Testing Grounds

Please see update at end of post!

In previous posts I showed you how to install Tiger and Leopard on your boring PC and cut its chains of slavery to Windows operating systems. Installing Tiger involved quite a bit of work, and may have taken someone with advanced knowledge of computer software an entire weekend to perfect. Drivers were hard to come by, and it was largely luck of the draw if you were able to get your particular hardware to work with Tiger. Leopard was an evolutionary step forward, automating much of the process and having great compatibility with PC architecture. More modern devices are supported automatically, both through default Leopard software, and from the lovely folks who compiled these hacks in order to liberate OSX for the masses.

OS X Leopard was cracked for PC consumption the day of its release. This was mostly accomplished because Leopard was meant from the beginning to be used on computers with the x86 Intel architecture. The roadblock keeping OS X from naturally running on any pc is something called EFI, or Extensible Firmware Interface. The EFI that Leopard uses is only tooled to work with Apple hardware, which means that it needs to be patched. The original method of patching was to use a thumbdrive attached to the computer and utilize the terminal to transfer files from the thumbdrive to the operating system files of Leopard. Compared to installing Tiger onto a PC, this method was ridiculously easy and was all that was required to have a successful boot of Leopard. But a better solution is now available, one where no thumbdrive is required and installation is streamlined and so easy that nearly anyone can do it.

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This tutorial is a simple guide for showing someone how to upgrade their install of 10.5.1 Leopard OSX86 to 10.5.2. For those of you who have suffered through an Apple update and have had a bricked machine, this is a good alternative.

If you have not installed 10.5.1 Leopard, my tutorial can be found here:

http://tgrounds.blogspot.com/2008/03/osx-leopard-1051-on-pc.html

Let me first explain that this update is not perfect. By that I mean that it may, in fact, do exactly what the Apple update will do to your system – brick it. It all depends on your system configuration.

For example, I encountered a serious problem during my experience of upgrading. The install went perfectly fine, but when it rebooted and the white apple loading screen came up for a few seconds, the monitor turned black and said it lost signal. I waited for about 2 min because the computer seemed to be still loading and eventually the Leopard desktop came up like nothing had happened. I later traced the problem to a graphics card issue. This is just one example of what may happen if your upgrade goes wrong.

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In a previous post I showed you how an ordinary and boring windows PC could be converted into a OS X Tiger powerhouse. That project might have taken someone with advanced knowledge of computing an entire weekend to perfect. The most difficult part of the operation was ensuring that all of the computer components worked correctly. Improvements have been made since Leopards release, and more modern devices are supported automatically. Needless to say, this is a handy feature for people with cutting edge computers.

OS X Leopard was cracked for PC consumption the day of its release. This was mostly accomplished because Leopard was meant from the beginning to be used on computers with the x86 Intel architecture. The roadblock keeping OS X from naturally running on any pc is something called EFI, or Extensible Firmware Interface. The EFI that Leopard uses is only tooled to work with Apple hardware, which means that it needs to be patched. The original method of patching was to use a thumbdrive attached to the computer and utilize the terminal to transfer files from the thumbdrive to the operating system files of Leopard. Compared to installing Tiger onto a PC, this method was ridiculously easy and was all that was required to have a successful boot of Leopard. But a better solution is now available, one where no thumbdrive is required and installation is streamlined and so easy that nearly anyone can do it.

(continue reading…)

Putting the OSX operating system on a PC might sound intimidating at first, but a person new to installing OSX86 can easily get it perfected in a weekend. Some would say you can get it done in much less time, but there are usually hiccups, and to be on the safe side, you need to account for those hiccups. For the most part, those hiccups include audio issues and ethernet issues, and occasionally a video card issue. It takes a while to discover the fixes for these, but after you apply them, they usually work perfectly. OK, to get started you will have to have the following pieces of the puzzle:

• A PC that meets the compatibility requirements for OSX86 you can find this list at
• OSX86 Project HCL Wiki
• Blank DVD-R
• Broadband connection
• Software for burning an iso to a disk, like Nero for example

There you go, that’s it! Now you can start the process. But before you do, you need to understand a few basic things.

1. YOU HAVE TO BACKUP YOUR STUFF!!!
2. It is only legal to install OS X on a PC if you are an apple developer, and are in good with the folks at Apple. But if that were the case, you probably don’t need this guide, so most people should probably stop reading now. For those more adventurous, keep readin.
3. I AM NOT RESPONSIBLE FOR ANY DAMAGE THIS MAY CAUSE this is a tip showing how one might go about putting OSX on a Dell, I in no way condone doing so. Any damage to hard drives, data, or any other unforeseeable issues are not my fault, you brought them on yourself.

Now that we have the pleasantries out of the way, we can get down to the nitty gritty. You have to find a copy of the Jas installation DVD version 10.4.8. You might possibly want to start looking in Pirate Bay or the other usual sites. Keep in mind the legal stuff if you decide to do so. Then your going to need to burn that ISO to a disk, you might have some software that will do it for you, otherwise use Nero. Let the fun begin.

1.) BACK EVERYTHING UP!!!!!

2.) With the Jas 10.4.8 disk in hand, put it in your DVD-ROM drive in the computer and reboot. Press any key to continue, and let it load up with its crazy text screens.

3.) Let it spin for a while, depending on your exact hardware configuration, it could take anywhere from 2 – 10 min. Be patient young padowan. Eventually a blue screen with a pinwheel will come up and stare you in the face for about a min.

4.) Then a language selection screen will pop up, select whatever works for you, for me its English, and click the arrow

5.) An introduction screen will pop up, click continue:

6.) The next screen asks you where you would like to install OSX, but seeing as how you have a PC, nothing is available.

