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[GUIDE] Dual Boot Windows 7 and Snow Leopard 10.6.3 Vanilla GUID x64; Acer Aspire 6930 Laptop


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Overview

 

After much trial and error, I have documented the complete process that I took to install Windows 7 64-bit and Snow Leopard 10.6.3 retail (GUID), dual-boot, on an Acer Aspire 6930 laptop. Although I have only verified this method with the Aspire 6930, I suspect that most of the steps can be applied to a variety of Intel-based laptops or PCs (with the exception of custom kext files depending on your hardware). I have followed my own written instructions multiple times to ensure that the instructions are as comprehensive and accurate as possible for the Aspire 6930 laptop; I can't guarantee this will work on other systems without some tweaking. The entire process takes about two hours to complete.

 

 

My Acer Aspire 6930 System Specs

  • Intel Core 2 Duo T5800 (2.0 GHz, 800 MHz FSB, 2 MB L2 cahce)
  • 16" HD Acer CineCrystal LCD
  • Mobile Intel Graphics Media Accelerator 4500MHD (GM45)
  • 4 GB DDR2 RAM
  • 250 GB Hard Drive
  • DVD Super Multi DL
  • D-Link DWA-125 USB WiFi Card (Replaces the built-in Intel 5100/5300)
  • Attansic ATL1E LAN ethernet
  • High Definition Audio

Prerequisites

  • Mac OS X Snow Leopard 10.6.3 retail DVD (vanilla)
  • Windows 7 retail DVD (I am using Windows 7 Home Premium 64-bit; this should work for any Win 7 edition)
  • USB keyboard and mouse (only needed during installation process; you may be able to get by without them)
  • Empire EFI 1.08 boot CD
  • myHack 1.0 RC4.1 Installer (included on the Empire EFI 1.08 ISO and in the Acer6930OSXFiles folder)
  • Acer6930OSXFiles package (includes kext files, video patch, DWA-125 driver, myHack 1.0 RC4.1, EasyBCD 1.72) DOWNLOAD HERE

 

What works

  • Laptop keyboard and trackpad (including trackpad clicking)
  • Native video resolution/color
  • Sound
  • Battery indicator
  • Energy saver
  • Internal "Crystal Eye" webcam
  • Integrated card reader
  • USB ports
  • D-Link DWA-125 WiFi USB device

 

What doesn't work

  • Video features other than native resolution
  • Internal LAN ethernet port (you may have success with the driver in THIS thread)
  • Internal WiFi card (I use the DWA-125 as a substitute, which works perfectly)
  • Internal microphone (admittedly I did not try to get this working)

 

Getting started

  1. Power on the laptop and hit F2 to enter BIOS setup. Verify the following settings:

    1. SATA Mode: AHCI Mode
    2. Boot Priority Order 1: IDE CD
    3. Boot Priority Order 2: IDE HDD (S1)

[*]Insert the Empire EFI boot CD, connect your USB keyboard and mouse, save the BIOS settings, and restart.

[*]After the Empire EFI boot screen loads, eject the CD and insert the retail Snow Leopard DVD. Wait for the DVD to read, then hit F5.

[*]Highlight the "Mac OS X Install DVD" icon from the Empire EFI boot menu, then type: -v and press Enter.

  1. Note: If you don't see the "Mac OS X Install DVD" icon after hitting F5 the first time, hit F5 once again and it will appear.

[*]After 2-4 minutes, you will be at the Mac OS X installation screen. Ignore any error messages you may see during boot, they will be resolved later.

 

Mac OS X installation

  1. Select your language and click Next.
  2. Select Utilities > Disk Utility from the file menu.
  3. Click on the root hard drive name from the list on the left (mine is "250.06 GB WDC...")
  4. Click on the Partition button to the right.
  5. Select "2 Partitions" in the Volume Scheme drop-down list (you will lose all data if you proceed; so be sure to have everything backed up first).
  6. Click on the "Untitled 1" partition. This will be the Windows partition and must be the first partition on the drive. Set the following properties:

    [*]Click on the "Untitled 2" partition. This will be the OS X partition and should be the second partition on the drive. Set the following properties:

    1. Name: OSX [give it any name you want.]
    2. Size: 125 GB [the size will be auto-calculated based on the size specified for the Windows partition above.]
    3. Format: Mac OS Extended (Journaled)

    [*]Click on the Options button below the Volume Scheme, and make sure it is set to "GUID Partition Table" then click OK.

