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[Guide] Dell XPS 15 L502X (Early 2011) Snow Leopard Install (possibly L702x too)

wen1

By wen1,
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DoiX
DoiX
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I had the old intel pci card installed in the secondary slot, down side on that is that bluetooth is always active so battery life gets reduced a bit.

 

As for the screen, the general UI of apple is grey so that might give you the impression of washed colors, of course you can always try to create a color profile that suits you (System Prefs > Display > Color tab > Calibrate or just choose one from the list) Another or you could google and see if someone posted their color profile calibration.

 

I never had the full brightness bug, my screen has the brightness level that i set, after each reset or wake... People reported that their screens were brighter after their systems woke up from sleep. You could try this i guess (after you get sleep working)

 

A06 Bios is the only one that provides working sleep. You can find it on the Dell website. Must be installer via Windows.

 

"home and end keys are not working correcly" I believe this is the first time anyone reported this, or maybe i'm not getting what you mean by "current line"? On my system, Home/End smoothly scrolls to the page header or footer.

 

 

The guide is updated when there are things to add, there is no reference to the installer bug because i usually roll out versions in short intervals and they don't affect people.

 

 

"another problem: on youtube, with chrome, I get audio from videos about 1 time every 5. any advice?" What CPU do you have, what bootloader are you using. What Audio Kexts?

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reiser44
reiser44
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I had the old intel pci card installed in the secondary slot, down side on that is that bluetooth is always active so battery life gets reduced a bit.

 

As for the screen, the general UI of apple is grey so that might give you the impression of washed colors, of course you can always try to create a color profile that suits you (System Prefs > Display > Color tab > Calibrate or just choose one from the list) Another or you could google and see if someone posted their color profile calibration.

 

I never had the full brightness bug, my screen has the brightness level that i set, after each reset or wake... People reported that their screens were brighter after their systems woke up from sleep. You could try this i guess (after you get sleep working)

 

A06 Bios is the only one that provides working sleep. You can find it on the Dell website. Must be installer via Windows.

 

"home and end keys are not working correcly" I believe this is the first time anyone reported this, or maybe i'm not getting what you mean by "current line"? On my system, Home/End smoothly scrolls to the page header or footer.

 

 

The guide is updated when there are things to add, there is no reference to the installer bug because i usually roll out versions in short intervals and they don't affect people.

 

 

"another problem: on youtube, with chrome, I get audio from videos about 1 time every 5. any advice?" What CPU do you have, what bootloader are you using. What Audio Kexts?

 

 

hello, thanks for your answer;

 

what antenna configuration do you use? each card gets one antenna?

 

I have a full size atheros so I can keep intel in primary slot (I don't have wwan or dvb card so full-height slot was free).

 

I get less brightness than in windows, I realized that today in a sunny place where I could use windows without issues and with osx I have to keep the screen in a vertical position (no big deal btw).

 

what's the faster way to get A06? installing a windows or maybe I can use a bootable linux distro or freedos?

 

You are right, home and end keys are working in osx way that is different than windows or linux way. so it is not a kext or keyboard issue, just I'm not used to it.

 

I have an l502x with i7 2630qm, 6gb ram, 60gb ssd, fullhd display. iatkos l1 chimera bootloader, kext is l702x from your installer. should I try applehda?

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DoiX
DoiX
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The bluetooth was working on a short range with no antenna because the cables were not long enough to reach it, as far as i remember.

 

The full/min brightness is set by kext, can't really modify it, except in DSDT i think (can't remember exactly if i saw the brtn function being used).

 

You can install it only on Windows, no other way.

 

The L702x and L502x Audio kexts are the same... i don't even know why i've made 2 different sections for them in the installer. Anyway, i guess you could try l502x and hope a miracle occurs. If you still have audio problems then i suggest you try VoodooHDA 2.7.4 ( http://www.osx86.net..._installer.html ) just follow the instructions from there and skip the "if VoodooHDA doesn't work" part.

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adeebm
adeebm
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another problem: on youtube, with chrome, I get audio from videos about 1 time every 5. any advice?

 

I had this problem too, and it has to do with flash player not being able to distinguish the default audio device sometimes. Go to System Prefs->Sound Then on the Sound Effects tab, find the "play sound effects through" dropdown and select the proper audio device. It was "internal speakers" for me. Then go to the output tab and make sure the same device is selected. This solved the problem for me.

 

Also, on my system, it showed internal speakers and headphones as separate devices. Make sure you select internal speakers. That device also alternates as headphones in the first headphone jack.

 

--Adeeb

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darren cox
darren cox
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I had an issue with my mountain lion install, was going to wait for release and try again but as its the same as GM I can stick with my (mostly) working install.

Everything seems OK, except for two things:

1) On waking from sleep the keyboard / mouse stop working - I'm sure this is a common thing, never happened on Lion and didn't happen on ML at first - any ideas what I might have changed?

