[Guide] Easiest way to Dual Boot XP and Leopard iATKOS v7 10.5.7 on Acer Aspire One A150

[oman412]

First and foremost I would like to make it clear that I do not take credit for this information, I just would like to provide the OSx86 community with the formula that worked best for me all in one guide. I will be give credit to all those who deserve it as we walk through this, my purpose is just to save maybe just one person from numerous trial and error installs and hours of googling (though I love to google, if that's even a real verb lol).

 

In this guide I explain how to dual boot XP and Leopard without the use of any media i.e. DVD, Flash Drive etc., assuming you already have xp installed OKAY LETS GO!!!

 

Computer & Hardware

• Acer Aspire One AOA150
  
• CPU:Intel Atom N270, 1600 MHz
  
• Memory:1.5 GB DDR2-667 SD-RAM
  Stock 1 GB (512 removable),replaced with 1 GB I bought from NewEgg for $25.
  Google Install memory in Acer Aspire one and you will be flooded with tutorials. Also use this opportunity to switch out your wireless card since you have to remove it to get to the memory slot anyway.
  
• Video:Mobile Intel 945 Express Chipset Family 224 MB
  
• Audio:Intel 82801 GBM ICH7-M ALC268
  
• Network:
  Wired-Realtek RTL8139/810x PCI-E Fast Ethernet
  Wireless-Dell Wireless 1490 Dual Band WLAN Mini PCI card (DW1490) Works OOB!!!
  Replaced stock Atheros AR5007EG Wireless Networt Adapter with DW1490 bought from ebay for $8.
  If you did not find and use a tutorial to upgrade memory as a opportunity to switch out the wireless card and/or only want to install a wireless card and skip the memory upgrade for now I found this tutorial to be very helpful. Just go through to step three ignoring any reference to disassembling the screen, once you get to step three and install the card hit reverse and reassemble your netbook. Like I said the DW1490 I bought worked right OOB, no need for kext or any non-sense.
  

 

If you are unsure what your hardware configuration is download and run Everest Ultimate, or for a free alternative use Belarc Advisor (you know because you wouldn't want to go to your favorite torrent tracker site and search/download for Everest Ultimate for a more detailed description of your hardware/software configuration )

 

 

Okay I am assuming you already have XP installed, I am not going to cover installing XP other than saying if you need to install XP the easiest way on this netbook is to use WinToFlash, this guide should work for you, and also make sure to install XP prior to installing any other operating systems it will make your life much easier.

 

Pre-Installation

1. Download iATKOS v7
   
2. Upgrade your BIOS, check out Acer's website to see if you have the latest release.
   
3. Log into XP and unzip the files I have attached to this post
   
4. As to not reinvent the wheel let's use what we need from this very helpful guide written by Mr twilight.lee (thank you Mr. twilight.lee ) to set up our install partition.
    

   Guide:
   Step 1: Format a PRIMARY FAT32 partition . (Make sure no file or directory) <--- We called this partition as Install Partition
   Step 2: Use DiskPart create a PRIMARY partition for leopard install in. See here <--- We called this partition as Destination Partition
   

   
    
   -Yes, yes very nice but if your someone like me plain text just bores you sometimes and using an application with a GUI does not make you a bad person does it, so let's do that. Download and install Easeus Partition Master which is FREE!!
    
   -Open EPM and select the partition XP is installed to (unless you have already partitioned your drive it should be pretty much on the entire disk) then click on the "Resize/Move" icon, resize to whatever size you want your XP partition to be (I set mine to about 30 GB and I was being generous Bill Gates) click ok
    
   -Now select the unallocated space and click the "Create" icon, choose the following
   
   Partition Label:
   leave blank
   
   
   Create As:
   Primary (do not select logical as you might run into boot problems
   
   
   Drive Letter:
   none (windows won't see it anyways once OS X is installed)
   
   
   File System:
   Unformatted
   
   
    
   
   

   Under "Size and Position" shrink that partition down as to leave about 4.5 GB unallocated space (i.e. Unallocated Space After 4608 MB), then click ok
    
   -Select the last unallocated space and once again click the "Create" icon, this time choose
   Partition Label: Call it Install partition or something I called mine iATKOS v7
   Create As: Primary
   Drive Letter: Assign whatever you would like (as long as the Letter is not already in use obviously)
   File System: Fat32
    
   -Click ok
    
   -Now click apply at which point EPM will prompt you to restart your system to apply the changes, do so and when it reboots it will partition and format your drive as set up.
    

   Step 3: Run "Leopard HD install helper" and select a ISO file.
   Step 4: Select the Install Partition and Click "Start" Button.
   Step 5: When its done . reboot. DON'T REBOOT YET
   Now , you can install leopard from HD , the rest steps are same as use DVD to install. good luck!

    
   As explained by twilight.lee the interface in Leopard install helper is in chinese so I provided you with a image of the interface in English in the zip file attached, it's the same image twilight.lee was so kind to provide us .
    
   -Whoa not so fast, still have to do one more thing before we can reboot and install. Once again thank you to twilight.lee for yet another very helpful post
    

   Assume your windows install on C:\
   
   step1 : Download attachment and extract it to C:\.
   step2 : Edit boot.ini , add a line : c:\ieldr="Chameleon-2.0RC1-r431"
    
   NOTE: Do NOT rename the chameleo.iso , because ISOEmu only support 8.3 format file name.
    
   Thanks Chameleon Team , ISOEmu author!