    [*]Click on the Apply button, then hit the Partition button to format the drive to the settings you just specified; this should take less than a minute.

    [*]Close the Disk Utility and wait for the Install Mac OS X wizard to re-appear, then click Continue. Accept the TOS by clicking Agree.

    [*]Select the "OSX" disk partition you created and click Install.

    1. Note: The "WIN7" partition will have a yellow explanation mark; this is because it is FAT32, don't worry.
    2. Note: Leave the default installation features as-is, do not click Customize at this time; we will customize everything later.

    [*]Let the install proceed. This will take about 30-40 minutes to complete. After the installation is complete, the system will restart but will fail to boot.

     

    Mac OS X post-installation

    1. After the Mac OS X installation has successfully completed, remove the Mac OS X Install DVD and reinsert the Empire EFI boot CD.
    2. Verify that the BIOS settings are still set to boot from the CD/DVD drive first, and then restart your machine.
    3. Once at the Empire EFI boot screen, highlight the "OSX" disk icon, then type: -v and press Enter.
    4. After 1-3 minutes, you will be at the Mac OS X Welcome screen. Select your country, then click Continue.
    5. Select your keyboard layout, then click Continue.
    6. Select "Do not transfer my information now," then click Continue.
    7. Leave the Apple ID information blank, then click Continue.
    8. Leave the registration information blank, then click Continue. Click Continue once more to confirm registration skip.
    9. Enter your name, account name, and password/hint. I use my first name for the account name, all lowercase. Click Continue.
    10. Wait a moment for the OS X desktop to load. A couple of dialog boxes should appear, do as follows:

      [*]Insert your USB stick or CD that contains the Acer6930OSXFiles folder and files. Copy this folder to your Mac desktop.

      1. Note: If using a CD, be sure to right-click the "Empire EFI" disk icon and select "Eject" or you won't be able to open the CD tray.

      [*]Run the myHack_Installer_1.0.RC4.1.mpkg application. Click Continue, Continue, Continue, Agree, Customize.

      [*]Uncheck the OpenHaltRestart.kext package, and leave everything else as-is. Click Install. Enter password when prompted, and hit OK.

      [*]After 10-15 minutes, the myHack install should be completed successfully. Click Close. Do not restart at this time

      1. Note: The install may appear to hang when it gets to "less than one minute remaining" but within 10-15 minutes it will finish successfully.

      [*]In the "Kexts" directory of the Acer6930OSXFiles folder, drag all of the kext files to the Kext Utility application (you can drag them all at once).

      1. EvOreboot.kext
      2. VoodooBattery.kext
      3. VoodooHDA.kext
      4. VoodooPowerMini.kext
      5. VoodooPS2Controller.kext

      [*]Enter your password, when prompted, and Kext Utility will install all of the kext files. This should take 1-5 minutes.

      [*]When Kext Utility indicates "All done" click Quit.

      [*]Install the video driver. For the GM45 video chipset, the X4500 patch works perfectly. The file is included within the Acer6930OSXFiles folder.

      1. Note: Many Aspire 6930 laptops have a GeForce card instead; if your laptop has a Geforce card then you should install a more compatible driver.

      1. Launch a "Terminal" window.
      2. Type sudo -s and then enter your password
      3. Drag the GMA_X4500_video.bash script file to the terminal window (do not press enter until the next step).
      4. Append -rf 2A42 to the command line generated in the previous step, then press enter.
      5. You should now repair the disk permissions.

        [*]Optional: If you have a D-Link DWA-125 wireless USB ethernet card, you can install the driver now as described below.

        1. Double-click the dLinkDWA125_wifi.dmg package, which will mount the installer package (icon should appear on desktop).
        2. From the installer package, open the USBWireless-10.6 folder and then double-click the USBWireless-SnowLeopard.pkg file.
        3. Click Continue, Install, [Enter Password], Continue Installation. The process should finish in about 5 minutes.
        4. When the install is successful, you can plug the wireless card in and it should detect it as a new network interface.

        [*]Eject the Empire EFI CD if it is still in the drive.

        [*]Restart your computer (you can now unplug the USB keyboard and mouse before the PC restarts).

        [*]If you installed the video driver described above, when the PC restarts you will want to reset the color mode to fix some color peculiarities.

        1. Navigate to System Preferences > Displays > Color.
        2. Click on one of the four profiles listed below the horizontal line; you should see the background fix as soon as you select one and can compare them.

