[Guide] HP DV8, DV7, DV6, & DV5, 10.6.4 Easy, Comprehensive Installation

[Mammoth]

I had already tried pfix. I've also tried to boot the legacy_kernel with multiple variations of: cpu=1 or 8, arch=X86_64 or i386, busratio=12 (or no busratio flag), ... All were a no go. Always a KP when I try to boot the legacy_kernel.

 

 

mach_kernel boots fine with cpus=1, busratio=12.

 

 

Just to make sure I didn't screw something up following the guide. I'm going to re-partition the drive and start all over. I'll let you know if I get the same results.

 

HOLD THAT THOUGHT...

 

I have an updated Guide 3. I'm trying to resolve issues so I can update the boot CD to go with it though. For some reason, the kext files are NOT being loaded from Cham/Extra/Extensions. I'm thinking it has something to do with this Legacy_kernel, but I'm trying to figure it out now. So I want to give you a copy of the new Guide 3 to try, but the updated Boot CD isn't ready yet.

 

Mammoth

[Mac Man 50]

Mammoth

 

Thanks for the info. Did you burn the dmg file to a dvd-r DL disc?

 

Thanks.

[Mammoth]

Mammoth

 

Thanks for the info. Did you burn the dmg file to a dvd-r DL disc?

 

Thanks.

 

Sorry, I always miss at least 1 question don't I.

 

I have an external USB hard drive and put everything on there. Fast, easy to add / make changes, and super fast access.

 

Mammoth

[Mac Man 50]

Sorry, I always miss at least 1 question don't I.

 

I have an external USB hard drive and put everything on there. Fast, easy to add / make changes, and super fast access.

 

Mammoth

 

thanks mammoth.

I have a USB flas drive 16gb. Will this work? How do I

burn the dmg file on to the flash drive and make it bootable?

I don't have a running mac in my home.

 

Please advice.

 

Thanks.

[macvett]

Just to add some of my experiences with this guide on my DV8t. I have 8GB of DRAM and that was causing a Kernel Panic when i tried to boot the legacy_kernel. I had no problems with the vanilla kernel but wanted more than one core.

 

To get around this (after you've followed the guide through the legacy_kernel installation), at the Chameleon boot screen, type:

 

legacy_kernel -v -busratio=12 -force64. (I've added this to my Cham/Extra/com.apple.Boot.plist file but for some reason it is not being read at startup so I have to add the line manually each time I boot)

 

With that I can boot legacy_kernel fine, 8GB and 8 cores running!

 

Thanks for all your help on this Mammoth!

 

Now, if anyone has figured out how to the the sound running...I'm all ears!!! :-)

[Mammoth]

thanks mammoth.

I have a USB flas drive 16gb. Will this work? How do I

burn the dmg file on to the flash drive and make it bootable?

I don't have a running mac in my home.

 

Please advice.

 

Thanks.

 

Oh, wait... sorry, I've got too many things going. You're talking about how to burn a "copy" of the OS X DVD. Sorry, sometimes I take these thing for granted.

 

1) You must have a blank, DL DVD. You probably don't have any of these, so you will have to go buy some. I would see if you can get a pack of say, 15 or so.

2) The best way is to burn it from a Mac using the free program, SimplyBurns.

3) If you have to burn it from a PC in Windows, you will have to Google "how to burn a .dmg from Windows" or something like that. You may be able to use Nero.

 

Mammoth

 

Just to add some of my experiences with this guide on my DV8t. I have 8GB of DRAM and that was causing a Kernel Panic when i tried to boot the legacy_kernel. I had no problems with the vanilla kernel but wanted more than one core.

 

To get around this (after you've followed the guide through the legacy_kernel installation), at the Chameleon boot screen, type:

 

legacy_kernel -v -busratio=12 -force64. (I've added this to my Cham/Extra/com.apple.Boot.plist file but for some reason it is not being read at startup so I have to add the line manually each time I boot)

 

With that I can boot legacy_kernel fine, 8GB and 8 cores running!

 

Thanks for all your help on this Mammoth!

 

Now, if anyone has figured out how to the the sound running...I'm all ears!!! :-)

 

Thanks for sharing MacVett! You've been a great asset to this thread.

 

For the sound, check Post #1 at the bottom. I have recently added a bunch of links to others with systems similar to ours, and there are people using VoodooHDA for sound (however I am waiting on what Kizwan and I will come up with so we don't have to use VoodooHDA). It work as a temporary though.

