Kext install results in computer hanging at reset

[Jickler]

Hello all-

 

As a preface, mods feel free to relocate thread if you think it's inappropriately placed, and responders feel free to reply with a one line forum link and insult While my goal is to install a NIC kext, I don't think my problem is coming from the actual kext itself, but my box's inability to install kexts at all, so I put it here. I'm sorry if this is somewhere else, I've been digging through forums all day and I haven't had any luck.

 

I installed kalyway 10.5.2, vanilla kernel, this morning on a PC with a Gigabyte G41M-ES2L mobo, 1 gig RAM, 320 GB SATA HDD and a SATA DVD-RW drive. The mobo uses an Intel G31 chipset, and, while I don't have an XP partition atm and I presume System Profiler's going to give me a list of garbage, the board is advertised with onboard: RTL 8111C (NIC) and Realtek ALC883 (Audio). This board DOES have a (positive) entry in the 10.5.2 HCL, and I've seen it a lot of places in the forums.

 

The HCL said the LAN would "work out of the box," and I decided that since I didn't know so much about the kexts in the Kalyway DVD, I would go with a "less is better" approach, so I didn't install any NIC kexts. In retrospect that was probably a mistake :/ Upon the system booting for the first time, after jumping around and being very happy for a while, I found that it didn't see the onboard NIC, so I went to find a kext.

 

First I tried the homebrew kext found in the extremely helpful, stickied topic: http://www.insanelymac.com/forum/index.php?showtopic=29436 . I installed it with the kext installer on the Kalyway DVD (EasyKext I think? You probably know what I'm talking about), and rebooted. When shutting down, the computer brings up a dialog that says it's "Rebuilding caches," which I understand is standard after installing any kext/driver. The problem is that it hangs here, and it won't reset. I left it running for about an hour the first time, and ten minutes on every subsequent try. I've also tried installing the "official driver" from Realtek (mentioned about halfway through the earlier thread link), installing it manually, installing it with the terminal scripts in the package, all result in the same "system hang" and when I force restart I THINK it hasn't installed properly (NIC still not seen in System Pref/Device Profiler).

 

 

I was thinking that the problem MIGHT have to do with powering on/off problems, but in the HCL the contributor mentioned that he installed a kext to fix power on/off/sleep problems AFTER he installed OS X, so obviously he's not having any problems like this. Of course, there's also the more likely problem that I'm an idiot and I'm doing something very obviously wrong But that's why I get a chance to introduce myself to the forums! Thanks in advance!

[Jickler]

Fixed by buying a new NIC :/ Still think I'm missing something really obvious; but, eh. This computer exists to be a server, so I'm thinking I'll probably be able to scrape by without ever installing a new driver. On the up side, got a new NIC for the HCL.

[Erbid]

You might try mounting the Kalway media, and browsing for the bundle it installs for the NIC card in question. I'm starting to dissect some of my favorite distributions, and have found the .bundle files can be useful for adding things you would have added at initial install if you knew you would be able to boot with them installed.

 

Erbid