AOpen MiniPC Duo MP945-D (Now 100% compatible!)

[CharredPC]

I recently had the opportunity to pick up an MP945-D AOpen MiniPC for just $50. My intention is to use it with XP as a HTPC. But since it's here, and I have to format anyway, why not try OSX? I searched the forum, but found very little on this unit, and definitely nothing recent. So this is my actual as-it-happens commentary on installing OSX onto this tiny device.

 

My MiniPC is configured with a 1.73GHz Celeron-M (booo!), 1GB of DDR2 ram, and a 60GB SATA drive. It also has a wifi card installed. I've ordered a 500GB drive replacement, so anything I do on this little 60GB is just for fun. Let's start with iDeneb 10.5.5... well, rats. My disc is a scratched up mess. It's 12:30am, I'm just starting, and it's already over? No way. What else have I got ready to pop in?

 

Ah, my Boot132 CD and retail disc! I doubt it, but... what have I got to lose? Boot132 went fine, now inserting the OSX dvd. Hey, it came up! Working mouse and keyboard, too. Good thing this little thing uses USB, not PS2. Okay, Disk Manager to set up the drive as GUID, then back to setup... uncheck the printer drivers and language translations, and- begin.

 

Uhg, this always takes forever. And it recalculates all over the place. An hour and a half?! I hope not. There we go, 50 minutes is better. Waiting, waiting... now it jumps from 32 minutes to 9, then 7. Status bar is 3/4 the way across. Did I mention I don't actually have a monitor in the house? I'm doing all this using the composite-out onto my 40" TV It's like a geek movie, I guess.

 

Incidentally, I've named the hard drive MacMini; it's true, in a way. My plan is to up the RAM in this to 2GB, and pop in a Core Duo cpu. I spent little enough on the unit itself that I don't feel bad doing upgrades. Hurrah, less than a minute left! Wait, now "About a minute." I wish it would make up its mind.

 

Just snapped a few pictures to make this thread official or something. Not very exciting, but it'll give you an idea of how little this thing is. Not too small to add a usb ATSC tuner inside it! ... but that's giving away another of my upgrade ideas. Still saying about a minute. Not frozen, though; the mouse still moves, and it's accessing the dvd. Maybe I'm just not a patient person.

 

Finally! Done! About to restart... can't forget to swap the Boot132 out again. Hrm, dark gray screen during shutdown with the spinner. Wonder how long I should wait before I force a reboot. Guess two minutes is long enough. Held the power button till it was off, then tapped it back on. Swapped in boot cd, choose the hd... success! Watching the intro movie. Now setting up keyboard, etc. Setup all went fine except it wouldn't let me alter the incorrect time and date. I bet there's a bios setting blocking changes or something. If I were keeping it this way, I'd go look. Or even just set the bios time to UTC to make OSX happy / correct.

 

Now at the desktop. Looks like audio and wifi card weren't detected, but the Ethernet shows up! Plugged in the cable; it instantly DHCP'd everything. Let's do some Software Updating, that might add a kext or two. Everything appears pretty snappy, even with this being a Celeron. This would be a pretty awesome baby Mac with a Core2Duo in it. Okay, looks like the important updates are the Airport ones and the 10.5.7 upgrade. Here goes nothing...

 

Of course this means more waiting. *sigh* The worst part of this is there's no soda in the house to keep me awake. What kind of geek lets their soda supply run out? After everything gets done updating, I guess installing Chameleon is in order. ETA 19 minutes on the downloads. No, 21 minutes. No, 27 minutes. 17? More than halfway through now, and back up to 22.

 

By the way, if you're too lazy to look it up, the MP945-D runs off the Intel 945 chipset (could never have guessed that, huh?) and supports any 533/667 Socket M cpu. The ram can be maxed out at 4GB of 667Mhz 200-pin DDR2, and I assume any laptop SATA hd is compatible. It's really a laptop in cube shape with DVI / VGA / RGB / Composite output, right down to the 19v power adapter. Seems really quiet, and so far hasn't even gotten warm. Mine has an internal wifi antenna; some have external ones in the back. There's four USB plugs, a firewire port, standard three audio connectors, and the optical drive is a slot-loading slip (laptop) drive.

