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[HowTo] Intel GMA 900 (for 915GM and 910)

Andy4life

By Andy4life,
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devDelay
devDelay
Posted
Posted

I have a HP dv4000. I have edited my original AppleIntel915.kext to reflect the device id for my lcd display. I have been able to get past the blue screen by using -f and/or pressing f4 to change the displays without an external monitor plugged in. It seems pretty stable. In system profiler I get the following:

Intel Graphics Media Accelerator 900:

 

Chipset Model: GMA 900

Type: VGA-Compatible Controller

Bus: Built-In

VRAM (Total): 256 MB

Vendor: Intel (0x8086)

Device ID: 0x2592

Revision ID: 0x0004

Displays:

Display:

Resolution: 1280 x 800

Depth: 32-bit Color

Core Image: Not Supported

Main Display: Yes

Mirror: Off

Online: Yes

Quartz Extreme: Not Supported

Display:

Status: No display connected

 

The AppleIntel915.kext is not listed in loaded extensions so it seems like there is another kext that is being referenced since the 915 kext looks like it is not loaded at all. Has anyone had any success getting os x to fully recognize this hardware and support QE?

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Nando
Nando
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Hi all!

I have the same problem.

 

Some posts back, i've read that this problem didn't occured in 10.4.1 because it was using VESA drivers instead of the GM900. No i understand why when i lodaded the driver in 10.4.1 i start getting the blue screen. :gathering:

But ok, on to the question, so if i managed to delete the ktext that has the GM900 driver and go back again to VESA in 10.4.3 this problem will be gone right? Ok, i won't have QE and so on... but the dual monitor will end.

If so, what ktext should i erase?

 

I've been reading straight from page 1, so my eyes could be playing tricks on me.

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yakuzaa
yakuzaa
Posted
Posted

I have a SONY VAIO VGN-FS640w, and I solved the problem by creating a "hibernating monitor" - two resistors between 1-5 and 2-12. Plug this device to notebook when Installer is loading, the scren must blink two times, and then blue screen appears, at tis moment you should connect external monitor and see installer window on it, you can drag installer to main monitor, or continue installation on external monitor. When you finish installation process, and computer goes to reboot, connect "hibernating monitor" to computer and boot to Mac OS, screen will blink two times and you will see gray screen and hear music, connect external monitor, go to System Preferences>Displays and drag white bar to the notebook screen, then connect "hibernating monitor" and reboot! Enjoy! And don't forget to keep "hibernating monitor" plugged in!

 

P.S. Sorry for my ugly english, i am from Russia!

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devDelay
devDelay
Posted
Posted
I have a SONY VAIO VGN-FS640w, and I solved the problem by creating a "hibernating monitor" - two resistors between 1-5 and 2-12. Plug this device to notebook when Installer is loading, the scren must blink two times, and then blue screen appears, at tis moment you should connect external monitor and see installer window on it, you can drag installer to main monitor, or continue installation on external monitor. When you finish installation process, and computer goes to reboot, connect "hibernating monitor" to computer and boot to Mac OS, screen will blink two times and you will see gray screen and hear music, connect external monitor, go to System Preferences>Displays and drag white bar to the notebook screen, then connect "hibernating monitor" and reboot! Enjoy! And don't forget to keep "hibernating monitor" plugged in!

 

P.S. Sorry for my ugly english, i am from Russia!

 

I have read other threads that describe ways to make a dongle for vga or s-video if you don't like to solder. I have been able to use a s-video cable to boot up the laptop, then mirror the displays, restart and attach my s-video dongle to avoid blue screen. This still doesn't solve the real problem. QE is not supported and I can see the AppleIntel915.kext is not loaded....also take a look at my above read out from system profiler to see that the hardware isn't properly identified. There has to be some other kext that is loading the hardware as just a device it finds compatible and ignoring the 915 kexts and bundle alltogether. Am I right? What can we do about this? Wait for 10.4.4? Plugging a dongle in is lame.

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vanja
vanja
Posted
Posted

Problem is in allocating memory, osx86 does not "know" to tell GMA 900 that it needs more memory.

