[GUIDE] Vanilla Snow Leopard on MSI P35 Neo2-FR (or similar)

[teknokracy]

MSI P35 NEO2-FR GUIDE for SNOW LEOPARD RETAIL 10.6.1

 

This guide also covers the Neo2-FIR, and P35 Platinum, which are all essentially the same board. The other versions may require additional SATA or FireWire controllers as they have some added components - the chipsets are the same, and so is the basic board layout. This guide may also work with other P35 or even P45 based boards, of course you should add kexts specific to devices on those boards.

 

Please excuse me if I have made any omissions, or if there is something that I've done wrong. I've been a Mac technician forever, and a PC technician for a very long time also, so I have extensive knowledge about both and the way the hardware works, however this is the first time I have been successful in installing OSX on a PC

 

My system specs:

MSI BIOS 1.9

Intel Core2Duo E6750 @ 2.66ghz

2x2GB OCZ Reaper 1066 DDR2

Zotac nvidia 8800GT 512mb

LG GSA-H55L DVD-RW drive (shows up as this)

Pioneer DVR-111D DVD-RW drive (shows up as SuperDrive)

D-Link DBT-120 USB Bluetooth module (plug-and-play, works great)

Realtek 8139 PCI network card (my onboard died ages ago)

Hitachi 500GB SATA2 HDD

 

 

FOLLOW THIS GUIDE:

http://www.insanelymac.com/forum/index.php?showtopic=183751

 

I had success using this and most things worked out of the box. You only need to do a couple of modifications and additions, which I will attach to this post.

 

There are no special DSDT considerations for the P35 using the MacLoader_SL kit. All you need to do is add the kexts which I will provide, in to the KEXTs folder in the MacLoader folder and it will do the rest. Follow its instructions and you will get to install Snow Leopard. I chose to install on its own drive because I have another drive in the system which will be chosen by boot order/manual boot device when I want to run Windows 7.

 

For adding the nVidia 8800GT 512 or any other nvidia card, follow the instructions here to get the right resolution and QE/CI etc:

http://aquamac.proboards.com/index.cgi?act...&thread=509

 

KEXTS INCLUDED:

 

VoodooHDA - works great with the onboard ALC888 sound, haven't tried sleep (I don't really care, it's a desktop and it lives in another room). Install the PrefPane for all users and put the helper in a folder and set it to launch in the background every time you log in.

AppleVIAATA.kext - allows you to use the IDE channel, simulated as SATA. My Pioneer appears as a SuperDrive (it's the same model used on some Macs in the past), and my LG appears as its model number. Both support all burning types.

EDIT: I've had a KP when trying to read certain discs. I will be switching to a SATA drive to fix this problem.

 

AppleRealtek8139.kext only if you are using that card - if you still can't get it to work, navigate to /system/library/extensions and find IONetworkingFamily.kext, explore package and add the kext to /contents/plugins and repair permissions (best method is to manually add it to the IONetworkingFamily.kext then use Kext Utility to install it to the normal kext folder and it will repair everything.)

 

IOAHCIBlockStoreInjector.kext - fixes the built in hard drives as appearing in yellow (external). Purely cosmetic really... but still handy to have.

 

------------------

 

Please post your success with the onboard Realtek network, as mine is not functioning.

 

I have also restored my Time Machine backup from my iMac with great success.

 

Finally, remember to go in to Disk Utility and repair permissions for the entire drive when you think you are done tweaking. Enjoy your (updated) Snow Leopard!

 

Special thanks to ANYONE who has EVER developed, discovered, researched, or otherwise helped out with getting MacOS working on PC equipment! You guys ROCK!

P35_Hackintosh.zip

[Apollo Cosra]

I got a Kernel Panic by booting the restored disk.

 

My system:

Bios 1.10

MSI P35

Q9550

8 GB Ram

2 x Sata HDD

 

Have you any special Bios option or a hacked bios from http://osrom.net/biosmod/?

 

Have you compile the DSDT.aml on this machine?