 

Let us know as you get things working!

 

 

Mammoth

[Mac Man 50]

Oh, wait... sorry, I've got too many things going. You're talking about how to burn a "copy" of the OS X DVD. Sorry, sometimes I take these thing for granted.

 

1) You must have a blank, DL DVD. You probably don't have any of these, so you will have to go buy some. I would see if you can get a pack of say, 15 or so.

2) The best way is to burn it from a Mac using the free program, SimplyBurns.

3) If you have to burn it from a PC in Windows, you will have to Google "how to burn a .dmg from Windows" or something like that. You may be able to use Nero.

 

Mammoth

 

mammoth:

 

thanks. So you are saying I must get a DVD DL disc

and cannot use my flash 16gb drive to burn the dmg

file?

 

Thanks.

 

 

Thanks for sharing MacVett! You've been a great asset to this thread.

 

For the sound, check Post #1 at the bottom. I have recently added a bunch of links to others with systems similar to ours, and there are people using VoodooHDA for sound (however I am waiting on what Kizwan and I will come up with so we don't have to use VoodooHDA). It work as a temporary though.

 

Let us know as you get things working!

 

 

Mammoth

[Mac Man 50]

Mammoth:

 

thanks. So you are saying I must get a DVD DL disc to

burn the 10.6.3 image

and cannot use my 16gb flash drive to write the dmg

file?

 

Btw, you were mentioning having a external hard drive

to copy/edit/delete changes. Are you referring to kexts

or to the full mac os x install DVD?

 

Thanks

[Mammoth]

Mammoth:

 

thanks. So you are saying I must get a DVD DL disc to

burn the 10.6.3 image

and cannot use my 16gb flash drive to write the dmg

file?

 

Btw, you were mentioning having a external hard drive

to copy/edit/delete changes. Are you referring to kexts

or to the full mac os x install DVD?

 

Thanks

 

Hi MacMan50,

 

For the 10.6.3, use a DL DVD, as I did.

 

For the update files, backups, ets, use a USB drive as I was referring to the kexts, etc, not the install DVD.

 

 

 

Mammoth

[Mac Man 50]

Hi Mammoth,

 

I'm expecting my notebook soon.

I'm happy to understand that all 4 cores with 8 threads are working in the patched kernel (mentioned in the first page on this topic). Is SL running natively in 64 bit? I didn't see it being mentioned anywhere.

 

Also, I would like to know what wireless card did you get for SL to work natively? Is it this: Broadcom BCM4321 (rebadged as Dell)?

Btw, how is your SL install working? Is it now running in 10.6.4? Did you try to use iDVD/iMovie or install any other video editing apps? Did you also try to run some benchmarks (GeekBench - http://www.primatelabs.ca/geekbench/)?

 

Thanks.

[Mammoth]

* UPDATE * - 2010-06-27 - 12:50 PM GMT -8:00

 

I am pleased to announce that all of the guides have been substantially updated, there's an updated Mammoth DVx Boot CD, and ALL previously reported issues have been resolved!

 

Here are some of the improvements:

 

- Disappearing TrackPad / Keyboard resolved

- Lock-ups due to memory issues addressed

- Typographical errors corrected in guides

- Fewer CD boots required (hard drive is bootable sooner)

- No need to place kexts such as for TrackPad / Keyboard in /S/L/E/, 100% working

in /Cham/Extra/Extensions/

- Permissions & attributes on kexts in /Cham/Extra/Extensions/ automatically

set using new ChamExtUp script

- More stable install process (less chance of lock-ups throughout process)

 

Hi Mammoth,

 

I'm expecting my notebook soon.

I'm happy to understand that all 4 cores with 8 threads are working in the patched kernel (mentioned in the first page on this topic). Is SL running natively in 64 bit? I didn't see it being mentioned anywhere.

 

Also, I would like to know what wireless card did you get for SL to work natively? Is it this: Broadcom BCM4321 (rebadged as Dell)?

Btw, how is your SL install working? Is it now running in 10.6.4? Did you try to use iDVD/iMovie or install any other video editing apps? Did you also try to run some benchmarks (GeekBench - http://www.primatelabs.ca/geekbench/)?

 

Thanks.

 

- 64-bit is covered a bit more in the new version of the guides.

