Preliminaries

I think that we have needed a guide like this for some time, so here's the place to get started if you want to install OS X on your PC. Most of these resources are on this site, so be sure to search!!!

Also, always remember to include these things in any of your posts here (copied from the FAQ):

1. Hardware Specs:
Motherboard: intel, amb, etc.
Video: nV, ATI, etc.
Data storage: SATA, PATA, ATA, USB, etc.

2. Detailed Error Messages
Hit F8 at boot and type -v to boot in verbose mode in order to identify the problem if you’re having problems booting. Otherwise, just be as detailed as possible.

Finally, use the wiki. This site has a great one and it will save you a lot of questions.

Everything you need to get started

Ok, with those things out of the way, here is a list of questions and answers for installing OS X.

Where do I download it?

You shouldn't. It's highly illegal and it's theft - you're stealing from Apple. If you already have a copy of the installation disc and just need a backup, it's probably less illegal, but since with bittorrent you're always seeding, you're not off the hook. However, for those interested, a simple google search can tell you where these files are located. Most of the time they end up on the usual suspects such as the Pirate Bay and Demonoid. Don't place links in this forum, though - I happen to like this place and want it to stay around.

Where are the guides for installing everything?

Check the wiki. This Installation Guides page should have all you’d ever need.

What hardware works?

Visit the wiki for huge lists of hardware for every version of OS X - the HCLs tell what works and what doesn't work. Always check the lists before you ask about hardware!

I've got it installed. Now what?

Visit the wiki (are you seeing a pattern here?) for tricks to speed up your installation and tweak various settings. Then come back here to the forum to help those who need it (and maybe right a guide like this one!).

Final notes...

If you have specific questions about these things, start a new thread elsewhere only after you search. Let's keep this thread clean for discussion about this guide.

I will update this list as it requires it, so let me know below when there are things I need to add.

Thanks Ranger. I'm stickying this thread since it's exactly the kind of guide we're looking for.

P.S. Great title!

Hi Ranger,

Its a good one for a newbie.
Post more about Mac OS X x86 as the title says
Keep it up!

I have a freshly bought Version of osx tiger 10.4.6 can I use the dvd that I bought? Or do I have to use one that i find on bittorrent for loading osx on a pc? The reason im asking is I really dont like using Bittorrent.

Hi great post.

I think it would be nice though for those getting started to be a-bit more detailed, instead of just linking out it would be great if this was the place to "end up" for information.

Not sure if this is the right place and if its not just let me know but I'll post the steps I took to get things working. Ive tried most of the guides out there and this is what finally worked for me.

Basic OSx86 and Vista Dual Boot Guide

First Off Credit Goes to all those truly talented developers, programmers, and coders out there that made this possible. Thank you all.

I'll start off assuming that you already have an installation DVD (note: unfortunately cannot be store bought) and Vista already installed.

1. Create a partition on a second drive.(Provided that you would like to boot back into windows I suggest using a separate hard disk if you wish to avoid problems and easily boot back into windows after the install)

In my case I needed to free up some space first on my second drive for OSX to live.
To do this in Windows go to Control Panel/Administrative Tools/Computer Management/

Select "Disk Management" your hard disk drives are listed here and you should be able to shrink your 2nd drives partition without destroying any data. If you notice that you already have enough un-allocated space proceed to diskpart. I shrank the primary partition on my second drive by 20GB. Alternatively you could use a 3rd party app like partition magic to accomplish this.(note: you need as much free space on your drive as you plan to un-allocate.)

Now Click Start/Run and type: diskpart
(note:hit enter after you type each line)

list disk
select disk 1(this is for a second drive, if you are attempting this on your only primary hard drive (not-recommended) you would use 0 instead of 1)
create partition primary id=af

Now type select disk 1
list partition
select partition (the number of the partition you just created)
active(If that does not work try set active)
(note: if you do this on a drive that windows is on you will not be able to boot back into windows easily)

2. Insert your OSX Install DVD restart your computer and boot off of the DVD. (hit F12 during bios boot)

When you reach the OSX Installer screen look on the top bar and select Utilities and from there select Disk Utility. You should see your drives greyed out. Select the partiton you created on your second drive. (Most likely disk1s2)
(If you are attempting this on your only primary drive and created a partiton on the same drive that windows is on you would most likely look for disk0s2 (not-recommended).

