Mac OS X guest unlocker for VMware

[heres a tenner]

It will run Mac OS X ok in 64-bit mode. Won't run anything else though such as Windows 7 guest using EFI BIOS.

 

 

Well I do not intend to run Windows 7 with EFI firmware, only BIOS. What is the problem? Is it sloppy about the patch job/any incompatibilities caused?

 

BTW, sound is not working... tried both 32bit and 64bit kernels, no audio in my OS X guest I tried several darwin.iso versions and the Ensoniq package (up to 1.0.3). No luck. It would be nice to have sound though It isn't a terrible showstopper. I just don't like having something broken when it worked before in my perfectly working EFI32-based OS X guest (before unlocker).

[heres a tenner]

I upgraded to 10.6.2, system won't boot anymore. CPU 'disabled'. This is interesting. I need to install separate updates so I intended to move incrementally (10.6 to latest, taking snapshots).

 

Any clues?

[bugmenot09]

Has anyone had success with this using the latest retail Snow Leopard DVDs (10.6.6) on an early 2011 MacBook Pro?

 

The patch worked for me, but after selecting my language in the install, the installer itself says "OSX cannot be installed on this computer."

 

Oddly, System Profiler gets the CPU wrong (says 2.19 GHz when it should be 2.3GHz), and it feels sluggish in general, but at least it works.

 

That is with the OEM disc. If I use a retail 10.6.3 disk image, it goes into the reboot loop. Same thing with the snow leopard server image I tried. Parallels has the same problem.

 

In virtualbox, I can install right off of my OEM dvd with no patching and no issues at all (except excessive cpu usage).

[xforce]

I upgraded to 10.6.2, system won't boot anymore. CPU 'disabled'. This is interesting. I need to install separate updates so I intended to move incrementally (10.6 to latest, taking snapshots).

 

Any clues?

 

Add this line to your vmx file:

cpuid.1.eax = "0000:0000:0000:0001:0000:0110:1010:0101"

 

It's needed on core i systems to function past 10.6

[MSoK]

Add this line to your vmx file:

cpuid.1.eax = "0000:0000:0000:0001:0000:0110:1010:0101"

 

It's needed on core i systems to function past 10.6

xforce,

 

Good advise, but to be completely accurate, having created the CPUID mask originally, with Donk's help, 10.6.0 to 10.6.2 should not have the problem, it was specific to 10.6.3, and was resolved in 10.6.4 onwards. However, if the CPUID mask resolves your problem great, but in theory it should not make any difference, have a look at the following post for more information.

 

http://www.insanelymac.com/forum/index.php...t&p=1622074

 

Cheers,

MSoK.

[heres a tenner]

Add this line to your vmx file:

cpuid.1.eax = "0000:0000:0000:0001:0000:0110:1010:0101"

 

It's needed on core i systems to function past 10.6

 

 

This is an Intel Xeon (5600 series) workstation, like a Macpro. I am now able to boot but observing lockups (the screen freezes and the cursor wont move). This is after some short idle time. Only a hard reset will bring it back to life. Any clues?

 

Update: noticed the smc setting is set to true. The unlocker makes this irrelevant, right?

[MSoK]

This is an Intel Xeon (5600 series) workstation, like a Macpro. I am now able to boot but observing lockups (the screen freezes and the cursor wont move). This is after some short idle time. Only a hard reset will bring it back to life. Any clues?

 

Update: noticed the smc setting is set to true. The unlocker makes this irrelevant, right?

Have a look at my reply to xforce and the link for more information on CPUID and Core i / Xeon 5600 series processors.

 

The lock-ups you are getting could be the Energy Saver setting under System Preferences, if Computer sleep and Display sleep are not set to "Never", lock-ups can occur, also untick the "Put hard disk(s) to sleep when possible" and "Allow power button to put the computer to sleep".

 

The "Unlocker" sets smc.present = "TRUE" as part of the installation wizard, so I would leave well alone. However Donk's "darwin.iso" method requires the smc.present = "FALSE" to be set, hence the possible confusion.

[ben1066]

Sorry if this is against the rules but where could I obtain a darwin.iso, i know nobody with mac osx :S I tried extracting from the fusion dmg but it wasn't there, i guess it's dled when its installed or ran.

[MSoK]

Sorry if this is against the rules but where could I obtain a darwin.iso, i know nobody with mac osx :S I tried extracting from the fusion dmg but it wasn't there, i guess it's dled when its installed or ran.

Have a look at the following topic, it has links for all related files including Fusion 3.1.2 darwin.iso:

 

http://www.insanelymac.com/forum/index.php...t&p=1622074

[goadeff]

I use Albert's unlocker with VMware Workstation 7.1 on a Linux host, and it works great! Thank you, thank you, thank you!