        [*]Although energy saving options generally work fine, if you laptop freezes ups if you leave your laptop idle you may wish to disable or adjust the settings.

        1. Navigate to System Preferences > Energy Saver.
        2. Set the options accordingly for both "Battery" and "Power Adapter" modes.

        [*]To enable clicking via the laptop's trackpad, go into System Preferences > Trackpad and check the "Clicking" option.

        [*]Restart one final time just to make sure everything is working perfectly with your Mac OS X install!

         

        Windows 7 installation and dual boot

        Make sure that Mac OS X is installed and fully functional as explained in the previous two sections before attempting to install Windows 7.

         

        1. Verify that your CD/DVD drive is still set as the first boot device in your BIOS.
        2. Insert your Windows 7 DVD and restart your computer, pressing a key when prompted to boot from the DVD.
        3. After 1-3 minutes, the Install Windows screen will appear. Select your language, time/currency, and keyboard input then click Next.
        4. Click the "Install Now" button.
        5. Check the "I accept the license terms" box and click Next.
        6. Click on the "Custom (advanced)" option.
        7. You should see four partitions.

          [*]Select the WIN7 partition (should be the second in the list, and then click the "Drive options (advanced)" link. Then click Format, OK.

          [*]With the newly formatted WIN7 partition still selected (e.g., Disk 0 Partition 2) click Next.

          [*]Wait for Windows to expand its files and complete the install. This takes 20-30 minutes. Leave it go until you are booted fully into Windows 7.

          [*]Enter your user name and computer name (does not have to match the OSX install), then click Next.

          [*]Enter a password if you'd like, then click Next.

          [*]Enter your product key; you may wish to uncheck "Automatically activate Windows when I'm online" until you verify that everything works.

          [*]Set your Windows Update options as you wish, same with the time and date settings.

          [*]After windows loads, I would recommend disabling User Account Control so it doesn't become annoying, but that's a personal preference.

          [*]Restart your PC, again booting from the Windows 7 CD.

          [*]Select the "Repair Windows" option from the setup screen.

          [*]Select the "Use Recovery Tools" option.

          [*]Select "Command Prompt" and then enter the following to reset the Windows partition to Active:

          1. diskpart
          2. select disk 0 (You can type "list disk" before this to verify the proper hard drive)
          3. select part 2 (You can type "list part" before this to verify your Windows partition)
          4. active
          5. exit

          [*]Eject the Windows 7 DVD and restart your computer.

          [*]Install EasyBCD 1.7.2 using the default settings, then run it.

          [*]Select "Add/Remove Entries", and under "Add an Entry" click the "Mac" tab and select "Generic x86 PC" then click "Add Entry".

          [*]Restart once again and you should now be able to successfully boot both Windows and Mac through the boot loader screen.

          Note: If you've followed everything exactly but still can't get Mac to boot from the boot menu, you may want to try booting once more to the previously installed Mac partition via the Empire EFI disk; then repeat steps 16-23 above to set Windows back as the active partition.


      6. Disk 0 Partition 1 - System partition created by Windows 7 (~200MB)
      7. Disk 0 Partition 2: WIN7 - The FAT32 partition we created in Disk Utility.
      8. Disk 0 Partition 3 - The HFS+ formatted partition we installed OS X to.
      9. Disk 0 Unallocated Space - Nothing (~127MB)

  7. Open Disk Utility via Applications/Utilities.
  8. In the left panel, click on the "OSX" partition that OS X is installed on.
  9. In the right panel, click "Repair Disk Permissions" button and wait 5-15 minutes for it to complete.

Configure your USB keyboard by following through the Keyboard Setup Assistant wizard that should have appeared.
Click on the "Don't Use" button in the prompt asking if you want to use "WIN7" to back up with Time Machine.

Name: WIN7 [give it any name you want; name will be erased when we install Windows but should be specified now for clarity.]
Size: 125 GB [give it any size you want; at least 20 GB. In this example I use 1/2 the available space on the hard drive.]
Format: MS-DOS (FAT)
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  • 2 months later...
  • 5 weeks later...
  • 2 weeks later...
During the -v part I always keep rebooting, its shows some lines but before i can see them they are already gone then it reboots.

 

Me too! I can run the initial Darwin bootloader, but when i get to putting -v in, it screams through tons of lines of code, then my computer restarts! :/

 

BTW, i have an Acer Aspire 5745g Intel i7...

 

Hope someone has some idea!

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