Surface-Go-2-OpenCore

macOS on the Core m3-8100Y Microsoft Surface Go 2 thanks to Acidanthera's OpenCore bootloader.

Disclaimer

This repository is neither a howto nor an installation manual. Using these files requires at least basic knowledge of Acidanthera's OpenCore bootloader, ACPI, UEFI and the art of hackintoshing in general. I recommend reading the excellent Dortania's OpenCore Install Guide, as well as all its linked resources.

Although this repository is a fork of kingo132's Surface Go 2 hackintosh repository, my OpenCore EFI folder was built from scratch by following Dortania's OpenCore Install Guide with the latest releases of Acidanthera's OpenCore bootloader and every required kexts. Nevertheless, kingo132's repository provided an extremely valuable and helpful resource for building my OpenCore EFI folder and hacking the tablet's UEFI BIOS.

Recommendations

I recommend completely erasing the device's SSD by creating a new GPT partition table before attempting to install macOS, as it makes the installation process much easier. You may use any Linux live ISO with a partitioning tool such as GParted or KPartition to erase the SSD.

For macOS to be able to boot on the Surface Go 2, the Secure Boot option needs to be disabled in the BIOS. The boot screen will then display a large red bar with a lock icon at the top of the display when Secure Boot is disabled. This is normal.

Please be aware that all PlatformInfo and SMBIOS information was removed from the OpenCore config.plist files. Users will therefore need to generate their own PlatformInfo with CorpNewt's GenSMBIOS tool before attempting to boot a Surface Go 2 with this repository's EFI folder.

The kexts required to enable the trackpad and the touchscreen are special versions of VoodooI2C.kext and VoodooI2CHID.kext patched and improved by lazd. Updating those kexts with the official ones from the VoodooI2C repo will most certainly break trackpad and touchscreen functionality! They were renamed to VoodooI2C-SurfaceTouch.kext and VoodooI2CHID-SurfaceTouch.kext so as not to be auto-updated by tools such as OCAT. The AirportItlwm.kext from the OpenIntelWireless repo is required to enable the Wifi chip and was renamed to AirportItlwm-Sonoma.kext for the same reason.

Software Specifications

Software	Version
Target OS	Apple macOS 14.2.1 Sonoma
OpenCore	MOD-OC v0.9.8
SMBIOS	MacBookAir8,1
SSD format	APFS file system, GPT partition table

Computer Specifications

Device	Hardware
CPU	Intel Core m3-8100Y (1.1 - 3.4 GHz, Amber Lake-Y)
iGPU	Intel UHD Graphics 615
Audio	Realtek ALC298
RAM	2x4 GB LPDDR3 1867 MHz
Wifi + Bluetooth	Wifi6 AX200, Bluetooth 5.0
Storage	Kioxia/Toshiba 128GB SSD
USB Type-C 3.1 Gen 1	Supports Power Delivery and DisplayPort
MicroSD Card reader	Realtek PCI-E Card Reader
Front & Rear camera	Intel(R) AVStream Camera 2500, ISP Interface, 8 MPix/5 MPix
IR camera	Intel(R) AVStream Camera 2500, ISP Interface
Keyboard / Trackpad	Microsoft Type Cover
Display	10.50 inch 3:2, 1920 x 1280 pixel 220 PPI, 10-Point Capacitive
Touchscreen	`ELAN9038`, `\_SB.PCI0.I2C1.TPL1`
Screen	BOE CQ NV105WAM-N31, BOE088B
NFC	NXP NFC Client Device, NXP3001
Battery	26.81Wh 7.66v 3500mAh
LTE (if available)	Surface Mobile Broadband, USB device, Qualcomm Snapdragon X16 LTE
GPS (if available)
Accelerometers, gyroscopes, ambient light sensors

What works

What needs some more work

Sleep (hibernatemode 3) - the device wakes up from sleep displaying the Surface logo on the internal display
Accelerometers, gyroscope
Ambient light sensor

What will probably never work

Front & rear cameras
IR camera (Windows Hello)
NFC
LTE

Turning off BD PROCHOT

On this device, BD PROCHOT will activate at temperatures as low as 60°C ~ 70°C. When it kicks in, the CPU will throttle down to 0.4Ghz, making the device more or less unusable. That's why BD PROCHOT needs to be disabled in order to increase the performance of the machine.

You may use arter97's DisablePROCHOT UEFI extension which is already included in the EFI/OC/Drivers folder to disable BD PROCHOT. However, if the CPU continues to be fully loaded with BD PROCHOT disabled, the temperature may increase up to 90°C. Beyond 90°C, the device will become unstable and either crash or power off. To avoid this, the temperature needs to be kept under control.

The DisablePROCHOT.efi driver is included but disabled in both config.plist files, as enabling it leads to the CPU overheating and the computer shutting down during install. You may enable the driver once macOS is installed on the device.

Undervolting to reduce heat and improve performance

There are two undervolting tools available for macOS:

The VoltageShift.kext is already included and enabled in this repository's Kexts folder. To be able to launch the voltageshift command line tool from anywhere, copy VoltageShift from the Tools folder to your /usr/local/bin folder by entering sudo cp voltageshift /usr/local/bin/ in the macOS terminal after navigating to the folder where you downloaded and unzipped the voltageshift executable file.

Please refer to the instructions found in the VoltageShift repository, as well as to the excellent howto found in zearp's repository.

Disabling CFG Lock

Boot into OpenCore
Press Space to see the list of tools
Select setup_var
Press enter
Restart

To verify this worked, press Space and select the ControlMsrE2 -- if it was successful, you'll see:

This firmware has UNLOCKED MSR 0xE2 register!

Finally, edit config.plist and set Kernel -> Quirks -> AppleCpuPmCfgLock and Kernel -> Quirks -> AppleXcpmCfgLock to false.

Enabling native HiDPI display settings in macOS

On the installed macOS system, the default display resolution is too small for a small device such as the Surface Go 2. To enable the native HiDPI settings in the Display Preferences of macOS, download and run the one-key-hidpi script and select the option (4) 1920x1280 Display. This fork of xzhih's one-key-hidpi tool was modified to add the 1920x1280 resolution needed for the Surface Go 2.

Disabling Sleep and enabling Hibernate

As there is still no solution to the sleep issue on the Surface Go 2, it is recommended to disable Sleep altogether and use Hibernate for now:

sudo pmset restoredefaults;
sudo pmset -a hibernatemode 25;

Fixing broken iMessage

To fix issues with iMessage (Apple Messages) related to the Intel Wireless driver, please disable the AirportItlwm-Sonoma.kext in your config.plist and use the itlwm_v2.2.0_stable.kext.zip and its companion app HeliPort instead.

Related issues

Useful links

https://www.anandtech.com/show/6355/intels-haswell-architecture/3

jlempen/Surface-Go-2-OpenCore