- I ordered the same one as gsly from ProjectOSX, but have not received it yet. he has provided his modded BIOS which is needed to make it work, so once I get it, I will try it.

- My SL is running great with 10.6.4

- Have not tried video apps but will install FCS3 soon and will later run GeekBench.

 

Mammoth

[Mac Man 50]

Mammoth:

 

I just got my new dv8t replacement. But, to my

surprise, I got dv8t-1200 with a different product name.

The first thing I did is to clone the primary hdd using

norton ghost 11.5 to the secondary drive. Then created

4 recovery discs. I then quickly checked the devices

in device mgr and didn't see anything different than

what you have. I'm kind of concerned with the different

model - dv8t-1200.

 

Btw, do you know of a best way to clone both the

partitions - SL and Windows 7 to a single image? I tried

clonezilla just to begin with and it fAiled reading the

first partition. Then I managed to di with ghost 11.5 and

it worked with just the windows partitions.

 

Btw, do I need to have a new DSDT.aml and smbios.plist

for dv8t-1200?

 

I'll wait for your reply before I attempt sl on this.

 

Btw, for wireless card I think you are getting Dell dw1500

(broadcom bcm 4321) which may work directly

without patching bios I think. Any updates on the

audio without the Voodoo one?

 

 

Thanks for all your help.

[Mammoth]

Mammoth:

 

I just got my new dv8t replacement. But, to my

surprise, I got dv8t-1200 with a different product name.

The first thing I did is to clone the primary hdd using

norton ghost 11.5 to the secondary drive. Then created

4 recovery discs. I then quickly checked the devices

in device mgr and didn't see anything different than

what you have. I'm kind of concerned with the different

model - dv8t-1200.

 

Btw, do you know of a best way to clone both the

partitions - SL and Windows 7 to a single image? I tried

clonezilla just to begin with and it fAiled reading the

first partition. Then I managed to di with ghost 11.5 and

it worked with just the windows partitions.

 

Btw, do I need to have a new DSDT.aml and smbios.plist

for dv8t-1200?

 

I'll wait for your reply before I attempt sl on this.

 

Btw, for wireless card I think you are getting Dell dw1500

(broadcom bcm 4321) which may work directly

without patching bios I think. Any updates on the

audio without the Voodoo one?

 

 

Thanks for all your help.

 

Hello MacMan50,

 

I don't know of a way to clone OSX and Windows 7 with one program. I make .DMG files using Disk Utility (discused in Guide 4) for my OS X images.

 

I'm farily certain the DSDT will work perfectly.

 

I would use Ghost 15. That's what I used. Let me know if 11.5 works, but I don't think it will as the Windows 7 partitioning is different (I think I tried Ghost 14 at one point and it didn't work, and then I got 15 which did). I mention in the guides that you can get it free as a 30 (or 15) day trial from Symantec's web site.

 

I let you know about the wireless card when I get it.

 

Haven't had time to play with audio.

 

Mammoth

[kellis]

Hi guys,

about the EFI story in this thread.

I just wanted to let you know that the same thing happened.

No access to BIOS. nothing.

I took the drive out, then the BIOS would work.

 

I inserted the drive in my other machine, and redid the active partition.

For some reason i think it was set to a wrong partition, or something, not sure. but i set it back

Put the drive back in the laptop. Bam, BIOS and all worked fine.

so i believe the BIOS at least checks something on the drive. I know weird. but NOT faulty.

I knew that when i inserted the drive in my other machines. no problem at all.

[Mammoth]

Hi guys,

about the EFI story in this thread.

I just wanted to let you know that the same thing happened.

No access to BIOS. nothing.

I took the drive out, then the BIOS would work.

 

I inserted the drive in my other machine, and redid the active partition.

For some reason i think it was set to a wrong partition, or something, not sure. but i set it back

Put the drive back in the laptop. Bam, BIOS and all worked fine.

so i believe the BIOS at least checks something on the drive. I know weird. but NOT faulty.

I knew that when i inserted the drive in my other machines. no problem at all.

 

There is a new BIOS available, F.25, and they are saying it corrects an issue with not being able to start the machine. Maybe this is what you are seeing.

DV8t-1100 Download page

 

Try it and let us know if it fixes it.

 

Mammoth

[kellis]

There is a new BIOS available, F.25, and they are saying it corrects an issue with not being able to start the machine. Maybe this is what you are seeing.

DV8t-1100 Download page

 

Try it and let us know if it fixes it.