    
   A quick recap
   -Extract chameleo.iso to C:\, your root directory
   -Go to your start menu, right click on "My Computer" and select properties. Select the "Advance" tab and under "Startup and Recovery" click settings.
   -Under "System startup" click edit and add c:\ieldr="Chameleon-2.0RC1-r431" as in step 2 to the end of the file. Then save (just save not save as...)
    
   Okay now we should be ready to reboot and install Leopard, and the beutiful thing is you can have a permanent partition for iATKOS in case you have to reinstall drivers
   
   

Installation

1. Restart your machine at which point you should see the option to choose between XP or Chameleon v2, Select Chameleon then your install partition.
   
2. Mac installer will open and Click button
   
3. In the task bar select utilities=>Disk utility
   
4. Select the partition you made for OS X, then click on "Erase"
   
5. Under "Volume Format" select Mac OS Extended (Journaled), name your partition (no spaces) I named mine X yup just X. Now click "Erase"
   
6. Once Disk Utility is done doing its thing exit out and click "Continue", READ THE LICENSE AGREEMENT IT HAS USEFUL INFORMATION THAT YOU MAY NEED IN CASE YOU RUN INTO PROBLEMS, Click Agree
   
7. Select your newly formatted OS X partition, click "Continue".
   
8. Click on the "Customize" button in the lower left corner and select:
   

 

iATKOS v7 Main System (Default)(Check)

-Bootloader

---Chameleon v2 (Default)(Check)

-X86 Patches

---/Extra Directories (Default)(Check)

---DSDT (Default)(Check)

---Decrypters

------AppleDecyrpt (UnCheck)

------dsmos (Check)

---Kernels

------9.5.0 Kernel voodoo (Check)

---ACPI

------x86 ACPI (Check)

---Disabler (Default)(Check)

-Drivers

---VGA

------Intel

---------GMA 950 (Check))

---System

------Sound

---------Voodoo HDA driver (Default)(Check)

------PS/2 mouse/keyboard

---------Apple PS/2 (Check)

------Laptop Battery (Check)

---Network

------Wired

---------Realtek

------------Realtek R1000 (Check)

Post-Install Actions (Default)(Check)

 

Click done then Install, now you can take a break and let the system do its thing. Once it's done installing it should prompt you to restart or just restart on it's own in my many trials both have occurred.

 

Post-Installation

 

At this point you should have an almost fully functional system, almost everything works except for some of the trackpad features and sleep, and a partial card reader (have to boot with card in for the system to see it).

 

To fix the trackpad, unzip the Keyboard.prefPane.zip and copy the Keyboard.prefPane file into System\Library\PreferencePanes. It will ask you to authenticate do so then agree to replace. Go to system preferences and you should have a trackpad control panel inside "Keyboard & Mouse".

 

To get a fully function sd/sdhc card reader just use OSx86 Tools to install the IOSDHCIBlockDevice.kext

 

EDIT: Another option is to install voodoosdhc.kext, I have found it to be faster not to mention not as much hassle to get it working. But it is in beta so use with caution (though I have not run into any problems myself). The link to the kext is at the end of this post .

 

I am currently working on fixing the sleep problem, but what i did to avoid problems was go into the "Energy Saver" in System Preferences click on show details and and slide both over to never. I will update my post when I find a more elegant solution.

 

 

Well there you go, I told you it would be easy now you have a fully functional Mac Nano Congrats.

 

If anyone has any useful information feel free to contact me and post your ideas, feedback on whether this method worked for you would be great.

 

Links to my references

 

twilight.lee's post on Leopard Install Helper

Yet another one of twilight.lee's useful post

Tutorial on how to switch out the wireless network card. thx lufcfan

WinToFlash reference for installing XP

 

Everything you need for this guide is right here.

 

Here is the VoodooSDHC.kext if it's all you need.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[explicitlyrics]

Fantastic guide, but a point to note is that your download at the end of the article doesnt contain ieldr or isoemu.ini. It took me quite a while to realise they werent extracted automatically and then even longer to actually find a copy.

 

Great work though, its installing now!

[miksee]

@oman412

 

Just got iAtkos_v7 and will try this out. Thanks!

 

Is there a way to triple boot this with Ubuntu Netbook Remix 9.04? Right now, Grub has deleted my ntldr/bootmgr. I initially tried installing kalyway, but then that screwed up grub and I had to reinstall Grub just to boot up my aspire one.

 

Chameleon should be able to handle the triple boot, yeah? Appreciate any input you can give on this.

 

Thanks!

[Sp0oner]

Does anyone have similar instructions for iATKOS S3 v2 for the same hardware? I can install it fine but it's unstable so wondered if anyone had succeeded on the a150?

[Sp0oner]

Does anyone have similar instructions for iATKOS S3 v2 for the same hardware? I can install it fine but it's unstable so wondered if anyone had succeeded on the a150?

 

I've sorted it, was the ethernet patch selected in install options auto detecting the wrong card occasionally causing a panic on boot. Deselected that and then installed fine and then got the ethernet working by installing the correct kext.

[joejordan]

From the date of the last entry of this tutorial, I can only conclude, the owner has now abandoned this post. So, I would like to pick up from where explicitlyrics left off, i.e. to proceed, you need the files ieldr & isoemu.ini & isogrub.iso all in the root directory. However, my a150 will only boot as far as the ezboot menu, and I was wondering do I need to alter the command rootnoverify(hd0, 0) in the file boot\grub\menu.lst for it to continue?? Truly puzzled, please help!!

 

 

 

Fantastic guide, but a point to note is that your download at the end of the article doesnt contain ieldr or isoemu.ini. It took me quite a while to realise they werent extracted automatically and then even longer to actually find a copy.

 

Great work though, its installing now!