Voodooprojects
Chameleon => General Discussion => Topic started by: Krishna21 on November 15, 2009, 07:44:20 PM
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I installed OSx86 (Kalyway 10.5.2) and it went fine.
But I have a problem, if I shut down and turn on my computer, I have to have my installation DVD in to boot.
So now I know I need a bootloader so I don't have to have the DVD in every time.
But the thing is, I don't know which bootloader I need..I have one hard disk in my PC, and that is running Mac OS X, which I am on right now.
So which bootloader do I need, and how do I install it?
Please help, thanks!
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Read the Chameleon FAQ and documentation.
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Hi everyone, I just managed to install the MAC OSX on my PC with the following specs.
MSI P35 Neo 3
Intel Core 2 Duo E6750
Cossir 2GB DDR2
Creative X-fi Extreme
ATI Radeon HD 3800 Series
1st Question
But when I try to boot into the harddisk.. it display with this screen and just hang there after the Apple logo loading screen
(http://img218.imageshack.us/img218/8354/img0876g.jpg)
Anyone know what might cause this error?
2nd Question
So the only way I can get into the OS successfully is using the -X flag command and everything works well.. But can someone teach me how do I set the -X flag command into Chameleon 2 Bootloader so everytime when I choose MAC.. the command will automatic load?
Sorry this is my first time using MAC OS so I not sure the basic in all this. So hope someone can teach me clearly step by step on how about doing it. Thanks!
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hi there!
last time i was investigating how i would be able to run OSX 10.5 on my pc is now approx. 3 yrs ago...
so seemingly a lot has been accomplished in the meantime...
what do i want?
ok - i want OSX SnowLeopard (=> http://www.amazon.com/dp/B001AMHWP8/) - i read this is truly a fullversion...
so... i found several bootloaders and several forums - AND i found YOU! :>
so i think the chameleon approach seems to be the best...
ok... just for making it clear to me:
i got:
- mobo: asus p5q
- intel core2quad 2.4ghz (q6600)
- 8gig RAM (DDR2-800)
- 512meg AMD/ATI 4850
- http://chameleon.osx86.hu/file_download/37/Chameleon-2.0-RC3-r658-bin.tar.gz (http://chameleon.osx86.hu/file_download/37/Chameleon-2.0-RC3-r658-bin.tar.gz)
i will get:
- http://www.amazon.com/dp/B001AMHWP8/ (http://www.amazon.com/dp/B001AMHWP8/)
so, in my fantasy it will work as follows:
- i use your bootloader (so i fire up my machine with the to be created cd)
- the bootloader tells me that i may insert my original snowleopard-DVD
- the setup of SL is running...
- i have mac os x 10.6.1 on my machine...
am i right?!
if so, how do i create a boot-cd from: http://chameleon.osx86.hu/file_download/37/Chameleon-2.0-RC3-r658-bin.tar.gz (http://chameleon.osx86.hu/file_download/37/Chameleon-2.0-RC3-r658-bin.tar.gz)?!
thank you very much in advance!
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I'm currently researching all this Hackintosh business, and I'm trying to build a machine running Windows 7 and OS X, preferably on different HDDs. What I haven't been able to establish is does a Chameleon CD have to be in the drive in order to select which OS to boot into? Or is it a program that runs off the HD without any need for a disc to be in the drive at all times?
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Chameleon is like other bootloaders, you install it to HD and use it to boot the OS you want.
A Chameleon boot CD is really useful for backup and troubleshooting though.
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How do I set Chameleon BootLoader to boot my Leopard install automatically, and in a fashion that bypasses the Chameleon bootlogo as well? I'd also like to set Chameleon to show the available bootable partitions when I hold down a specific key - any key is fine.
I realize that the information is definitely probably out there, somewhere - but it's 4:30am and I needa go da bed.
Thanks for all the help.
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Hey guys.
I have a triple boot system going on right now - Windows Vista (Not working), Ubuntu, and Kalyway 10.5.2
As a helper, I'm using Chameleon v2 RC2 to boot load for me, and I installed through a package posted on InsanelyMac.
But..my DVD drive stopped working? Here's the scoop. As mentioned before, Vista didn't work. So I planned to reformat my HDD and use 7, so I popped in my Kalyway disk (to Disk Utility) and then the screen was just dark..it just hung there for one hour..so I opened my DVD drive and it went to Chameleon. So, I bought a new fresh pack of DVD's from Wal-Mart, and I reburned the .iso on my computer, and then I booted with the DVD in the drive, so then after the Gateway logo it shows a / for like half a second, the screen refreshes, and goes to chameleon..
How odd..my DVD Drive can burn DVD's just fine..yet it stopped reading DVD's upon boot and on a desktop? So, I posted this because I have the slightest feeling it's Chameleon..
Anyway I can remove Chameleon so I can boot into DVD's :O
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Take a look @ Faq#11 + BootHelp.txt for the corresponding kernel flag(s)
btw, if you're able to boot only with the -x flag, nothing works well
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Oh lovely human nature,
Gringo, I see they all took a second to thank you
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lol
what happened here? ;D
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^ yeah it looks like cr_p now, i wish i could move replies up + down but it's all about the timestamp of each post
the title cracks me up but i couldn't stand 3 different identical threads in the forum. instead of locking 3 of them, here comes the merged General Noob/Boon thread for those who don't want to play nice need one
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This looks like the perfect place to ask my question! First, a little info so I don't look like a complete idiot:
My motherboard's an Intel DG45ID (G45 chipset), paired with a 2.8GHz Core2, 8GB, 9500GT 1GB and a 74GB Raptor that I want to install Snow Leopard on. The drive's connected to SATA0, AHCI mode, no other device is connected to the motherboard.
I loved r0m30's idea of a helper partition so I've done that. The 200MB EFI partition is empty, with Chameleon on the 500MB partition. On boot, Chameleon shows up, loads up the four basic kexts (fakesmc, NullCPUPowerManagement, PlatformUUID & OpenHaltRestart) just fine and hands things over to Darwin. I'm guessing that upto this point, I've done everything fine?
Darwin throws up a few USB errors (of which most go away with USBBusFix/Yes) and this is where I'm stuck. The "Still waiting for root device" error. Now my question is two fold, one of which I think I know the answer to.
This has nothing to do with Chameleon, right? It's that Darwin/Whatever can't recognise my SATA controller (ICH10R). I just have to find the right kext and I should be good? Or is there something I'm missing?
My second question is more general, if I can't find a kext that works, a modified kernel should do the trick, right?
I haven't done this a long time, my last hackintosh was a few years ago, with Tiger. I didn't get anything to work but I loved it, things sure have changed since then!
(Oh and I've the Snow Leopard Install Disk restored onto a 8GB USB drive, I did that in a virtual machine and I'm thinking everything's fine with that.)
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A modified kernel won't help you, if it's set to AHCI mode and the drive is really connected to the ICH10, then it's a driver problem.
Chameleon comes with injector kexts that support the ICH10R.
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Hey man, thanks for replying! I think I figured it out - it wasn't waiting for my hard drive, but my USB stick. I think there's a glitch with my motherboard with that. I tried a bazillion combinations of kexts but nothing could get it to detect the USB stick as a source for installation files.
Anyway, so I gave up on a vanilla install and went ahead with something that a dude named Hazard cooked up. It worked fine for me, nearly flawless. But yeah, I ended up with a soup of kexts that I need to trim down. Also, is it just me or is Mac OS really depressing? Everything's grey, grey, grey, some white, grey grey, emo blue, more grey and yeah.