[teknokracy]

I'm using BIOS 1.9, I assume the 1.10 is the same as 1.A on the MSI site?

 

I would try disabling cores if you can. I used the default optimized settings for this board.

 

Make sure you format the USB stick properly and have MacLoader INSIDE the usb key root level directory when you run the scripts or it won't work properly.

 

I didn't modify DSDT.aml in any way. I followed the instructions in MacLoader but did not edit anything in DSDT.aml, and I was able to boot properly first time. So far the only KP I've gotten was due to the DVD drive, which I am replacing with a SATA one very soon.

[Apollo Cosra]

Can you please upload your dsdt.aml and SMBIOS.pilst?

 

I think the problem is i generate all the data on a Vostro 1400.

[oranges2]

Followed your guidelines and got it installed on this box running flawlessly, networking, 5.1, QE/CI

 

Also something you should add, if you get a KP during the actual install process, go into the BIOS and make sure AHCI is turned on. It was one of the "RAID Mode" settings for me if you have trouble finding it.

 

c2d E4500

P35 Neo2-FR

8800GS

[Apollo Cosra]

Can someone please upload your dsdt.aml and SMBIOS.pilst?

 

AHCI is on. I got the Kernel Panic before i can choose some language.

[TripleJJJ]

I also had the same KP before I can get to the SL installer, I think it's due to the Quad core processor. I have the last MSI BIOS. I used to try other methods, also with the modified BIOS but i always had the same KP, starting thinking it's impossible with my hardware configuration. Hope it works for others.

[rectifier23]

No Kernel Paniks here and SL runs if I boot with -x (safe mode). A normal start results in a grey screen of death. I can't figure out the problem. My graphic card (radeon 2900 pro) is recognized in the system profiler.

ATI Radeon HD 2900:

 

Chipset Model: ATI Radeon HD 2900

Type: GPU

Bus: PCIe

Slot: Slot-1

PCIe Lane Width: x16

VRAM (Total): 512 MB

Vendor: ATI (0x1002)

Device ID: 0x9400

Revision ID: 0x0000

ROM Revision: 113-B1480A-236

EFI Driver Version: 01.00.236

Displays:

Display:

Resolution: 1024 x 768

Pixel Depth: 32-Bit Color (ARGB8888)

Main Display: Yes

Mirror: Off

Online: Yes

Display Connector:

 

and

 

ATI Radeon HD 2900:

 

Name: ATY,Franklin

Type: display

Driver Installed: Yes

Bus: PCI

Slot: Slot-1

Vendor ID: 0x1002

Device ID: 0x9400

Subsystem Vendor ID: 0x1002

Subsystem ID: 0x3000

Revision ID: 0x0000

Link Width: x16

Link Speed: 2.5 GT/s

 

There are also no paniks if I boot with -v....but a black screen.

 

It must be something with that board because I think the grapics card works and is recognized.

But again I might be wrong. Would appreciate it if someone could help me out

[jkant]

edit: ahh sorry. I actually meant the contrary: did you try the setting "execution bit support" on enabled? I think its disabled on default for security purposes.

[rectifier23]

edit: ahh sorry. I actually meant the contrary: did you try the setting "execution bit support" on enabled? I think its disabled on default for security purposes.

 

just tried it out. there's no difference. I'm getting the same grey screen. I can hear how the HDD loads the OS. I think that it runs in the background. The only problem is that I'm not getting an image....which could be again graphic card-related

 

I'm thinking about getting an older iPC or iAtkos distibution and try my luck with those.

[jkant]

I had the same issue with my GTX 260, I followed this guide. Had the same black screen issue like you. Don't know if it helps though. But this (from the guide)

mount -uw /

mkdir /kext_backup

mv /System/Library/Extensions/NV* /kext_backup

rm -rf /System/Library/Caches/com.apple.kext.caches

reboot

allowed me to get into OSX without black screen. Or try out a different graphics card...