 

One question: when I create a VMware clone of a Macintosh guest, the "Hardware UUID" as displayed in the OS X System Profiler does not change. I think this is causing a problem with an Open Directory experiment--I cannot bind a clone to Open Directory if its original is already there. How can I change the Hardware UUID on a clone?

[eyeb1]

much thanks for effort ..

 

and chance of adding the ability to select the VMware directory for non default installation directories and will it work on Windows 7 x64 if i could direct it to the VMware directory ..

[MSoK]

much thanks for effort ..

 

and chance of adding the ability to select the VMware directory for non default installation directories and will it work on Windows 7 x64 if i could direct it to the VMware directory ..

eyeb1,

 

The "unlocker" will work fine under Windows 7 x64, the preferred installation platform, due to its extended memory support, beyond 4GB.

 

So to your question, why install VMware Workstation or Player anywhere but the default location, the installtion is not large, and you are / should install your VM's on a disk with plenty of space. This I promise will minimise any issues with either the VMware Workstation / Player installation or the use of Albert's "Unlocker" or Donk's "darwin.iso".

 

This is assuming your configuration is straight forward, please forgive me if your configuration or requirements are more complex, a like simple! But feel free to document your requirements for a more complex configuration and I am sure we can help.

 

Regards MSoK.

[Shint]

eyeb1,

 

This is assuming your configuration is straight forward, please forgive me if your configuration or requirements are more complex, a like simple! But feel free to document your requirements for a more complex configuration and I am sure we can help.

 

I'd also like to be able to point it to where VMware is installed, since I don't have it installed in the default location, either. It would be great if there were a config file where the location could be changed.

 

 

Thanks!

[diederikm]

Hello,

 

Just wondering ... and i scanned previous post but could not find it.

 

Is the functionality of virtualizing osx always present in every non osx vmware install ?

 

And therefore is the Appe efi also always present ?

 

 

Apple is not delivering any server hardware anymore .. so would vmware be future platform/infrastructure for osx servers ? ;-)

 

Thanks Albert for the great find!

 

Regards,

 

Diederik

[Ag0os]

Hello There!

 

Does anyone knows if this works also for vmware player on linux?

 

thanks in advance!

[Donk]

Hello,

 

Just wondering ... and i scanned previous post but could not find it.

 

Is the functionality of virtualizing osx always present in every non osx vmware install ?

 

And therefore is the Appe efi also always present ?

 

 

Apple is not delivering any server hardware anymore .. so would vmware be future platform/infrastructure for osx servers ? ;-)

 

Thanks Albert for the great find!

 

Regards,

 

Diederik

 

Yes it is and ESXi 5 is rumoured to work on Xserve and possibly other Apple hardware. Anything else is against the EULA so VMware would never support until Apple changes it. However you need to decide if you wish to use the VMware in an unsupported way. There are significant issues especially if you expect to run anything that requires 3D graphics acceleration or high performance sound.

 

Is it still the case that 3d Acceleration does not work on OS X guests (regardless of using Unlocker or darwin.iso)? Does someone know if the VirtualBox OS X guest (Windows Host, with hack) supports it?

No product support QE/CI for Mac guests.

 

Hello There!

 

Does anyone knows if this works also for vmware player on linux?

 

thanks in advance!

Yes it does.

 

I'd also like to be able to point it to where VMware is installed, since I don't have it installed in the default location, either. It would be great if there were a config file where the location could be changed.

 

 

Thanks!

You can use the windows.exe directly passing the folders. Just run it from the command line with no parameters and you can see what it needs. I have also updated the command file recently to add some more checking will upload when I am happy with it.

[Mikelli]

Good day.

 

I wrote a little program which allows to create a virtual machine and run any flavor of Mac OS X

• Mac OS X
  
• Mac OS X Server
  

inside the virtual machine, using any VMware product

• VMware Workstation for Windows
  
• VMware Workstation for Linux
  
• VMware Fusion for Mac OS X
  

on any Intel-based physical machine

• PC
  
• Mac
  

I hope you will enjoy it. For details, please read the file README.txt. Give me your feedback about it in this forum.

Hi There, I ran the program and thank you for it!!

 

It got me further on the installation than I ever have been before. I have a Dell T5500 workstation with a Westmere processor bios enabled and it seems to hang up on the installation (Apple gray screen, keeps restarting). Is there a setting I am missing? I am using a retail Apple disc, should I be using something different?

 

Thanks,

 

Mike

[Ag0os]

I just wanna thank Albert for writing this. I'm installing SL on Vmware fusion running on a Mac pro and everything's going fine. I had some failed installations, first on my hackintosh and then on Ubuntu 10.04 running Vmware player, all the time I was getting the forbidden sing on the installation. But well, it seems that the problem was on the Os image I was using. I took my retail SL out of the box and now everything's going fine. thanks a lot!