 

About 2 minutes left now, or so it claims. Now about 2am. I wonder how a Mac would do as a home theater computer? Oh, download is done. Restarting computer... installing updates... So, if this doesn't fix (or break) anything, once it's done I'll need to track down an audio kext, and see what kind of wifi card this has. It uses a standard MiniPCI slot, so swapping it to something compatible would be easy enough. You can also toss a TV tuner into that spot instead, but I have yet to find one with Mac drivers. Which is really unfortunate, because that's an upgrade I'd love to do in my Hackbook.

 

Once again it looks like it's having trouble rebooting. It might go if I wait long enough, but... Forced shutdown again, restarted with the boot cd. Hrm, that didn't work. Curse this non-HD tv, the text is almost impossible to read! It looked like it was trying to reboot again, and hung, so I helped it along. Now booted successfully back into OSX. Still no audio or wifi. System Information shows no audio device nor Airport card. Ok, time to pop the case open and see what we've got. Shutdown worked almost instantly- I guess it's just reboot that gets confused.

 

Wifi card is a Lite-On WN2302A. Doesn't look like there's any OSX support for it. A shame, but as I said, not a deal-killer. My big question is the audio. Appears to be ALC888. Mixed bag as to whether drivers work or not, it seems. I'll try a few. While I was searching and downloading, I let the Mini think about that reboot hang. 20 minutes later, it still sits. Guess reboot will need a fix, if Chameleon doesn't cure it. Now have an audio driver to try- let's see...

 

Just for fun; it takes less than 30 seconds to boot into OSX on this. Opened Safari, grabbed B7 Kext Helper, installed the audio files, rebooted- ok, no reboot. Grr. Forced restart. Hey, it shows an audio icon! But no sound... lots of audio options, and it hums slightly when switching to Line Out, but no audio. I'll try a shut down / start up, sometimes it takes a reboot or two. Nope. Well, it hums when audio is played, so I think it's just a matter of tracking down the right kext.

 

It's now 3am. I WILL fix this before going to bed. Trying another method. Okay, weird... I don't seem to have an AppleAzaliaAudio.kext. Fine, I'll delete the AppleHDA kext and try one more thing. 4-5 seconds to shut down, so you know. And... audio! Hooray! Listening to iTunes radio now Looks like no input, just output, but I'm never going to use line-in on a HTPC anyway.

 

Now for Chameleon, so I can stop booting off the cd. ...all right, installed using EFI. Wasn't sure about the other options; again, little hard to read. Let's try it! Eject boot cd, shut down, boot up- there's the Chameleon logo, now the Apple boot screen... ouch. "You need to restart your computer." I guess some kext on the boot cd is not in my install. Maybe something as simple as dsmos or the disabler kext.

 

Well, it's 4am, so I think I'll call it a night- a successful night. With the addition of a few tidbits into the Extra folder, and a $10 swap-out of the wifi card (any suggestions?), this is a great little MiniMac! Most importantly, enough works right out of the box so that you can get the rest working without a second pc. Automatic QE is a plus too. After I get my upgrades done, this will be a kick-but machine. I may very well keep it OSX I therefore highly recommend picking one of these up, if you can find a good deal on one as I did. They're very fun little toys.

 

Hope some of this dribble was helpful, or at least amusing, to someone!

[Monkey D. Luffy]

$50? Where did you buy it? I want one too!

 

Nice post, btw.

[Zaap]

Nice find and write up! Yeah, Intel 945 is a pretty safe bet for Hackintosh-ability.

 

If you can find one for a decent price, pop a socket 479 Core2Duo in that, max the RAM, and you'll have an even nicer mini-Hack.

[CharredPC]

@Monkey D. Luffy: Found it local, listed on Craigslist. I guess the company this guy was working for went under, couldn't pay their paychecks... so they paid everyone in hardware I'll ask him if he has any more he'd like to sell.

 

Thus far I've ordered a new WD Scorpio 500GB hard drive for $86 shipped, and nabbed a Core2Duo T5200 for $12.25 shipped. Now waiting to grab 2GB of ram for under $14, and have to figure out what wifi card will work best. Total cost for the system and all upgrades will be under $175, yay! Looking at eBay's Mini PC selection, that's a pretty sweet deal.

[Zaap]

T5200- is that the right socket type?