Oh well. I'll try a vanilla install once I get a DVD drive that works.
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YES YES YES FRAK YES!
The problem WAS my motherboard's usb thing ness. I went ahead and bought Mac OS X today, they didn't have the single user one so I got the family pack but yeah, installed it, patched my DSDT, everything's beautiful.
All that's left is the easy stuff, network, audio, EFI String & sleep.
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welcome 7thk: beginning of a great adventure
keep your positiveness/enthusiasm (most people miss the fun part these days)
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Thanks! ;D
Just wrapping up my install here, I got audio working with the latest VoodooHDA (0.2.2) - it's Intel/IDT Audio - mixer & speakers are fine, SPDIF is iffy but I think I'm asking for too much with SPDIF right now. I skipped EFI String for now and went with GraphicsEnabler/y, which works just fine with RC4 + 9500GT 1GB. Networking was a simple kext, Intel82566MM.kext. I'm using VoodooPowerMini for speedstep.
All that's left is Sleep, which is proving to be an issue, but hey, I really can't complain. Maybe when I get the itch, I'll try experimenting with DSDT, but I couldn't be more happier with how things have worked out.
(http://thumbnails21.imagebam.com/6004/5457d560037053.gif) (http://www.imagebam.com/image/5457d560037053)
Man oh man, I'd forgotten just how awesome iStat Menu is (I had a trio of macs a couple of years ago).
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Nice style 7thk :)
You'll find a good starting point for editing DSDT, over @ insanelymac (thread about p5k pro) by Master Chief. His oldskool commenting habits rock.
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I'd like to understand the values to be used with the 'Default Partition' key
diskutil list shows:
/dev/disk0:
0: GUID_Part....
1: EFI
2: Apple_HFS my Hackintosh HD (disk0s2)
/dev/disk1:
0: GUID_P...
1.. EFI
2: Apple_HFD HackintoshInstallDVD (disk1s2)
Do these values map directly to the Default Partition key or is there more I need to take into account?
Chameleon presently defaults to disk1s2, I'd like it to default to disk0s2. I've read that Chameleon defaults to the first partition on the first disk, so there must be something here I don't yet understand about the boot process and the order of the devices.
Thanks in advance.
Sincerely,
- Jack
<key>Default Partition</key>
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Within Chameleon, I see that there's an /Extra/Extensions folder -
I'd like to add support for my Audio Device, an AD2000B & I've found a kext for it.
Is dropping the kext in this folder all thats needed?
I've also seen things like the kext helper and am wondering what is the difference between two approaches.
Thanks,
- Jack
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This is covered in the FAQ and documentation, as is your previous question.
The syntax for 'Default Partition' is hd(drivenumber,partitionnumber).
Kernel Extensions go in /Extra/Extensions or /Extra/Extensions.mkext.
You can use Kext Utility from applelife.ru to build the mkext or you can do it yourself from the command line.
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Nice style 7thk :)
You'll find a good starting point for editing DSDT, over @ insanelymac (thread about p5k pro) by Master Chief. His oldskool commenting habits rock.
Sweet, I'll look in that. Thanks again! Also, I got SPDIF working, no 5.1 passthrough but then there's almost no way to get that on a Mac, so hey. :)
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Thanks Gringo,
I had tried Default Partition hd(1,2) but got a Kernel panic. Is the numbering is off between what Diskutil -list shows and what Chameleon is looking for? Ie is it possible that disk1s2 is really hd(2,3)?
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As for the kext, when I drop them into the /Extra/Extensions folder - does Chameleon present that to the OS as if it were coming from the /Library/Extensions folder?
The FAQ makes it sound as if I only need the kexts or the mkext, but not both - is that right?
Thanks for pointing me to applelife.ru, I'll check them out and seek a FAQ on the kext utility.
Thanks again Gringo this as well as many of your other posts have been extremely helpful in getting me to the point I am at right now!
- Jack
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You're welcome, I'm glad you find my posts useful.
Is the numbering is off between what Diskutil -list shows and what Chameleon is looking for?
The drive number that goes in Extra/com.apple.Boot.plist seems to be relative to the drive that Chameleon is installed on. But I've never tried using Chameleon on one drive to boot OS X on another, physical drive. I don't know what would happen then.
The order the drives are plugged in and the order your BIOS is set to boot from them doesn't seem to be as important to Chameleon in regards to what it sees as the first drive, as where Chameleon is actually installed.
If you consider this for a while it seems like bad behavior for a boot loader - but since Chameleon is also kind of a BIOS replacement (well, EFI replacement) I think it makes some sense.
On my system, physically, the first drive (SATA port 1 and drive 1 in the BIOS) is actually my Windows drive.
I use the BIOS' built-in boot selector (F8) to pick my second hard drive whenever I want to boot OSX.
From then on in, according to Chameleon and Disk Utility, this drive becomes the first drive. So I use hd(0,2) in com.apple.Boot.plist. 0,1 is the EFI partition, where Chameleon is installed and 0,2 is my Snow Leopard installation.
I've sometimes seen Disk Utility getting confused and seeing my OSX drive as the second disk though (which, in all fairness, it is). But Chameleon always auto-boots with hd(0,1) no matter what Disk Utility says once the system is running.
As for the kext, when I drop them into the /Extra/Extensions folder - does Chameleon present that to the OS as if it were coming from the /Library/Extensions folder?
It's irrelevant. You could load a kext from your desktop if you wanted to. Extra/Extensions just happens to be where Chameleon looks for them.
The FAQ makes it sound as if I only need the kexts or the mkext, but not both - is that right?
I've found that some kexts will only work when loaded from the .mkext, some won't. I keep both an mkext and an extensions folder, it doesn't seem to cause any problems with particular set of kernel extensions I'm using and this way I don't have to think about it.
As for Kext Utility, just drag and drop your /Extra/Extensions folder on its icon and it will create an mkext for you in the Extra folder. Don't use it to fix kext permissions in S/L/E though (it does that automatically if you run it by itself) because it sets the wrong permissions.
If you can't find it at applelife.ru, visit insanelymac and search for user cvad, there's a download link to it in his signature.
"...and the music keeps on playing on and on.."
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Thanks Gringo!
It helped a ton knowing that yours was hd(x,2)
I must have had a typo - I know I tried hd(1,2) before, but it hadn't been working mine ended up being hd(1,2)
I've been reading up on the DSDT stuff you pointed me to - So far I've already benefited as iStatMenu now shows CPU temps - so an extra thank you for that!
My next task is to get Audio working, hopefully via the DSDT.
Thanks again!
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Gringo,
I've tried dumping the DSDT from Ubuntu 9.1 and it does not have an audio section.
Do you have any suggestions on what to do next?
- Jack
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Sure.
Visit the "[HOW TO] Patch AppleHDA" thread over at the Project OSX forums (sorry, can't link it's against the rules) and use the DSDT HDEF patch provided by THe KiNG and the AD2000B.kext patched by Phoenix Wright (see page two - but read the whole thread and learn cool stuff).
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Thanks Gringo - hopefully I can learn something from those (almost) links!
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Hi all,
All the same whether with installer or with hand, i do not have a success.
Which i make wrong, formatting etc. ???
If i copy an image (dmg) BootThing on USB Stick, it works.
Does someone have an idea?
Thank you for each assistance.
parcival
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Hi parcival
I understand that English is not your native language but please Rule, FAQ + edit your question.
