2. Open Disk Utility.
3. Select the Flash Drive on the left column.
4. Click Erase.
5. Set the following settings:
   • Name: Hackintosher.
   • Format: Mac OS Extended (Journaled).
   • Scheme: GUID Partition Map.
6. Click Erase.
7. Click Done upon finish.

Part 2: Transferring the Catalina Installer

Afterwards the the Catalina Installer downloaded from the Mac App Store is ready to be placed on the USB drive using Terminal.

1. Verify Install macOS Catalina is in the /Applications folder.
2. Open Terminal through spotlight or launchpad.
3. Paste the following into Terminal entering your password if prompted:
   

sudo /Applications/Install\ macOS\ Catalina.app/Contents/Resources/createinstallmedia --volume /Volumes/Hackintosher /Applications/Install\ macOS\ Catalina.app --nointeraction

4. Do not close Terminal, the installer will transfer over slowly and can take awhile especially if you are using USB 2.0.

Part 3: Catalina EFI Partition & Drop Files

1. Mount EFI Partition:
   1. Download Clover Configurator.
   2. Open Clover Configurator.
   3. Select Mount EFI under TOOLS.
   4. Click Mount Partition for Install macOS….
   5. Click Open Partition.
2. Drop my EFI Folder in:
   1. Delete the folder called EFI in the partition you mounted (If it exists).
   2. Copy EFI folder.
   3. Paste the EFI folder into your mounted EFI partition or /Volumes/EFI.

Step 3: BIOS – Recommended Settings

Restart your computer and press the F2 key to enter BIOS when computer posts the splash screen logo.

You’re motherboard may not have all of these settings and that’s okay:

Change the following settings:

• Virtualization : Enabled
• VT-d : Disabled
• XHCI Hand-Off : Enabled
• Legacy USB Support: Auto/Enabled
• IO SerialPort : Disabled
• Network Stack : Disabled
• XMP Profile : Auto / Profile 1/Enabled
• UEFI Booting set to Enabled and set Priority over Legacy
• Secure Boot : Disabled
• Fast Boot : Disabled
• OS Type: Other OS
• Wake on LAN : Disabled

Setting Boot Device:

Enter BIOS and set Boot → Boot Option #1: UEFI : XXX (For example I used a SanDisk flash drive so I would select UEFI: Sandisk, Partition 1) This is easier if you don’t want to spam F8 on startup every time to boot macOS.

Press F10 to Save and Exit the BIOS

Step 3: Install – macOS Catalina Hackintosh Installation

Step-by-step walkthrough of installing macOS Catalina

Step 4: Post-Install macOS Catalina Hackintosh

Install HeliPort to be Intel WiFi Client

Now that you have macOS up and running here are some post install steps to help you.

• Test audio output if its not working you may need to change something called an audio layout-id which is a single number in your config.plist
• All system files were moved to a read-only partition meaning /L/E or /S/L/E can’t be edited by you when adding or removing kexts.
  • To get around this after Catalina is installed these folders need to be mounted with write privileges through the Terminal app with sudo mount -uw /
• You should also be able to access the internet since I included kexts for four Ethernet chipsetes, there are four of them in EFI/Clover/kexts/Other you may delete the ones you don’t need.
• darkwake=0 is set as a bootflag in config.plist by default. darkwake=8 might be better for waking up an ASRock or MSI motherboard. If you have issues with restarting when trying to shutdown try changing FixShutdown in config.plist under Acpi > Fixes