I have enable Sata on ati sb450 simply by adding the string to AppleVIAATA.kext/Contents/info.plist as follow

<dict>
<key>CFBundleIdentifier</key>
<string>com.apple.driver.AppleVIAATA</string>
<key>Hardware Name</key>
<string>8237 SATA</string>
<key>IOClass</key>
<string>AppleVIAATARoot</string>
<key>IOPCIPrimaryMatch</key>
<string>0x31491106 0x00e310de 0x005410de
0x43791002 0x005510de</string>
<key>IOProbeScore</key>
<string>1000</string>
<key>IOProviderClass</key>
<string>IOPCIDevice</string>
<key>Serial ATA</key>
<true/>
</dict>


0x43791002 are the string to add to your AppleVIAATA.kext in order to make sata work.

the 0xxxx10de are only for nvidia and 0xxxx1106 only for VIA.

there's no need to remove nothing. Simply add your string ( in my case 0x43791002 for ati sb450 )

If jas was able to add this in the boot driver of the install dvd the system should start from SATA by detecting correctly the SATA drive.

I don't know the other sbxxx string but you can simply go with xp to check your details in system properties, check the vendor ( 1002 for ati ) and the id ( 4379 for sb450 sata )

Always rember to repairpermission with diskutil for the file you edit and always remove kextcahce and mkext before restart.

forget to mention that only first 2 channel are working atm. Hope to make the other work too.

WoW Great to know that.
For the other two channel, did you try to add 0x43761002 together with 0x43791002?
And which DVD release you used?

I am wondering if we can extract AppleVIAATA.kext from the .iso, modify it, and then send it back before burn DVD. Anybody has this experience? Thanks

mmmmmmm. are you sure that 4376 is the second channel sata ? if that' true it certainly work. I can't test now cause i'm working with an intel atm. I'll let you know.

I found that the exact string to add for the second channel sata in SB450 is 0x437A1002. This enable the second sata channel too.

The exact same steps work on the SB400 chipset.

They may share the same S-ATA controller: when I googled to try and find the SB400's identifier string it turned up this page, where only the SB400 is listed (ATA_ATI_IXP400_S1 this is the exact string).

Thanks diegoo, you fixed two chipsets at once

I CAN'T BELIEVE THIS!!!

diegooo you're my super hero, i can read my sata hd now!!!!

now my amilo pa 1510 is running os x native!!!!!!!

wooopsss. second boot:
Still waiting for root device.
THAT'S TOTALLY NOT COOL.

But how can I make it recognize my sata hard drive when I install from dvd. Must I patch it from the iso, then reburn into the dvd? Please, help me.

the complete solution
howto install ati sata

Hello,
Just a question about this...I currently have a MSI rs482m4 botherboard and am trying to install osx 10.4.7. I have 2 SATA drives installed. When it boots into the installer no drives are listed in the system profiler. I'm just wondering how you would go about performing this at the time of install since I can't get it installed without performing this hack. My system specs are:
MSI RS482M4-ILD
ATI SB450 CHIPSET
ATHLON 4400 X2
2 GB RAM
NVIDIA 7800GTX
2x250gb hd
If I need another version of osx let me know.