Could someone kindly explain Lilu, ProperTree, WhateverGreen, EFI, Bootloaders etc...?

[KrustyKrab]

I would love to buy you a beer in person for taking the time to explain all this to me.

 

By sheer luck, I've managed to successfully build my first Hackintosh that runs Big Sur and dual boots to Windows 10 via BIOS boot selector (both installed on separate NVME drives).

 

I basically just followed this video tutorial step-by-step: (Please let me know if I'm not allowed to post any videos of this nature here)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jqg7MX3FS7M

 

I did all this on my genuine Apple iMac with OC Gen-X. I also installed ProperTree and WhateverGreen. Once I had my boot-able USB sorted, with the BIOS settings help I got from a user from InsanelyMac, I now have a running Mac (apart from Bluetooth and Hotplugging that I'm still trying to fix).

On my new Hackintosh, I currently do not have any of these "hackers" apps installed. I don't even know where to find my EFI folder.

From my basic understanding, OC Gen-X was a shortcut to manually installing all these kexts? I'm also seeing a lot of posts about people backing up their Hackintoshes via EFI and all.

 

What I need help with:

• Now that my Hackintosh is running, what else do I need to install to ensure it is running smoothly in the future (Lilu, ProperTree, WhateverGreen)?
• Is it safe to run any Big Sur updates like a normal Mac computer?
• Where would I find my EFI folder (not from the USB anymore) and what purpose does it serve at this stage?
• Say I download an App from a user here that has kexts to be injected, what is the step-by-step way of doing it?
• Is there a possibility that one day my Hackintosh may no longer boot (due to a breaking update or some sort)? What do you guys do to prevent this from happening?
• I'm seeing videos of people using Clover to mount partitions even though the Mac is running via Opencore. What is the purpose of that?
• I am quite content with switching between Windows 10 and Big Sur via BIOS boot selector. Is there a better recommended way of doing so?

 

I've watched and read hours and hours of tutorials but I just cannot seem to understand what I need to know. I'm also not very sure if I'm running my Hackintosh the way it's meant to be?

 

Thanks in advance for everything!

 

 

[1Revenger1]

The TechNolli guide is based off of the Dortania guides - so I would give that guide a good read.
I'd specifically look on the terminology and kexts page, they should both have a short blurb (or a bit longer) about what certain things are

Video guides do tend to gloss over a lot of information so I myself would not recommend them in the future.

With OpenCore, you shouldn't need to do much maintenance - it is good practice to update your kexts and bootloader before upgrading macOS itself, as well as look up to see if other people have had issues. If you are not confident in your ability to figure out what may go wrong day 1 of an update, it may be best to wait a day or two to see if other people run into issues before you update macOS yourself. A lot of the time though, minor revisions (ie 10.15.6 -> 10.15.7) don't break compatibility. The major updates to look out for are major OS updates like 10.15 -> 11.0.  Best way to protect yourself is to generally keep things updated.

macOS updates are safe to run assuming you've updated everything and made sure your EFI works

The EFI is a partition on your USB, Harddrive, etc. You likely put OpenCore into the EFI partition of your drive with macOS on it, so you will want to mount it using diskutil (or other program, I personally like MountEFI) in order to edit it.

Clover != Clover Configurator - Clover Configurator is a program which you can run in macOS to edit Clover config.plist (Not OpenCore config.plists), and also has a utility to mount the EFI partition.

You can use OpenCore itself to switch between booting windows 10 and Big Sur, though keep in mind that OpenCore always injects ACPI and SMBIOS changes. You can work around SMBIOS changes though.

[dradovsky]

That video guide also helped me to install Big Sur, which seems to work with no problems. But I am having trouble making my two-drive machine dualbootable.

 

Previously, using Clover, I installed Catalina 10.15.6 on one SSD, and then installed Windows 10 on the other SSD. I was then able to choose my startup OS with no problems. But, in attempting to update to 10.15.7, I somehow screwed everything up and couldn't get it to work properly again. That's what made me try OpenCore.

 

So my question to you is: What did you do after installing Big Sur to be able to dualboot?

 

Dan

 

 

[Slice]

May be return to Clover? It works properly with Catalina and with Big Sur.

[dradovsky]

I want to continue with OpenCore because, at least, I was able to install Big Sur with no drama whatsoever. So I am going to keep trying and am pretty confident I will eventually find a way. Thanks.

[MooNear]

Start Reading on Dortonia site

[Slice]

9 hours ago, dradovsky said:

I want to continue with OpenCore because, at least, I was able to install Big Sur with no drama whatsoever. So I am going to keep trying and am pretty confident I will eventually find a way. Thanks.

You have a drama with dualboot.

[HenryV]

If any of you are having trouble with multiple hard drives and installed operating systems including windows macOS Linux and Android, see HenryV post for Big Sur 11.3b4 for multiboot info.

 

https://www.insanelymac.com/forum/topic/347139-big-sur-113b4-multibooting-chainloading-tweaks-brew-migrating-apps/

[Anto65]

https://medium.com/macoclock/guide-multiboot-dualboot-opencore-with-windows-macos-linux-kextcache-131e96784c3f