[CharredPC]

Yep, a T5200 is a Socket M. These can take any 533/667 Socket M cpu's, which includes some of the C2D

 

I ended up getting the 2GB (2 x 1GB kit) of PC2-5300 ram for just $9.04 shipped. Now just have to buy the wifi card... I think I'll go with a BCM94306MP, unless anyone else has a better suggestion. I can pick one of those up for $7 - $12. Hard to believe that a cpu, ram, and wifi upgrade is costing about $30 total!

 

Trying to get widescreen resolution on a little 15" LCD I have here... no go so far. Think I'll install XP, update the BIOS, and make sure that XP can handle WS (that it's not a DVI->VGA problem, or that the monitor won't report it as available). Also give me a chance to see how XP runs on a stock one of these.

 

Might be getting another one, too! Not that I need two, but these are neat. Perhaps I'll hackintosh one, HTPC the other, and sell one off when I've decided which I prefer.

[Zaap]

Trying to get widescreen resolution on a little 15" LCD I have here... no go so far. Think I'll install XP, update the BIOS, and make sure that XP can handle WS (that it's not a DVI->VGA problem, or that the monitor won't report it as available). Also give me a chance to see how XP runs on a stock one of these.

That's sounding like you don't actually have QE/CI. Under graphics/displays in System Profiler you have both enabled, correct?

 

Sounds like you found some pretty good deals on hardware!

[CharredPC]

I did have QE enabled, but the problem may have been the monitor I was using. It's a 15" eMachine widescreen TFT vga, and I couldn't even get 1280x800 going in XP. Depending on which DVI->VGA adapter I used, it wouldn't even turn on. No wonder I was given it for free

 

Yep, got lucky on the hardware deals. Let's hope my luck holds out, if I get this second one and try to upgrade it too.

[CharredPC]

Couple little updates:

 

The monitor was entirely at fault for the resolution issues. It shows up as "Non Plug-n-Play" under Win7 on the same machine. Using XP on a different PC, there is no 1280x800 resolution available. Though widescreen, eMachines decided not to give it any true WS options. Yay for cheap manufacturers.

 

After grabbing a Leopard-happy Mini PCI wifi card for $7 shipped, I'm now debating if I want to keep my Mini HTPC on OSX. It'll be a near-perfect Hackintosh, but now I'd like to add an internal USB ATSC/QAM tuner... and there's pretty much no support in the Mac world for those, unless you're spending really big bucks. Grr.

 

I now have two of these, so maybe I'll keep the HTPC on XP and play OSX on the other. Open to recommendations on USB ATSC/QAM/NTSC tuners.

[CharredPC]

Mini-update: I've decided to go ahead and install an ATSC/Analog USB tuner into the MP945-D. I'm not willing to sacrifice my OSX-compatibility, though, so will use an EyeTV tuner Should be a cool mod once it is completed. C2D cpu, ram, hard drive, and wifi card should get here this week. Stay tuned!

 

 

Edit: Editing this post so this doesn't turn into a bump-fest, keeping the thread on top.

 

Got in the RAM, hard drive, and Wifi card; all installed and work well. Sold the old PC2-4200 ram and 60GB hard drive for $15; that pretty much covers the cost of the new ram and wifi card. I expect the CPU tomorrow- can't wait! Will do the serious Mac OSX installation once that's in, and then transfer over all the old HTPC's media.

 

I've picked out an OSX-happy USB tuner to purchase- looks to be about $55 used, $69 new. It does everything- ATSC, QAM, and Analog. Still planning on mounting it inside the case. It'll be a tight fit, but the end results will be worth it

[CharredPC]

Well, uhg. I installed the BCM94306MP Mini PCI card I bought, installed OSX... and nothing. It doesn't see it at all. From my research this should be natively supported, but it doesn't even know it's there. I tried the tape trick over pins 11 & 13 found here, even though the MiniPC has no wifi on/off switch; no change. I'm doing some system updates (Airport and 10.5.7), though I don't think that will solve things. Maybe it will take same kext editing as described here, but wouldn't it at least show up somewhere in system info?

 

Really hoping the motherboard <-> PCI card bridge isn't the one thing incompatible on this sweet little machine... that would really suck.

