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Alienware 14 (Haswell CPU) - Working Mavericks 10.9 [Small Guide]


awak3
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**If this is in the wrong section, please move it.. sorry I'm new here.

 

I'm making this small guide to show people out there with the new Alienware 14 model laptop (haswell cpu) that is possible to get Mavericks booting without any errors and without having to use commands such as: -x and GraphicsEnabler=No. However, you will have to get other hardware such as soundcards, internet cards, and graphic cards working by yourself. Hopefully this guide will serve a greater purpose, helping all of us create or find working kext for these hardwares.

 

Guide (USB Method):

*Must have: A copy of Mac already installed and running, I used OS X booted on VMWare, worked perfect.** || Download the 'mach_kernel' from this link: mach_kernel (it is at the bottom in an attachment)

**Recommended: 8GB or more USB drive** & myHack as it will rebuild the cache automatically for us

**Note: I'm doing most of this from recent memory so if something doesn't work, just let me know.

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1) First find and download a retail copy of OS X Mavericks. It doesn't matter how you get the copy as long as it is the retail copy.

 

2) Now you have your copy of Mavericks. Now its time to format your USB drive. Open Disk utility and select your drive and format it as 'Mac OS (Journaled)'. That's it, now exit the disk utlity.

 

3) I used myHack 3.3 to create the USB installer if you have another method of doing this, go ahead and use your method as it doesn't matter, we just need to create the USB installer. If you have never used myHack, it is pretty straight forward and does all the work for you. Click create USB installer and choose 10.9 Mavericks and specify where your copy is and myHack will begin working. When myHack ask you if you want to set the drive for Master Boot Record or GUID Partition Tables, make sure you choose GUID Partition Table or the USB installer will not function correctly and then let myHack finish working. Now exit myHack.

 

4) Now you must download the custom 'mach_kernel' if you have not already (mach_kernel link).  Once you have the kernel downloaded it is time to replace the one that is in the USB installer. Go to finder and go into the USB installer, mach_kernel will be in there, look for it and make sure you are in the root folder where it is located. Now drag the 'mach_kernel' you downloaded from RehabMan's thread and REPLACE the one that is in the USB Installer. Now close finder.

 

5) This is where myHack is recommended, if you didn't use myHack, find out how to rebuild the cache for the installer and make sure you do not overwrite that 'mach_kernel'. Open myHack and choose to 'Fix myHack', choose your USB Installer volume and myHack will begin to rebuild and repair the USB Installer. Once this process is finished, close myHack and you now have a working USB Installer for the Alienware 14 with Haswell CPU. (the old mach_kernel was keeping the installer from starting)

 

**From this point you should know what to do, so I will be short on some parts**

 

6) You are not done yet! Boot your USB Installer and get to the disk utility. Format the hard drive you want to mac os extended (journaled) and begin the installation of Mac OS X 10.9.

 

7) Once the installation is done it will reboot the computer, boot back into the USB Installer!!

 

8) Now that you are in the USB Installer again, open up terminal. We need to copy the new mach_kernel from the installer over to mac OS X 10.9 (this is why when you try and boot it quickly reboots, this will fix that). Type this in the terminal:

# in Terminal from the OS X installer, assuming your HDD volume is called "Macintosh HD"
cp /mach_kernel "/Volumes/Macintosh HD/mach_kernel"

Now restart your PC. (for more info on the mach_kernel vist this thread here on the site: haswell early reboot)

 

9) Boot into your Mavericks installation with these commands:( -v -x -f GraphicsEnabler=No ) Mavericks should now boot up in Safemode and you should be able to see the desktop or setup leading to login.

 

10) To get Mavericks to boot without any error or using commands we have to start fresh. Its time to delete some kernels that are causing the PC to panic or hang. Open finder and navigate to 'System, Library, Extensions' and delete or backup every kext that has to do with a graphics card, because at this point these kext are keeping your PC from booting correctly. If you have trouble finding which kext are graphics, they usually start with AMD, ATI, Geforce, Graphics, etc.. just be careful and do a google search if you are not completely sure.

 

11) After you have deleted or backed up the graphics kext it is time to delete or backup the bluetooth kext. There will be two bluetooth kext in there that are keeping the PC from booting correctly. They are the only ones in that folder that say bluetooth, remove them from the extensions folder.

 

12) Now you may restart the PC and boot your OS X installation normally without any commands and it should boot right to the login or desktop screen. Now it is up to you to get all the other hardware working correctly with the kext, just do it with caution because the installation is unstable at this point.

 

I did this guide so that other people with the same hardware can come together and hopefully make fully functional kext. If you have any questions or anything to throw into the guide just let me know.

 

-awak3

 

 

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