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Boot2TargetDisplay - Boot supported iMacs straight to Target Display Mode

Status

Works on at least my 2010 iMac. Should work on other DisplayPort-based iMacs but will not work on Macs with Thunderbolt ports as those are far more complicated.

How it works

This is a tiny EFI executable that pokes at the Apple System Management Controller to enable Target Display Mode. This can be placed on a USB flash drive (formatted as FAT32 and placed at \EFI\BOOT\BOOTX64.EFI) or on the hard drive and will work regardless of what version of macOS is on the iMac.

Known issues

Thunderbolt iMacs

These do not work at all with this iteration of Boot2TargetDisplay and appear to be much more complicated in their design.

Other issues

  • The CPU is pinned at 100% when this is running, which can be solved by hooking this up to EFI timers
  • The "waiting for connection" display does not reappear if the cable is disconnected, but Target Display Mode will spring back into life when it is reconnected/when there is a signal no problem.

Compiling

You need GNU make, Clang, and lld-link, once you have those just type make.

To-do

  • Don't pin a CPU core while Boot2TargetDisplay is running
  • Display auto-detection kinda, we can now hotplug the display connector, but we can't return to EFI
  • Possibly put the iMac CPU to sleep to minimize heat output (not sure if this is possible, I'd have to experiment in Linux)

Credits

License

This is licensed under the MIT license.

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Boot supported iMacs straight to Target Display Mode

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