NVIDIA's ION Platform and OS X

[kaiou]

. . . IMO the above issue [my emphasis in red] can be sorted.

 

In the BIOS, in the Southbridge section, what do you have set as the primary display?

I fiddled with those options & I *think* [cannot remember & haven't rebooted for five days or so] that I set it to the option [of 3] that used the term: "PCIe"

 

This definitely affects VGA behaviour. One of these settings works better with OSX & its EDID sensing.

 

I can shut the display down, cycle it between inputs, switch from TV to any of the HDMIs & so on, & it always works properly when switched back to the HDMI used by the Zotac/OSX.

 

You did not understand, I think ..

 

With nvenabler I can even turn off the monitor, change source, etc.. It work properly!

 

The monitor turns off and will not turn over just trying to make him sleep.

You have tried both as a technique for S1 S3 sleep?

[shoarthing]

You did not understand, I think ..

 

With nvenabler I can even turn off the monitor, change source, etc.. It work properly!

- glad to hear it (expressed clearly).

 

The monitor turns off and will not turn over just trying to make him sleep.

You have tried both as a technique for S1 S3 sleep?

. . . could you translate this into English again, please?

[Frogburn959]

I have made a bit more progress at getting OS x running on my Ion based Acer Revo. I have found that the reason most of the distro and my successful install of iDeneb either rebooted or stopped at:

 

"using 9175 buffer headers and 4096 cluster IO buffer headers"

 

Can be fixed by going into the BIOS and turning off hyperthreading for the Atom CPU.

 

Since doing this I have been able to get the iDeneb install to boot past the above problem but it stops later on.

 

I have been able to do a retail install and get this to boot into OSX by using this command on the Darwin boot option point

 

"Graphics Mode"="640x480x32" -v

 

It did take a LONG time to boot though.Since OS X in such a low res there is not much you can do but at least it boots. Upon a reboot and with out the above command I got a kernel panic caused by the AppleIntelCPUPowerManagement kext which I have since removed.

 

It now gets further but into OS X it appears to stop at different places according to the debug when using -v.

 

From the debug that scrolls past when using -v on retail I have found that OS X does not reconise the GPU but it does reconise the Ethernet, this is one of the places it hangs.

 

Anyone have any suggestion for me to try?

 

Just a thought what kernels have you tried, I have an Aspire one Netbook and it loves the Voodoo Kernel, it thinks its a Dual core.

[Openminded]

Me dutch too, and the article was by me.

Still here no solution for the qe-ci problem found that works.

Trackpad needs voodoo ps2 mouse-trackpad choice to have a mouseclick touchpad.

Device and vendor id i get in the plist, but what do some people mean by the NVdarwin binary patch and where to put in the NVIDIA ION LE string (Howto= ).

 

Gigabyte M912X i had for 1 day, what a terrible keyboard and screen is in that netbook and resolution is far to high to read without eyestrain.

 

I must say I am pretty content with the M912!

Keyboard is not too big, but I like the resolution (1024x600 just sucks).

I have snow Leopard 10.6.1 running with full QE/CI, working sound (including mic and connectors!).

Only the webcam does not work and the sound sometimes needs a reboot to work.

I like it for it's portability.

 

I think NVCAP stuff is to complaticated for me at the moment.

This whole DSDT stuff is hard to comprehend for me at the moment.

I requested a fixed one, but got no response.

Guess I'll live with this for a while .

[Mushishi]

shoarthing

 

I have been a little away from osx86 on the zotac doe to some toothe ake and personal problems.

 

But did jsut today try some stuff on it..

 

Latest beta of 6.2 have the same problem with the kernel.. I belive this is the last beta so do this.. make a copy of the 10.6.0 kernel now so you have this to boot when 10.6.2 is out...

 

2 thing... The Atheroes kexts are out in 64bit and the wifi card works oob in 64bit now.. So beside that the kernel hates atoms the rest looks great..

[shoarthing]

Edit 5 Nov 2009 - moving info to a Zotac-specific thread

[Mushishi]

Well right now i have the ION running 10.6.2 using the 10.6.0 kernel and using 10.6.2 system.kext and seatbelt.kext with no problems...

 

And just to make this clear..

 

All atoms get the problem not just the 330... We have testet the Intel Atom mobos, (Both single and dual core) and on a netbook... All have the problem.

