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Installation on a Dell Latitude XT Tablet

blowry22

By blowry22,
in OSx86 10.5 (Leopard)

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blowry22
blowry22
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Hello all- I am new to InsanelyMac but I have been looking through these threads for a week now while I am attempting to install OSx86 on my Dell Latitude XT Tablet.

 

Thus far, it's been a bumpy road trying different things. At this point, I don't know if I can call it a success (and probably wouldn't) but I do have it booting nicely (from an external USB drive).

 

Here are the details on the unit:

Dell Latitude XT Tablet, BIOS A01

Intel Core 2 Duo Proc, 1.2 GHz

2 GB RAM (1.79 GB available)

80 GB Toshiba ATA-6, 1.8" HDD

ATI Radeon Mobility x1250, 256 MB RAM

Sigmatel 9205 Audio Controller

Dell 1490 Dual-band Wireless (Broadcom)

N-Trig Digitizing Tablet

SD reader and firewire as well

 

Now that's out of the way, here's what I have so far:

 

I tried the Kaly Leopard but was quite discouraged when I didn't see the internal HDD. Somehwere (mistakenly) I read the internal drive was SATA and to use the TOH Leopard. So that's where I'm at today, I used the TOH (plus that one had some extra scripts but I can't rule anything with Kaly out because I learned so many other techniques and steps working through ToH).

 

Neither one can see my internal HDD (which I learned later is not SATA but ATA-6) so I decided to try and use an external USB 40GB HDD. The install saw the USB drive and after following some additional steps regarding using MBR rather than GUID for the partitioning scheme I created the drive and loaded Leopard (just to note, that even before with using the GUID method, Leopard did install however at the end I received a "install failed").

 

After using MBR scheme I didn't receive the "install failed"... in fact it was successful. Of course then I had to boot back in with the DVD and go to "Terminal" to set the drive to properly boot and "blessed".

 

Now you have my "back story". I connect the external USB drive, power-on the tablet, and it boots straight into Leopard. I even installed Office 2004 without any problems. I still cannot see the internal HDD either. The tablet / digitizer part works though right from the start. The Latitude XT tablet's screen works with both a pen and touch... under Leopard both are on at the same time but do work. Firewire works as well as USB and accessing the CDROM. Also surprisingly, right out of the box, my wireless works too!! I have not tested the internal NIC yet because I want to figure out why it does not see my internal HDD.

 

Also, sound doesn't work yet (but then again I have done anything to help it work or look for/modify any Kext).

 

All of the "running" stuff above was done after using a ToH Leopard install... I may wipe it out and do the same steps with Kaly. Before that I thought I should start writing on here to see if anyone had any comments first. Should I stick with Leopard or try to find a Jas Tiger? Thoughts on ATA-6 and why I can't see my internal HDD?? ToH or Kaly... which should I use??

 

I haven't found anywhere anyone who was installing OSx86 on a Dell Latitude Tablet so here I am. I've been keeping notes and as I make progress I will post up here. When completed, I will also post my steps and update the wiki for the Dell tablet.

 

 

 

Thanks all!!

Brian

 

 

FYI- I have a 17" MBP and a 17" iMac G5. Looking to create a Mac Tablet from the Dell Latitude XT.

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  • 3 weeks later...
blowry22
blowry22
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Any updates?

 

 

Not yet... work had kept me from woking on this any farther. However that has cleared up so I thought I'd come back here first to see if there were any posts with other tips.

 

I have confirmed that I have a regular ATA controller and internal drive (not a SATA after all) so I am a bit puzzled on why it isn't being recognized. I have spoken with a few contacts I have at Dell and they may be able to provide me with appropiate timing data for creating my own kext. But I'm not even close to there yet. I am still booting from the external HDD. Also, after awhile, it seems to lock up completely (but I think that may be due to the external USB drive).

 

 

Thanks!

Brian

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neks0ne
neks0ne
Posted
Posted

I also have a dell tablet, Do you think it has anything to do with the security measures in the bios of the dell....It probably is all kext realated, Id really like to see this happen. Let me know is you come across anything. I have the 80gb sammy drive in my dell tablet, apparently it is the same that is in the mac book air.....can we possibly "steal" a kext from that?

