10.4.6 on SATA primary drive (Toshiba Tectra M5)

[dazzer]

There's a lot of talk around issues with SATA drives on these forums, but no definitive answers, so I thought I'd ask....

 

Can OSx86 boot from SATA drives?

 

My laptop Toshiba Tecra M5 has a SATA drive only. I have installed the MacOSX_10.4.6DVDPATCHED_Myz dristrubution onto my laptop and that all works. However my problem is I cannot actually boot from that OSx86 partition (either by marking is active or using GRUB from Solaris). However, I can boot via the OSx86 DVD using:

 

hd(0,a)mach_kernel cpus=1 idlehalt=0 fn=3 -v

 

If I am reading the forums right it seems that the bootloader isn't SATA aware? - although I am still unsure as some people report this all works OK.

 

My system:

Toshiba Tecra M5

# Intel® Core™ Duo Processor T2600 (SSE3)

# 1GB DDR2 RAM (Upgraded to 1.5GB) 533MHz

# 80GB SATA HD

# Intel® 945PM Express Chipset - 667MHz Bus

 

The SATA controller is reported in Windows as Intel 82801 GBM/GHM ICH7-M family

 

and my disk layout:

1 - NTFS WIndows XP primary

2 - MAC primary (type AF)

3 - Solaris - primary active (GRUB bootloader)

4 - DOS/FAT logical volume

 

 

Any SATA booting assistance would be gratefully received.

 

Darren

[Rammjet]

Can OSx86 boot from SATA drives?

 

I cannot actually boot from that OSx86 partition (either by marking is active or using GRUB from Solaris). However, I can boot via the OSx86 DVD

 

If I am reading the forums right it seems that the bootloader isn't SATA aware?

 

When you boot from the OSX install DVD, you are using the Darwin bootloader and it is successfully booting your SATA drive.

 

In another posting, you mention an error you get when trying to boot. I believe this is the problem with your inability to boot from the Darwin bootloader on the partition.