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nForce OS X Snow Leopard (10.6) RETAIL INSTALL GUIDE on a Series 6 or 7 nForce chipset / Intel CPU MOBO

verdant

By verdant,
in OSx86 10.6 (Snow Leopard)

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Snow Leopard on nForce + Intel CPU MOBO in Desktop  

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  1. 1. Have you successfully installed a working, bootable Snow Leopard system?

    • Yes, on a Series 7 (750i, 780i, or 790i) nForce chipset Intel CPU MOBO, using the USB flash drive installer method
      34
    • Yes, on a Series 6 (650i or 680i) nForce chipset Intel CPU MOBO, using the USB flash drive installer method
      50
    • Yes, on a Series 6 (610i or 630i) nForce chipset Intel CPU MOBO, using the USB flash drive installer method
      18
    • Yes, on a Series 7 (750i, 780i, or 790i) nForce chipset Intel CPU MOBO, using verdant's nForceSLBoot132DVD installer method
      14
    • Yes, on a Series 6 (650i or 680i) nForce chipset Intel CPU MOBO, using verdant's nForceSLBoot132DVD installer method
      13
    • Yes, on a Series 6 (610i or 630i) nForce chipset Intel CPU MOBO, using verdant's nForceSLBoot132DVD installer method
      6
    • Yes, on a Series 7 (750i, 780i, or 790i) nForce chipset Intel CPU MOBO using OSInstall.mpkg method from Leopard to another HDD/volume
      10
    • Yes, on a Series 6 (650i or 680i) nForce chipset Intel CPU MOBO, using OSInstall.mpkg method from Leopard to another HDD/volume
      9
    • Yes, on a Series 6 (610i or 630i) nForce chipset Intel CPU MOBO, using OSInstall.mpkg method from Leopard to another HDD/volume
      8
    • No, none of the above methods has worked for me
      35
    • I have sold or plan to sell my nForce chipset MOBO to go over to the "light" side....Intel chipset MOBO.....
      10
    • I have sold or plan to sell my nForce chipset MOBO to buy a "real" Mac
      6

  2. 2. Would you say that your Snow Leopard system is working to your satisfaction (e.g. compared to Leopard)

    • 100%
      60
    • 90%
      53
    • 80%
      20
    • 70%
      19
    • 60%
      4
    • 50%
      6
    • <50%
      18
    • Are you running 10.6.1 successfully , having auto-updated without any problems
      21
    • Are all the standard Apple applications running OK
      12

  3. 3. Is your Snow Leopard system working 100% on

    • SATA HDD
      173
    • SATA DVDRW including burning disks
      47
    • PATA (IDE) HDD
      42
    • PATA (IDE) DVDRW including burning disks
      51
    • Video
      146
    • Onboard LAN (Ethernet)
      131
    • USB devices (mounting/unmounting), plus USB keyboard and USB mouse
      161
    • Firewire
      54
    • PS/2 keyboard and mouse
      42
    • Audio including Front Panel headphones and microphone
      63
    • Audio except Front Panel headphones
      38
    • Audio except Front Panel microphone
      27
    • Sleep including waking from sleep
      24
    • PCI NIC
      24
    • eSATA
      20
    • Bluetooth
      41
    • WiFi
      38
    • Time Machine
      53
    • Overclocking
      35
    • Auto Software Update e.g. to 10.6.1
      90

2,142 posts in this topic

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verdant
verdant
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Guess I should have read the guide a little better. I was able to change the IONetworkingfamily.kext . We'll see how these changes go for me. Thanks! For some reason I find it easy to skip over/forget things in this guide. ;)

 

Then you should try remembering what has been changed and what needs changing in the guide and in Snow_Support_Files.....LOL

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jchief4040
jchief4040
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Then you should try remembering what has been changed and what needs changing in the guide and in Snow_Support_Files.....LOL

 

Yeah! Hey I couldn't find the link to v2.1 support files? ;) Also, is there a place in the guide that tells me how to get my graphics card working at full res? I now see the link for OSx86Tools and the other one to find the strings to save to a text file but missed where it comes back to that.