 

Mammoth

 

 

very possible, but i have the dv7 3180us model, which i think carries a different bios.

and i had updated mine to the latest, this was few days ago.

maybe that fix didn't make it to my bios yet. but at least i found a way to get it to work with that workaround.

[Nativedude]

Thank you very much Mammoth for this very helpful guide

I have OS X running really smooth on my DV7T-3300 Quad

 

Can't wait for further updates so when can get these things running vanilla

[kellis]

Hi guys, any of you got the screen brightness to work?

through the prefpanel, or even through the keyboard FN keys?

 

(nvidia 230m)

[Mammoth]

Thank you very much Mammoth for this very helpful guide

I have OS X running really smooth on my DV7T-3300 Quad

 

Can't wait for further updates so when can get these things running vanilla

 

Awesome! Thanks for posting about your success. I thought it would, but it's good to know for sure that the guide works for the DV7t series too.

 

Some of our next goals are to work on getting sound to work (without using VoodooHDA), more functionality through DSDT improvements, customized SMBIOS, and also getting even better video support via DSDT rather than just GraphicsEnabler. Everyone should post their wish list for fixes / support and I will add them to the main post.

 

I'm also going to be experimenting with a Dell WiFi card to see if we can get a wireless solution. I already know of a guy who has done this, so I know it works. I'm waiting for mine to arrive so I can begin testing.

 

Thanks again, and I'm happy it worked so well for you!

 

Mammoth

[Mammoth]

Hi guys, any of you got the screen brightness to work?

through the prefpanel, or even through the keyboard FN keys?

 

(nvidia 230m)

 

So you are correct. No way to adjust the brightness, not that I could find. However, this is also the case with my other 2 Hack desktops. : |

 

So if anyone knows how to add this functionality, please let us know.

 

Thanks,

[kellis]

So you are correct. No way to adjust the brightness, not that I could find. However, this is also the case with my other 2 Hack desktops. : |

 

So if anyone knows how to add this functionality, please let us know.

 

Thanks,

 

My other hack* which is an acer a0a150 has the screen brightness functionality through the FN keys.

So i am pretty sure it is possible to achieve.

[Mammoth]

My other hack* which is an acer a0a150 has the screen brightness functionality through the FN keys.

So i am pretty sure it is possible to achieve.

 

OK, that's good to know then. How did you get video working, DSDT, GraphicsEnabler? Do you have special kexts loaded that might have added that functionality? Like I said, I don't have any machines that is working on. So if you could figure it out, that would be great.

 

Thanks,

 

Mammoth

[kellis]

OK, that's good to know then. How did you get video working, DSDT, GraphicsEnabler? Do you have special kexts loaded that might have added that functionality? Like I said, I don't have any machines that is working on. So if you could figure it out, that would be great.

 

Thanks,

 

Mammoth

 

for which machine would you like to know?

 

my acer atom a0a150? (intel GMA)

 

or my dv7 3180us machine (i7- nvidia 230m)?

[Mac Man 50]

Awesome! Thanks for posting about your success. I thought it would, but it's good to know for sure that the guide works for the DV7t series too.

 

Some of our next goals are to work on getting sound to work (without using VoodooHDA), more functionality through DSDT improvements, customized SMBIOS, and also getting even better video support via DSDT rather than just GraphicsEnabler. Everyone should post their wish list for fixes / support and I will add them to the main post.

 

I'm also going to be experimenting with a Dell WiFi card to see if we can get a wireless solution. I already know of a guy who has done this, so I know it works. I'm waiting for mine to arrive so I can begin testing.

 

Thanks again, and I'm happy it worked so well for you!

 

Mammoth

 

Mammoth:

 

Thanks for all the guides (very informative and descriptive). However, I do have some issues:

a. I followed your 1.10 of the guide religiously and I'm stuck on the page 8 on the Part 3 of the guide. I followed, double checked line by line in installing Chameleon onto the Chameleon partition and after restart (removing the Mammoth 1.10 boot cd), I'm seeing a blinking cursor and nothing is happening. Then, what I did is to boot thru the CD again and then SL was able to boot from the HDD. I quickly checked up what's in the Chameleon partition on the HDD and found that it is just having a folder named "Extra". Inside "Extra",  there are lot of files which I presume are Chameleon boot files. Do I have to move these files to the root of the Chameleon partition deleting the "Extra" folder? This step is not found in your guide or I'm missing something.

