Mac Os X Snow Leopard 10.6 Original.iso
Ronald Bonk
Being hijacked at home by the flu, this weekend I tried to update my current Leopard setup. I had tried it many times, but until now I haven't found a method to start the installation of the Snow Leopard DVD. Until now, all my setups have been done using the original Apple disc, and I was commited to find a solution to run Snow Leopard as vanilla as possible.
I haven't tried this guide on other systems, but I'll be testing it on a Gygabyte GA-G31M-S2L with a Core 2 Duo E6600 and GeForce 8400 GS, but I think this method could apply to any system capable of running the stock kernel.
Here's a desktop screenshot, showing the system profile with the version of Snow Leopard, the graphics section showing Core Image & Quartz Extreme support, and also a Geekbench run, throwing a not-so-bat 7128 points. You can click on the screenshot to show it in it's native resolution of 1680x1050 pixels.
I've been surprised by the performance of Snow Leopard. I've read a lot of positive comments but it's not until you test it in your own system that you can conclude. It's the same hardware and thus there isn't mre bruteforce, but the system run much more smoothly, and that's what's important in the final user experience, isn't it?
Before dealing with the real installation with the internal drives that had Leopard installed, I've done many tests with an external USB drive. I've used an old 80GB SATA drive attached to a Sharkoon QuickDeck case.
After many trials and errors, when I found the right combination that provided me with an stable setup, I detached the drive from the QuickDeck, labeled it and stored it as an emergency solution to restart a corrupted system, something that can happen quite easily if you plan to apply every patch from Apple.
Run System Update from the Apple menu and you'll get updates for the following software. You can download and apply them automatically or download and save them for later use. This is what I've done because I'll need them again in the test partition.
This is a comprehensive list of every option included in myHack. The texts are obtained from the installer and I've marked green the ones that I've kept, red the ones discarded and blue the ones that I've obtained from another source.
This will install Chameleon 2.0 RC3, PC EFI 10.5, myHack pfix v2.1.1 & a Snow Leopard port of lspci onto the selected volume. It will place a preconfigured com.apple.Boot.plist into /Extra by default. Be sure to further modify it as needed. This will also perform a test to determine if the selected volume is an installation device, if so it will install OSInstall.mpkg & OSInstall framework to enable installation on MBR partitioned devices automatically.
Overwrites above com.apple.Boot.plist with GraphicsEnabler = Y option. This will enable graphics acceleration on most Nvidia Graphics Cards & a few ATI Graphics Cards. NOTE: If this does not work at first try entering -pci1 in the chameleon boot prompt. Read installer documentation for more information.
This will place chocolate_kernel into / and modify the com.apple.Boot.plist to use it by default. This is required to run OS X on otherwise unsupported intel processors (Pentium4, i5, etc). It includes sse3emu for sse2 only processors but there have been reports of instability with some applications, it will not be enabled if your CPU has sse3 support however. This kernel will run most AMD systems as well but it does not include on the fly CPUID patching so if you intend to use this on an AMD system you will need to obtain a third party tool to patch your binaries. For a full explanation of what this kernel can and can not do and when it should or should not be used consult the myHack documentation online. NOTE: Do not use this kernel if you have a Core2 or i7 processor, this kernel has been reported to cause kernel panics on i7 processors and Core2 systems run better with a vanilla mach_kernel.
This will provide PATA (IDE) support for most systems. It will also allow many of you to run your SATA devices with AHCI disabled on most ICH6/7/8/9/10 based motherboards. NOTE: This AppleIntelPIIXATA.kext is a BETA KEXT for Snow Leopard, it has been reported to cause Kernel Panics for some users. The IOATAFamily.kext however, was recently compiled from patched 10.6 source and has no known bugs.
Disables the framebuffer kexts (NVDAResman.kext, ATIFramebuffer.kext, AppleIntelIntegratedFramebuffer.kext) which have been known to cause kernel panics when booting to installation or post-installation environment that does not yet have functional graphics acceleration. [This is NOT required if you are using the GraphicsEnabler or a custom EFI Graphics String in your com.apple.Boot.plist]
Legacy AppleRTC.kext repackaged to function with Snow Leopard. This prevents the "CMOS Reset" error that is encountered on most motherboards running OSx86 10.6. IMPORTANT NOTE: This MUST be removed (and replaced by a dsdt CMOS fix) before booting to an x86_64 kernel.
