The Hackintosh Thread

[Zaap]

Just an FYI, just editing the boot.plist won't force the correct screen resolution if your graphics chip is unsupported, or you don't have proper Core Image/Quartz Extreme support. That's a function of fully enabled graphic drivers. If all settings are blanked out under prefs/displays/scaled (or best for display isn't native res) then you don't actually have working graphic drivers. The resolution setting in boot.plist is mainly to set the initial boot graphic to native resolution (if possible, otherwise it drops to the default boot resolution.)

As for no admin account, I think when I've seen that a few times the default should just be to leave the username and password fields blank.

 

[purbeast0]

so about 6 months ago i updated my dell inspiron from osx 6.6 to i think 6.8 (i think that is the correct version number honestly don't remember anymore).

my dumbass just did it through the software update instead of the proper way to do it on a hackintosh. now i can't boot the laptop.

anyone have any clue how to recover from this error? i can give more details about what the log says and stuff if anyone has any clue wtf could be causing this. i just went on a vacation and it was the first trip i didn't have my laptop with me, and it just made me realize i should probably try to fix my laptop lol.

okay so i think i might actually try to fix this either tonight or sunday morning.

anyone have any idea how i can actually resolve this issue? i'm not sure how to simply "roll back" to the 10.6.6

 

[purbeast0]

ok i posted this on insanelymac forums and figure i'll ask here too to see if anyone has any suggestions.

------------

I have a Dell Inspiron 1545 laptop. A few months ago I upgraded from 10.6.6 to 10.6.8 (I believe that was the versions) and me being an idiot at the time did it through Software Update in the OS.

When I rebooted it was stuck and I could not figure out why.

So months later, today, I actually am trying to figure out how I can fix this. It's been a while since I've messed around with a Hackintosh though and am just stuck at this point.

When I boot chameleon in -v mode, here is a screen shot of where it hangs.

http://i.imgur.com/dkLAS7T.jpg

Anyone have any suggestions on how I can fix this? I do have one of those linux boot CD's so I can get into the file system and stuff and edit files and what not.

Thanks.

 

[Zaap]

Try disabling SleepEnabler kext if it's present.

It may require a patched version, but virtually guaranteed SleepEnabler from 10.6.6 will not work in 10.6.8.

If it's anything like the 1525 it may require kexts from 10.6.7 to be fully functional in 10.6.8. (Possibly AppleHDA and the right I/O kexts for wifi).

If you end up redoing the thing, consider a bootable backup partition for quick and easy access back into a borked system. I'd never do a Hacktop without one.

 

[purbeast0]

im having trouble being able to have write access to the drive when i'm in linux. i'm booting up with a dvd to linux mint, but i can't figure out how the hell to mount the drive with read/write access and it's doing read only by default.

any ideas how to do this?

 

[mosslack]

You can do another install of 10.6.x to an external USB drive and work from there. As Zaap said, always have a backup, that's the #1 rule for Hackintoshes!

 

[adairusmc]

I have been tasked at work to make a hackintosh for our phone tech support guys to make themselves familiar with OSX, 10.8 preferably.

My boss scrounged some hardware, and after some research it looks like it should work, but I figured I would ask here.

Motherboard - Intel DH55TC - Socket 1156
CPU - Intel Pentium G6950
4Gb of Crucial Ballistix

I also have an Nvidia 7600GT that I can use in the build too if the intel onboard video doesnt work.

Any problems with this setup?

 

[Zaap]

^ Board should work for OSX. It may need a DSDT patch for proper shutdown and restart:

http://www.tonymacx86.com/user-builds/58595-success-core-i7-870-dh55tc-gigabyte-550ti-oced-1gb.html

I'm pretty sure the onboard video isn't supported- likely no resolution switching, and no Core Image/Quartz Extreme. (Like using Windows in safe mode=sucky experience).

The graphic card is a big grey area. I know a 7600GT will work in Snow Leopard, but no idea if it will work in Mountain Lion. You could try GraphicsEnabler=yes in the boot.plist and hopefully it will work with native resolution, CI/QE enabled. If not, you might want to look into a cheap GeForce 210 card.