[MSoK]

Hi There, I ran the program and thank you for it!!

 

It got me further on the installation than I ever have been before. I have a Dell T5500 workstation with a Westmere processor bios enabled and it seems to hang up on the installation (Apple gray screen, keeps restarting). Is there a setting I am missing? I am using a retail Apple disc, should I be using something different?

 

Thanks,

 

Mike

Mike,

 

The specs for your Dell T5500 Workstation suggest it has a Xeon 5600 Series processor, and the latest Retail OS X Snow Leopard DVD is 10.6.3, which does not support your processor. We have to cheat OS X into thinking it is running on a support processor i.e. Xeon 5500 Series. To do this we use what is called a CPU Mask or CPUID, you need to add the following line in to your VMX config file:

 

cpuid.1.eax = "0000:0000:0000:0001:0000:0110:1010:0101"

 

I have created a "How to Install Retail OS X" which has a lot of relevant information see the link below:

 

http://www.insanelymac.com/forum/index.php...t&p=1622074

[MSoK]

I just wanna thank Albert for writing this. I'm installing SL on Vmware fusion running on a Mac pro and everything's going fine. I had some failed installations, first on my hackintosh and then on Ubuntu 10.04 running Vmware player, all the time I was getting the forbidden sing on the installation. But well, it seems that the problem was on the Os image I was using. I took my retail SL out of the box and now everything's going fine. thanks a lot!

Ag0os,

 

Just for reference, it is unusual to get a Retail DVD in the Box with a Mac, normally they are a gray coloured restore version specifically for your Mac, these versions cannot be used for installation under VMware.

 

MSoK.

[mrdelurk]

Results on 10.6 (copy and paste from Terminal)

 

"Mac OS X guest unlocker for VMware, version 7

 

Directory /Library/Application Support/VMware Fusion:

File vmware-vmx: Error making file writable.

File vmware-vmx-debug: Error making file writable.

File vmware-vmx-stats: Missing file.

 

File /Applications/VMware Fusion.app/Contents/MacOS/vmware: Error making file writable.

logout

 

[Process completed]"

 

Launching the tweaked app brings up a screen I never saw before:

 

Boot Failed. EFI SCSI Device 1

EFI Shell version 2.10 [4096.1]

Current running mode 1.1.2

Device mapping table

fs 0 : Removable Hard Disk - Alias hd17a0c blk0

(etc. etc., a lot more snipped)

Press ESC in 1 seconds to skip startup.nsh, any other key to continue.

Shell> _

 

This is an i7-920 with an EFI-x hardware capsule.

[heres a tenner]

Any luck installing Lion with this baller patch?

[iSnatch]

Update for WMware Workstation 8 beta?

[DavidinCT]

had problems loading a Lion VM under workstation 7.1.3, this solved it perfectly. Thanks !

[McReid]

Albert,

 

First and foremost allow me to thank you for your, "Unlocker".

 

Worked like a charm.

 

Not new to computers, just new to this interesting world of running the Mac OS on a PC.

 

Only one problem, that I am aware of thus far, which is actually of importance to me, and Im hoping that maybe you might have an answer for me.

 

At the end of this post, I will list all of my hardware and software to possibly help you diagnose my problem.

 

Long and short of it, Im using that pre-installed Mac OS X Lion Developers 3 from Mahmood, and VMWare Workstation in Windows 7 x64.

 

I have no problem entering the Mac OS, but within the Mac environment, I have no cd/dvd burners listed.

 

In my system, I have 2 of them, both of them SATA.

 

I have them turned on in VMWare/Settings/Hardware Tab/CD-DVD (IDE)/, I have both, Connected, and Connect At Power On selected, as well as the correct drive letter of my main burner.

 

Yet when I look in System Report in the Mac OS, and under hardware, and Disc Burning, it says, "No disc burning device was found. If the device is external, make sure it's connected and turned on."

 

Both drives are internal SATA drives.

 

Any help with this?

 

Thanks.

 

 

Main System:

Microsoft Windows 7 Ultimate x64

 

VMWare Workstation v7.1.4-385536

 

Motherboard:

Asus P5K-Deluxe

 

Cpu:

Intel QX9650 Quad Core

 

Memory:

8 Gig of DDR2-800

 

DVD Drives/ Both SATA (Optical):

(Main) TSST Corp CDDVDW SH-S223F (ATA)

(Secondary) HL-DT-ST BD-RE GGW-H20L (ATA)

 

 

 

One last question, if I may sir.

 

If I have the original Mac Retail (non server) Install OS DVD, can I still load it into a virtual environment, on a PC, using VMWare Workstation, and your Unlocker?

 

Thanks again.