 

As soon 10.6.2 is out and we get the kernel source we can ofc make kernels that just fixes the atom problem...

[shoarthing]

Edit 5 Nov 2009 - moving info to a Zotac-specific thread

[Mushishi]

i did try GrapichsEnabler before i did patch it in to the DSDT and it did work beside the name.. i did not need the rom...

 

but do you have the NVCAP from NVEnabler then i will try to mod that into the dsdt i use..

[shoarthing]

Edit 5 Nov 2009 - moving info to a Zotac-specific thread

[GMScribe]

Hi guys,

 

I'm needing a Mac system for iPhone development but buying a full on Mac that I'll never use for anything else seems a bit extreme. I'm wanting a desktop unit as laptop screens are a pain in the ass not to mention osx doesn't like my acer timeline.

 

Any update on how it's going with the ION platform? In particular i'm looking at the Acer Aspire Revo R3600 as it's damn cheap!

 

What versions of the os do you recommend and which kernels/drivers will be required? Will I need to patch my bios or simply configure some settings?

 

Many thanks for any help.

[Mushishi]

Hi guys,

 

I'm needing a Mac system for iPhone development but buying a full on Mac that I'll never use for anything else seems a bit extreme. I'm wanting a desktop unit as laptop screens are a pain in the ass not to mention osx doesn't like my acer timeline.

 

Any update on how it's going with the ION platform? In particular i'm looking at the Acer Aspire Revo R3600 as it's damn cheap!

 

What versions of the os do you recommend and which kernels/drivers will be required? Will I need to patch my bios or simply configure some settings?

 

Many thanks for any help.

 

Yes... Dont.. as it seems now the Atom cpu wont get any love in 10.6.2 so i have to say ofc patched kernels will work but for me the atom is a dead end.. i have to be able to have to use patched kernels.

 

shoarthing

 

Here is how mine look now using DSDT.

 

[shoarthing]

Hi guys,

 

I'm needing a Mac system for iPhone development but buying a full on Mac that I'll never use for anything else seems a bit extreme. I'm wanting a desktop unit as laptop screens are a pain in the ass not to mention osx doesn't like my acer timeline.

 

Any update on how it's going with the ION platform? In particular i'm looking at the Acer Aspire Revo R3600 as it's damn cheap!

 

What versions of the os do you recommend and which kernels/drivers will be required? Will I need to patch my bios or simply configure some settings?

 

Many thanks for any help.

. . 'patching my BIOS' seems a trifle OTT - you *should* be able to get OSX running with no more than a mildly-edited dsdt.aml

 

The Aspire 3600 is just another MCP7A box, & should be quite easy to get working - the real hassle is the initial installation.

 

If you do not have access to a mac [or hack] running the version of OSX you wish to install you'll have to find some sort of suitable boot132 CD [if this Revo 3600 has an optical drive].

 

Audio is likely to be a hassle - if this is important to you you'll need to find out exactly what codec this box uses & do a search here & in the Wiki.

 

As Mushishi points out, the upcoming 10.6.2 update looks as though it'll break SL-onna-Atom functionality at a pretty basic level; but you could always set your sights on using 10.5.x [pretty well sorted] until such time as there is a functional community-build 10.6.x kernel.

 

If I needed to have a cheap OSX box for development I'd buy a mac mini - the current models are genuinely good value & [when you can afford to buy the stuff] you can fit/use 8GB of RAM.

[Mushishi]

i 2 that with the mini... the base mini model dont cost that much more then the ion ready build computers do... and then you are sure they work with snow as long they run intel.. Or even get a used mini... just remember they need to have intel cpu..

[Methanoid]

That's what I found on another website from the netherlands. (google can translate it very well), but nope. still no qe/ci.

 

Yeah but no mention of any kexts/enablers used.. my Asus P5N9300N barebone is fussy and IIRC needed nvEnabler to work with QE/CI

 

Have you given up or have you done more? I'm thinking to buy this machine but waiting to see if it can be made to work.

[Mushishi]

Yeah but no mention of any kexts/enablers used.. my Asus P5N9300N barebone is fussy and IIRC needed nvEnabler to work with QE/CI

 

Have you given up or have you done more? I'm thinking to buy this machine but waiting to see if it can be made to work.