 

Forgive my noobness, Im still grasping the Mac/Apple Architecture....

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ReD-DaWg-OnE
ReD-DaWg-OnE
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Posted

I also have a XT like you do and ran into the same issue you did. I did have an idea but wasn't sure if it would work, my first Latitude XT had the 32GB SSD drive, so i wanted some more storage and bought a 16GB SDHC card. Would there be a way to get the OSX to recognie the SD card?

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SirJames_AU
SirJames_AU
Posted
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Hey Guys, Good to see a post on the Dell XT.

 

I have had my XT scince the day they were released, if not a week before. I am a tech arch doing a role out with the XT and have sent 30 of them out in the last month..

 

I tried, same as all here, to install osx in the first week and got the no drive error same to.. haha

 

After reading this post I am installing now on to a external USB, its about 50% the way thru so fingers crossed..

 

Two things:

 

1) What you had to do to make the install bootable after the install

 

2) I am using the KALYWAY 10.5.2, on their you can select 9200 series Dell sound

 

I will post back if this works

 

Cheers, SirJames

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skwalla
skwalla
Posted
Posted

Is there a kext for the macbook air hd controller? Just noticed it has the same 1.8inch hardrive pata as the dell xt. Dunno if they have the same controller. but worth a try. When I receive my refurb xt next week i'll take a look and fiddle.

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syncope
syncope
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Awesome, I'm just as happy as you yourself would have been to find this post.

 

Have an XT too, but it is my only computer and I rely on it for work.[which to me probably means - keep reading and reading and making backups until confident enough to take the plunge]

 

 

Further I intend to do a complete bootcamp Parallels/VMware Fusion install [i.e.:Backup | install osx | install Bootcamp (or other bootloader) | install windows | restore backup from within or over the new windows instalation | create virtual machine in Par/VM | happily use both ever after] And this sounds like potentially a ton of pitfalls and trial & error re-installs to get running. 

Performancewise it should work quite usably on this Tablet. t'would be awefully nice and rebooting is a {censored}.

 

+ Sayyy...what happens when you have both the pen and a finger on the screen at the same time. Does it differ from placing two fingers on it, does the cursor just jump irratically or is one input ignored ?

 

Good luck with figuring out the PATA/ATA-6 internal install. I dont have any additional insights in that department to ad yet.

[NextStop: Hell why not triple boot XP, OSX and Fedora/Ubuntu and VM within them all - oh this is just crying for a bigger harddrive and lots more time]

Anyone still reading may be interested in the following site in that regard.

http://ofb.net/~rafi/latitude_xt.html very very resourcefull

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Island133
Island133
Posted
Posted

Any updates guys ? I tried 20 different ways, and with many different things. But still no luck, anyone else luckier ?

 

*EDIT* - One thin I forgot to mention, while I was trying to detect my hard drive. I spent a lot of time in the installer menu, at which point I started to get bored and mess with the screen. I noticed that in the installer menu for the kalyway CD, the touchscreen works just fine. It works almost the same as in vista, but I just can't detect the hard drive to install os x. Anyone know a good live CD to format HFS or HFS+ ?

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Syph
Syph
Posted
Posted

I have the 120Gb Hd on my Dell Latitude XT, and i have succesfully installed Mac OS X 10.5.2 on an external HD unsing iAtkos 2.0i

Well...by succesfuly, I mean that it boots into Mac OS, but i have no sound, no ethernet, no wireless, but 2 cores ( if i remember correctly).

 

I was unsucessfuly with ToH which I could not boot into because I could never get the partition to start up.

Kallyway 10.5.2 worked, without ethernet, wireless, sound, but seemed slower than iAtkos.

 

I am currently trying to get iDeneb 10.5.5 to work, but I think I did not chose the right kernel, because I got stuck in a loop at the first startup after install. (tried cpus=1 -f, did no change anyhting) I am reinstalling with another kernel, as i think the Vanilla did not work...