Apparently, two screens require additional memory to GMA 900.

 

I don't see s-video dummy connector as a {censored}. I have it connected all the time and makes no trouble to me at all. I do agree, though that software solution is much better one. I made s-video connector, now someone make the software solution :(

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devDelay
devDelay
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Posted

I beg to differ, it couldn't take more memory because the hardware only supports 128MB of vram. System profiler is playing games because the hardware is not properly identified, I've seen it happen before. I noticed in your sig you say that QE and CI are supported on your laptop. Does system profiler really list that you have QE supported? I have gotten the laptop to boot up fine a few time without using a dongle, directly after editing the 915.kext in order to reflect my lcd only, it didn't work again after I rebooted. Anytime I have ever booted my hp dv4000 into os X it has never said QE supported. I don't think the hardware supports it. Am I missing something, still? It still is very lame that I must plug in a dongle because only a software solution is the right way.

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Urbz
Urbz
Posted
Posted

hey devDelay,

how about editing your post to exclude the synonym for "crud"?

you too, vanja.

 

A hardware solution is where we currently are in this project, because we are unable to find, as of yet, a feasible software alternative to allow osx to boot with QE and CG enabled without this solution (which mimics having an external monitor connected).

 

Please keep this thread general, and do not argue over which theory is right, because at the moment, they are all right and all wrong untill proven otherwise.

 

Wanna prove a theory right? Set out to make a software fix, don't fight to attain supremacy: this is a web-site dedicated to running mac os x x86. Do not turn this topic, which in turn is focused on getting our gma900s to work properly, into any sort of flame war, and do not make it uncomfortable for people to post their opinions and theories. Yes, devDelay, I'm looking at you.

 

Lets stay on-topic, on-focus, and PG.

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vanja
vanja
Posted
Posted

@Urby3

I don't think there is a single person here who does not agree with memory theory, but if you think this is a start of flaming, i'll shut up :happymac:

 

@devDelay

Yes, System Profiles says I have QE and CI supported. Every boot it is supported.

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randomblame
randomblame
Posted
Posted

I ditched my svideo dongle for 2 wires and some electrical tape to cover my vga out port, that way I dont have anything hanging or anything it works wonderfully, I also have QE and CI supported on every single boot with my gma900 based xps m140.

 

 

Just take pin one and connect it with pin 6, and pin 2 to pin 12... it cant get any cheaper/easier. I'm not using any resistors just two plain wires from an old power supply and some electrical tape to cover it up with. So far it's working great.

db15hd_female.gif

Picture0011.jpg

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Murdock
Murdock
Posted
Posted

Hi again!

 

I deleted all my AppleIntel*.kext files and now works withou external monitor!

Yes I know, I don't have acceleration but...everything seems to work well and fast (exposé and all the desktop things), so, what's the difference to have or not the acceleration?

 

Thanks!

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jseldon
jseldon
Posted
Posted

I've been messing with this for a while, but I'm not sure whats wrong. Should Andy4lifes's fix work on 10.4.3?

 

Seems my Inspiron 6000 (Intel915gm/GMA900) sticks to 1024x768 mode when booting .

 

VID: family specific matching fails (x3)

VID2: family specific matching fails (x3)

 

I'm using the kext's Andy provided, but I assume those are for 10.4.1 not 10.4.3 and thus my problem, anyone got them for 10.4.3. Been hunting through posts looking but I haven't had any luck. I thought I backed up the originals when doing this, but apparently not.

 

Any help would be appreciated.

 

Thanks.

 

James

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yakuzaa
yakuzaa
Posted
Posted
no damage so far all the research I have done suggests that the voltage is negligable and that this is safe. I will use a multimeter on it one of these days and post the results

Try to measure Current, NOT Voltage.

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quietglow
quietglow
Posted
Posted

Ok. I have a DV4000 and I just spent 3 hours reading through this thread. I'm running 10.4.3 and I'd like native resolution. I just sorted out that the kext modification which worked for 10.4.1 isn't whats needed for 10.4.3. So do I still need to modify the kext files? If so, how? Should I just use the attached drivers? I've actually tried that w/o much luck.