Select it than select the Erase tab, this will format your drive properly. Name your drive something that you like and choose Mac OS Extended as the format than click erase and confirm the warning box.

Once that has finished go ahead and verify your new drive partition under the First Aid tab. Quit Disk Utillity

3. Continue with the installation. Agree and Select your partition that should not be grayed out now. Make sure to choose customize when you get to that screen. It is Important to choose only the appropriate options for you installation in this area (note: If your only SSE2 or SSE3 compatible than check only SEE2 or SSE3 and so on for your hardware). Once you have customized your installation click install and let it install through.
When it prompts you to restart go ahead and click restart but be ready for step 4.

4. This next step is to make sure the drive that windows is on does not boot automatically as it most likely your first drive. As your system restarts hit F2 to enter the bios setup. Scroll down to drives and turn off the disk drive that windows is on.(Usually your first drive) Save and Exit.

5. If all went well you should have your new os booting.
(Quick Tip: If you have the error "HFS+Partition Error" you need to boot back off of the DVD and and open the Terminal under Utilities and type: fdisk -u /dev/rdisk1 and than "y" to confirm writing MBR than reboot) This was the case for me and it is even possible to circumvent this error by typing the command in the terminal before you install.
(note: If you do this to a disk that windows is on ex=rdisk0 windows will become un-bootable)

Other things to try if your having problems booting: from the darwin prompt type -v for verbose mode to Identify problems or -x for safe mode.

6. When you want to boot back into windows provided you followed this guide just go back into the bios setup (F2 during startup) and turn back on your first drive.(The drive that windows is on) Once you are back in windows there are various methods of setting up a boot manager.

I used EasyBCD 1.5, (which is a really user friendly app to use) as I am running Windows Vista along side OSx86 and the normal chain0 command can be tricky to work. In order to get EasyBCD working as a boot manager with OSX on a second drive on a second partition, as is described above, all I had to do was set up EasyBCD as GenericOSx86 Platform (There is an option for that) and than copy the boot.efi found on the OSX partition (/usr/standalone/i386/boot.efi) to the EasyBCD NST folder located on Windows C:\ at which point Windows Vista's boot manager is all set to go. Or you can just use the bios setup as what I call your "manual" boot manager.

I know this has all been covered but I think it can get a-bit confusing with so much information especially for someone just starting out. Hopefully this will help a little for those in need.


Quick Tip: If you having trouble with your wireless network especially if it worked after install try this:

Modify:
/Library/Preferences/SystemConfiguration/NetworkInterfaces.plist

swap the en0 with en1 for that device.

a few lines below that change 0 to 1

Save and Run Disk Utilities and repair permissions than reboot.

Quick Links

Things you'll will most likely need to do next.

Some Helpful ATI Graphics Drivers
("Versions, depending by your hardware and monitor. If you have a laptop, try 006, if you have LCD flat panel on your desk, try 008.")
(Highest success reported with 003)(If you run nvida card check out Titan drivers)

A place to start if your having audio trouble.

you cant buy any os x tiger dvds that work on intel hardware at the moment, its all PPC

As far as i could understand this guide for Dual boot OSX / Vista Only works if you have 2 hard drive.

EasyBCD seems to be a great tool are there any other way / guide to use dual booting Vista and OSX without the use of Acronis?

Yes the above guide is for dual booting vista and OSx86 with 2 hard drives but it could be easily adapted for various single or dual boot installations.

Illegal: yes. Theft: no. It's copyright infringement, not stealing. It is copying information without permission to do so.

Stealing involves taking something from someone else. By downloading a copy of of this software, you are not taking anything from Apple, you are just copying information that, in most countries, Apple has the right to disallow you from copying.

I'm not saying it's right or wrong, only that it is clearly not theft.

Hi, where can i legally get a legal developers installatio DVD?
i tryd to install with my macbook install DVD, but my PC can't reconize the DVD, should i copy the whole DVD and burn onto a DVD with a windows compatible format? (is it jolliet)

here is my pc spec:
AMD Athlon™ 64 Processor 3800+, MMX, 3DNow, ~2.4GHz
asus A8N-VM CSM --chipset GeForce 6150 GPU
nForce 430 MCP
soundMAX audio
but im using a PCI-E asus GF 6800 GT 256

and i have a recentely cleared second HD (sata, and the first one is sata too) , so i think im all set except of getting a usable DVD.

i have 3 weeks of freetimes so im looking forward to get my mac installed on PC.... but i definitelly need a lot of help from any of u guys.!!!:P

To find a suitable installation disc any straight forward Search will do...Google is your friend. Gotta love Noobs.