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verdant
verdant
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Yeah! Hey I couldn't find the link to v2.1 support files? ;) Also, is there a place in the guide that tells me how to get my graphics card working at full res? I now see the link for OSx86Tools and the other one to find the strings to save to a text file but missed where it comes back to that.

 

I was busy uploading it as you typed....... :)

 

Section D Part 3.......for generating graphics string, then Section D Part 11B on where it should go....... :) I will modify guide to point it out ..... :wacko:

 

I can pretty much make it kernel panic anytime i want now.. cpus=1 doesn't do anything anymore, no clue what to try next.. could this be causing any problems?

 

AppleACPICPU: ProcessorId=0 LocalApicId=0 Enabled

AppleACPICPU: ProcessorId=1 LocalApicId=3 Enabled

AppleACPICPU: ProcessorId=2 LocalApicId=1 Enabled

AppleACPICPU: ProcessorId=3 LocalApicId=2 Enabled

 

or does it not matter they're not matching o.O

 

I am not aware of it being critical that they match......particularly as all cores are shown as enabled.....

 

cpus=1 won't work because Snow Leopard expects at least 2 cores to be running.......so try cpus=2.....

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jchief4040
jchief4040
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I was busy uploading it as you typed....... :)

 

Section D Part 3.......for generating graphics string, then Section D Part 11B on where it should go....... :) I will modify guide to point it out ..... -_-

 

I am having trouble trying to figure out which portion of the graphics part I need to copy out of the EFIStudio editor and paste into the apple.boot.plist. Right now I have this:

 

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>

<!DOCTYPE plist PUBLIC "-//Apple//DTD PLIST 1.0//EN" "http://www.apple.com/DTDs/PropertyList-1.0.dtd">

<plist version="1.0">

<dict>

<key>Graphics Mode</key>

<string>1280x1024x32</string>

<key>Kernel</key>

<string>mach_kernel</string>

<key>Kernel Flags</key>

<string>-x32</string>

<key>Timeout</key>

<string>5</string>

<key>device-properties</key>

<string></string>

<key>Default Partition</key>

<string></string>

<key>Instant Menu</key>

<string></string>

</dict>

</plist>

 

I copied this from the editor:

 

<key>PciRoot(0x1)/Pci(0x3,0x0)/Pci(0x0,0x0)/Pci(0x0,0x0)/Pci(0x0,0x0)</key>

<dict>

<key>@0,compatible</key>

<string>NVDA,NVMac</string>

<key>@0,device_type</key>

<string>display</string>

<key>@0,name</key>

<string>NVDA,Display-A</string>

<key>@1,compatible</key>

<string>NVDA,NVMac</string>

<key>@1,device_type</key>

<string>display</string>

<key>@1,name</key>

<string>NVDA,Display-B</string>

<key>NVCAP</key>

<data>

BAAAAAAAAwAMAAAAAAAABwAAAAA=

</data>

<key>NVPM</key>

<data>

AQAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA==

</data>

<key>VRAM,totalsize</key>

<data>

AAAAMA==

</data>

<key>device_type</key>

<string>NVDA,Parent</string>

<key>model</key>

<string>Nvidia GeForce 8800 GTX [G80]</string>

<key>name</key>

<string>display</string>

<key>rom-revision</key>

<string>Nvidia GeForce 8800 GTX [G80] OpenGL Engine [EFI]</string>

</dict>

 

It's hard to tell which part needs to go where.

 

EDIT: Now I have a bigger issue. I tried to follow the updated guide and remove the GeForce.kext, NVDAN50Hal.kext, NVDAResman.kext, replaced the AppleNForceATA.kext with AppleNForceATA.slash then repaired permissions and now when I boot into SL I get the wallpaper and icons but I can't click on anything for minutes and when I try to click on, say the Trash icon, the whole bar dips off the screen, the screen flashes, and freaks out. Is there a way I can just get into a Safe Mode or something and try and move the files back from the Trash can that I removed just to get it back to the way it was? I got way more than I bargained for here LOL..