I don't know of anyone here with a crystal ball
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Hi,
I'm currently running 10.6.2 but don't know how I did get there ;-) I'm trying to install a fresh copy on a 1.5TB samsung (in combination with Ex58-UD5, 6GB, HD4870). My running OSX helps me with all the tools, but I can not get past the point of making an active Chameleon RC4 HDD disk (for the last 3 days...)
I got a bootable disk by using EFI, but I want to have it working with Chameleon. Using the standard manual does not result in the desired end product ;-)
My HDD is partitioned (Case sensitive Journalized) within OSX. (linux naming convention). My basis is this tutorial (http://www.insanelymac.com/forum/index.php?showtopic=185097). Everything is fine except the booting part. Manual copying of RC3/4 found on this site don't result in the desired solution.
What's the best next step ?
Thanks for ANY useful help
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I've been very careful to follow the Chameleon installation instructions, but I just can't get this to do what it's supposed to do. I've tried installing it with the flash drive partition table as GUID and as MBR and get the same result for both: after i finish installing everything in the terminal, a file called "boot" is clearly on the flash drive, so I eject it and plug it into the eee 901, in which it does nothing. The computer sees that the Cruzer is plugged in but does not see anything on it to boot from. Interestingly, when I plug the flash drive back into my Mac, I'm told it's unreadable and needs to be initialized.
Any help would very much be appreciated. Thanks in advance.
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Hello,
i have an Q9300 and the fsb, stepping, multiplier and so on is wrong.
it should be at 2.5Ghz but its running at 3Ghz.
Any chance to redetect the right values to get the right CPU speed ?
i have searched but didnt find an fix.
My System:
SnowLeopard 10.6.2 using Vanilla Kernel@64bit
Chameleon 2.0 RC4
Intel Q9300
Intel DP43TF
Geforce GTS 250 Graphics
8GB Ram
thx a lot
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set FSB and CPU clocks in /Extra/smbios.plist.
http://forum.voodooprojects.org/index.php/topic,85
@myhobby: don't format as case-sensitive, it brings nothing but trouble.
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I installed OSX on my MSI Wind with Chameloen RC4, WinXP still there. I thought it worked fine until I tried to boot from my USB-DVD by pressing F11 and selecting the DVDdrive, when the Chameleon Bootloader appears again and no option for a boot from the optical drive. So I even can not install anything now. Anybody knows how to fix it? I deleted the OSX partition, beause I wanted to make a clean install of SL anyhow. The Chameloen stuff is on an USB-HDD by the way.
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There is nothing to fix. When installed to HDD, Chameleon cannot boot from optical drives.
You need to make a Chameleon boot CD to be able to boot from an optical drive.
Guide:
http://forum.voodooprojects.org/index.php/topic,484.msg2131.html#msg2131
You can install retail without a boot CD if you use Apple Disk Utility to 'restore' the contents of the retail DVD to a hard drive partition. Then use Chameleon (installed to your HDD) to boot the installer.
Of course you would need a working OS X installation to do that. As long as it is compatible with your hardware, any nasty old hackintosh distro DVD will work for this purpose.
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I have 10.5.8 running on my second partition. On the first one, I used to have Vista, which I deleted later.
I would like to know if there is a way to install Snow Leopard on the first partition and boot with the Chameleon on the Leopard partition.
In other words, assuming I installed all the necessaray kexts for snow leopard, would I be able to boot it with the chameleon, which is installed on my Leopard installation.
I am also thinking about deleting the chameleon on leopard partition (I don't know how to tough) and installed it on the Snow Leopard partiton.
I am aware of the feature that Chemeleon supports Osx specific Extra folder;yet, what is the best pratice in my case.
Thanks,
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best practice would be a separate (small) partition just for Chameleon or the EFI solution
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Then, if I am to install Chameleon on a separate partition, which I've already learned how to do it, could you tell me how I can remove Chameleon on my existing Leopard partition.
Should I delete boot1h and boot0 under usr/standalone/i386 and then install these files on their required partitions. I know I should leave 'boot' file in its location.
In short, what are the files that I have to remove prior to moving Chameleon to a new partition. Lastly, I have MBR formatted harddisk, this wouldn't cause any problem, right?
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Maybe this will help:
http://forum.voodooprojects.org/index.php/topic,1072.0.html
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First of all thank you for having this board! As a real Newbie from OuterSpace, I made some investigations for building a Hackintosh, but I completely got lost in the jungle called 'building your own Hackintosh...'
I'm sure that this won't happen here!
Then my simple question(s): generally speaking, I have a new built computer with 1 HD, 1 partition with Win7 working. I would like to have 2 partitions, one with OS X SL, and the other, for Mrs Bouffski, with Win7. I know how to partition (Parted Magic or a free partition manager). Also it would be no problem to reinstall Win7 if needed, 'cause no data on it yet.
What would be my next step? More specific: what format do I need on the second partition? And do I need a third partition for Chameleon?
I promise to reread your FAQ's, but maybe someone will answer me...
Cheers
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Firrst of all i dig your Vonnegut sig :), please remember to update it with your computer's specs.
About your hack:
MacOS X will need an HFS+ Journaled partition, formatting can be done from booting into the MacOS X retail DVD via DiskUtility.
Before we go on about "if you need a 3rd partition or not", do you have any experience with an OS other than Windows?
If it's not much hassle ($ or otherwise) a 2nd HD could come handy, to save Mrs Bouffski some technical headaches in case things go wrong.
Make sure to check the basics here, most of your questions are already answered
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@rocksteady... Thanks for your quick reply!
On your questions: yes I have some experience, from Windose 2.0 via 3.11 (WfW) to "Se7en"; but almost got insane from this OS. In the last millenium Apple OS 8.2 Classic, crossed my path, and stole my heart...
Furthermore I installed Suse Linux and Mandriva on a PC years ago and recently Ubuntu on a VM driven by OS X (piece-of-cake with VMWare on SnowLeopard)...
Your remark about a second HDD would be the best solution, but I built a PC with a mini-ITX case with a Intel D945GCLF2 motherboard and an Atom330 dual core CPU, 2 GB RAM (max), 320 GB HDD, without DVD (yet)... There is no more space inside the case for whatever piece of hardware... Except a slimline (Sony) DVD burner...
I used a bootable USB-stick to install Win7... So that is (for the moment) a further handicap... Ergo I have to deal with 1 HDD, but I learned Mrs. Bouffski to backup all her data on my FTP-server on the Internet, so that hurdle has been taken... :)
As I promised, I will do my homework (tomorrow), now I need some sleep!
Cheers & thanx again
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Hello and thanks for the great work.
I have currently, a USB Card with 10.6 installer on it, and a chameleon install with boot and Extra. When my PC starts from this USB, I can use it to install 10.6 on to a hard drive parition. I can also use the USB card to boot that hard drive partition once it's installed.
I have some silly questions :
1) boot and Extra are on my USB Card. If I put a boot and Extra on to the hard drive parition, will they be used instead?
2) On the USB Card, boot and Extra/Extensions are for 10.6.[0] they won't work with 10.6.2. If I install 10.6 and then upgrade it, I can't boot it from my USB Card because it panics. I can upgrade the Sleepenabler.kext on my USB Card to the 10.6.2 version, then I can boot the installed 10.6.2, but I can no longer boot the installer. What is the way around this? I want always to be able to boot the installer from the USB Card (so it needs 10.6.[0] kexts) but I also want to be able to use it to boot any 10.6.2 installations I have. Is this answered by question 1?