 

Well you need anyform for enabler on all graphics cards.. only one that work with out are the ones on real macs..

 

So both the Geforce 9300 and the Geforce 9400 will need ether a kext or a dsdt string to enable the card..

 

And i will bet that NVEnabler will work on the Geforce 9400M LE also

[wrc4]

Hi,

 

I'm new to this forum.

 

Looks like you guys have figured out how to get 10.6 work on the Zotac IONITX board. But I'm having problems installing it on my IONITX A-U still. (Probably because I'm a n00b).

 

Here is what I did:

1.(On a working OSX system) Restore the retail DVD to an eSATA external drive.

2.Install Chameleon-2.0-RC3-r658 and replace the boot file with the one from PC EFI v10.5.

3.Put the Extensions.mkext from this post (http://www.projectosx.com/forum/index.php?showtopic=464) in the Extra folder. The kexts included in this mkext should be: dsmos, NullCPUPowerManagement, OpenHaltRestart and PlatformUUID.

4.There is also a smbios.plist file in the Extra folder.

5.Adjust BIOS setting. (Turn off Hyperthreading, enable AHCI and etc.)

6.Then I was able to connect the drive to the eSATA port of the ION to boot it up and get things going for a while (with a bunch of EHCI errors) until I saw this message:

NVEthernet: Ethernet address 00:01:2e:26:06:d2

And it just hung there.

 

So my questions are:

1. Am I using the right install method?

2. Did I miss any important part?

3. Will I be able to install the system without the DSDT hack? I know I will eventually do that to make things work but just wonder if I can do things step by step.

 

Any help is appreciated.

[Mushishi]

Hi,

 

I'm new to this forum.

 

Looks like you guys have figured out how to get 10.6 work on the Zotac IONITX board. But I'm having problems installing it on my IONITX A-U still. (Probably because I'm a n00b).

 

Here is what I did:

1.(On a working OSX system) Restore the retail DVD to an eSATA external drive.

2.Install Chameleon-2.0-RC3-r658 and replace the boot file with the one from PC EFI v10.5.

3.Put the Extensions.mkext from this post (http://www.projectosx.com/forum/index.php?showtopic=464) in the Extra folder. The kexts included in this mkext should be: dsmos, NullCPUPowerManagement, OpenHaltRestart and PlatformUUID.

4.There is also a smbios.plist file in the Extra folder.

5.Adjust BIOS setting. (Turn off Hyperthreading, enable AHCI and etc.)

6.Then I was able to connect the drive to the eSATA port of the ION to boot it up and get things going for a while (with a bunch of EHCI errors) until I saw this message:

NVEthernet: Ethernet address 00:01:2e:26:06:d2

And it just hung there.

 

So my questions are:

1. Am I using the right install method?

2. Did I miss any important part?

3. Will I be able to install the system without the DSDT hack? I know I will eventually do that to make things work but just wonder if I can do things step by step.

 

Any help is appreciated.

 

first off... Dont use dsmos use fakesmc... find the snow leopard version on netkas.org

 

And no you dont need a dsdt on it and if you have the single core version of the atom (The 230) then Hypertreading still works.

And then disable Legacy usb under the controller in the bios... that removes the AHCI problems...

 

And you dont need to use a Extensions.mkext the kexts can be in /Extra/Extensions on the esata drive

 

hope that help a little.

[shoarthing]

Edit 5 Nov 2009 - moving info to a Zotac-specific thread

[wrc4]

. . you don't need any UUID/platformuuid.kext [well, I don't] . . & I'd think it likely your hang at the MAC address is likely to be because the UUID/platformuuid.kext in this Extensions.mkext has someone else's ID-string in it - conventionally these ID-strings draw their last 12 characters from your MAC address.

 

Bin this s/h extensions.mkext & just put three kexts in E/E - fakesmc + nullintelcpupowermanagement + openhaltrestart

 

You can use PC-EFI's graphicsenabler [i do] - we also have a neat solution for onboard sound.

 

Perhaps you might be best advised to boot up off a Linux liveCD & dump your dsdt

 

cat /proc/acpi/dsdt > ~/Desktop/dsdt.aml

 

. . then zip it up & attach to a post here: if you wish I'll do a quick edit for sound & remove the CPU alias'

 

Both Mushishi & I use similar smbios.plists - you should be able to find the significant entries in posts in this thread.