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samdelgado
samdelgado
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Posted
Sorry about that......are you running the latest BIOS for your MOBO....?

 

Yes I am...

 

Edit: Does it matter that my USB drive is considered a HDD and not a bootable device when starting the computer? I always remember it showing up as a bootable device back when installing leopard, but now it isn't.

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verdant
verdant
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how do i know if a kext is 32bit or 64bit?

 

I am not personally aware of any quick easy way of knowing.....System Profiler in Snow Leopard shows if kexts are 64bit, it appears to only do so for Apple kexts......e.g. kextstat in Terminal shows AppleNforce.kext (32bit) as being loaded but it does not appera in the System Profiler....

 

I am having trouble trying to figure out which portion of the graphics part I need to copy out of the EFIStudio editor and paste into the apple.boot.plist. Right now I have this:

 

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>

<!DOCTYPE plist PUBLIC "-//Apple//DTD PLIST 1.0//EN" "http://www.apple.com/DTDs/PropertyList-1.0.dtd">

<plist version="1.0">

<dict>

<key>Graphics Mode</key>

<string>1280x1024x32</string>

<key>Kernel</key>

<string>mach_kernel</string>

<key>Kernel Flags</key>

<string>-x32</string>

<key>Timeout</key>

<string>5</string>

<key>device-properties</key>

<string></string>

<key>Default Partition</key>

<string></string>

<key>Instant Menu</key>

<string></string>

</dict>

</plist>

 

I copied this from the editor:

 

<key>PciRoot(0x1)/Pci(0x3,0x0)/Pci(0x0,0x0)/Pci(0x0,0x0)/Pci(0x0,0x0)</key>

<dict>

<key>@0,compatible</key>

<string>NVDA,NVMac</string>

<key>@0,device_type</key>

<string>display</string>

<key>@0,name</key>

<string>NVDA,Display-A</string>

<key>@1,compatible</key>

<string>NVDA,NVMac</string>

<key>@1,device_type</key>

<string>display</string>

<key>@1,name</key>

<string>NVDA,Display-B</string>

<key>NVCAP</key>

<data>

BAAAAAAAAwAMAAAAAAAABwAAAAA=

</data>

<key>NVPM</key>

<data>

AQAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA==

</data>

<key>VRAM,totalsize</key>

<data>

AAAAMA==

</data>

<key>device_type</key>

<string>NVDA,Parent</string>

<key>model</key>

<string>Nvidia GeForce 8800 GTX [G80]</string>

<key>name</key>

<string>display</string>

<key>rom-revision</key>

<string>Nvidia GeForce 8800 GTX [G80] OpenGL Engine [EFI]</string>

</dict>

 

It's hard to tell which part needs to go where.

 

EDIT: Now I have a bigger issue. I tried to follow the updated guide and remove the GeForce.kext, NVDAN50Hal.kext, NVDAResman.kext, replaced the AppleNForceATA.kext with AppleNForceATA.slash then repaired permissions and now when I boot into SL I get the wallpaper and icons but I can't click on anything for minutes and when I try to click on, say the Trash icon, the whole bar dips off the screen, the screen flashes, and freaks out. Is there a way I can just get into a Safe Mode or something and try and move the files back from the Trash can that I removed just to get it back to the way it was? I got way more than I bargained for here LOL..

 

What you show is not the hexadecimal EFI graphics string, which is a long list of hexadecimal numbers that appears in a box below the information above (in either EFIStudio or OSx86Tools)....

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Giorgio_multi
Giorgio_multi
Posted
Posted

Hi, verdant.

 

All OK on my P5N-E SLI.

 

Thanks for the guide, particullary for the issue of graphic refresh.

 

Now I have Snow Leopard with 2 graphic adapters and 4 monitors.

 

I'm waiting for a 64 bit ApplenForceATA.kext for a completely 64bit System

 

Very, very good work.

 

Giorgio

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verdant
verdant
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Hi, verdant.

 

All OK on my P5N-E SLI.

 

Thanks for the guide, particullary for the issue of graphic refresh.