Edit:

The proper vendor id etc ARE already built into OSX. It could use wifi natively... if it could only see the card. This is very disappointing. I tried installing a couple different IOPCIFamily.kext's using B7, but there was no change at all. The latest Chameleon is installed; that and dsmos.kext is all that's needed to boot in after a retail install. QE is enabled by default. The only thing stopping this from being a perfect stock install is the audio (no biggie, one kext), the restart bug, and the apparently non-functioning Mini PCI slot.

 

Anyone have any ideas on what to try on the latter two? It would be a shame to turn back to Windows at this point...

[NielsR]

I've snatched a MP945-VXR from a colleague for a fair price. It's a "lower" model than the D-series and the biggest/dumbest difference is that it only has 2 USB-ports and the empty mini PCI slot...

 

I'm going to strip down the inner parts for a hobby project in a custom case with touchscreen and running it as a Hackintosh jukebox...

 

One question... Do you also have 2 white 4-pins connectors on the mainboards left side (front facing to you) with the notations CN5 and CN6 next to it? If so, any idea what they are?

 

For my modding I've to find a nice way to make the DVI a VGA-connector, add USB ports and find power for my 8.4" touchscreen

 

Next week I'll start installing Mac OS X using your method (I've got an iMac, so I own the official Leopard install DVD too).

 

Cheers,

l:x

[CharredPC]

One question... Do you also have 2 white 4-pins connectors on the mainboards left side (front facing to you) with the notations CN5 and CN6 next to it? If so, any idea what they are?

 

You'll find that those four-pin white connectors are in fact USB ports. I have two in my MP946-D. The difficult part is tracking down proper-sized plugs to go into them. I plan on using one of mine for the internal USB tv tuner... if I can get the wifi sorted out.

[CharredPC]

Feeling frustrated.

 

Installation of the Core 2 Duo cpu went flawlessly. Things are noticeably faster than when I first experimented at 3am on my TV. This time I partitioned the 500GB drive so that ~50GB was for the OS, and the rest was media storage. Then I installed OSX, and updated to 10.5.7.

 

After installing Chameleon, placing kext files into the EFI Extras folder, and getting sound going, my Mini PC now can't reboot OR shut down. Installing Openhaltrestart.kext did absolutely nothing. I'm forced to hold the power button in every single time. That could get really old...

 

Ignoring that problem for a moment, I went back to the wifi card. Using a couple different OSX apps, I can in fact see the card sitting there on the PCI bus. I went and checked again in the AppleAirPortBrdcm4311.kext, and my vendor id etc are in there already... ?!?!

 

This little machine seems 5% away from being a really awesome, upgradeable, fully Leopard-compatible HTPC. But that last little bit is making me tear my hair out

[HBP]

I had similar issues with a Broadcom card. I finely decided that it was cheaper, and easier to Grab a cheap AirLink wireless N USB dongle then messing with trying to get the internal Wifi to work. that solved my issue, it sounds like you have an awesome little HTPC built, like a AppleTV.

 

Hope you enjoy it.

[CharredPC]

Easier, I'm sure... but not cheaper

 

After some more fine tuning, I now have every single thing working (including a faster boot-up, working shut down / reboot, and even the firewire port on the back)... except the wifi card. Now it's just laughing at me

 

There has to be a way to make it click. It's an OSX native chipset (945 / ICH7), running retail Leopard, with a native compatible card. It's visible on the PCI bus, and the hardware ID's match up properly... just won't appear in the Network config. It's the last 5% of this puzzle to make a perfect Mac Mini HTPC. Sure, I can shrug, give up, and stick a USB dongle into it... but I'd much rather utilize what it has, and maybe even image the finished hard disk for others to use.

 

It's just so dang close!

 

 

EDIT (MP945-D Summary):

Even if I never figure out how to get the internal PC Card slot going (not that I'm giving up!), this machine makes a superb Mac. Working TV-out AND HDMI video. Native Ethernet, native video, native chipset. With VoodooHDA, I have COMPLETE input/ouput control. USB, Firewire, CD burning... everything works. Chameleon, a DSDT patch, and my cheap upgrades have made this thing friggin' fly. It's rock solid, and both acts and performs like a real Mac.

 

Bottom line? Highly recommend this model if you can pick one up. Very upgradeable, few kext's needed, no weird rigging or unstable hassles. Retail EFI install lets me update everything without issue. If I used a desktop PC at home, this one would be it. Tiny, smooth, and Simply Works

[NielsR]

You'll find that those four-pin white connectors are in fact USB ports. I have two in my MP946-D. The difficult part is tracking down proper-sized plugs to go into them. I plan on using one of mine for the internal USB tv tuner... if I can get the wifi sorted out.