Disables AppleIntelCPUPowerManagement.kext - this extension is required until you have built a proper dsdt for your system. Without this or the dsdt your system will not boot (kernel panic). IMPORTANT NOTE: It is suggested that everyone use this kext for now even if your system runs fine without it. There is an unresolved issue with the way AppleIntelCPUPowerManagement.kext handles HPET on non-apple hardware that causes the CPU to run much hotter than normal. [This is not required if you are running the "Chocolate" Kernel but it won't cause any problems to keep it.]
Adds Restart and Shutdown functionality for most systems that are using NullCPUPowerManagement.kext. [This is not required if you are running the "Chocolate" Kernel but it won't cause any problems to keep it.]
This kext was running fine with Snow Leopard 10.6.0, but after upgrading to 10.6.2 I got a kernel panic, as netkas says in its blog MacOSX 10.6.2 Released so I proceeded downloading the updated one for 10.6.2
I hope you find this guide useful. I've come across InsanelyMac many times so I think it's nice to contribute when you have success. I'm a spanish speaking person and so the screenshots are in spanish. I'll try to get them in english, although I think they are self explanatory.
I know that there are a lot of Snow Leopard guides in this forum, but this one is pretty straightforward, really easy to follow and it's generic, so if you follow it and choose the right kext for your motherboard you're going to get an install almost 100% vanilla, with an untouched system folder and just a bunch of kexts in the Extra folder.
In SL i take the VoodooHDA.kext, if i put it to S/L/E, everything with shutdown & restart is o.k. But i want it better in /E, then i must put the IOAudioFamily.kext and the OSvKernDSPLib.kext to /E too. Then Audio work fine, but i get the shutdown & restart issue. The problem is the IOAudioFamily.kext, if i delete it from /E, shutdown & restart work again, but Audio don't.
I can successfully get Snow Leopard running on my Asus P5B Deluxe Wifi-AP but I'm having trouble getting the WIFI to work. It's a Realteak 8187L and with the various install discs I've used for Leopard and Snow Leopard, I have yet to get the Wifi working correctly.
I have used the P5B driver off the Asus website, I've used a few kexts given on websites here... the closest I can get is to have the Realtek WLAN Client to display all the WIFI access points (including mine) and I can connect (seemingly) to my own router (o2 thomson) but I dont have internet access when it says Connected in the status. (Router uses WPA2-PSK / AES)
I finaly finished this with my P5W everything works great. For some reason(possibly my flash drive) It took a very long time to install. When it was done everything worked great for my mobo. Except 2 issues.
I have some problems when booting installer. I have usb drive with 2 partitions, first with restored installer + installation of package from your guide, second is empty - for installation. I think i got no KP when booting, but after some time of loading i got this:
Instead, if I choose shutdown, the computer seems to be shutdown, but the power supply is still on and the fans running. The only way I can shut it down completely is by mantaining the power button pressed.
I'm completely new to the whole DSDT file. I understand what it is and how it works, but any way I could get a copy of yours... then to change it to my liking? I have a P5B Deluxe. Did several Leopard installs, just having the Kewts always made installing Leo a breeze, now SL has both.
You only need to run the program, push the button "Extraer DSDT" to extract the DSDT code from your BIOS, and next press "Compilar DSDT" to get it compiled, and with all optimization applied. It can even install the DSDT file if you press "Instalar DSDT".
Thanks for your effort, I'm happy to have found a guide for such "ancient" hardware as the P5B. I'm still happy with it's performance as well, although I merely get 4000 on Geekbench (Core Duo 6600 2.4 G, unmolested )
Your instructions are excellent, I got Snow running nicely on second try. ; ) the only thing I had trouble with were the networkports, I ended up using the Yukon88E8056.pkg and Yukon88E8001 kext from kexts.com. (are there different revisions of this MB?)
Sleep only seems to work halfway, the system seems to shut down but my fans stay on. This doesn't bother me much as I prefer to shut the computer down when not in use. Do you think it's safe (or wise) to remove SleepEnabler.kext and NullCPUPowerManagement.kext?
As a variation from your setup, on install I used the MBR option instead of GUID to dualboot Win7. That way I can "cleanly" boot with EasyBCD without having to go through BIOS. In my experience EasyBCD doesn't recognize GUID-partitions. (Why are so many guides suggesting the GUID-option?)
Nice tutorial: it worked perfectly for me. The only problem is to upgrade. I downloaded the 10.6.2 update from Apple, but when i start it it says that the hard disk doesn't require the necessary conditions to install SL (?!) Any idea ?
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