 

Now I have Snow Leopard with 2 graphic adapters and 4 monitors.

 

I'm waiting for a 64 bit ApplenForceATA.kext for a completely 64bit System

 

Very, very good work.

 

Giorgio

 

Hi Giorgio

 

Glad to help......thanks for the words of appreciation...... ;)

 

You have quite a P5N-E SLI system......(as well as the other PCs....!)....... :(

 

Are you using a modified DSDT for audio and/or sleep (assuming they are both working)......?

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Giorgio_multi
Giorgio_multi
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Posted
Hi Giorgio

 

Glad to help......thanks for the words of appreciation...... :)

 

You have quite a P5N-E SLI system......(as well as the other PCs....!)....... ;)

 

Are you using a modified DSDT for audio and/or sleep (assuming they are both working)......?

 

 

No, (I'don't like DSDT modification for add video-udio-etc to the System)

 

For audio with voodoo 0.2.1 all OK (output, mic input with low quality)

 

Sleep don't work.

 

Giorgio

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verdant
verdant
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ok thanks. i am getting really long boot up time using the 3 versions of AppleNForceATA. is there any workaround for it yet?

 

btw, thanks for this guide! managed to get my PC to work with sl. so far everything is working!

 

Glad the guide has got SL working for you...... ^_^

 

We will have to wait until a fully compatible 64bit AppleNForceATA.kext is compiled.....

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jchief4040
jchief4040
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Yes I am...

 

Edit: Does it matter that my USB drive is considered a HDD and not a bootable device when starting the computer? I always remember it showing up as a bootable device back when installing leopard, but now it isn't.

 

Hey samdelgado - I should also say that I did the whole thing over again. I think there were some things I missed initially. I would, if you have the patience, try to redo your bootable USB. I used Cameleon RC1 with PC_EFI v10.x. I used fakesmc v2. It worked the second time around.

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samdelgado
samdelgado
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Hey samdelgado - I should also say that I did the whole thing over again. I think there were some things I missed initially. I would, if you have the patience, try to redo your bootable USB. I used Cameleon RC1 with PC_EFI v10.x. I used fakesmc v2. It worked the second time around.

 

 

Yeah I am doing all of that as we speak. I think what Verdant was saying about the battery on the MOBO is part of the issue though because even when I boot into Windows my time is always reset to some weird time, so I guess the battery is dying?

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jchief4040
jchief4040
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Posted
What you show is not the hexadecimal EFI graphics string, which is a long list of hexadecimal numbers that appears in a box below the information above (in either EFIStudio or OSx86Tools)....

 

BAM! Inserted the HEX string and it hung up after the first reboot but second try it worked flawlessly. Now my Time Machine works since the graphics limitation was causing it to not work... AWESOME! THANKS!

 

EDIT: Now I have a bigger issue. I tried to follow the updated guide and remove the GeForce.kext, NVDAN50Hal.kext, NVDAResman.kext, replaced the AppleNForceATA.kext with AppleNForceATA.slash then repaired permissions and now when I boot into SL I get the wallpaper and icons but I can't click on anything for minutes and when I try to click on, say the Trash icon, the whole bar dips off the screen, the screen flashes, and freaks out. Is there a way I can just get into a Safe Mode or something and try and move the files back from the Trash can that I removed just to get it back to the way it was? I got way more than I bargained for here LOL..

 

I put the NVDAN50Hal.kext, NVDAResman.kext, and GeForce.kext back on the USB left slash's AppleNForceATA though - and that solved the issue from last night - FYI. Apparently I need those?

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samdelgado
samdelgado
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Posted

So I decided to wipe the USB and target disk drive and start over...I got all of the same errors, but just like chief I actually booted to the installer! Unfortunately, it has now been stuck at about 5% with 19 minutes to go, and i have hundreds of localhost reportcrash happening in the installer log. Is it doomed or do I let it do its thing?

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jchief4040
jchief4040
Posted
Posted
So I decided to wipe the USB and target disk drive and start over...I got all of the same errors, but just like chief I actually booted to the installer! Unfortunately, it has now been stuck at about 5% with 19 minutes to go, and i have hundreds of localhost reportcrash happening in the installer log. Is it doomed or do I let it do its thing?