Awesome guide thx.

I'm thinking about doing a slightly different installation so I can use VirtueDesktops to switch in realtime between OSX x86 and Vista 64bit (running on Parallels).

Has anyone done this? (successfully?)

This guide describes how realtime switching is setup (the video is awesome)
http://lifehacker.com/software/parallels/h...lels-201451.php

Was looking for a recommend or to see if anyone was doing this?

Also I'm running two BFG GeForce 7600GTX cards in SLI - what's the chance I can get the cards recognized as SLI? (is there SLI support in OSX x86?) - hoping to get at minimum one card recognized (the card is in the compatible list in the Wiki). BTW what is the NV40 item mentioned as required during install for the card to get recognized?

Any thots/help much appreciated.

Thanks much.
- guts

Hi, I contacted italian commercial Apple department and spoke about osx86 with their employer. He told me that there are no legal matter if you install an Apple OS on your x86 machine as officially (for Apple) it doesn't exist. I don't know if this is true or less but it is what he told me.
I am a newbe of mac and mac-x86. I have installed the 10.4.1 version on my dell m90. It started fine good and I could say it works, except for lot of missing drivers. I wish to update it to 10.4.8, hoping some driver is included in it, before reading lot of threads for any not working device. I wish to ask to expert people in osx86 how I ca do it. Can I simply use the update software in system prefernces of mac osx86? In the affirmative, once updated, shall I patch it? If it weren't possible to update throgh osx86 itself, how should I proceed? I read the thread of egwan, but statements require a 10.4.4 version already installed. So how to from 10.4.1 to 10.4.4 (or better directly to 10.4.8)?

Thank you

Well I can not find if there is a way that I use my Mac os X disk that came with my new imac to install onto my pc.

Is there a way to get this to work?

No, that is not possible. You need to obtain the OSx86 .ISO file in order to install OS X on your PC.

- SABR.

First off, if I'm posting in the wrong area, I'm sorry...

I was looking at the HCL for 10.4.8, and I see that the Dell Latitude D600/D620/D800/D820 are all posted, but I can't find any info on the D610/D810 (I happen to have the D810). Has anyone had any experience w/ the machine? Or am I going to be braving new watters?

Hardware is as follows:

P-M 2.16
2G DDR2 667
160G HDD
Intel 915 chipset
Intel 2200BG Wireless (Not working atm to the best of my knowladge)
ATI x600 Video
Sigamatel Sound (Don't recall which one, but the same one the Dx00 has)

hello,
sorry if I am in wrong topic! I will erase in case!
IMy problems comes well before. I tried to install the MacOSX 10.4.8 from a X86 disk on a different HD (not a partition. I tought (wrongly) that I could try that way on a second time. Everything went smooth (seemed) during the installation. The DVD started with the "usual" windows (I am a Mac user) and so on. Until the VERY last when my wife called me.... When I came back there was the underscore symbol blinking on the black screen. I had to restart as I could do nothing... not even type anything (may be due to a Trust wireless keyboard?). From that time there was NO chance!!!! I am not anymore able to boot from a MacOSX DVD installer! I downladed a new one from a Torrent (may be different as newer)but everytime I boot from DVD I get the blinking underscore cursor!!! So I cannot try to install the OS using the same HD of XP partitioned... :-(
Please.... any suggestion? Do you think I might get trough reformatting EVERYTHING? :-)
Thanks
Gabriele
P.S. I hope the bosses will forgive me (may be erasing the post, NOT banning ;-) me ) if I post this question in different topics as I cannot figure wich is the right one.

Getting ready to wipe ubuntu and install osx86 on my amd64 3500+ on a ecs nforce4a939 with a nvidia 7600gt 256mb ddr3 and 768 megs of ram. Hopefully it boots up and works smooth...ill be from if it does.More will come after I install 10.4.6

Yea Thanks a lot !

thanks for the awesome post!

Hopefully, I'm not off topic here. Your bible is fully AWESOME, and has answered almost all of the questions I've had in preparing to attempt an dual-boot (w/ XP, because why would you do things simply when you can make them complicated?)

