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Thread: How to install Mac OS X 10.6 (Snow Leopard) on PC, Laptop & Dell XPS

  1. #1
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    How to install Mac OS X 10.6 (Snow Leopard) on PC, Laptop & Dell XPS

    There is a way by which you can use Mac OS X 10.6 on your pc or laptop. Though there is always an issue of using this operating system with your regular system. The dedicated systems by Apple are much better is true. But somehow for the geeks modification generates more curiosity. The process is not 100% working, but to some extent it is successful if performed well. The procedure is also not much hefty. There are some hardware which will not respond, and as you are modifying your system un-officially. Lots of updates are needed here. The most important here, is to first figure out the hardware compatibility. Many tests are made on various systems, and due to lots of hardware variations there is no exact method available.

    There are many to ready to use disc which need just proper boot and other is automated. I found some of the most helpful tutorials here which can help you to configure Mac OS X 10.6 on Desktops and Laptops. Have a look on the system configuration first before performing any step.

    Reason behind why you cannot use Mac Operating System on Regular System:


    There are many reasons for this which is related to both hardware and software. First and most appropriate is that Mac operating system is specially designed to run and work only Apple motherboards. This is not like Windows or Linux, where hardware and software are designed and manufactured by independent companies. All compatibility issues are resolved by a dedicated experienced team so that end user can work on plug and play basis. On Mac the entire scenario is different. Hardware and software are specially designed to make a Mac system which is not supported by any Third party sources.

    Second it is quiet illegal when you are using a Mac based operating system on non-Apple systems. You might have noticed that even today, you will hardly found an Apple disc for non-Apple systems. They sell but too costly. Your operating system does not remain genuine when you run it on non-Apple system. And any updates received from Apple is enough strong to break your systems compatibility.

    The third reason is that, on some Intel based computer it is possible to run Mac operating system. Dedicated community like Hacktintosh is group of people who try to do modification on Mac operating system and test them on various other systems. Every Mac operating system comes with an End User License Agreement. This prevents the operating system to work on other hardware. While this is not present in Windows or Linux.


    Boot-132 Mac Disc:

    Boot 132 is a kind of bootloader which is used to boot Mac operating system. This was lately provided by Apple for loading XNU kernel. It consists of 3 stages boot process. Those are boot0, boot1 and boot2.

    Install Mac OS X 10.6 (Snow Leopard) on PC:

    Remember that this is just for testing purpose. You cannot use this legally without having a purchased copy from Apple.


    PC components are critical to or not install Mac OS X. Generally it is recommended to have Gigabyte motherboards, processors from Intel Core 2 and nVidia graphics cards.

    System Configuration:
    • Motherboard INTEL DG33TL / Asus P5Q (Intel P45 / ICH10R Chipset)
    • Intel Q8800 2.4 GHz CPU / Intel Core2 Quad Core Q6600
    • Nvidia GF 8800 GT 512MB / NVIDIA GeForce 8600 GT
    • Kext folder which will be needed at the end of setup
    • A system running on Mac Operating system (Required to build HDD)
    • Proper bios and firmware updates.

    BIOS/Firmware Update:

    One of the most important when installing OS X on a non-Apple system you have to run a fresh bios updates. There are specially modified BIOS available on internet for running Mac operating system. You can download and run. Remember that wrong flashing of BIOS can cause permanent death of your motherboard. So this on your own risk. It is better if you have a Gigabyte board. In the case of the Asus P5Q need to upgrade the firmware of the BIOS ROM (Asus P5Q Juzzi BIOS). Download this and copy the files on an usb drive. Boot the PC with the flash drive connected and update the BIOS. The process to update bios is simple. Thanks to ASUS EZ Flash 2 tool. Under Tools you can choose the drive location to update your bios.