I'm just trying to understand better how the chameleon boot sequence runs.
Thanks a lot
Gary
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Sure, you can install the boot files onto that hard drive partition as well, but forget that sleepenabler.kext first :) It just causes issues.
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I have already searched the forum topics, and I could not find anything to answer my (mostly simple) questions. So here goes:
I want install Mac OS X 10.6 from the original retail DVD to a number of different PCs. By reading various tutorials and posts, I concluded that the best strategy is...
1. Create a bootable USB stick and install Chameleon on it, along with any necessary kexts.
2. Boot the PC from the USB stick.
3. Select the retail DVD from the Chameleon boot menu.
4. Boot from the retail OSX DVD, and start the Mac OS X install process.
5. Reboot from the USB stick and this time choose the new OSX partition.
6. After Mac OS X boots, install Chameleon to the new OSX partition.
The problem is, I'm stuck at step 3. The Chameleon bootloader boots fine, but the icon for the install DVD does not show. Only the icon for the current Windows partition on the HD is visible.
I tried the rescan CD command (F5) and the rescan devices command (F10) without any success. I tried this with two different versions of Chameleon (RC3 and RC4) on two DIfferent PCs, and I got the same result.
So my main question is, does Chameleon need any special configuration to be able to show the Mac OS X install DVD icon on its boot list?
I'd also like to know if there are any tutorials about Chameleon which explain what each component does.
For example, is the com.apple.Boot.plist file nesserasy for Chameleon to work, or is it optional?
And do the kexts work if you simply place them inside the Extras\Extensions directory, or do I need to do something more? Some tutorials mention creating a kext cache. Is this required, or optional?
There are many tutorials online, but most deal with following steps for specific hardware, and do not explain these basic questions. I have been unable to find answers so far. I'll keep searching, but if someone could post an answer on this topic, I'd be grateful.
[There's a thread we keep open for basic questions, almost identical title too. Teleporting you there]
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Steps 1-6 are fine, you can also achieve step 1 with a bootable CD…
Unless you used /boot instead of /cdboot (from /i386) your DVD should be showing up on your device list
(/boot can not boot optical media, /cdboot does that)
/Extra/com.apple.Boot.plist is necessary, otherwise the default one in /Library/Preferences/SystemConfiguration/com.apple.Boot.plist will take over and you don't want that
Did you try any of the Apps under Spin-Off Projects?
You may also restore your Retail DVD on a usb stick and install this way (much faster).
mkext is recommended, chameleon can read kext(s) form /Extra but some fake kexts have to be part of a mkext in order to load. In other words, do not use kexts that you do not understand/know what they do (to your hardware) (http://forum.voodooprojects.org/index.php/topic,1066.0.html).
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Damn, too slow (but nice feature, reply-posted-while-typing warning)... cdboot already mentioned now, so I am leaving only the first part of my post:
I feel your pain re "It worked for me on <somehardware> with <some prepatched distro> when I tried out the following steps but I am not sure what it all means" - Guides.
However, there is a sticky in this very forum explaining the inner works of Chameleon: (unofficial)Documentation for Chameleon 2 RC (http://forum.voodooprojects.org/index.php/topic,767.0.html)
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Steps 1-6 are fine, you can also achieve step 1 with a bootable CD…
I prefer the USB stick approach, because it allows for easier trial and error with the various kexts. I want to be able to experiment with adding or removing kexts from the USB stick until I find a combination that works, before I add the kexts and Chameleon permanently on the Mac OS X partition of the Hackintosh.
Unless you used /boot instead of /cdboot (from /i386) your DVD should be showing up on your device list
(/boot can not boot optical media, /cdboot does that)
That's what I did wrong then. The instructions I followed to prepare the USB stick mentioned adding boot to the root directory. Not cdboot. I did try to move cdboot to the root directory, but I had renamed it to boot, assuming that the bootloader needed to see a specific name (i.e. boot) in order to recognize the file. This did not work, and I didn't think of simply moving cdboot to the root directory without changing the name. I was looking for a more complicated solution, and the simple solution did not occur to me.
/Extra/com.apple.Boot.plist is necessary, otherwise the default one in /Library/Preferences/SystemConfiguration/com.apple.Boot.plist will take over and you don't want that
Did you try any of the Apps under Spin-Off Projects?
No, I'm trying to find a formula that will work without an existing installation of Mac OS X. I own several Macs, but I have to write an article about building a hackintosh, and I want to find a generic solution that does not require a Mac, and can be completed entirely from Windows.
All the hackintosh-related apps I found so far are Mac-only. Talk about the chicken and the egg. ::)
You may also restore your Retail DVD on a usb stick and install this way (much faster).
mkext is recommended, chameleon can read kext(s) form /Extra but some fake kexts have to be part of a mkext in order to load. In other words, do not use kexts that you do not understand/know what they do (to your hardware) (http://forum.voodooprojects.org/index.php/topic,1066.0.html).
So, can I build a kext cache (mkext) from Windows or a Linux distribution running on VirtualBox? Or does this require a Mac OS X install? (I suspect the latter).
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No, I'm trying to find a formula that will work without an existing installation of Mac OS X. I own several Macs, but I have to write an article about building a hackintosh, and I want to find a generic solution that does not require a Mac, and can be completed entirely from Windows.
All the hackintosh-related apps I found so far are Mac-only. Talk about the chicken and the egg. ::)
Hi kbear
Have you seen this post by r0m30?
http://forum.voodooprojects.org/index.php/topic,911.0.html
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Hi kbear
Have you seen this post by r0m30?
http://forum.voodooprojects.org/index.php/topic,911.0.html
Yea, I've seen it, thanks. :) Only problem is, that guide does not tell you how to install Chamelon on a USB stick, but how to install Chameleon directly on a partition of the Hackintosh PC, which is not what I want to do.
r0m30's guide was very useful in some respects, as in how to use Parted Magic to create the USB stick without using Mac OS X (I actually did it using VirtualBox in Windows, which I think is easier than actually booting from a bootable Parted Magic USB stick, because you can read the PDF with the instructions while you're running the Parted Magic environment).
However, r0m30's instructions assume that you're not going to have a trial-and error approach to the kexts, and that you already know exactly which kexts will work with your hardware configuration. So if you mess up and end up with an unbootable partition, you have to start from scratch. That's why I wanted to have Chameleon installed on the USB stick first, do all my kext tests there, and add chameleon and the kexts to the OS X partition of the Hackinotsh PC only after everything is tested on the USB stick (which I can modify from the Parted Magic environment until I get it right) .
[editorial note: You do not have to start from scratch, you can reboot the pmagic USB, mount the chameleon partition and modify it without reinstalling (add/remove kexts etc) ... r0m30]
I have managed to combine r0m30's instructions with other tutorials that require the use of Mac OS X to create the Chameleon USB stick, but I was stuck because all the instructions I read mentioned the /boot file, and not the /cdboot file.
Thanks to rocksteady, I hope I'll be on track now. I appreciate the help guys. I'll try the /cdboot file tip tomorrow.
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Damn, too slow (but nice feature, reply-posted-while-typing warning)... cdboot already mentioned now, so I am leaving only the first part of my post:
I feel your pain re "It worked for me on <somehardware> with <some prepatched distro> when I tried out the following steps but I am not sure what it all means" - Guides.