 

Thanks Mushishi & shoarthing! I followed your suggestions and successfully installed OSX on my Zotac board! Here is what I did:

1. Delete Extensions.mkext in /Extra on the install drive.

2. Put fakesmc.kext (Snow Leopard version from netkas.org), nullintelcpupowermanagement.kext and openhaltrestart.kext in /Extra/Extensions on the install drive.

3. Make sure smbios.plist has the required information

4. Make sure there is no DSDT.aml file in /Extra

5. Boot the Install Drive with "-v" option. (I didn't use CPUS=1. Also, because I need to use my USB keyboard & mouse, I didn't disable USB Legacy support. So I ended up with a lot of EHCI errors but the Install disk booted OK.)

 

After install finished the system rebooted. I switched to the Internal hard drive at the Chameleon boot screen but the new system couldn't start! It stopped at the same place I mentioned before! So I went in BIOS and selected "Clear NVRAM [Yes]". After reboot it worked! I'm not sure if this is caused by the USB problem but this definitely fixed the problem!

 

Up to this point I got:

1. Very slow graphics at 1280x1024 on my 21.5" ASUS Monitor (1920x1080 native resolution).

2. Self-assigned IP address (no Internet)

3. No sound

 

Not so impressive, but now I can start playing with the hacks mentioned in this post! Thanks again, Mushishi & shoarthing!

 

EDIT: DSDT for Zotac IONITX A-U attached. Please cast your magic to it, shoarthing!Zotac_IONITX_A_U.DSDT.zip

[shoarthing]

Edit 5 Nov 2009 - moving info to a Zotac-specific thread

[wrc4]

... . . hmm: slightly surprised by issue 2

 

Suggest you put attached dsdst.aml in /Extra; & attached *.kext in E/E - then rebuild your caches & Extensions.mkext using, if lazy like me, the latest version of Cvad's natty tool.

 

Suuggest you use the graphicsenabler in PC-EFI, together with the NVIDIA.ROM I attached to post 133, remembering to edit your apple.com.boot.plist as in that post.

 

Please report back

 

Hi shoarthing,

 

Thanks for the file.

 

Yes. I do have problems with Ethernet. It still doesn't work after using your kext & DSDT.aml. Sound works after adding the kext for ALC662 and updating everything using Cvad's tool. (BTW, it's a great tool!)

 

But my video is still not working. Here is what I did:

1. copy NVIDIA.ROM to / of my HD.

2. Modify com.apple.Boot.plist in /Extra to include the following:

<key>GraphicsEnabler</key>
<string>Yes</string>
<key>VideoROM</key>
<string>/NVIDIA.ROM</string>
<key>VBIOS</key>
<string>Yes</string>

3. Run KextUtility & Reboot

 

But after that, nothing seems have changed. Am I doing this wrong? Or is there any other steps to use GraphicsEnabler?

[Mushishi]

What link speed do the nic report.. i did experince something like that but that was after booting the ubuntu live cd (9.04) then the cabme nic only did report as 100 mbit and was not working in linux, osx86, vista or win 7...

 

but after installing win xp and then installing the drivers from zotac hp then it did go back to 1000MBit and was working in osx86 again.

[shoarthing]

wrc4 - Hi - first suggest you check you have allocated 256M or 512M to video [in the southbridge section of the BIOS]

 

Then please get hold of ioregistryexplorer [included in xcode tools, also in dsdtse] & take a look at what is shown when you type

 

'igpu' into it

 

. . you can see the sort of output Mushishi & I see above in his thread.

[wrc4]

What link speed do the nic report.. i did experince something like that but that was after booting the ubuntu live cd (9.04) then the cabme nic only did report as 100 mbit and was not working in linux, osx86, vista or win 7...

 

but after installing win xp and then installing the drivers from zotac hp then it did go back to 1000MBit and was working in osx86 again.

 

Hi Mushishi,

 

The nic did report only 100 mbit. And I was using Ubuntu 9.04 Live CD to capture DSDT information.Previously I had Windows XP on the MB but now it's gone. Is this some kind of nasty firmware issue? Also, are you doing OSX86 and WinXP dual boot?