    Modifying Bios Settings:

    I prefer to go with Asus P5Q board. I had listed some settings which you will need to modify to make Snow Leopard boot properly.
    • From the Main BIOS screen set SATA as AHCI
    • No go in Advance > Onboard Devices Configuration > and disable Serial Port1 Address & Marvel IDE. Put No for PCIPnP.
    • Go to Power > set no to Repost Video on S3 Resume. Set AHCI to APM Configuration. S3 only for Suspend Mode.
    • Disable Control Drive Xpert and Express Gate under tools. Some of your motherboards have settings to enable boot form OS X/other OS. Check for same and enable.

  2. #2
    Join Date
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    re: How to install Mac OS X 10.6 (Snow Leopard) on PC, Laptop & Dell XPS

    Snow Leopard Installation:

    Using Empire EFI:

    Once you had configured the bootloader your more than half works in done. You can use EmpireEFI boot disc to install this. Boot from Empire EFI and let him recognize the Snow Leopard disc. Then press F5 and hit entire to run installation. After sometime you can see a text mode setup of Snow Leopard.

    1: Choose Language.

    2: You have a process here to create a partition. This is a very important part. Because Mac operating system do not really work on NTFS or FAT drivers. They need a different partition scheme. At the top you can see some menus. Choose Disk Utility. When you click on Disc utility you get a screen where the hard drive is listed on the left side. Choose Volume Scheme > 1 partition > Type a name > Format > Mac OS Extended (Journaled). After select Options > GUID Partition Table > Apply. Once ever tying is done fine, you can see the Continue button to run the installation.

    3: Choose Mac OS X disc by clicking on it. When you clicked the operating system installation begins. You can see a progress bar.

    4: Now after that when you boot with EFI you can see two options in that. First is Empire EFI and second is Snow Leopard. Choose Snow Leopard. You can now see the Welcome video. Proceed to choose the language > keyboard > and a process to create your Apple ID. This all is needed to complete the process.

    5: Now you can use an automated tool myHack Installer, which can help you to install kext bootloader. But a manual setup of this is much better and successful.

    6: The main work here is to install a bootloader so that your hard drive does not rely on EmpireEFI disk to boot every time. For that the best thing is to use Chameleon 2.0 RC3. The setup is easy here and after installation you can see the boot menu with a smiling chameleon. Right your Snow Leopard is installed on the partition /dev/disk0s2.

    7: You have to first unzip the file Chameleon-2.0-RC3-r658-bin.tar.gz and placed in the folder i386 in a Terminal window. To install the boot0 on your MBR follow the below steps:
    Code:
    sudo fdisk -f boot0 -u -y /dev/rdisk0 
    Install boot1h in the boot sector of partition: 
    sudo dd if=boot1h of=/dev/rdisk0s2 
    Install boot in the root directory of the partition: 
    sudo cp boot /
    8: The next step is to install all necessary kext for the team. For the components of the PC can use the compilation of kext that have previously downloaded. The easiest way to install is using Kext Helper. If you need to repair permissions of the application you can use Kext Utility.

    9: To configure your graphic card you can use EFIStudio. For that you will have to Select Device and Display. Form the drop-down you can choose your graphics card. Like Nvidia GeForce 8600 GT - 512 MB in my case. Then click on Add Device and the new window that opens. On that click on write to com.apple.Boot.list, which will add information on your graphics card to the file /Library/Preferences/SystemConfiguration/com.apple.Boot.plist. Reboot your system and you can see the Chameleon bootloader.

    Manual Setup:

    The most requirements here are to have a system which is already running on Mac operating system. Because you cannot prepare the Hard drive to run Mac OS X on other operating system. The compatibility of partition affects here.

    1. Find Disc Utility in system on running Mac operating system

    2. Choose a Hard drive in that. You have to choose the entire hard disk, not just a partition.

    Now go to Partition in Disc Utility and from the menu choose > GUID Partition Table > HFS + File System. This you have to do an any external disc you had attached or a memory card. That will be then used to use install Mac on your Intel based system.