 

No worries it did that to me.. then it jumped a bit. If the USB drive light is blinking and you seeing some action there is hope. Be patient since the install took my like a freakin hour or so. Awesome that you got to the installer.. HEY that's progress! :blush:

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samdelgado
samdelgado
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Posted
No worries it did that to me.. then it jumped a bit. If the USB drive light is blinking and you seeing some action there is hope. Be patient since the install took my like a freakin hour or so. Awesome that you got to the installer.. HEY that's progress! :blush:

 

Thx jchief...I went ahead and let it keep going and like you said it made a jump to about 25%. More errors and what not kept streaming in the log, and then it had a KP. I rebooted, thankfully got to the installer screen again, and it said it could recover the SL install so I let it keep going, and it once again had a KP. Since we were so similar in issues can you tell me exactly what kexts you used? At this point I just did everything verdant has in his guide, excluding the nforcelan which I wont need. Did you add anything?

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breakingbad
breakingbad
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Hi verdant.

Hi all.

 

Well, I have a little problem that keeps me from moving away to installation part.

After doing all the procedure, when I go to restore the OSX_10.6_USB_Installer with the .DMG file created at the begin when it comes at 2 minutes to finish I got an error from Disk Utility (input/output error).

 

Does anyone here had a problem like that? Is there a way to solve that?

 

I believe I can´t go on with the file restored properly, right?

 

Cheers.

BB.

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jchief4040
jchief4040
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Thx jchief...I went ahead and let it keep going and like you said it made a jump to about 25%. More errors and what not kept streaming in the log, and then it had a KP. I rebooted, thankfully got to the installer screen again, and it said it could recover the SL install so I let it keep going, and it once again had a KP. Since we were so similar in issues can you tell me exactly what kexts you used? At this point I just did everything verdant has in his guide, excluding the nforcelan which I wont need. Did you add anything?

 

Right now on the USB I have used: in /E/E: AppleNForceATA.slash.kext, fakesmc.V2.kext, GeForce.kext, IONetworkingFamily.kext, nForceLAN.kext, NullCPUPowerManagement.kext, NVDANV50Hal.kext, NVDAResman.kext, OpenHaltRestart.kext, & PlatformUUID. I am using Cameleon RC1, PC_EFI v10.x. Did you run Kext Utility on /E/E? Not sure if this is right but I drag both the folder and the Extensions.mkext on top of KU to do it.

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verdant
verdant
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BAM! Inserted the HEX string and it hung up after the first reboot but second try it worked flawlessly. Now my Time Machine works since the graphics limitation was causing it to not work... AWESOME! THANKS!

 

 

 

I put the NVDAN50Hal.kext, NVDAResman.kext, and GeForce.kext back on the USB left slash's AppleNForceATA though - and that solved the issue from last night - FYI. Apparently I need those?

 

The PCIClassMatched NVDAN50Hal.kext, NVDAResman.kext and GeForce.kext do not need to be used in /E/E on the USB or in /E/E on the HDD because the unmodified original kexts from Snow Leopard are apparently now working OK with the nForce chipset without the need for PCIClassMatching in their Info.plist file (unlike in Leopard)......furthermore, these kexts when in /E/E are in fact being overwritten by the original kexts from Snow Leopard...... ;)

 

Right now on the USB I have used: in /E/E: AppleNForceATA.slash.kext, fakesmc.V2.kext, GeForce.kext, IONetworkingFamily.kext, nForceLAN.kext, NullCPUPowerManagement.kext, NVDANV50Hal.kext, NVDAResman.kext, OpenHaltRestart.kext, & PlatformUUID. I am using Cameleon RC1, PC_EFI v10.x. Did you run Kext Utility on /E/E? Not sure if this is right but I drag both the folder and the Extensions.mkext on top of KU to do it.