Don’t worry! go into the utilities button in the upper left hand corner and click on Disk Utility. In about a minuet the Disk Utility Screen will pop up:

7.) Select your hard drive, and click on the erase button. Then for the format select the Mac OS Extended (Journaled) and name it whatever you want. Untitled is so drab, make a good name. When your done with that, click the erase button.

8.) Erasing won’t take too long, and when you can see that its renamed the hard drive (Or hard drive partition) click the red x in the corner to exit out. The disk will spin for a bit, then get back to the installation screen seen in step 6, only this time it will have the picture of a hard drive in it. Click on this Hard Drive, click continue, and come to the next screen.

9.) This screen is called installation options. It will have various extras you may or may not need to install OS X onto the PC. It has an AMD processor option, an Intel option, various language supports, printer support, X11, NVIDIA Titan/ATI drivers for graphics cards (Install only one if you need to, I made the mistake of choosing both and it screwed it up a bit) And if somewhere in the options there is a choice between SSE2 or SSE3, pick only one (SSE3 if you can, its the bomb), otherwise it will mess something up. But if there is only one choice(SSE2/SSE3), that makes it easier. Depending on your language and hardware setup, this step is crucial. This one screen can make or break your install, so choose wisely. If you screw something up its easy to start over, and if you do end up messing it up, don’t worry, it happens to everyone.

10.) After you’ve decided your installation fate, click the button. I’m pretty sure once you click that button, there is no going back. you can pull the plug on the computer, but other than that I think its full steam ahead. OSX will install after a thorough disk check. Unless time is an enormous factor, Don’t skip the disk check! It checks the DVD for errors, I made the mistake of doing that once and paid for it with about 5 wasted hours of frustration. My install was somehow corrupted and i had to re-download the torrent. Hiccups people, they happen.

Like most installations on PC hardware, the length of time all depends on your hardware configuration. It usually takes about an hour, so don’t worry about the time factor.

11.) Believe it or not, the hard parts are over! Once the installation has finalized, optimized, and caused you to hold your breath, OSX will need to restart. When your PC/OSX86 beast restarts, remove the installation DVD and go through the setting up your Mac steps. It might not recognize your keyboard, it’ll need your time zone, it’ll need other info and so on and so forth. After that you have a brand new Mac!

UPDATE: Because of this articles popularity (over 300 hits per day) and all of the questions people are having, I will not be able to help a
nswer people’s questions anymore. Every computer is a different case, and with many cases OSX86 will not take. Sometimes when it does, the network card will not work, the graphics will be screwy, or the sound might not work. Because of the individuality of each and every computer, I cannot help you. Instead I will show you the places where I got my help at. The main resource for OSX86 problems/solutions is the InsanelyMac Forum.

http://www.insanelymac.com/

It is a website with news, rumors, and most importantly, solutions to various OSX86 problems.

http://forum.insanelymac.com/index.php?s=7aff1723af5a81c52a2a2765cca079df&showforum;=85

That is the link to the Homebrew Macs section of the Forums. It has helped me many times.

I hope you find all the answers you are looking for in these websites. I wish you the best of luck.

Putting OSX on the Dell Optiplex GX620 was the easiest installation I have ever done. Mostly this is from experience, but I had zero hassles. The two main problems are Ethernet and sound. I have fixed the Ethernet, but didn’t get the chance to fix the sound. I have heard fixes for it, and I will look into them. If someone has a surefire way, drop a comment or an email to me.

First follow my first post about how to install OSX on a PC. You won’t need to install either the NVIDIA or ATI options if you have a stock GX620, but you know your hardware configuration better than I do, so its up to you.

Second, the Ethernet problem. To fix this hassle you need to install a .kext file, which I have hosted here:

Broadcom Netxtreme 57xx kext

Third, you will need to know the MAC address of your NIC card. Hopefully you wrote it down somewhere for future use, but seeing as how this is doubtful, I’ll discuss that in the last part of this post

Unzip the file and place it in the Extensions folder. To get there open the Finder and go to your hard drive/partition that has OS X installed on it, and click System > Library > Extensions.

Now, to get it to work you need to go to the Terminal by clicking Go > Utilities > Terminal. Once you get the opening screen you need to type EXACTLY these lines of code. Each line is a new line of code, which means you need to press enter after each line.

sudo -s

chown -R root:wheel /System/Library/Extensions/

cd /System/Library/Extensions

chmod -R 755 AppleBCM5751Ethernet.kext

OK, you’re done with the hard part. Now would be a good time to repair your disk permissions. To do that click on Go > Utilities > Disk Utility, and in that screen select your hard drive/partition with OS X installed.

So, you’ve got your Ethernet card working eh? Almost. I never did test if it works at this stage, but there is one problem. Right now your MAC address is 00:00:00:00:00:00. You’re going to need to change that, so here’s the instructions for that:

Open the terminal again and type in:

sudo -s

ifconfig en0 ether __________

That ___________ is for your MAC address. it needs to be 16 numbers with a : after every two. I found one forum post that used a live Linux cd to find the MAC address, I will link to that list in my next blog post. One thing I never got the chance to test is just BS’ing the MAC address and typing in whatever you want. Try it. Let me know what happens so i can post the results.

OK, after all that junk your Dell Optiplex GX620 should have internet! Woo-Hoo for you!

Thanks to the following thread for information and the original file. Special thanks to Nisa-it
http://forum.insanelymac.com/index.php?showtopic=4987&st;=180&p;=129957&#