However, there is a sticky in this very forum explaining the inner works of Chameleon: (unofficial)Documentation for Chameleon 2 RC (http://forum.voodooprojects.org/index.php/topic,767.0.html)
Thanks! :) I don't know how I missed it. I downloaded other documentation for Chameleon from this forum, but it only covered the basic commands and install procedure. I wish I've seen this sooner...
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......but I was stuck because all the instructions I read mentioned the /boot file, and not the /cdboot file.
Are you planning on using the cdboot file for a bootable USB? I ask because I don't think it will work, as the cdboot is used on a bootable CD only.
Can somebody correct me if I'm wrong here?
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Are you planning on using the cdboot file for a bootable USB? I ask because I don't think it will work, as the cdboot is used on a bootable CD only.
Can somebody correct me if I'm wrong here?
Yes, that's what I'm planning. I'll try it tomorrow, and I'll let you know if it worked.
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kbaer,
did you manage to create the chameleon boot image without needing a working OS X system? If so, it would be great if you could elaborate how it worked or point me to more infos. This would help me a lot to try out stuff.
edit: arrgh.. it was late and I was tired. mentioned r0m30's instructions should cover this. thanks.
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Yea, I've seen it, thanks. :) Only problem is, that guide does not tell you how to install Chamelon on a USB stick, but how to install Chameleon directly on a partition of the Hackintosh PC, which is not what I want to do.
OK, so if you use the guide substituting the USB drive for the internal drive on your target PC you will have chameleon installed. Then:
mkdir -p /c/System/Library/CoreServices
touch /c/System/Library/CoreServices/SystemVersion.plist on the USB drive
[edit: the correct commands if following the guide would be
mkdir -p /c/System/Library/CoreServices
cp /s/System/Library/CoreServices/SystemVersion.plist /c/System/Library/CoreServices/SystemVersion.plist
...r0m30]
You will have a bootable USB that can mount the retail DVD once you get past the KP's.
Then it's boot, KP, google, fix ... rinse & repeat.
When you get the "still waiting for root device" message you have the kext combo that will get you to the installer so you can either run the installer from the USB drive or transfer the kexts to the target drive and use it to install. You can either remove the "Scan Single Drive" key from com.apple.boot.plist and use the USB drive to boot your osx install or install Chameleon on the hard drive.
One caveat, you may still run into issues with your internal hard drives because up until this point you have not accessed them.
....I actually did it using VirtualBox in Windows....
Grrr so many toys so little time....
.... which I think is easier than actually booting from a bootable Parted Magic USB stick, because you can read the PDF with the instructions while you're running the Parted Magic environment...
I've considered posting the instructions on the web and linking them so you could read them using firefox while booted into pmagic but the forum rules prohibit that (for good reason a pdf is forever, a web site not so much).
I don't understand why this would be preferable to rebooting the pmagic USB, mounting the Chameleon partition and modifying the kexts in /Extra/Extensions on the target drive.
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Hi there
I used the iAtkos 7 installer and everything is running fine.
Graphics card took a fair bit of work, however my ram is comming up at the wrong speed.
It should be DDR 3 1440 MHz, but the system detects it as 667 MHZ DDR 2.
My FSB reads wrong too
I noticed the machine identifies itself as a mac pro 2.1. Could that be the reason for the ram speed issue?
Any suggestions on how to alter this? The motherboard identifies the ram correctly on start up.
Not sure if this is the right place, but this is my first post and although i've been a lifelong mac user, i've only been into hackintoshing a few months.
Here's my specs as they should be:
Vanilla Kernel
Leopard 10.5.7
Gigabyte X58 UD3R Motherboard
Intel core i7 920 - 2.66 (Overclocked to 3.6)
6GB DDR3 triple channel PCZ Gold ram 1333MHz (Overclocked to 1440 mhz)
NVIDIA GeForce GTX 275 - 896 MB
Need anymore info just let me know
Calum
I've moved your post, it's not a bug report and doesn't belong in the bug reporting sub forum.
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Please search and/or browse around the forum before asking basic questions that have been answered several times already.
http://forum.voodooprojects.org/index.php/topic,85
Set up /Extra/smbios.plist with correct clock speeds for your RAM and FSB, and spoof any Mac model you want. You could use MacPro4,1, as you have an i7 CPU. Refer to the docs and the FAQ, also google smbios.plist.
Delete your existing smbios injector kext from /System/Library/Extensions (if any), and make sure your AppleSMBIOS.kext is unmodified.
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I don't think it will work, as the cdboot is used on a bootable CD only.
Did not work for me, only with boot. Bummer.
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r0m30, rocksteady and Blackosx first of all, I appreciate all your help. :-*
Now for the next round of stupid questions ;)
I tried to put cdboot (instead of boot) in the root directory of my Chemeleon USB stick. As Blackosx predicted, it didn't work. (Chameleon failed to load).
Of course, the obvious solution would be to create a Chameleon bootable CDRW to start the Mac OS X retail installer, install Mac OS X on a partition, and then use the Chameleon USB stick for all the kext experiments.
The only problem is, how do I make a Chameleon bootable CDRW without using an existing Mac OS X installation? I'll have to google it (of course), but if you know of a tutorial about this, please post the link.
OK, so if you use the guide substituting the USB drive for the internal drive on your target PC you will have chameleon installed. Then:
mkdir -p /c/System/Library/CoreServices
touch /c/System/Library/CoreServices/SystemVersion.plist on the USB drive
I tried this. The Mac OS X install DVD icon did not appear. I only got a new icon which represented the Chameleon USB partition. I also got an error message "failed to parse the .plist" (or something similar) which is not surprising, since I created an empty SystemVersion.plist with touch. So I copied a real SystemVersion.plist from a Leopard installation on my Mac, and got rid of the error. Still the Mac OS X install DVD icon does not appear on the Chameleon partition list. (Needless to say, I tried F5 and F10. No joy.).
You will have a bootable USB that can mount the retail DVD once you get past the KP's.
Then it's boot, KP, google, fix ... rinse & repeat.
On the risk of sounding incredibly stupid... what's KP? The olly KP I know is the one you do in the Army ???
When you get the "still waiting for root device" message you have the kext combo that will get you to the installer so you can either run the installer from the USB drive or transfer the kexts to the target drive and use it to install. You can either remove the "Scan Single Drive" key from com.apple.boot.plist and use the USB drive to boot your osx install or install Chameleon on the hard drive.
One caveat, you may still run into issues with your internal hard drives because up until this point you have not accessed them.
I did not get that far (obviously) but I'm not very clear on what you mean either. Right now these are the installation steps as I understand them:
1. Create a bootable USB stick and install Chameleon on it, along with any necessary kexts.
2. Boot the PC from the USB stick.
3. Select the retail DVD from the Chameleon boot menu.
4. Boot from the retail OSX DVD, and start the Mac OS X install process.
5. Reboot from the USB stick and this time choose the new OSX partition.
6. After Mac OS X boots, install Chameleon to the new OSX partition.
Now it seems I may have to replace the USB stick in step 1 with a CDRW, in order to get Chameleon to see the Mac OS X install DVD. However, I don't see why I'd need to put the Mac OS X installer on the USB stick (unless I wanted to make modifications to the installer so that it does not require a GPT partition so I could install Mac OS X on an MBR partition).
BTW, I had already removed the "Scan Single Drive" key from com.apple.boot.plist during all my previous tests.
I don't understand why this would be preferable to rebooting the pmagic USB, mounting the Chameleon partition and modifying the kexts in /Extra/Extensions on the target drive.