 

You only need to drag and drop the Extensions folder onto the Kext Utility icon....... :)

 

managed to speed up the boot time by using : http://rapidshare.com/files/281901335/speedupsl_nforce.zip

 

i think the kext is 32bit so you would need to use arch=i386 during boot.

 

installation:

just place nForceIOATAFamily.kext in the same folder as AppleNForceATA.kext

 

Thanks for that link...... :)

Do you know the origin of these modified kexts in PlugIns and did you run the Unix Executable file that is in the unzipped folder......?

 

Yeah I am doing all of that as we speak. I think what Verdant was saying about the battery on the MOBO is part of the issue though because even when I boot into Windows my time is always reset to some weird time, so I guess the battery is dying?

 

See my blog entry on the time differences berteen Windows and OS X and Linux...... ;)

 

Hi verdant.

Hi all.

 

Well, I have a little problem that keeps me from moving away to installation part.

After doing all the procedure, when I go to restore the OSX_10.6_USB_Installer with the .DMG file created at the begin when it comes at 2 minutes to finish I got an error from Disk Utility (input/output error).

 

Does anyone here had a problem like that? Is there a way to solve that?

 

I believe I can´t go on with the file restored properly, right?

 

Cheers.

BB.

 

I assume you are using an 8GB USB flash drive partitioned/formatted as GPT/HFS+ with a formatted capacity of at least 6.5 GB since all the files including those from the SL Mac OS X Install DVD .dmg image use up 6.21 GB......?

 

To restore the Mac OS X Install DVD to the USB flash drive, do as follows:

 

1. Make the OS X Install DVD image [.dmg] (or indeed any CD or DVD image) in Disk Utility by highlighting the disk in the sidebar -> File -> New -> Disk Image from diskXsY (Mac OS X Install DVD)....leaving Image Format as Compressed and Encryption as None.......

 

2. Then use Disk Utility -> Restore function to load the Retail Mac OS X 10.6 Install DVD (or its .dmg/.iso image file) onto the OSX_10.6_USB_Installer volume.....

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breakingbad
breakingbad
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Posted
I assume you are using an 8GB USB flash drive partitioned/formatted as GPT/HFS+ with a formatted capacity of at least 6.5 GB since all the files including those from the SL Mac OS X Install DVD .dmg image use up 6.21 GB......?

 

To restore the Mac OS X Install DVD to the USB flash drive, do as follows:

 

1. Make the OS X Install DVD image [.dmg] (or indeed any CD or DVD image) in Disk Utility by highlighting the disk in the sidebar -> File -> New -> Disk Image from diskXsY (Mac OS X Install DVD)....leaving Image Format as Compressed and Encryption as None.......

 

2. Then use Disk Utility -> Restore function to load the Retail Mac OS X 10.6 Install DVD (or its .dmg/.iso image file) onto the OSX_10.6_USB_Installer volume.....

 

Yeah dude.

 

I´m using an Kingston of 8Gb that OS X recognizes as 7.45.

Just one doubt... GPT/HFS+ would be same as Mac OS Extended (Journaled)? [this question sounded like a noobish one]

 

The rest of the process runs pretty smooth, and at the end of restore process, about 2 minutes to finish it shows the input/output error.

 

Cheers.

BB.

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verdant
verdant
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Yeah dude.

 

I´m using an Kingston of 8Gb that OS X recognizes as 7.45.

Just one doubt... GPT/HFS+ would be same as Mac OS Extended (Journaled)? [this question sounded like a noobish one]

 

The rest of the process runs pretty smooth, and at the end of restore process, about 2 minutes to finish it shows the input/output error.

 

Cheers.

BB.

 

GPT (GUID Partition Table) is the partition scheme (i.e. not MBR or APM) and HFS+ is Mac OS Extended (Journaled).......

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breakingbad
breakingbad
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GPT is the partition scheme (i.e. not MBR or APT) and HFS+ is Mac OS Extended (Journaled).......

 

Didn´t know that info on GPT.

Maybe that´s the problem I´m facing at the end of restore process.

 

Would you be mad if I ask you how to GPT my flash drive???

 

Cheers.

BB.

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