Success: Gigabyte X48T-DQ6 & Intel Q9550 & Snow Leopard 10.6 (10.6.1)

[holyfield]

Success: Gigabyte X48T-DQ6 & Intel Q9550 + Snow Leopard

 

I have great success on installing Mac OS X Snow Leopard on Gigabyte GA-X48T-DQ6 & Intel Q9550 based computer. Everything is working really fine. This hardware can be used with EFI-X dongle or without it, just by using some patching techniques. Read detailed review of GA-X48T-DQ6.

 

 

System specification

 

System consist from:

* Gigabyte GA-X48T-DQ6

* Intel Core 2 Quad Q9550 Yorkfield 2.83GHz, 12MB L2 Cache, LGA 775

* 2x 2GB DDR3 1333 MHz

* Asus NVIDIA GeForce 9800GTX+ 512MB (Dark Knight edition), Accelero S1 Rev. 2

* Samsung 1TB HD103UJ (Good silent HD)

* Zalman CNPS9900A (Not so silent as expected)

 

Installation with EFI-X dongle

 

If you have EFI-X dongle, then you can install your Mac OS X 10.5 just from original DVD. I believe that EFI-X dongle is overpriced, as it has only $10 hardware inside. Normal price should be between $59-$99, depending at support plan.

 

How to install Snow Leopard (without EFI-X dongle)

 

This is short list how to install Snow Leopard on X48T-DQ6 & Intel Q9550 based computer. I will update within few weeks this post by adding detailed instructions for each step.

 

1. Buy original Snow Leopard DVD (I recommend to buy Mac Box Set, which is great software bundle and costs less than Windows OS)

2. Create bootable USB installation media from original DVD

3. Install Snow Leopard from USB installation media

4. Make new installation bootable

5. Create your DSDT patch

6. Apply modifications and

7. Boot your new system

 

Network issues (RTL8111C)

 

X48T-DQ6 motherboard has RTL8111C network chip. This chip does not work properly with Apple drives. Download Realtek R1000 driver for Snow Leopard and install with Kext Helper. Also you can try to install Realtek original drivers for RTL8111C network chip.

 

Audio issues (ALC889A)

 

X48T-DQ6 motherboard has 8 channel ALC889A audio controller.

 

List of audio channels:

 

* Line Out Green

* Line Out Orange

* Line Out Black

* Line Out Grey

* Line Out Digital

* Line Out on Front Panel (Headphones)

 

* Line In Blue

* Line In Digital

* Mic In Red

* Mic In on Front Panel

 

I haven't found yet a fully working solution for this controller. There are different solution's which are providing access to some channels. Any solution does not provide all channels available by board yet. Try different options, which best suits your needs.

 

Some useful links:

 

* Various ALC889A Gigabyte solutions - different options

* 5.1 surround solution DSDT - gives 6 ch on back panel (can be used for 5.1)

* DSDT solution from Evosx86 forum

 

Recommended Tools

* Kext Helper

 

NOTE (Nov 12, 2009) Just updated to 10.6.2 with success.

 

Board Specification

 

00:00.0 Host bridge [0600]: Intel Corporation 82X38/X48 Express DRAM Controller [8086:29e0] (rev 01)

00:01.0 PCI bridge [0604]: Intel Corporation 82X38/X48 Express Host-Primary PCI Express Bridge [8086:29e1] (rev 01)

00:06.0 PCI bridge [0604]: Intel Corporation 82X38/X48 Express Host-Secondary PCI Express Bridge [8086:29e9] (rev 01)

00:1a.0 USB Controller [0c03]: Intel Corporation 82801I (ICH9 Family) USB UHCI Controller #4 [8086:2937] (rev 02)

00:1a.1 USB Controller [0c03]: Intel Corporation 82801I (ICH9 Family) USB UHCI Controller #5 [8086:2938] (rev 02)

00:1a.2 USB Controller [0c03]: Intel Corporation 82801I (ICH9 Family) USB UHCI Controller #6 [8086:2939] (rev 02)

00:1a.7 USB Controller [0c03]: Intel Corporation 82801I (ICH9 Family) USB2 EHCI Controller #2 [8086:293c] (rev 02)

00:1b.0 Audio device [0403]: Intel Corporation 82801I (ICH9 Family) HD Audio Controller [8086:293e] (rev 02)

00:1c.0 PCI bridge [0604]: Intel Corporation 82801I (ICH9 Family) PCI Express Port 1 [8086:2940] (rev 02)

00:1c.3 PCI bridge [0604]: Intel Corporation 82801I (ICH9 Family) PCI Express Port 4 [8086:2946] (rev 02)

00:1c.4 PCI bridge [0604]: Intel Corporation 82801I (ICH9 Family) PCI Express Port 5 [8086:2948] (rev 02)

00:1c.5 PCI bridge [0604]: Intel Corporation 82801I (ICH9 Family) PCI Express Port 6 [8086:294a] (rev 02)

00:1d.0 USB Controller [0c03]: Intel Corporation 82801I (ICH9 Family) USB UHCI Controller #1 [8086:2934] (rev 02)

00:1d.1 USB Controller [0c03]: Intel Corporation 82801I (ICH9 Family) USB UHCI Controller #2 [8086:2935] (rev 02)

00:1d.2 USB Controller [0c03]: Intel Corporation 82801I (ICH9 Family) USB UHCI Controller #3 [8086:2936] (rev 02)