 

I am also not sure which chipset to chose....all i was able to find out was that the northbridge was ATI RS600M, the southbridge was ATI/AMD SB600, and the FSB was Intel AGTL.

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Cruxado
Cruxado
Posted
Posted

Hi all,

 

I also recently got a Dell XT! I've been dying to get Leopard on it! It's good to hear that there aren't many Hardware problems with it except for the Internal HDD... I've followed the link posted about the PATA kext and will be trying that out.

 

Just to add a little note, I basically have about 20 DVDs of Leo Installers and I've found out that JaS's DVDs can recognize the External CDROM at the Disk Utility screen. So best bet JaS 10.5.4 will work... hopefully. I'll place an Update if I get anything working.

 

 

BTW, I have a MBP and Leo is jut fantastic!

 

 

=========

Adding TAGS for Google Spider search...

 

Dell Latitude XT Tablet HDD hard drive harddrive not recognized recognizing Disk Utility

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Twisted Syntax
Twisted Syntax
Posted
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Not sure if anyone has checked out this option yet?

 

Up until now expresscard SSD has been too slow to be a viable option but this company claims sustained read and write speeds of 100MB/s.

 

http://www.mtron.net/English/Product/Produ...de=MSD-EXCD3034

 

Definitely worth I try I would say, at worst you would end up with some spare hi speed solid state memory...

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Cruxado
Cruxado
Posted
Posted
Hi all,

 

I also recently got a Dell XT! I've been dying to get Leopard on it! It's good to hear that there aren't many Hardware problems with it except for the Internal HDD... I've followed the link posted about the PATA kext and will be trying that out.

 

Just to add a little note, I basically have about 20 DVDs of Leo Installers and I've found out that JaS's DVDs can recognize the External CDROM at the Disk Utility screen. So best bet JaS 10.5.4 will work... hopefully. I'll place an Update if I get anything working.

BTW, I have a MBP and Leo is jut fantastic!

=========

Adding TAGS for Google Spider search...

 

Dell Latitude XT Tablet HDD hard drive harddrive not recognized recognizing Disk Utility

 

 

Well... I just can't figure out how to place the ATA-6 kext, as suggested by yoyotojo, into an Install DVD. But I will try the following.

  1. Install Leopard into an Ext HDD or 16gig Pendrive
  2. Boot it up and later Install ATA-6 Kext
  3. IF the internal drive is recognized by the Leopard, then I'll just clone the Image of my Ext HDD into my Int HDD (which is already partitioned in HFS+) using a Norton's Ghost.

Sounds simple enough... no?

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pegasys
pegasys
Posted
Posted

I've had my XT for a week now - love the screen and the thin and light style.

 

I''ve not used Mac OS since the summer when I had Leopard running nicely on a Dell 1720, so I'm a bit rusty and don't know what the latest releases are, etc.

 

I still had a 200GB sata 2.5" hard drive which has been divided into 16 HFS+ partitions (easy to do using Disk Util). On the first 6 partitions I had Kalyway 10.5.2, a cloned iatkos 10.5.2, Jas10.5.4, iatkos 10.5.2, iatkos10.5.4, Leo4allv3 installs - and on the last few partitions i'd restored the contents of the install DVDs (using disk util) to each partition individually (it's faster to install from a hard drive than from a DVD). The rest were for fresh installs or cloned installs. (I'd set the drive up using a vaio FE).

 

Anyway, plugged the HD into the XT, choose first partition from Darwin bootloader (Kalyway 10.5.2), it started to load but then quit... not good.

 

Rebooted, selected 2nd partition, (a clone of the iatkos 10.5.2 install that I was using on the Dell 1720)...started to load...continued to load...desktop appeared...wifi was already connected to my home network...on the 1720 I had an apple script which loads a playlist into itunes at startup...saw this bouncing up and down on the dock...wasn't expecting any sound....and then music started playing loudly from the speaker...final surprise was that the touch screen worked...WOW

 

Considering that I'd spent zero effort getting to this point (with the XT, that is), I was extremely impressed!!!

