Exploring the possibilities

[mosslack]

As many of you know, I have been interested in developing multi-OS computers for some time now. I even started the Alt-OS group in hopes getting more folks interesting in this fascinating hobby. But one OS that I dearly love has eluded my efforts to include it for quite some time now. I am of course talking about OS X which cannot be installed (at least a vanilla install) onto an MBR partitioned hard drive. Alas the MBR partitioned hard drive reigns supreme in the multi-OS world and so the only OS X installs that work are those which use a so-called distro.

As my experiments before getting involved in the Hackintosh scene involved a boot manager called Bootit Next Generation, I decided to turn there to see what was available after an absence of about 4 years. What I found was the latest from TeraByte Unlimited, a boot manager named Bootit Bare Metal. 

Bootit BM (crappy name, pun intended), allows use of GPT drives in so much as copying to and from, but not booting from. At least it's a step in the right direction. So far I have been able to copy a retail OS X install from a GPT drive onto a Bootit BM MBR drive and have it boot successfully. The last experiment I did involved installing the iAtKOS L2 distro directly under Bootit BM, which worked like a charm. 

Next I will be trying MyHack installs using retail Lion and ML to see if that works. If it does, and it should, I will be writing a complete guide on installing OS X using Bootit BM. In addition to the added possibilities this will bring to Hackintosh users, it will also eliminate some problems which stem from having non-recognized file systems attached to your Hackintosh on boot. Those of you who double or triple boot now using Chameleon with a Linux distro know what I'm talking about.

From the main system of mosslack...

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[mosslack]

On Feb 14, 2013, at 11:59 AM, mosslack wrote:

Next I will be trying MyHack installs using retail Lion and ML to see if that works. If it does, and it should, I will be writing a complete guide on installing OS X using Bootit BM. In addition to the added possibilities this will bring to Hackintosh users, it will also eliminate some problems which stem from having non-recognized file systems attached to your Hackintosh on boot. Those of you who double or triple boot now using Chameleon with a Linux distro know what I'm talking about.

The experiments were a success. The lengthy guide has been written and is available to view here:

https://docs.google.com/document/d/1lwFmmPHIpTx3Nvi9FqvWPP5EjrQ8UvEr_xlHbRY3MKA/edit?usp=sharing

I don't expect that everyone will want to go this route, but for those who do I think you will enjoy the experience. Nothing like being able to boot almost any operating system you desire each time you turn on your computer. Enjoy.