That's very cool! That means I can use this to attach a touchscreen controller to it.

 

Anyways, thanks for all the info you're providing in this thread. When I'm back from London I'll be trying to install Mac OS X on mine... (Might be next week)

 

I'll share my experiences too, of course!

 

Cheers,

l:x

[NielsR]

Ok... First attempt ain't very successful. REMEMBER: This is my first attempt in any way to install Mac OS X on a non-Apple computer.

 

I've downloaded the BOOT-132 image (BOOT-KABYL-BUMBY.iso) and added dsmos.kext to the initrd.img.

 

When I boot the BOOT-132 CD I got to the Darwin prompt. I switch the CD with my original Leopard install DVD (2009 24" iMac) and I'm presented a gray screen with the Apple logo and a spinner. After a while I got to the "space" screen (pink/black/stars) with a spinning "beach ball" icon. This stays for several minutes. The DVD spins up and down a few times and then all goes quite. The "beach ball" keeps spinning, but no change (> 15 min waiting time).

 

I'm sorry to be such a n00b at this, but can you give me a hint how to go further?

 

Can you give me a copy of your BOOT-132 CD? This might get me past the "beach ball"...

 

Kind regards,

l:x

 

EDIT: Second attempt...

 

I downloaded a initrd.img that someone putted online and I'm able to boot to the Mac OS X (10.5.6) installer with it. But... the installer let me know: "Mac OS X cannot be installed on this computer".

 

I also tried using -v -f boot options, which doesn't seem to change anything except for the fact that booting takes a lot more time...

 

Any suggestions?

 

EDIT: Added export of System Profiler info

Hardware_Overview.txt

Hardware_Overview.rtf

[CharredPC]

Firstly- HOORAY! The PCI slot works just friggin' fine. The problem turned out to be the card revision...

 

Feeling stupid for ordering a second non-working BCM4320 card before testing the first one, I decided to pop it in my Hack Mini just for the heck of it. And up pops the Airport! This machine now works 100%

 

Turns out my first card was a A00 model, dated 2001-2002. This new one looks exactly the same, except it is labeled Rev. B, and is from 2003. I guess that's all it took. I'll see what I can dig up on flashing firmware or modding the A00 card so it can be useful too. This makes me very excited, as I now have a fully functioning tiny OSX machine, which will be the perfect HTPC!

 

@l:x - My boot disc is named BOOT-KABYL-BUMBY.iso as well, but mine was pre-made. I couldn't get the create-it-yourself version to ever work. I think it was this version here, but I downloaded it a long time ago, so can't be sure. If that doesn't work, I'll try making my copy back into an ISO for you. Also keep in mind you need a true RETAIL DVD to install; not one that came bundled with a machine.

 

If you install it the way I did (GUID / EFI partition with latest Chameleon installed) then I can try giving you the kexts I used. Not sure how different our hardware will be, but it never hurts to try. Keep us informed!

[NielsR]

...Also keep in mind you need a true RETAIL DVD to install; not one that came bundled with a machine...

 

Ok, this is the problem... I don't have a "true" retail DVD. I totally misunderstood this... I'll have to decide if I want to spend 129,00 € on another copy of Leopard.

 

To be continued!

[NielsR]

Ok... I got myself a retail DVD and everything went smooth!

 

Couple things:

1. I haven't installed any custom drivers yet, so sound (RealTek ALC880) doesn't work yet.
   
2. I did the System Update ("Max OS X Combined Update" or something simular) and the update hanged when almost complete ("Running installer script"). I left it for about an hour and switched it off. This morning I wanted to boot again and it hanged (Last message on debug/verbose: "MACH Reboot"). Switched off and on again an booted into Max OS X. "About This Mac" says "Mac OS X 10.5.8", so hopefully the update went fine after all.
   