 

Wireless card is broadcom, which is why wifi worked, I'd installed the relevant sigmatel audio codec on the 1720 using HDA patcher (must be same or similar codec that XT uses) which is why the audio worked, and I guess touchscreen and pen work because they're on a USB port (most tablet PCs use a serial port so you need the app Tablet Magic).

 

Biggest problems at the moment - as others have pointed out - no internal hard drive detected and 1024x768 res streched onto a 1280x800 screen.

 

Is there no fix for Ati that will give the correct resolution without QE/CI (like MacVidia used to do for Nvidia cards 2 years ago)??

 

Second question, are people using vanilla installs with efi??

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pegasys
pegasys
Posted
Posted

@Cruxado

Have you had any success with the atiata kext? I've tried it on a couple of partitions but it doesn't seem to have any effect. I'm asuming of course that I've installed it right - at least it shows up under System Profiler>Software>Extensions. Anyway, I'll post in the ~Eurekas thread, maybe he could help solve this...

 

Theres quite a few topics in the forum on atiata, viaata, SBA 200/ 400/600 southbridges etc, dcat has an interesting post on getting a ide hd conroller with the same device id (0x438c1002) to work. I find it kind of confusing that there's so many kext's with 'ATA' in their name!!

 

@Twisted Syntax

 

Thats interesting, does the XT detect a SD Card or an Express card as a bootable device when you press F12? - if so that should/might work

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paulobrien
paulobrien
Posted
Posted

So I can't actually get it going on an external USB disk (installs OK but reboots as soon as you try and boot the OS for the first time), so instead I used the kalyway kext injector script to try the ATA kext posted earlier in this topic.

 

No dice, at least the installer still couldn't see the internal HDD.

 

Would love to get it working, but obviously seeing the HDD is an important first step! :)

 

P

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Cruxado
Cruxado
Posted
Posted
@Cruxado

Have you had any success with the atiata kext? I've tried it on a couple of partitions but it doesn't seem to have any effect. I'm asuming of course that I've installed it right - at least it shows up under System Profiler>Software>Extensions. Anyway, I'll post in the ~Eurekas thread, maybe he could help solve this...

 

Theres quite a few topics in the forum on atiata, viaata, SBA 200/ 400/600 southbridges etc, dcat has an interesting post on getting a ide hd conroller with the same device id (0x438c1002) to work. I find it kind of confusing that there's so many kext's with 'ATA' in their name!!

 

 

 

Pegasys,

 

Maybe you should try one of the Kext installers like OSx86 Tools (google it) to install the Kext. That way you can be sure it was correctly installed.

 

I have not been able to try the method I suggested... I'll have to wait till Thanks Giving Break to tinker away. hehehe....

 

Thanks for the info on DCAT's interesting post... I'll see if I can read up on it.

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pegasys
pegasys
Posted
Posted

@paulobrien

 

What release were you using, what kernel did you select? (for installing to USB HD)

 

I used the leo4allv3 installer to do a couple of installs to different partitions yesterday - 1st time I used the default selected kernel ( 9.2.0 ) and it booted fine. Second time I selected 9.2.0 vanilla kernel and it quit just after rebooting just as you described. (I also selected for both installs VIA SiS Marvell SB chipset drivers under the chipset driver section - not that I expected it to make any difference).

 

Of the installs already on the 200GB external drive that were done on a Vaio FE (Core Duo) - they all quit after starting to boot on the XT - perhaps the XT doesn't like vanilla kernels - or just needs other options to be checked in customize section of the installer

 

 

 

@Cruxado

 

I did use Osx86 tools to install the kext - so I suppoose it must have installed correctly and I didn't get any 'kext improperly installed' on rebooting.

 

But I'm out of practise with installing kexts, editing hardware ids, etc - with the hardware I've had over the last year (intel, nvidia) - everything has usually just worked...

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paulobrien
paulobrien
Posted
Posted

I tried the MSIWindOSX install with vanilla 9.4 kernel, and also Kalyway with the speedstep kernel (IIRC).

 

I also and XD set in the Latitude BIOS (which as I understand it the Vanilla Kernel needs), so it's a bit weird.

 

Frustrating!

 

At least you have a working install, try every SB600 driver you can find? :(

 

P

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