Gantlett Posted May 21, 2009 Share Posted May 21, 2009 I have a Gigabyte GA-EP35C-DS3R Rev 2.1 motherboard, Intel E8400, 4GB RAM and nVidia 8800GT 512MB. This machine has been running flawlessly for the past few months using the following setup: I used a retail 10.5 DVD and booted it using BootDFE 132 Generic ISO, updated to 10.5.5 and used Chameleon_DFE_for_Hard_Disk to install Boot132+kexts onto disk. I used the kexts from the Boot132 CD and added OpenHaltRestart.kext to enable proper ShutDown/Restart/Sleep. I used an EFI graphic string for the display card. To make audio work, I installed the kexts into /System/Library/Extensions. This worked flawlessly for months. Just perfect. Then, I decided to be brave and updated directly to 10.5.7 WITHOUT patching DSDT. It booted just fine. Because the update broke the audio kexts, I decided to try and put some HDA kexts directly in the /Extra folder, instead of installing them again to S/L/E, thinking this will make audio kexts survive the next system update when the time comes. This was stupid of course, because after I restarted I got a BSOD (didn't take note of the error). The only way I could get the system to boot was by using the Boot132 CD. So I decided to format and reinstall. I used the same method again, this time sticking to 10.5.5, but after I install the Chameleon_DFE_for_Hard_Disk I get an error in the middle of the boot process! This is the message I get: panic(cpu 0 caller 0x547BFB9C): "No HPETs available...CPU(s) configured incorrectly\n"@\SourceCache/AppleIntelCPUPowerManagement/AppleIntelCPUPowerManagement-39/pmThread.c:100 Again, the only way I can boot the system is using the Boot132 CD. I tried deleting the AppleIntelCPUPowerManagement kext but that kills the system... I used this method on several computers (including this one) and I know it works 100%. I have two other computers running using this exact method of installation. I formatted the whole drive and reinstalled about 5 times and the same thing happens every time. If I format the entire disk and reinstall but get this failure it means that something else is suddenly preventing this setup to work. It doesn't make sense because I didn't change anything in the BIOS or hardware. What could be the cause of this? Link to comment https://www.insanelymac.com/forum/topic/167207-suddenly-the-system-fails/ Share on other sites More sharing options...
Gantlett Posted May 23, 2009 Author Share Posted May 23, 2009 OK, after drinking some green tea and practicing some yoga I revised the original post and made it as clear as possible. Any help will be GREATLY APPRECIATED. Thanks in advance. Link to comment https://www.insanelymac.com/forum/topic/167207-suddenly-the-system-fails/#findComment-1162641 Share on other sites More sharing options...
finish.06 Posted May 25, 2009 Share Posted May 25, 2009 OK, after drinking some green tea and practicing some yoga I revised the original post and made it as clear as possible. Any help will be GREATLY APPRECIATED. Thanks in advance. I would be very interested in finding out if you were ever able to fix the problem & how? Thanks. Link to comment https://www.insanelymac.com/forum/topic/167207-suddenly-the-system-fails/#findComment-1163091 Share on other sites More sharing options...
Gantlett Posted May 27, 2009 Author Share Posted May 27, 2009 No I wasn't! Since this has started I replaced the motherboard to a GA-EP45-DS3R. I also replaced the CPU under warranty (to the same model, E8400). I also swapped a physical disk thinking the disk holds something that might cause this problem. The only things I didn't replace are the GPU card and RAM sticks. Surprisingly enough, the problem persists. Upon further investigation I noticed that since this problem started, I started getting a new message at the Boot132 boot process: It appears that when I boot in verbose mode I started getting the following message right before the "small" verbose text starts: Attempting to determine CPU Multiplier. If system reboots, RDMSR 198h causes a fault. Determined CPU:FSB multiplier to be 9 Measuring TSC frequency (e.g. CPU speed) CPU runs at 2999.710800 MHz BUS must therefore run at 333.301200 MHz This appears RIGHT BEFORE the small verbose text starts showing. Now I have another identical machine (except for the CPU which is an E6550) which was installed the same EXACT way using the same Leopard DVD and the same Boot132 CD. That system works perfectly and does NOT display the above message at all. Is this weird or what??? I must get this machine up and running... I'm really depressed now... Link to comment https://www.insanelymac.com/forum/topic/167207-suddenly-the-system-fails/#findComment-1164153 Share on other sites More sharing options...
Gantlett Posted May 27, 2009 Author Share Posted May 27, 2009 After wasting some more hours on this stupid computer I tried replacing the graphics card. Of course that didn't help... I tried also taking out all the RAM modules but the first one, but that didn't help either. Memory is the last piece of hardware I didn't replace on this machine. What I STILL can do though is put a different RAM module (not any of the 4) in the first slot and leave all the other slots empty. Could be that that module is defective. I sure hope so! What's interesting is that 10.5.5 and 10.5.7 stop booting with different messages... Anyway, some more on that tomorrow! (If anyone has some more ideas I'd love to hear them of course) Link to comment https://www.insanelymac.com/forum/topic/167207-suddenly-the-system-fails/#findComment-1164472 Share on other sites More sharing options...
Gantlett Posted May 28, 2009 Author Share Posted May 28, 2009 OK I HAVE NEVER SEEN ANYTHING LIKE THIS IN MY LIFE, and I support about 100 PC's I installed myself (with Windows naturally). I totally give up. I used a different RAM module and left all slots but the first one empty. Same thing happens. How can this possibly be? I replaced EVERY bit of hardware on this machine - this is no longer the same computer in essence, so how can I still experience this problem??? The software came from a CD. That couldn't have changed over time. The hardware was the same, so that couldn't have changed either. Assuming the hardware is faulty, I tried replacing everything. SO HOW CAN I STILL HAVE A PROBLEM??? (I'm sorry, I'm shouting out of frustration...). The situation is this: Current hardware: CPU = E8400 (replaced under warranty) MB = Gigabyte GA-EP45-DS3R RAM = 1GB Kingston 800MHz CL5 GPU = 8800GT 512MB HD = SATA WD160 Installed system using Apple 10.5.1 DVD and Boot132 generic ISO. Installed Chameleon_DFE_for_Hard_Disk and used kexts from Boot132 CD + OpenHaltRestart.kext. When trying to boot from HD, system stopped with: disk0s1 unsupported mode Then I started the system from the CD. It will only boot using -x (Safe Boot). Booted in Safe Boot and updated system to 10.5.5 and tried to boot from HD. This is what I get: http://img20.imageshack.us/img20/8039/cimg0221small.jpg System will only boot using the CD and in Safe Boot (-x). Link to comment https://www.insanelymac.com/forum/topic/167207-suddenly-the-system-fails/#findComment-1164869 Share on other sites More sharing options...
Gantlett Posted June 2, 2009 Author Share Posted June 2, 2009 Updated BIOS from F7 to F10 - didn't make any difference. Tried to install Windows XP and Windows 7 - both install just fine, meaning the hardware is functional. Any other ideas? Link to comment https://www.insanelymac.com/forum/topic/167207-suddenly-the-system-fails/#findComment-1168306 Share on other sites More sharing options...
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