Chameleon 2 RC and placing of kexts

[eRAZOR2007]

I'm a happy user of OSX 10.5.6 Retail in conjunction with Chameleon 2 RC installed on the harddisk. There's one question though. The main benefit from running a vanilla retail Leopard version is to maximize compatibility with Apple Software Updates. Therefore it is my understanding that the preferred installation location of custom .kexts is in Chameleons /Extras/Extensions folder.

 

Unfortunately, when placing either a network driver kext (Attansic Atheros L1e) or a sound driver kext in that location, the extension did not seem to work. What worked though, was moving them to /System/Library/Extensions. Could anyone enlighten me why it didn't work?

[Beerkex'd]

Some kernel extensions depend on other kernel extensions to work/load.

 

If you look in the .plist inside you can see which ones they depend on.

 

For example for my LAN to work from extra/extensions I need to keep IONetworkingFamily.kext and IOPCIFamily.kext there as well.

 

Also try the search box and type 'legacy kext' and then your LAN make and model. If your LAN only needs a plist modification to work you might be able to use a legacy kext for it.

 

Maybe you can find a legacy kext for your audio too.

[gmacman]

I'm a happy user of OSX 10.5.6 Retail in conjunction with Chameleon 2 RC installed on the harddisk. There's one question though. The main benefit from running a vanilla retail Leopard version is to maximize compatibility with Apple Software Updates. Therefore it is my understanding that the preferred installation location of custom .kexts is in Chameleons /Extras/Extensions folder.

 

Unfortunately, when placing either a network driver kext (Attansic Atheros L1e) or a sound driver kext in that location, the extension did not seem to work. What worked though, was moving them to /System/Library/Extensions. Could anyone enlighten me why it didn't work?

 

Unfortunately I have heard of others having this problem (kexts not working correctly within /Extra folder). Did you take out the mkext that was in the /Extra folder? (I believe it was called Extentions.mkext). In my /Extra folder I only have the following:

 

com.apple.Boot.plist (having graphics and time machine fixes)

smbios.plist (which helps to show memory correctly and machine type, etc.)

Extentions folder (which contain all my modified kext)

Themes folder

 

You can also use the KextSpy (I've attched it below), a handy little app which is just a nice gui of an existing app within OS X that can tell you if the kext was loaded and what dependencies it may have (it may have been loaded but is not correctly working). Also take a look at your Console app (it's in the Utilities folder within the Applications folder). Launch it, click the "Show Log List" on the top left, and select the "system.log" under the "LOG FILES" menu on the left. Look and see if it shows any messages during boot (messages about the kext you are having trouble with).

 

KextSpy.zip

[Beerkex'd]

Or you can just type 'kextstat' in terminal and have it output to a text file:

 

kextstat -l > kextlist.txt

 

To see what non-apple kexts are loaded, type this:

 

kextstat -kl | awk '{ print $6 }' | grep -v apple

 

You can also see which extensions are loaded from the System Profiler.

[gmacman]

Or you can just type 'kextstat' in terminal and have it output to a text file:

 

kextstat -l > kextlist.txt

 

To see what non-apple kexts are loaded, type this:

 

kextstat -kl | awk '{ print $6 }' | grep -v apple

 

You can also see which extensions are loaded from the System Profiler.

 

Yep, thanks I forgot the command since I use that app now all the time. And really the only benefit of the KextSpy is that it loads everything into a textedit doc instead of doing the command line thing. Not rocket science or anything, but it helped me greatly when I was first getting my machines up and running.

[eRAZOR2007]

Thanks guys. That explains a lot.