    3. Now you will need a tool called Finder to view the hidden files of package. There are many folders that cannot be found in simple explorer. For that first download the tool and then click on CF-A. By choosing this option you can see the hidden files Mac operating system.

    4. Now open the image file of Snow Leopard that is in dmg format. There are many folders inside that. Which are set in order of System / Installation / Packages. Now run OSInstall.mpkg in that and choose the location to put the operating system.

    5. Now at last do not reboot and move the following file in kext:
    • Chameleon-2-1.0-r431.pkg
    • Chameleon v2 Snow Leopard Support
    • All files ending in. Kext with the program: OSX86Tools
    • Copy and paste the root of location of Leopard hard drive in Extras (/ Extras) and the DSDT.aml smbios.plist

    6. Download and launch the “ Dsdt DSDTPatcherGUI_1” applying the patch to the volume of the White Leopard

    7. Download and launch the “EFI STUDIO”. This will configure your video card. Select from the dropdown menu and click on Add Device. Now from here you can see two screens. series of numbers in the screen below.

    8. After that copy the file com.apple.Boot.plist. This file is located in / Library / Preferences / System Configuration (in the volume of Snow Leopard) and move it on your desktop. Now you have to open the file with plist Editor Pro and modify it like that in the folder for download kext. This done to activate the resolution of the video card and QE / CI. Once done you will need to overwrite the file by copying and pasting it in the Extras folder found in root

    9. Restart your system when you are done with this and check for any errors. If you have to first boot a kernel panic, replace the mach_kernel with the one present in the root folder kext.

  3. #3
    Join Date
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    Location
    Portland, OR
    Posts
    523

    re: How to install Mac OS X 10.6 (Snow Leopard) on PC, Laptop & Dell XPS

    Installing Mac OS X 10.6 (Snow Leopard) on Dell XPS Laptop :

    There are two ways to install Snow Leopard on a Dell XPS laptop. This will also work with other laptops with similar configuration. They are basic method where you do all installation manually and second is by using bootable cd.

    Basic Setup :

    In this the maximum work is done manually. You can also refer the above guides which are for desktop system, but have many process in similar. You just have to follow those steps. There are some additional thing you will have to do here for an laptop which are important. This are mostly post installation procedure. When you are done with your Mac setup you have to make sure that there are some ore-requirements.

    The first is that you have to ensure that you had modified the /Extra/smbios.plist file. This is to modify the bios information of your system. It is just like adding information of Apple laptops on your system. It is an hacking bios technique which is not recommended for all. You had to download and run Smbios.plist file. I had attached an file below. download and unzip it. Once you are done with the setup, use Model Identifier and verify that it is set to Studio XPS 1340. If this is not properly done, Snow Leopard will not work on the laptop.

    Other things are similar, you begin by making the hard drive compatible with Mac installation by modifying the partition scheme.

    Using a Bootable CD for setup

    For this you will need an OSX retail DVD. You can also boot from a usb drive or an external drive. The method to make a manual bootable is mentioned in under Manual setup of Desktop systems. You have to modify the boot drive partitions as hfs+. That can be done easily by using Disc Utility. Now when you are done with you will need to find an Snow Leopard bootable disc which is equipped with boot-132.

    Boot your system from the disc and look for error - Device timeout. The F8 key can be used to run the guy mode of bootloader. Run the setup and choose customize. Follow the screen instructions and customize it as per your need.

    Notes :

    There will be some hardware which will not work. That is due to incompatibility issue of different hardware. Touchpad, wifi, Ethernet, usb, webcam, Bluetooth, etc will work. There are mods available to configure the graphic card, speaker, headphone, hdmi/vga display, touchpad gesture setup, battery, etc. Things which will not work at all are mic, sli, memory card, etc.

    Apple systems are best in security, performance and usability. I did not find any other device so more functional and the usage is just simple. All you are looking can find inside a Mac system. But that makes it more and more costly.
    Attached Files Attached Files

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