I assume by this you mean using VirtualBox. Well, apart from being able to have the pdf open while you type the commands in Parted Magic, it can be a bit faster if you have a second PC (say, a laptop) with VirtualBox open while you're installing Mac OS X on a Hackintosh PC. This way you can have all the advantages of your normal working environment in Windows, plus the parted Magic Environment, while you're experimenting with the Chameleon USB stick. Also, in my specific case, it's nessesary in order to take screenshots of Parted Magic for my article. :)
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You won't need any data from the retail DVD to create a chameleon-boot-cd, I do not really understand why there even should be /System/Library/... on the chameleon partition.
Not exactly what you are looking for, but there is a ready-made preboot.dmg attached to this post (http://forum.voodooprojects.org/index.php/topic,484.msg2131.html#msg2131) from Gringo. Under linux you can decompress it with dmg2img, mount it, customize, burn.
heureka! chameleon's boot does scan usb-drives, does it? so you could dump the retail dvd to a usb-drive or key. That way it should work without needing Os X.
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Oops! We're in the newcomers thread. Apologies, should have been clearer: yes /cdboot for .iso images to be burnt into a cd. /boot for usb sticks/hds.
I mentioned that you can restore the retail DVD into a usb stick since it's ridiculously faster than booting the dvd.
By the way:
... but I have to write an article about building a hackintosh, and I want to find a generic solution that does not require a Mac, and can be completed entirely from Windows.
Where do you plan to publish your guide (online/print)? Are you willing to provide support for your guide? Both questions based on one simple fact: We're full of guides claiming easy-this easy-that. If all this was so easy all OSx86 forums would have a couple of HELP! threads. If you spend some time here you'll find out that we re-direct users asking for support about guides followed elsewhere, back to where said guides are hosted. We wouldn't like having users saying "yo d00dz I followed kbear's guide but..."
Help us end this nonsense
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Where do you plan to publish your guide (online/print)? Are you willing to provide support for your guide? Both questions based on one simple fact: We're full of guides claiming easy-this easy-that. If all this was so easy all OSx86 forums would have a couple of HELP! threads. If you spend some time here you'll find out that we re-direct users asking for support about guides followed elsewhere, back to where said guides are hosted. We wouldn't like having users saying "yo d00dz I followed kbear's guide but..."
Help us end this nonsense
I'm a freelance writer, mostly for print magazines and computer books. The hackintosh article is for a magazine called Total Xaker (http://www.facebook.com/pages/total-XAKER-Magazine/109599236870) [sic]. I usually write reviews for Mac hardware and software, and sometimes hacking howtos, such as firmware hacking for AppleTV, Sony eBook Reader, iPhone, WDTV Live, etc. The magazine is published in Greece, so I doubt you'll have to worry about people asking questions about my guide :)
In any case, my goal is to create a step-by-step guide that will be as simple to follow as possible, for people who have no experience with Macs or Unix. The guide will be as generic as possible, i.e. I will not mention specific hardware configurations if I can avoid it. I also want the steps to be implemented using only freeware tools in Windows (which is what most readers will have). Your help and this forum in general has already been an invaluable resource for my article, and I appreciate it.
Been a long-time (since 1989) Mac user, I was never that interested in Hackintoshes, but now that I am researching the subject, I find it fascinating. It feels really weird to see the Apple boot logo appearing on a PC screen.
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Thank you for leveling with us kbear, I appreciate straightalkin'. I wasn't looking for details of your business, just wanted to make clear what we do and what we don't deal with in this forum.
If you're willing to start + stand behind a thread in your language here, you -just like anyone else- are more than welcome to do so. It's what all members of the Moderation Team do, while helping w/ Documentation, Code, Graphics etc.
...It feels really weird to see the Apple boot logo appearing on a PC screen.
heh
It also feels weird hearing all those fanatical ex-Apple-haters asking all those questions. You can easily tell when someone never used a Mac before the hack-era.
Back to troubleshooting...
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First, sorry KP is Kernel Panic......
As I understand it, what you are trying to do is not possible with the current version of Chameleon. I believe that there is an issue with the BIOS enumerating CD/DVD drives during boot. The only time a CD/DVD drive is in the device list passed to Chameleon is when it is the selected BIOS boot device. That's why all of the CD boot methods require you to burn a CD/DVD to start the process.
The process I developed works around this issue by adding the mach_kernel and /System/Library/Extensions to the Chameleon boot partition. This allows you to select the Chameleon partition as the boot device. The kernel and kexts then load from the boot partition on your first boot. During kernel initialization the entire device tree is enumerated, the kernel does not rely on the BIOS device list so it finds the CD/DVD drive. By passing the kernel parameter rd=disk?s3 you tell the kernel to use the DVD as its root device. then you run the installer from the DVD.
I tried this. The Mac OS X install DVD icon did not appear. I only got a new icon which represented the Chameleon USB partition.
That is exactly what you want, if you chose the Chameleon partition as your boot device it will load the kernel and /System/Library/Extensions from there and then by passing the rd= parameter the loaded kernel will mount the DVD and allow you to run the installer.
If you read this (http://forum.voodooprojects.org/index.php/topic,911.msg4010.html#msg4010) post, at the end I explain the boot process and how I twist it to get the installer app to run without actually booting off of the DVD
I also got an error message "failed to parse the .plist" (or something similar) which is not surprising, since I created an empty SystemVersion.plist with touch. So I copied a real SystemVersion.plist from a Leopard installation on my Mac, and got rid of the error. Still the Mac OS X install DVD icon does not appear on the Chameleon partition list. (Needless to say, I tried F5 and F10. No joy.).
Sorry, I knew SystemVersion.plist had to be there for Chameleon to offer it as a boot device, I didn't know it read it too.
I did not get that far (obviously) but I'm not very clear on what you mean either. Right now these are the installation steps as I understand them:
1. Create a bootable USB stick and install Chameleon on it, along with any necessary kexts.
2. Boot the PC from the USB stick.
3. Select the retail DVD from the Chameleon boot menu.
4. Boot from the retail OSX DVD, and start the Mac OS X install process.
5. Reboot from the USB stick and this time choose the new OSX partition.
6. After Mac OS X boots, install Chameleon to the new OSX partition.
Step 3 is the issue, as noted above unless you boot from a CD/DVD it is not in the device list passed to Chameleon, you have to select the the Chameleon partition and then tell it to use the DVD as it's root device with the rd= parameter.
Now it seems I may have to replace the USB stick in step 1 with a CDRW, in order to get Chameleon to see the Mac OS X install DVD.
If you're dead set on having the OSX install DVD show up as a selection in Chameleon then yes, you need to replace the USB drive with a CDRW. If you're willing to select the Chameleon partition then no you can use a USB drive.
However, I don't see why I'd need to put the Mac OS X installer on the USB stick (unless I wanted to make modifications to the installer so that it does not require a GPT partition so I could install Mac OS X on an MBR partition).
Nothing in what I've posted says anything about copying the installer to the USB drive, just mach_kernel, /System/Library/Extensions and SystemVersion.plist. The entire DVD is over 6GB, I have you copy less than 300mb to the USB drive.
I assume by this you mean using VirtualBox.
No, by this I meant experimenting on a USB drive instead of the Chameleon partition of the drive you are going to install OSX on. You said...
However, r0m30's instructions assume that you're not going to have a trial-and error approach to the kexts, and that you already know exactly which kexts will work with your hardware configuration. So if you mess up and end up with an unbootable partition, you have to start from scratch. That's why I wanted to have Chameleon installed on the USB stick first, do all my kext tests there, and add chameleon and the kexts to the OS X partition of the Hackinotsh PC only after everything is tested on the USB stick (which I can modify from the Parted Magic environment until I get it right) .