00:1d.7 USB Controller [0c03]: Intel Corporation 82801I (ICH9 Family) USB2 EHCI Controller #1 [8086:293a] (rev 02)

00:1e.0 PCI bridge [0604]: Intel Corporation 82801 PCI Bridge [8086:244e] (rev 92)

00:1f.0 ISA bridge [0601]: Intel Corporation 82801IR (ICH9R) LPC Interface Controller [8086:2916] (rev 02)

00:1f.2 SATA controller [0106]: Intel Corporation 82801IR/IO/IH (ICH9R/DO/DH) 6 port SATA AHCI Controller [8086:2922] (rev 02)

00:1f.3 SMBus [0c05]: Intel Corporation 82801I (ICH9 Family) SMBus Controller [8086:2930] (rev 02)

01:00.0 VGA compatible controller [0300]: nVidia Corporation G92 [GeForce 9800 GTX] [10de:0612] (rev a2)

04:00.0 SATA controller [0106]: JMicron Technology Corp. 20360/20363 Serial ATA Controller [197b:2363] (rev 02)

04:00.1 IDE interface [0101]: JMicron Technology Corp. 20360/20363 Serial ATA Controller [197b:2363] (rev 02)

05:00.0 Ethernet controller [0200]: Realtek Semiconductor Co., Ltd. RTL8111/8168B PCI Express Gigabit Ethernet controller [10ec:8168] (rev 02)

06:00.0 Ethernet controller [0200]: Realtek Semiconductor Co., Ltd. RTL8111/8168B PCI Express Gigabit Ethernet controller [10ec:8168] (rev 02)

07:06.0 FireWire (IEEE 1394) [0c00]: Texas Instruments TSB43AB23 IEEE-1394a-2000 Controller (PHY/Link) [104c:8024]

[MacFanatic76]

Hey, Holyfield !

Thanx a lot for having shared your experience and for opening this thread !

You have actually "overrun" me with it, cause i have planned this for weeks but haven't really had the time for doing it myself

 

Glad you made it though, cheers.

Well, i have almost 100 % identical hardware, with the exception for some more RAM (4x2 GB), the graphic card,

and a slightly different (that is, older) Zalman-cooler

 

I will certainly post my experience too, especially for the sound section. Rely upon that, will do - but as (almost) always,

i'm again running out of time., but will try posting back in the weekend, i hope.

Check back for answers, you will get them

 

Oh, and by the way, the onliest thing i still can't solve is sleep - it doesn't get to sleep properly,

and "waking" is utterly impossible for now, i have to hard-restart it every time...

I will be very grateful to anyone for any hints that might solve this and bring to a 100 % working Leo.

 

Well, gotta go again, thanx again for spending your time making this section possible, and all the best from me !

 

P. S. By the way, this mobo ROCKZ !

 

Cheers

[AiRiCk]

Hi,

 

Can't wait for the more detailed instructions, especially for steps 4,5 and 6 since I have the X48-DQ6 mobo as well. Great board indeed.

 

Tia !

[mmparkskier]

Finally, I have found someone who managed to get this board up and running with Snow Leopard.

 

I almost have the same board as you (DDR3 vs DDR2 RAM), and the same CPU. I've attempted to run OSX86 a couple times, but with little effort behind it, so naturally I failed.

 

Is it possible to buy the Leopard upgrade disk and use it to boot off the flash drive?

 

Here's a guide I was planning to follow. I just need to buy the disk and use a friend's Mac to format the flash drive.

 

"Install Snow Leopard on Your Hackintosh PC, No Hacking Required."

[MadMungo]

Finally, I have found someone who managed to get this board up and running with Snow Leopard.

 

I almost have the same board as you (DDR3 vs DDR2 RAM), and the same CPU. I've attempted to run OSX86 a couple times, but with little effort behind it, so naturally I failed.

 

Is it possible to buy the Leopard upgrade disk and use it to boot off the flash drive?

 

Here's a guide I was planning to follow. I just need to buy the disk and use a friend's Mac to format the flash drive.

 

"Install Snow Leopard on Your Hackintosh PC, No Hacking Required."

 

 

Yes you can, that is what I did with this exact same board.

 

Also you may want to download my patched DSDT from Here as it has the sata ports reporting as Intel ESB2 and the USB ports show as internal. Also the audio works with the use of This Kext. You will want to be using the latest Beta Bios (F6e) found Here.

 

The only kexts in my Extra/Extensions folder are

 

EvoReboot.kext

Fakesmc.kext

LegacyHDA.kext

NullCPUPowerManagement.kext

PlatformUUID.kext

[Dedrick]

Yea more detailed instructions would be greatly appreciated since Im about to try Leopard with almost the same hardware as Holyfield tried with!

[Le père citrouillard]

Detailed instructions available for Gigabyte X48T-DQ6 & Intel Core 2 Quad Q8400 here on InsanelyMac.

[InToGraphics]

For some time now I have OS X Leopard (upgraded to 10.5.8) running in VMware Workstation (thanks to Donk). But it has "Core Image : Software" and "Quartz Extreme: Not Supported".

This becomes noticeable now, since I started using the iPhone SDK with the iPhone emulator.

So I'm looking for a multi boot solution to real hardware to overcome this.

 

Thanks for this post. This is very good news.

I have the same hardware, apart from a Radeon HD 3870 graphics card, and a different quantity of memory in my box.

 

EDIT: OK, SNIP! SNIP!

Remainder with questions removed. The thread view was in outline mode and I missed the other responses.