The only thing I think you should add (and it's hard this info to find ANYWHERE without searching the threads and hoping someone has the same machine as you [apparently, no one does]) is how to select a version.

2 Questions I can't seem to find the answer to:

The hardware list on the wiki: Does it only list hardware compatiblilty that has been verified?
Example: According to the wiki, my laptop (Dell M140) isn't compatible with any version after 10.4.8 (or specifically, it's compatible with 10.4.8 and 10.4.6, but not 10.4.7). Is that because my computer WILL not run 10.5.1 (or 10.4.7 for that matter), or does it simply mean that no one has done it YET? (Does this mean that I shouldn't even bother to attempt a Leopard install, or will I get to add a line to the hardware list in the wiki if it works?)

Hardware aside, what factors should be taken into account when selecting a version?
It's common to always equate newest with bestest when it comes to software, new features, more stability, etc - but with grassroots development this isn't always the case, sometimes newest means most unstable. For instance, because my processor is only SSE2 and not SSE3, is a leopard install going to run painfully slowly?

Just a suggestion for an addition, and thanks again for the info.

so which version of the os x would i need to run on a dual core intel laptop? im downloading 10.4.11 which i read on a search was what i needed but the wiki doesnt have portable computers in the compatibility lists? any help appriciated

cheers

I have been reading here for a while now before I decided to register.

Laptop is changing:
The laptop is a Asus M51Sn and specs are:
* Intel Core 2 Duo T8300,
* 3Gb DDR2 667 Memory
* 15.4" WXGA+, NVIDIA Geforce Go 9500M GS 512Mb
* 250GB SATA 5400rpm, DVD Super Multi Light Scribe
* WLAN 802.11a/g/n, Bluetooth
* Firewire
* 1.3MPix videocamera
* Vista Home Premium


I am getting a new laptop with the following specs and I would like to partition the harddrive to so that I can retain the vista home premium that came with the laptop on one partition [or downgrade to XP] and install OSX leopard (tiger is leopard isnt possible) on the other partition.

The laptop is a MSI GX700 and specs are:
* Intel Core 2 Duo T7500,
* 2Gb DDR2 Memory
* 17" WXGA, NVIDIA GeForce 8600 GT 512Mb HDMI
* 250GB, DVD Super Multi
* WLAN 802.11n, Bluetooth
* Firewire
* 1.3MPix videocamera
* Vista Home Premium

Could someone kindly tell me if installation of Apple's OSX Leopard or Tiger would work on this since I couldnt get any info on this brand of notebook anywhere on the wiki. Any help in making this a reality for me would be highly appreciated.

Thanks!

hi i was wondering do you need to have vista or any windows os installed or can u install osx86 to a single drive with out windows, any help would be nice thanks in advance

This thread is useless as a sticky, it should be unstickied. With the exception of kapunas's post which tries to give some real world steps, the OP is mediocre as a portal to say the least.

And it's even wrong. You don't get all the answers from installation guides. It'd far more helpful to say, for example, that you get drivers and kexts from the forums. If you are going to be a portal for information list plenty of links. From netkas guides to forums etc etc

We got enough portals for information. Wiki portal is more than enough and it's the first result that comes up in Google.

Please make room for better stickies. It's getting tiresome seeing all of these guides explaining nothing. "The OSx86 Bible"? I was expecting to see all sorts of funky terms and concepts explained etc.

Actually it is theft. You are depriving Apple of the money that OS X sells for. Like it or not that is theft. The lawful definition of theft is the Intent to deprive the legal owner. If you are using OS X Apple has a right to some money from you. You are depriving them of their money, ergo theft.

i was wondering if my hardware wil work out for this i check the wiki but i couldnt find everything

ive got a gateway m6834
mobile intel 965 express chipset
optiarc dvd rw ad-7563a ata device
intel wireless wifi link 4965agn
core 2 duo 1.66 ghz each
2 gb of ram

let me know with a pm or on this thread

thank a bunch ahead of time

First of all... i am new, so Hello everyone.

the reason of this post (that i dont know if is in the right place) is that i have a hardware question.
I have been talking about this topic with many people here in my country, and well... i have gotten a question that nobody has answered...
OSx is a OS that really makes good use of the hardware it is installed in... and that means it heats up A LOT... what kind of cooling systems do people use, or better yet, how much time and precaution do people put into cooling for their Hackit0sh???