[rectifier23]

Thanks for the help guys. I think I found the problem. In S/L/E there were many radeon X2000 kexts that caused the problem. I deleted them all and installed the RadeonHD.kext that I found here on the forum. Now I have my full resolution and the OS works smoothly. Only problem now is to enable hardware accleration.

 

But I'm happy that I finaly can boot without any kernel flags

 

Here's some info I found:

 

Kernel Panic (During Installation) - This occurs for many of the people . I’ve managed find out what was causing it. It was no other then frame buffer kexts. It seems that on some graphics card (regardless of Intel , NVIDIA , ATI) , it causes some random kernel panic lockups. I’m not sure why either (I am guessing its because , the installer is doing some checks against the graphics card to check if its EFI-capable or not). Anyhow the fix is easy (thanks whis). All you have to do is delete apple frame buffer kexts from your /Volumes/OSX86/System/Library/Extensions/ – the kexts which you’ll have to delete are :-

 

NVDAResman.kext for NVIDIA Graphics card

ATIFramebuffer.kext for ATI Graphics Card

AppleIntelIntergratedFramebuffer.kext for Intel Graphics

 

and

 

I installed Snow on my Asus P5W DH Deluxe with ATI HD 3870 system recently and tried many of the suggestions to get the system to boot without success. It would always hang soon after “DSMOS has arrived”. The solution I finally found was to remove ATIRadeonX2000.kext and

ATI3800Controller.kext from /S/L/E and then the system booted to the GUI correctly and allowed me to fine tune from there. Other ATI video cards that are currently unsupported should benefit from the same process by removing the appropriate kexts from /S/L/E. I haven’t tested this but the ATI1xxx series should remove ATIRadeonX1000.kext and the corresponding ATI1xxxController.kext and ATI2xxx and ATI3xxx series remove ATIRadeonX2000.kext and ATI2xxxController.kext to achieve the same results. I hope you can use this info in your blog.

 

I currently boot the system from a USB stick with Chameleon-2-1.0-r431 with the following kexts in /E/E folder and they have so far provided me with a very stable system. I also added this line “-x32 boot-uuid=BCA03D4B-F4A5-387A-B80F-B793D2115741″ to the “Kernel Flags” section of com.apple.Boot.plist to boot by default in 32 bit mode as I have heard it may improve stability until 64 bit options are improved. If you have any suggestions please send a reply.

AHCIPortInjector.kext

AppleRTC.kext

ATAPortInjector.kext

fakesmc.kext

IOAHCIBlockStorageInjector.kext

IOAudioFamily.kext

NullCPUPowerManagement.kext

OpenHaltRestart.kext

OSvKernDSPLib.kext

PlatformUUID.kext

Sleepenabler.kext

VoodooHDA.kext

 

Thanks to http://prasys.co.cc

[Ruu1989]

Perfect result, thank you so much! Worked exactly as you said it would

 

Software update to 10.6.3 results in a KP for me, but I'm happy at 10.6.0

[terrorgen]

Does anyone have a long POST time on this mobo?

 

My mobo actually takes quite a long time between pushing the power button to actually see the POST messages on screen. The LED diagnosis lights took the same time before they started to turn green.

[teknokracy]

Wow, I've had my system running so smoothly for the last year that I haven't had to come back here for help.

 

Yes, the P35 depending on what bios you are using will do some weird things. If I hit reset, it turns off all fans/ HDs completely and then waits about 10 seconds before posting. Sometimes it will take a long time to post, depending on how many drives you have in there and what video card (sometimes it has to wait for the card to initialize).

 

I've successfully updated all the way to 10.6.5 just the other day, by making sure I have SleepEnabler.kext deleted, and doing a full permissions repair right after installing the stand alone 10.6.5 installer. On another hackintosh I built (using a G43 based board and E4400 or similar) I noticed the system became more stable after 10.6.4 - it used to almost predictably KP after 6-8 hours of being on, but no longer!)

 

Terrorgen - do you have any pictures/write up on how you did your install in a G4 case? I have an old G4 sitting around here that would make a great case when I upgrade this computer and finally have two separate machines - one PC and one mac!