 

b. Fan seems to be always running. I turned off "Fan always on" in the BIOS (F.24) and I don't think it has any effect. I'm not running anything.

 

c. It seems to be slightly high on the warm side.

 

d. How long does the battery last on a full charge?

 

e. Not that bright. I know you're working on enabling the Fn keys which will enable brightness. Btw, I changed the color profile to go with "Generic RGB" and removed the pinkish look. Can I also run the Calibration tool to see if I can do something there with colors? The reason why I'm saying is the other day I checked up the new MacBook Pro and it looks gorgeous. The display is very bright and rich in colors. Wonder, if we can achieve the same thing on our dv8t by doing color calibration built into SL or get a third party tool to do it for us.

 

f. While I'm writing this, I was still thinking of getting the dv7t-3180us which has LED display.

 

g. Any news on the true vanilla kernel w/ 64 bit?

 

 

Thanks for all your hard work.

 

 

 

for which machine would you like to know?

 

my acer atom a0a150? (intel GMA)

 

or my dv7 3180us machine (i7- nvidia 230m)?

 

hi Kellis,

 

I definitely believe that mammoth would love to

hear from you abt the dv7t-3180us. Btw, how is the

display on your dv7t-3180 as it comes with LED display?

Is it looking gorgeous? Mammoth and I have the LCD

on the dv8t and not LED.

 

Please reply.

[kellis]

Mammoth:

 

Thanks for all the guides (very informative and descriptive). However, I do have some issues:

a. I followed your 1.10 of the guide religiously and I'm stuck on the page 8 on the Part 3 of the guide. I followed, double checked line by line in installing Chameleon onto the Chameleon partition and after restart (removing the Mammoth 1.10 boot cd), I'm seeing a blinking cursor and nothing is happening. Then, what I did is to boot thru the CD again and then SL was able to boot from the HDD. I quickly checked up what's in the Chameleon partition on the HDD and found that it is just having a folder named "Extra". Inside "Extra", there are lot of files which I presume are Chameleon boot files. Do I have to move these files to the root of the Chameleon partition deleting the "Extra" folder? This step is not found in your guide or I'm missing something.

 

b. Fan seems to be always running. I turned off "Fan always on" in the BIOS (F.24) and I don't think it has any effect. I'm not running anything.

 

c. It seems to be slightly high on the warm side.

 

d. How long does the battery last on a full charge?

 

e. Not that bright. I know you're working on enabling the Fn keys which will enable brightness. Btw, I changed the color profile to go with "Generic RGB" and removed the pinkish look. Can I also run the Calibration tool to see if I can do something there with colors? The reason why I'm saying is the other day I checked up the new MacBook Pro and it looks gorgeous. The display is very bright and rich in colors. Wonder, if we can achieve the same thing on our dv8t by doing color calibration built into SL or get a third party tool to do it for us.

 

f. While I'm writing this, I was still thinking of getting the dv7t-3180us which has LED display.

 

g. Any news on the true vanilla kernel w/ 64 bit?

 

 

Thanks for all your hard work.

 

 

 

 

 

hi Kellis,

 

I definitely believe that mammoth would love to

hear from you abt the dv7t-3180us. Btw, how is the

display on your dv7t-3180 as it comes with LED display?

Is it looking gorgeous? Mammoth and I have the LCD

on the dv8t and not LED.

 

Please reply.

 

 

I have to say that the screen is just awesome. it is bright. Accurate, and the resolution is just perfect. 1600x900.

 

Here's where i am with the dv7-3180us

 

What works:

 

8 cores.

 

memory

 

power/battery/sleep (even with LID)

 

nvidia accelerated. (resolution switching etc)

 

audio (even internal mic) (although i THINK only the right speaker)

 

all USB

 

sim card reader

 

trackpad/keyboard

 

ethernet card (eth0)

 

internal camera (HP)

 

geekbench around 4750.

 

==

 

All this is without any DSDT.

 

but i am trying to edit my own to fix:

 

the display brightness

 

and function keys (like FN keys)

 

As far as the NVIDIA, i didnt have to do {censored} really, i just used the graphicsenabler=yes and the nvenabler kext, although i think i removed it. I will check later to really see what i have.

 

i plan to do a write up, and i even started a new thread in this forum about the installation and tweaks.

here's the new thread:

http://www.insanelymac.com/forum/index.php...p;#entry1501651