3. Reboot doesn't work. Problem is that I have to switch it of manually and sometimes the BIOS got resetted.
   
4. I've some BIOS settings which I've to figure out ideal settings for (bold is current setting):
   • ACPI Mode: S1 (POS) / S3 (STR) / S1&S3
     
   • SATA Mode: IDE / RAID / AHCI
     
   • DVMT Mode: Fixed / DVMT / Both
     

First I've to figure out how all those .kext work )

 

Cheers,

l:x

[CharredPC]

@l:x-

 

1. I ended up using VoodooHDA for the audio. Other kexts worked, but Voodoo gives me full input / output control instead of just general sound. I tried running it in my EFI partition's Extra folder, but due to dependencies, it needs to be in System/Library/Extensions. I don't think Apple updates will delete it, though, so don't mind too much

 

2. I may take the plunge with a 10.5.8 update tonight. It's always scary, escpecially after getting everything working so nicely... but how can I resist? What you describe sounds like the normal two-reboot cycle after upgrading that others are describing, though of course with our MACH errors and hangs thrown in for good measure!

 

3. To fix the reboot / shutdown issue; well, I'm not 100% positive how I solved it. I think after failing with OpenHaltRestart.kext, I found it seemed to be a kext-within-a-kext, so extracted it and used the inner one in EFI/Extras. I hope that makes sense and I'm remembering correctly! When I am at home, I'll bundle up what I use to make it easier.

 

4. I've tried setting those BIOS settings various ways; it seems to make little difference. I leave pretty much everything the way you have it, and it seems to be fine.

 

One big difference for me is after I installed Chameleon (latest version), I grabbed the DSDT patcher. After running it, it outputs a file to toss into your EFI root directory or Extras folder. After doing so, everything runs much quicker. As I understand it, it scans your BIOS tables for 'issues' and creates optimizations / fixes specifically for your system.

 

 

I couldn't help it, I'm Hack Mini-ing the other MP945-D I have here! Similar treatment to mine... Core 2 Duo CPU, more RAM, larger hard drive, native Airport card. I'll likely sell it, though, as I can't justify having two of these machines around while we're planning a move out of state. You might see it listed up on eBay in a few weeks, after I decide if I want to add the TV tuner to that one too

[CharredPC]

Just loving this little Hack Mini more and more!

 

Did the 10.5.8 update straight through Software Update. Rebooted twice, just like everyone else, then went right into OSX. Absolutely perfect, not a thing broken! No fixing, no KP, no headaches Wifi, sound, Ethernet, System Info, everything is working fine.

 

Sleep doesn't work, but now that I think about it, I don't think it worked before either. It doesn't lock up or anything, it just can't engage sleep. Pretty sure that the VoodooHDA kext stops it, and a certain 'sleep watch' kext can fix it (according to what I read). Will have to check it out tomorrow.

 

I don't have a monitor in the house right now, so I can't do any more tonight... using the TV makes command line a bit difficult!

[NielsR]

Hey CharredPC,

 

Thanks for all the info. I might try your suggestions tonight, but I'm not sure (been out of the country for a few days and would love an evening of rest).

 

I'll get back to you with more info about my progress.

 

Greetings,

l:x

[CharredPC]

We're in the middle of moving out of state and need money, so I'm selling my second Aopen MiniPC! Listed in the for sale section, and on eBay (item #270449352447). Quite a bit cheaper than the bare bones models there, ready to Hackintosh!

 

I got an offer for my original C2D T5200 1.6Ghz / 533Mhz bus cpu, so sold it and took the opportunity to upgrade for free Mine now has a Core 2 Duo T5600 1.83Ghz / 667Mhz bus cpu, nabbed for $39 shipped. It should now definitely have enough oomph to handle Hulu desktop and the new Hauppauge WinTv-HVR-950Q tuner I grabbed for $60 shipped. To recap, I'm using 2GB of 667Mhz DDR2 RAM, and a 500GB SATA hard drive.

 

Once prices drop on the new 1TB laptop drives, I'm really tempted to toss one in, seeing as this is my HTPC. What can I say, I have a big movie collection. Plus I want some extra space to record off the tuner. I also did a little easy mod to add an internal Aux wifi antenna, which doubled signal strength. Very, very pleased with this machine. We're currently staying with family until the official move in ten days, so I brought the Hack Mini and spent all yesterday watching movies.

 

Once we're set up at our new place I'll play with the HDTV tuner and begin mounting it inside. I can't believe I had a mammoth, loud, space-heater desktop PC for our home theater when this silent, tiny thing does it all... and with OSX to boot!