Open the Terminal
#cp -Rf /Bak_ATI/ATI*.kext /System/Library/Extensions/
Now you need configure your ATI Gaphic card.
Quickly check if all important hardware is working in SL e.g. Check internet for Ethernet working, open iTunes and play something to check your sound, open dashboard and add a gadget to it. If you get water waves effect, it means that QE / CI / GL of your graphics card is enable, otherwise you need to work on it too. I got Ethernet working out of box. But graphics (Zotac Geforce 8800GT) was not giving me QE/CI/GL support. So I used
OSX86 Tools for this for injecting EFI string to boot process (this way there is no need to use and load the kext and booting time significantly improves).
- Inject EFI strings for devices (graphics, Ethernet and sound (if available)
Although Mac Gurus don’t like so called EFI Injectors, but if you are new to SL and don’t wana go the detailes of DSDT.aml then check if you could get your graphics, ethernet and audio working through EFI injection using OSX86 Tools. This is the easiest way to get most of the things working (although my sound card ALC888 did not work through this method, so I had to do DSDT method, still doing research to enable sound in this motherboard). Well I agree with Mac Gurus upto some extent in this regard, but my idea is first to run SL without any problem and then do the improvements like creating and editing DSDT.aml for various devices etc.
- Run OSX86 Tools. Click on “Add EFI String/Boot Flag” button. First click on graphics card, from the drop down menu, choose your graphics card, it will give you hexadecimal EFI string in the bottom section. Then click on 2nd icon on top row “Import String to Boot Editor” After that you will have to click on button at the bottom “Apply changes to com.apple.Boot.plist”. Similarly do it for your Audio and Ethernet Strings. A quick tip here, you will not be able to see the effect unless you reboot. So when you next time boot, again check the QE/CI/GL for your graphics (by adding a gadget in dashboard, if you don’t see a clear water waves effect, again run OSX86 Tools, and click on “Enable/Disable Quarts GL” button of upper left side. Enable it. Again reboot and you will get the QE/CI/GL enabled for Nvidia GF8800GT card.
DSDT METHOD OF ENABLING DEVICES (If you don’t like EFI Injection method):
Generate DSDT.aml by following method
- Open the DSDT Patcher folder, and double click the DSDT Patcher icon. When it say press any key to continue, just enter. Then it will ask you “Which OS to emulate? [0=Darwin, 1=WinXP, 2=WinVista]. Press 0 and enter for Darwin based OS. 99% this gives you a DSDT.dsl file in the same folder of DSDT Patcher. This is a text editor file and we can change it in a text editor (if we need to do it). This patcher already applied the Snow Leopard’s CMOS reset fix for you. So you don’t have to worry about. Pay attention to the text appearing in this program window when it says “Process Completed”. If you get any error or warnings, then contact your best friend (google.com) for the help to remove these errors. If you get 0 error and 0 warnings, its ok to proceed.
- In 2nd step we will edit it if we need to. If you want to edit DSDT.dsl file to have the codes for Ethernet and sound etc. You need to follow this guide.
- Suppose you get no errors and no warnings and you don’t want to edit .dsl file. Next step is to compile this DSDT.dsl file to get a DSDT.aml file. Open the folder which contains the iaslME application. Open the DSDT Patcher folder also which should be having your dsdt.dsl file. Now drag and drop dsdt.dsl file over the iaslMe application icon. It will automatically generate a dsdt.aml file for you and will store it in the “Sessions” folder. Go to DSDT Patcher folder, then Open Session folder, then a folder which will be having most recent date and time as name of the folder. You will find two files; one will be dsdt.aml and other will be log.
- Now you right click on dsdt.aml and choose Get info -> Name and Extension. Change the name of the file from dsdt.aml to DSDT.aml. (as this file name is case sensitive). Now copy this file and past it in the Extra folder. It might ask you to authenticate it with administrative password.
- Final Step: Remove the Snow Installation DVD and reboot the system. Again press Del key go to BIOS and load the recommended settings for the last time (as you have already put DSDT.aml file in Extra folder which is having CMOS reset fix) and then save and exit from BIOS. Switch off your computer. Switch it on and you will get the Snow Leopard fully working (hopefully).
If by using DSDT.aml method still you are unable to use some of your devices, then you need to convert DSDT.aml into DSDT.dsl using iaslMe (just drop the DSDT.aml over the application icon) and edit the DSDT.dsl using text editor. For details I would recommend searching google for your problem, as I am also new in this particular technique and will not be able to help you much. Suggested links are in my reference section.