You don't have to start from scratch, you can reboot the pmagic USB stick, mount the Chameleon partition and add/remove kexts, add DSDT, modify com.apple.Boot.plist or make any other modifications you want.
The method I developed relies on (apparently esoteric) knowledge of how OS's bootstrap. I jump in at a convenient place and move where the OS would "normally" run to the place where I want it to run.
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I do not really understand why there even should be /System/Library/... on the chameleon partition.
Because you don't have a working OSX yet, you need to load the kernel from somewhere, see my previous post for all the gory details. This is about getting your very first h@ck without having access to any other computer running OSX.
heureka! chameleon's boot does scan usb-drives, does it? so you could dump the retail dvd to a usb-drive or key. That way it should work without needing Os X.
And then the installer app will suggest very unhelpfully that you clean the DVD and try again ???
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hahah... I see.
Thanks for the explanation!
Will try it out when I got more time to spare.
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Just found out how to generate the chameleon boot cd without Mac OSx - surprisingly simple:
sorry for the noise, this is not working.
simple reason: standard cd iso9xxx does not support funky filenames. oddly enough, the cd looks fine when mounted in linux, but it is not when booted. the preboot image is mandatory.
this means com.apple.Boot.plist turns into com~~1 something, and will not be used. one could specify all chameleon options at boot prompt, but the same problem applies for kexts...
kind of defeats the whole idea.
sorry again, and I hope if someone attempted to use this, he/she will come back to this post...
kbear, it can be done relatively easy with linux only and two usb sticks (although one must be 8gb, and it involves dd..). install chameleon to one drive (boot and /Extra only), and dd the osx dvd image onto the other.
Linux
1. Make a folder, lets call it iso
2. Set up your Chameleon files inside the iso folder:
* cdboot
* /Extra/Extensions/<your kexts>
* Themes, smbios.list, com.apple.Boot.plist (with rescan=yes) and so on inside /Extra
3. From one folder above iso, run the following command:
mkisofs -R -b cdboot -no-emul-boot -boot-load-size 4 -boot-info-table -o chameleon.iso iso4. Burn chameleon.iso & off you go
5. panics? change files/configs, rebuild iso, rinse, repeat
Windows
1. Set up your Chameleon files in a folder, with cdboot at its root (see ^^)
2. Get the open-source burning tool InfraRecorder (http://infrarecorder.org/)
3. Select Data CD and add Chameleon files (Extra folder & cdboot)
4. Go to File -> Project Properties -> Boot
5. Add Chameleon's cdboot and set Emulation Type to "None"
7. Burn the cd
Rudimentary com.apple.Boot.plist for cd boot image
<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>
<!DOCTYPE plist PUBLIC "-//Apple Computer//DTD PLIST 1.0//EN" "http://www.apple.com/DTDs/PropertyList-1.0.dtd">
<plist version="1.0">
<dict>
<key>Kernel</key>
<string>mach_kernel</string>
<key>Kernel Flags</key>
<string></string>
<key>Rescan<key>
<string>Yes<string>
<key>Instant Menu<key>
<string>Yes<string>
</dict>
</plist>
NOTES: Do not edit .plist files with notepad in windows, as it is likely to screw them up. EditPadLIte (http://www.editpadpro.com/editpadlite.html) and Wordpad are mentioned as alternative solutions, but I have no idea if/why they would work better. If you know more about this, please tell us and I will add it in here. Similary, could someone give feedback if copy&paste works with the above com.apple.Boot.plist, as I had some problems with examples pasted from other guides.
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As I understand it, what you are trying to do is not possible with the current version of Chameleon. I believe that there is an issue with the BIOS enumerating CD/DVD drives during boot. The only time a CD/DVD drive is in the device list passed to Chameleon is when it is the selected BIOS boot device. That's why all of the CD boot methods require you to burn a CD/DVD to start the process.
The method I developed relies on (apparently esoteric) knowledge of how OS's bootstrap. I jump in at a convenient place and move where the OS would "normally" run to the place where I want it to run.
I see now. Thanks for the detailed explenation. (It must be a pain to have to explain the same stuff over and over again. :) I appreciate it.)
The process I developed works around this issue by adding the mach_kernel and /System/Library/Extensions to the Chameleon boot partition. This allows you to select the Chameleon partition as the boot device. The kernel and kexts then load from the boot partition on your first boot. During kernel initialization the entire device tree is enumerated, the kernel does not rely on the BIOS device list so it finds the CD/DVD drive. By passing the kernel parameter rd=disk?s3 you tell the kernel to use the DVD as its root device. then you run the installer from the DVD.
It's a very geeky way to do it (I mean that as a compliment). I'm impressed by your inventiveness. However, I think that for my article I'd better stick to the simpler-to-understand CDRW approach.
I assume by this you mean using VirtualBox.
No, by this I meant experimenting on a USB drive instead of the Chameleon partition of the drive you are going to install OSX on. You said...
However, r0m30's instructions assume that you're not going to have a trial-and error approach to the kexts, and that you already know exactly which kexts will work with your hardware configuration. So if you mess up and end up with an unbootable partition, you have to start from scratch. That's why I wanted to have Chameleon installed on the USB stick first, do all my kext tests there, and add chameleon and the kexts to the OS X partition of the Hackinotsh PC only after everything is tested on the USB stick (which I can modify from the Parted Magic environment until I get it right) .
You don't have to start from scratch, you can reboot the pmagic USB stick, mount the Chameleon partition and add/remove kexts, add DSDT, modify com.apple.Boot.plist or make any other modifications you want.
Yes, I get that now (I didn't before). To answer your question, I think that choosing the USB stick instead of the Chameleon partition to do the kext tests is a purely subjective matter. I agree with you that from a technical viewpoint there's no real advantage. However, knowing that my partition is untouched while I experiment with the USB stick somehow gives me a warm, safe feeling. :)
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Just found out how to generate the chameleon boot cd without Mac OSx - surprisingly simple:
outragedtony, many thanks. This saves me from a LOT of trouble. I hope you don't mind if I rip this off for my article. (I will give the credit for this procedure to you, don't worry :) )
NOTES: Do not edit .plist files with notepad in windows, as it is likely to screw them up. EditPadLIte (http://www.editpadpro.com/editpadlite.html) and Wordpad are mentioned as alternative solutions, but I have no idea if/why they would work better. If you know more about this, please tell us and I will add it in here. Similary, could someone give feedback if copy&paste works with the above com.apple.Boot.plist, as I had some problems with examples pasted from other guides.
This is because UNIX (and Mac OS X) use the line feed (LF) character to mark the end of a line of text. Windows (and the Classic Mac OS) use the carriage return (CR) character. Some word processors are aware of this and fix it on the fly, but Notepad does not. Wordpad acknowledges the existence of the linefeed character, but it also adds carriage returns to every line. UNIX does not mind this, since it ignores the carriage return characters. But the .pist has to have linefeed characters at the end of every line to be readable by UNIX. You can find a more detailed (and possibly more correct) explanation here (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Newline).
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outragedtony, many thanks. This saves me from a LOT of trouble. I hope you don't mind if I rip this off for my article. (I will give the credit for this procedure to you, don't worry :) )
sure, go ahead. give the credit to chameleon developers for creating cdboot. I simply translated the hfiutils command from Distemperus' guide to mkisofs, stripping out the hybrid-disk stuff.
and test it first, I have not tried to load the retail DVD with it! it boots my linux install fine, though, and *should* work (but, never trust someone claiming something "should work").