 

Out of the box, I cannot boot past the blue scree w/o an external monitor--I needed it to install. Unlike others here, though, I can't get any action going for my LCD even when I use an external--i.e. the "boot with an external and switch the lcd to the main screen" doesn't work for me. I don't mind making a dongle, but I need to get the internal lcd going before that will help at all I suppose.

 

(FWIW, I've also booted without any of the kexts--works fine but no native res etc)

 

Thanks for helping clarify!

 

 

Just noticed this point above:

 

I'm using the kext's Andy provided, but I assume those are for 10.4.1 not 10.4.3 and thus my problem, anyone got them for 10.4.3. Been hunting through posts looking but I haven't had any luck. I thought I backed up the originals when doing this, but apparently not.

 

That's what I think we need some clarification on. If some gives me the 411 on the situation with 10.4.3, I'll be happy to take the time to make an updated HOWTO.

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ozzie123
ozzie123
Posted
Posted

Well, now I'm forced to use an external monitor everytime I tried to boot my OSx86 laptop. However, since I pretty much use it on my desk, the use of dual monitor increases my productivity!

 

Plus, if I wanted to use it mobile (on a coffee shop for example), I will simply set the second monitor to mirror the first one and then choose "Sleep". That way, when I go somewhere where I can't find an external monitor, my OSx86 still can run on a single laptop's LCD with QE and CI completely supported.

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quietglow
quietglow
Posted
Posted

Okay, I helped myself :-) I'm an Apple user since '84 so forgive any shortness and please ask for clarification if needed.

 

Here's what worked for my setup on a DV4000:

 

NO MODIFICATION TO KEXT FILES

 

Booted with jumpers connecting pins as described above.

 

While it was booting I hit the FN-F4 a few times.

 

When it booted, the built in screen was recognized as as the "extra display" (woohoo!) so I pulled the jumpers and plugged in an external monitor.

 

Set the built-in monitor as the default (drag the bar over etc.)

 

Voila!

 

Stability: the computer will *reboot* without the jumpers in place. If you *shut down* you'll have to have the jumpers when you reboot. But no further "screen switching." I'm going to find a crummy monitor at Goodwill or soemthing, cut off the cable and make a dongle out of it, myself.

 

Sleep is wonky. It blue screens when it comes out of sleep some times. Sometimes I can also trick it back by fiddling with the Fn-F4 and hitting the power button. I LOVE sleep, but my machine boots in ~30 sec so its not really all that necessary.

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Invader J
Invader J
Posted
Posted

Oy, chalk another one up to blue-screen-without-ext-monitor. Fujitsu P7120 with GMA900 chipset. Running modified 915 and Integrated Graphics kexts, I get native res on the built-in LCD and spanning on the external - but no fix on these 20 pages resulted in it working without the external monitor... =(

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Heywood
Heywood
Posted
Posted

Got a Dell Latitude D610 with an Intel 915GM/910ML/915MS (thats what the Darwin boot prompt regards it as anyway.)

 

Have a clean install of 10.4.3 on there, except for some fiddling of the kext files. Still just a blank blue screen when I boot with out an external monitor attached.

 

When I boot with single user mode and verbose switches I notice an error:

 

a link/load error occured loading AppleIntelIntegratedGraphics.kext

 

So i guess what ever i did wasnt much help.

 

Any reports of 10.4.4 having better results? How about 10.4.1. I'd like to get the LCD and network working (not even my wired ethernet port is working either with 10.4.3)

 

Also anyone with succes with this laptop lease speak up. Any advice is appreciated.

 

Thanks

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_-=RP=-_
_-=RP=-_
Posted
Posted

Has somebody of you a working resolution of 1400x1050? Would be interesting.

Because the external monitor works fine and I hope the s-video hack works for me as well. But I can't use a resolution of 1400x1050 then.

Under linux I'm using the 855resolution-tool to modify the VBIOS on the fly, everytime it startsup. Maybe I'm gonna have a look in those sources later.

1400x1050 works or not?

 

Edit: I've got a Fujitsu S7020

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