 

[vailr]

@ adairusmc: Do you have an online resource for "step by step" installation of OSX (on your specific board)?
A good reference point:
http://www.tonymacx86.com/344-building-customac-buyer-s-guide-april-2013.html
The most Hackintosh-friendly motherboard would specifically be: an Intel CPU Gigabyte board that uses a UEFI bios. And a UEFI bios is only available for some Z68, and (AFAIK) all Z77 and similar (latest generation) boards. The Intel DH55TC board should work, but may be more difficult due to lack of a UEFI bios.

 

[mosslack]

I've used an Nvidia 7xxx card on Lion using the 32 bit option in the Boot.plist file, but that trick doesn't work for ML. Minimum Nvidia card would be the 8xxx series. A preferred card for me is the 8400GS, works near 100% of the time.

Also, while the CPU chosen does offer Intel HD gfx, it is not the type needed for full resolution and QE/CI under OS X, but it may be enough for the base install and update to the latest OS version. Some work, some don't, it's a hit or miss proposition.

You might also consider using the myHack method of installation as it can be used for Snow Leopard, Lion or Mountain Lion.

HTH

 

[adairusmc]

Thanks vailr, I will give that link to my boss and see if he wants to dump some new parts on it.

He did give me an 8400GS card to put in this, so that should take care of the video.

All we really need this for is for reference for our phone technicians (I work for an ISP), to get familiar with 10.8. Right now we have an older powerPC mac for reference, but this will be meant to replace that

 

[adairusmc]

I was able to scrounge a P8Z68M-Pro board from the office, and a G630 processor to use with the 8400GS he gave me earlier. I found a compatibility list that has a modded BIOS for that board, and it says it works just fine, so we are going with that one instead.

Hopefully everything works fine.

 

[purbeast0]

You can do another install of 10.6.x to an external USB drive and work from there. As Zaap said, always have a backup, that's the #1 rule for Hackintoshes!

so how again would i go about installing OSX to another partition on a USB drive? just not sure how that would actually work, just been so long since i've done the whole hackintosh thing.

additionally, i do not see a SleepEnabler.kext in the /System/Library/Extensions directory. i'm also having a really hard time mounting this drive in read/write in linux mint. i'm not sure if it is even possible. it seems like this journalism option on the drive is making it so i can't get it into read/write mode.

 

[purbeast0]

Okay so I figured out how I can rename kext files down in there using Paragon disk tools.

So I didn't see a SleepEnbaler.kext file, and I renamed the AppleHDA.kext file so that it wouldn't load them. I'm still getting the same error.

I also tried getting a newer IOPCIFamily.kext file and putting that in there, renaming the old one to .bak, and I'm still having no luck.

I do notice though if I use some flags at the command line of Chameleon, like pci=off npci=0x3000 GraphicsEnabler=No that I do get further but then it hangs again. That was a suggestions I saw in another thread so I tried it but it is still hanging once I do that.

Any other suggestions?

 

[purbeast0]

So a little more information...

After tossing in some different command line arguments for pci=off, npci=0x3000 and GraphicsEnabler=No I ended up with a screen that was moving and then it ran fsck or something on my drive, and as I went to get a camera to take a pic of the screen it ended up erroring and this was the error screen.

http://i.imgur.com/KuAfB5G.jpg

I only got that to happen once

The following 2 are screens I can get fairly consistnely with different command line options.

http://i.imgur.com/0BrEtPQ.jpg

http://i.imgur.com/3DjxNWK.jpg

Gonna see if I can google any of these to find some more informatoin.

 

[purbeast0]

Sorry for all these updates, but i finally had some success!

After removing the AppleHDA.kext file by renaming it to AppleHDA.kext.bak, and updating my IOPCIFamily.kext to the one linked here - http://myhack.sojugarden.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=5&t=355

I booted chameleon with -v -x options for verbose and safe mode, and it actually booted up into OSX in safe mode!

Now I am not sure what I should do to fix my problems, and I'm scared to turn it off and never be able to get back there lol.

Any suggestions?

 

[Zaap]

Is there an Extra folder at root? If so, look for SleepEnabler there. Depending on what method you used to install at first, hacked kexts are often in the Extra folder not S/L/E. They may also be in an mkext file in the Extra folder.