Thanks for explaining the linefeed/cr thing... "funny" how they still are incompatibilities on such a basic level.
What would be the recommendation for windows users, then? does wordpad also adds lf characters, or only understands them? for quick conversions I found this online dos2unix (http://www.dos2unix.org/).
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Thanks for explaining the linefeed/cr thing... "funny" how they still are incompatibilities on such a basic level.
What would be the recommendation for windows users, then? does wordpad also adds lf characters, or only understands them? for quick conversions I found this online dos2unix (http://www.dos2unix.org/).
WordPad adds CRs and LFs (I just checked it by creating a new file in Windows XP and opening it up from Mac OS X's TextEdit), and as long as you remember to save the file as plain (unicode) text, UNIX should have no problem reading it.
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No idea what happens on the Windows side (I'm lucky enough to not have to use that thing at all) but for MacOS X, a decent native editor is TextWrangler (http://www.barebones.com/products/TextWrangler/), free and includes one of the nicest search/replace implementations I've seen (grep included), zaps text gremlins, etc.
kbear: glad to hear that you'll go for the BootCD/cdboot approach for your article, will save you lots of initial headaches + reams of questions from the ones who'll use your guide. Feel free to dive deep into technical stuff and do a second one for the USB stick approach. Just be prepared to support your guides :) If you decide to use r0m30's ideas/techniques, please take any further discussion @ his dedicated thread.
tony: could you create a brand new topic in this sub-forum with your Lunix/Windows steps referenced above? Just tag it [HowTo] till we polish the FAQ again.
gong! thought you'd tested this
Edit: removed redundant heads-up post for tony's update (http://forum.voodooprojects.org/index.php/topic,942.msg4905.html#msg4905)
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sorry for the noise, this is not working.
simple reason: standard cd iso9xxx does not support funky filenames. oddly enough, the cd looks fine when mounted in linux, but it is not when booted. the preboot image is mandatory.
this means com.apple.Boot.plist turns into com~~1 something, and will not be used. one could specify all chameleon options at boot prompt, but the same problem applies for kexts...
kind of defeats the whole idea.
Thanks for the heads-up. Probably I'll have to use ISO+Joliet format in the InfraRecorder application. Right now I'm completing a different writing assignment. I'll check this out once I'm finished. Have you tried to do it from ImgBurn (http://www.imgburn.com/)? I wrote about it few years ago, and it had many advanced features as I recall.
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No idea what happens on the Windows side (I'm lucky enough to not have to use that thing at all)
You don't know how lucky you are (or maybe you do). Most of my writing assignments are Windows-focused, and I have to use Windows (and by use, I don't mean just run Office once in a while, I mean actually use) almost every day. I really feel relieved when I can boot my Mac Pro back to the OS X partition...
If you decide to use r0m30's ideas/techniques, please take any further discussion @ his dedicated thread.
Will do. :)
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Hi there,
I have followed a fair few guides on installing this and know it can be done but havnt had any luck so far. I tried following your guide with a retail dvd of snow leopard and chameleon 2 rc3 but was stopped at the point where i need to make changes in the Efi partition as i am still fairly new to os x so would grately appreciate some help if possible.
Im using a V5535 with the following specs:
CPU: Intel Dual Core Mobile Socket P 2.17ghz
Memory: 4gb ddr 2 667mhz
Chipset: SIS M672
Graphics: SiS Mirage 3+, Grateful for any help if possible... Dave
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1) I've moved your post here - don't ask for help in the Feature Requests sub forum
2) When asking for help, try to describe the issue you're having as clearly as possible. You will most likely not get any help if people have to guess what your issue is.
3) If you'd read the FAQ you would have found this:
http://forum.voodooprojects.org/index.php/topic,649.0.html
If you follow that, and tell me exactly at which point you're stuck, I can help you.
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Hi guys, some new questions. (actually only one for now :) - this is unrelated to r0m30's technique, so I post it here)
Just found out how to generate the chameleon boot cd without Mac OSx - surprisingly simple:
sorry for the noise, this is not working.[/size]
simple reason: standard cd iso9xxx does not support funky filenames. oddly enough, the cd looks fine when mounted in linux, but it is not when booted. the preboot image is mandatory.
this means com.apple.Boot.plist turns into com~~1 something, and will not be used. one could specify all chameleon options at boot prompt, but the same problem applies for kexts...
kind of defeats the whole idea.
OK, I did some tests on this subject, and I concluded that:
a) outragedtony is right about creating a Bootable CD from Windows. I tried several combinations, and Chemeleon boots, but ignores com.apple.Boot.plist and all kexts. So it's basically useless.
b) there's no way of creating an HFS Chameleon CD and the necessary preboot.dmg without using Mac OS X. (If there is, I haven't found it).
So I'm back to creating a boot USB stick that can boot the retail Mac OS X DVD using parts of r0m30's PDF recipe.
However, reading Chameleon's documentation, I came across this:
boot1h - partition booter for HFS+ that loads the stage2 booter
boot1f32 - booter for FAT32 partitions on MBR
which seems to suggest that if I used boot1f32 instead of boot1h, I could create a bootable Chameleon USB Stick using a FAT32 partition that would be readable from Windows.
This is much better than using an HFS+ partition, because it allows me to to edit its contents (i.e. make changes to the kexts) directly from Windows without having to use PartedMagic.
So I formated my USB stick to MBR/FAT32, and I tried to install boot1f32 using this command (after I CD'd to the i386 directory of course):
dd if=boot1f32 of=/dev/rdisk3s1
However, all this did was to make the FAT32 partition unreadable. I tried this from both PartedMagic and the Mac OS X terminal, and got the same result.
I wonder if anyone can tell me what I did wrong. ???
P.S. I figured out a backup plan: install the Snow Leopard bootcamp drivers on Windows. The new version 3.0 includes HFS read/write capability, so I could create an HFS Chameleon USB stick, and still be able to edit if from Windows. However, I'd prefer not to have to install the bootcamp drivers if I could avoid it with the boot1f32 trick.
P.S2. Unfortunately, it turns out that the Snow Leopard bootcamp drivers for Windows only include HFS reading capability.
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Got a Vista laptop a while ago (Lenovo R61) and i soon got rid of that crap and installed Win7, runs great on it, now i am wanting to install Mac (i know you don't support this kind of info) on a partition i will create and want it to be fully functioning Leopard.
Now my questions is
Will i be able to run Chameleon?
Will i have to install Leopard first then install this or can it go on windows?
Is there a way to bypass the crappy windows text boot loaded and go straight to this?
Sorry if these have been posted i did have a quick scan.
Apppreciated
Simon
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Hi Simon
I recommend you try a retail install of OS X and for that you will find many guides on other forums, or you might try r0m30's guide here (http://forum.voodooprojects.org/index.php/topic,911.0.html). Once you have OS X installed, Chameleon will install easily and you will be able to boot OS X or Windows7 from it.
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Excellent, will this be able to get rid of the crappy Windows text boot manager? or will i have to get into that first?
I have a retail version of OS X so will try tonight. Much appreciated!
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Excellent, will this be able to get rid of the crappy Windows text boot manager? or will i have to get into that first?
Yes, Chameleon can be the default bootloader.
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Excellent, can't wait to get going with this now :D