Thursday, February 21, 2008

Running Mac OSX on an HP dv8000

The other day I started looking at running Mac OS X in a Virtual Machine under VMware. Well getting 10.4 (tiger) to work was pretty simple as there were already VM images out there so it was really nothing more than finding the torrent and downloading. Unfortunately it is a little slow and clunky but it should work OK for testing a web site in Safari 2.5 but what about the new OS X Leopard and Safari 3?

Well today I started experimenting with loading Leopard into a VM on my Centrino Duo HP Pavillion dv8000 laptop. I didn't get very far with the Kalyway 10.5.1 ISO so I tried the iATKOS 1.0ir2 ISO and got a little farther but I never managed to make it to the initial welcome screen of the installer. So I had to make a choice, give up and live with Tiger or do a bare metal install...

Of course I went with the bare metal install on an old disk that I had. I went with iATKOS first because it was a newer disk and had a few more things already done for me. The only problem is that I didn't understand all the options so it was too confusing and the install didn't work out. Then I tried the Kalyway ISO and it worked like a champ. Upon reboot I had sound but no network. I decided to load the Kalyway 10.5.2 update in hopes that it would fix my network issue. No such luck.

I decided to work on getting Grub to manage my multiboot situation and after a little effort I had it working. So now I'm able to boot into Fedora 7 for Linux, and reboot into OS X Leopard.

Next was the network. I found a post talking about using a USB network dongle and since I happened to have a Linksys USB200M I thought I'd give it a try. After installing an incorrect kext file I discovered that Leopard should natively support the adapter. Of course since I'm new to OS X I ended up reinstalling the os. Along the way I discovered that I have to use my powered USB hub for USB stuff as the the other USB ports on the laptop don't seem to work. Odd......

With Leopard reinstalled I inserted my Linksys and things worked. Hooray! So then I downloaded an ext2 application which allows me to read my Linux drives. I opted to mount them read only as to avoid possible data corruption. Once I was able to see my Linux home directory I snagged my firebox bookmarks and dropped them in the right folder. Now I have the same Firefox bookmarks in both OSes. I think I might write a little script to sync them every time I boot into Mac.

Now if I can only get dual or triple screens working as well as the wifi or on-board nic I'll be good to go.

12 comments:

Simon said...

Brian - Did you figure out the internal USB problem? I just installed OS X from iATKOS on my dv8000t and can't seem to get them functioning (thus allowing me to run a USB wireless card)...

Everything else seems to be working alright, with the exception of being able to change resolutions. :)

Brian said...

I haven't bothered with the USB modem because I don't even have a dial up account any more. The USB Linksys Network card works so that's what I use when I boot into Leopard. It'd be nice to have the built-in NIC work as it's an Intel E100.

Simon said...

Brian -

From what I read of your post, you can't get any of the 4 USB ports on the sides of the laptop to function... Correct?

If that is correct, then how are you using the USB Linksys card?

That's where I'm at right now... I purchased a USB network card, hoping that I would put it in and I'd be able to setup my airport settings... but failed when nothing was recognized when I put the drive in the USB port. Thinking that maybe it was just a fluke problem, I also tried my flash drive in all 4 ports and got the same thing... Nothing.

(this post from OS X; although connected via a stupid network cable)

Simon said...

Oh... If you haven't figured out the dual screen setup stuff yet... Google "Natit Installer" - It's an installer based program that will install the "correct" drivers for your NVidia card (assuming you've got the same or similar card as me)... It let me change my resolution to what I normally use under Vista and from what I understand, it also works with a dual screen setup - however I haven't tested that personally.

Brian said...

I've got an iogear universal media hub with usb ports in it. When I plug the Linksys USB NIC in there it works.

Simon said...

Brian -

Just wanted to let you know that I found a solution to the USB problem. I tried this on my dv8000t laptop and it's functioning:

http://forum.insanelymac.com/index.php?showtopic=28559

Download the file #1 (for Darwin 9.0.0) that's PCGenUSBEHCI 303.4.5 and then follow the "Risk Takes Approach" down 4 or 5 posts... After the reboot, I've got 4 functional high-speed USB ports that work off the side of the laptop.

(this was tested on my OS X with 10.5.1)

Enjoy. :)

Brian said...

Simon -
Thanks for the heads up. That fixed the USB issues perfectly. I tried the Natit Installer and it seems I'm still only able to get 1 display working and I don't think it's using the Nvidia drivers.

Simon said...

Glad I could help. Now if only someone would get that internal wireless card working... ;)

As for the NATIT... I believe they are a knock-off NVidia driver. There were 2 solutions listed on the InsanelyMac forum and this seemed to have more options available (as well as an Installer script, which made it easier for me)...

Their Wiki page ( http://wiki.osx86project.org/wiki/index.php/Natit ) says there are several types of GEForce 7600 drives. I'm not 100% sure which is in the laptop, but it says that dual screens worked on one of them. At any rate, the drivers set from the installer gives me more resolution options than I had before, so that was enough for me.

EndOfLine said...

Can anyone help me with an OSX install...

Tried iatkos v1.0i, Kalyway 10.5.2 and Kalyway 10.5.2 patched with the Jmicron fix

Still prompts: cannot find com.apple.boot.plist


Opinions will be valued...: )

Brian said...

Ryan - Look at http://forum.insanelymac.com for help installing OS X. I chronicled my installation for the benefit of myself and others. The post section of a blog isn't the best method to get support, but a great place to point a cool trick or useful suggestion.

EndOfLine said...

ok thanks. Will keep looking. I just thought you might have an asnwer since we share the same notebook model. Can't find anything to help on the forum as of yet...

OMM said...

Thanks for this posting. I was able to get a network connection on my DV8000 with no problems whatsoever.