SOME ISSUES:
Automatic USB Device Removal:
I discovered this issue in SL. My USB based attached hard drive is automatically ejected and a message appears “Disk was not ejected properly. If possible always eject a disk before unplugging it or turning it off”.
Solution:
I did a research for the solution. Found a solution on Apple’s Official forum. Solution is simple: Go to System Preference->Energy Saver and there you will see a check box saying “Put the Hard Drive to Sleep when possible”. Simply uncheck that box.
Audio in this motherboard (ALC888):
I tried everything but could not get the sound working for ALC888 chipset even by using
tmongkol guide by using DSDT editing and LegacyHDA.kext for ALC888.
Solution:
So I looked for alternate solution. Found a really cheap USB based sound card with virtual 5.1 CH sound track, power amplifier inside, recod function etc for just USD:3.90 from Hong Kong. Cheapest shipping is around $8 so I ordered it over the internet. According to seller its Mac ready and no drivers are required in any OS (windows, Linux and even Mac). I haven’t received and tested it yet, but will update this guide about the performance and quality of this sound card in SL.
NTFS Read/Write Support in Snow:
Apple does not like NTFS file system, so apparently there is no direct way of getting read and write access to NTFS volumes. Yes, NTFS volumes are visible in Mac
OSX but they only provide you read only access. If you try to change the permission through Get Info, it will not allow you to do so.
Solution:
In 10.5.x versions I was using NTFS-3G application / drivers to get read and write access to NTFS volume and it was working perfectly without any issue. However, recently I found this article which describes that Snow Leopard seems to include read/write support for NTFS partition, however its disabled by default. All you need to do is enable it. A command line method to enable native read/write access in SL is described there on this forum. I havn’t tested it yet (I will definitely do it and will update this guide about it when I have time), but another forum warrned of possible NTFS volume corruption using this method. So use it on your own risk
Sleep and Wakeup:
System sleeps instantly without any extra
delay. But …… I unable to wake it up.
Solution:
Not yet found.
SOME USEFUL COMMANDS:
How to Remove the old mkext file in /Extra/Extensions- Open Terminal and run following commands:
1. Execute this on a shell sudo chown -R root:wheel /Extra/Extensions
2. Execute this on a shell sudo chmod -R go-w /Extra/Extensions
3. Execute this on a shell sudo kextcache -v 1 -t -l -m /Extra/Extensions.mkext /Extra/Extensions
How to Clean the System Caches- Open Terminal and run following commands:
1. Execute this on a shell sudo rm -fr /Library/Caches/*
2. Execute this on a shell sudo rm -fr /System/Library/Caches/*
3. Execute this on a shell sudo kextcache -v 1 -t -l -m /System/Library/Caches/com.apple.kext.caches/Startup/Extensions.mkext /System/Library/Extensions
USEFUL REFERENCES:
I searched web for running my SL smoothly and found very good forums / postings / links which I have booked marked and would like to thank all respective authors for their contribution and especially
3rr0rists:
1.
What is Kext, Where is kext, how to install kext . Thanks to insanelymac for this article.
2.
Understanding kexts. Thanks to Prasys’ Blog for this article.
3.
ALC889A, Gigabyte, Vaious AppleHDA.kexts are available. Thanks to tmongkol for guide.
4.
Removing errors and Warnings from DSDT files. Thanks to its author.
5.
ACPI DSDT Table. Thanks to Donnerstag for this article.
6.
OSX Terminal Commands. Thanks to its author.
7.
How to apply DSDT. Thanks to insanelymac for this article.
8.
A simple introduction to building a DSDT. Thanks to blackosx for this post.
9.
Quartz Extreme and Core Imaging in Snow Leopard. Thanks to Prasys’ Blogh for this post.
10.
KextHelper b7, a very good utility to install kexts (in S/L/E), I am not sure if you can use it to install kext in E/E folder.
FINAL REQUEST:
I am not a mac expert and consider myself as a novice in this field, so I would request all Mac Gurus and experts to help me in improving this guide and correct me if I am wrong somewhere. I have a couple of un-resolved issues on this motherboard like sound (ALC888) not working tried every method. After DSDT editing my system profiler is able to see a device but my system preference does not show up any output or input device to select. If some one could guide me step by step how to get it working in a simple and detailed manner that would be great. 2nd issue is wakeup from sleep. If someone could also help me how to fix that, it will make this guide perfect. Thanks for reading this guide.
Gurujee (21-Sep-09)
A PDF of this guide is also attached [attachment=57297:EP45_UD3...on_Guide.pdf] with this posting.
