Getting bootloader to work on M1330

[DanGleesacks]

Hi,

 

First post here, but have been reading loads of stuff on this site all week, and for the most part its been the best source of info I have had... apart from one area I'm stuck! The frackin bootloader! Its giving me nothing but grief!

 

I'm trying to put Snow Leopard on my XPS M1330 (2.00GHz, Nvida, etc... usual spec)

 

I've been using Snow Dell CD to load full retail of Snow Leopard 10.6.3 and it installs perfectly and without testing yet, it looks pretty good (not tested WiFi / Network, Sound etc yet)

 

Basically its crapping out EVERYTIME I reboot its either hanging or giving me a Kernel Panic. I've done my homework and read loads on Chameleon (using 2 RC4 V3- Stable) and the pkg installs brilliantly, but it still gives me a Kernel Panic on reboot. I've been reading about editing the boot.plist to arch=i386 but this is where I fail... I've been a Windows man for many, many years (I work with computers) but this is my first time getting deep into a Mac (apart from playing on the desktop with software etc, I've never used them) so my questions and help is for, where am I going wrong (please STATE THE OBVIOUS!) lol

Where is this boot.plist? I did a search and the only one it found was in a folder on my Snow Dell boot CD??? Do I need to copy it somewhere?

Also I have an XPS M1330 DSDT file, it says this should be on the root directory... is this just literally where I open the disk and see all the folders (or does Apple do it differently?) I know that sounds stupid, but apple are funny like that!

 

Any help as where to go next! I have loads of kexts etc, but I don't see the point in installing them yet as I can't even get a reboot going. Once I figure this, I can work on the extensions (drivers!) etc.

 

Thanks,

DG

[koko]

You don't need to edit boot.plist, you can simple on chameleon boot screen press any key an type arch=i386 and every other command.

As you say, your root directory is your boot disk and there you can put dsdt.

I am using RC5, so right place for DSDT is /Extra folder.

When you boot use -v option for verbose mode (after arch=i386), that you can track how your rig boot.

[DanGleesacks]

Ahhh... that makes sense.

 

OK, I will try that. but does that mean I have to do that everytime I boot the machine?

 

I've down downloaded RC5, so going to give that a try now. My next option is to downgrade to just Leopard, but I'm not giving up yet!

 

Thanks.

 

DG

[DanGleesacks]

OK. Update: But its not too good!

 

I put on Chameleon RC5 beautifully. I loaded the DSDT for Generic M1330 / Nvidia...

 

On reboot, it got further, but this time failed on DSDT_DEBUG.

 

 

I managed to update the boot.plist to i386 (and even tried x86) no avail.

 

I added the smbios.plist, still nothing.

 

I then found the DSDTPatcher and tried that... still did no work. I'm now constantly getting the DSDT_DEBUG and can't get out of it? I'm inclined to think it defo the DSDT thats causing me problems, but I can't figure out a way around it.

 

 

I'm almost pulling my hair out... but keeping my patience