As for an extra bootable partition- you can use disk utility to carve off a 2nd partition of the drive. (OSX can do this on the fly on a boot drive, but I personally prefer doing it before even installing an OS). 20GB is a decent minimum.

Then use Carbon Copy Cloner or SuperDuper to clone your working install to the 2nd partition. Chameleon (or Chimera) bootloader will boot either install. If one gets hosed, the other remains bootable, so you can boot to it and repair the other. Or you could also clone/install to an external USB as mosslack suggested.

 

[purbeast0]

I will check if there is an Extra folder tonight when I get home from work and can mess around with it.

As far as my current install that is up and running in Safe Mode (I did not turn it off last night lol), is it fine now in the sense that I can reboot it and it will work fine in normal mode? I did notice that the log while booting in safe mode DID say that it repaired an install of Snow Leopard. What that means I have no clue.

Is the SleepEnabler kext the only one I should look out for and remove, then try to do a normal reboot?

And yeah I am definitely on 10.6.8 now as I checked in the About yesterday while in safe mode.

 

[adairusmc]

I was tinkering with this last night, and I dont really have another mac to use to make USB sticks. I was using a trail version of transmac to try and burn dmg files, some I got that were supposedly ready to boot, but nothing would boot.

Is there a way to do this without another mac or hackintosh around? Any good guides on how to get that done?

 

[vailr]

@ adairusmc: If you check the tonymac.com site, his detailed ML installation method involves first installing 10.6 Snow Leopard via the 10.6.3 retail disc. There's no currently known method of installing 10.8 Mountain Lion without:
a: already having available a system running a copy of OSX 10.6 that can then be used to purchase and download 10.8 ML directly from Apple, or:
b: using a pre-modified ML installer, such as Hazard or iAtkos ML2.
https://www.facebook.com/iATKOS.project
Note: Apple's final retail OSX disc is 10.6.3, which they still sell. Lion 10.7 and ML 10.8 are only sold via Apple's App Store as downloadable .dmg files.

 

[mosslack]

I was tinkering with this last night, and I dont really have another mac to use to make USB sticks. I was using a trail version of transmac to try and burn dmg files, some I got that were supposedly ready to boot, but nothing would boot.

Is there a way to do this without another mac or hackintosh around? Any good guides on how to get that done?

http://www.macbreaker.com/2012/02/snow-leopard-virtualbox.html

 

[adairusmc]

Thanks for the tips. I found a snow leopard disk here at the office, and burned the iso for iboot and will give that a shot this evening.

 

[purbeast0]

I will check if there is an Extra folder tonight when I get home from work and can mess around with it.

As far as my current install that is up and running in Safe Mode (I did not turn it off last night lol), is it fine now in the sense that I can reboot it and it will work fine in normal mode? I did notice that the log while booting in safe mode DID say that it repaired an install of Snow Leopard. What that means I have no clue.

Is the SleepEnabler kext the only one I should look out for and remove, then try to do a normal reboot?

And yeah I am definitely on 10.6.8 now as I checked in the About yesterday while in safe mode.

So there is no SleepEnabler.kext on my HDD anywhere.

Anyone have any suggestions as to what I should remove that will fix my issue so that I can start without going into safe mode?

 

[basslover1]

I've made some decent progress on my hackintosh attempt.

I've gotten most everything working except sleep/suspend, and screen brightness. I can select sleep from the menu bar, and the image will disappear but the backlight stays on and the system doesn't actually suspend, I tried a sleepenabler kext but it didn't make a difference. I haven't found much information on allowing adjustments to screen brightness it's stuck on pretty much as high as it will go.

The really big thing that's missing is QE/CI for my GPU, but the HD2000 isn't natively supported and I doubt it ever will be so it looks like I'm stuck with that not working. It isn't a deal breaker because it's an email/web browsing PC anyway but it would be nice for animations to run a bit more smoothly.

Took a few days of tinkering but I'm pretty happy with where its at.

 

[adairusmc]

I got a niresh build of 10.8 installed and bootable, but the screen goes blank after it boots and gets into the OS, even when trying safe mode (-x). Any ideas?