2) Sometimes after restart I cannot boot, just get the folder icon on the grey screen. If i reboot with -f -x it usually will boot, then i repair permissions and rebuild kextcache and all is good, however i boot with UseKernelCache=No so didn't think it was used?

 

Annoying issues, and I actually went back to windows 7 (well OK more for WOW and Diablo to use the nvidia lol) but i just hate windows!

 

@DoiX - haven't checked the other sites but is there any hope for the nvidia on the horizon?

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iMac2009
iMac2009
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I never had the full brightness bug, my screen has the brightness level that i set, after each reset or wake... People reported that their screens were brighter after their systems woke up from sleep. You could try this i guess (after you get sleep working)

 

I get the brightness bug every time.

But i figured out that Sleepmode is not needed. (Since I do not use A06)

 

With the "Magic Corner" function (dont know if it's the correct term in english version of OS X) I disable my display once and bring it back up.

Getting full brightness after that, in 2 seconds.

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DoiX
DoiX
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@Darren,

 

1. better delete the whole content of the Caches folder. I've noticed ML generates some sort of static cache even if you've rebuild it.

 

Do you use Voodoo or ApplePS2?

 

2. hmm, could be a bootloader problem. I'm not sure. Or maybe some old kext bugs it.

 

No nvidia, since i installed ML most tools are incompatible, i'm waiting for the proper updates. I can't even build packages...

 

Speaking of games on windows, i've decided to play Alan Wake (first game ever installed on Windows) with high settings the CPU heats up to 85ºC while the GPU is at a cool 65C... is that normal or my windows is bugged and it's using the IGPU instead of the Nvidia one? (The settings report that it's using the Nvidia tho...)

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adeebm
adeebm
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Speaking of games on windows, i've decided to play Alan Wake (first game ever installed on Windows) with high settings the CPU heats up to 85ºC while the GPU is at a cool 65C... is that normal or my windows is bugged and it's using the IGPU instead of the Nvidia one? (The settings report that it's using the Nvidia tho...)

That sounds like it's using the HD3000. If you have the latest nvidia drivers, go to the nvidia control panel, and under program settings or something there will be a list of applications. Find or add your game and verify that it is selected to use the nvidia card.

 

--Adeeb

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adeebm
adeebm
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I've done that, i set it to Alan Wake - Nvidia. I guess i'll reinstall windows and see then.

 

Btw, here's the script made by BCC9 to fix the UseKernelCache=Yes bug on ML.

 

http://www.insanelym...dpost&p=1834431

Before you blow away your system, check this link: http://forums.laptopvideo2go.com/topic/26992-optimus-test-tools-finally-in-users-hands/

The tool will tell you if the discrete is enabled and what executables it is powering. Then you'll know for sure whether the game is running on the igp or not. It may be that the game is just cpu intensive. Also, I would go to geforce.com and download the latest beta drivers. They are pretty stable and are updated more often than the WHQL ones.

 

--Adeeb

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DoiX
DoiX
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@ahmed, there's a draft one posted around here, it's by batisk8 i think... i'll write one in the original tutorial post when i have time, this week.

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pcwiz13
pcwiz13
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I got the "official" release of ML up and running yesterday and thought I would share my experience/technique for doing so. I'm not promising this will work for anyone else, its just how I went about getting it running.

 

My setup:

I have 2 hard drives in my L502x a SSD that currently is my stable working Lion install, and the original hard drive in a caddy replacing the CD drive with 2 partitions on it, one windows, and one a "test" partition for osx.

 

I installed ML on the "test" partition of my second hard drive.

 

This is the procedure i used to get it up and running. Once I get it 100% I will copy it over to my SSD to become my primary OS.

 

I followed these instructions for downloading/creating a bootable install USB for Mountain Lion:

 

I Paraphrased the relevant information form this tread:

http://www.insanelym...howtopic=280756

**Denotes items I added/modified

 

Software

-The Chameleon boot loader, the latest version of which can always be found here (You want "The Latest Trunk PKG ~ Standard and Official Revision"):

http://www.insanelym...howtopic=231075

 

**DoiX's Lx02XLion_V1.2

http://www.insanelym...2

 

Kexts

1. FakeSMC – absolutely essential – tricks OS X into thinking it’s a real Mac (Use the "Snow" one)

http://www.osx86.net...?do=file&id=161

2. NullCPUPowerManagement – generally required initially to prevent kernel panics, may not be needed once AppleIntelCPUPowerManagement is patched after install.

http://www.osx86.net...p?do=file&id=16

 

**3. Mountain Lion MBR Patch

http://www.osx86.net..._mbr_patch.html

 

Creating USB Installer

A. Preparing the USB

1. In your working OS X install open Disk Utility

2. Click on your USB drive in the left sidebar

3. Click the “Partition” tab

4. Under “Partition Layout” click “1 Partition”

5. Click Options -> select “Master Boot Record”; check the format is set to “Mac OS X Extended (Journeled)”; name it “USB”

6. Click Apply

 

B. Creating the OS X installer on the USB drive

1. Show hidden files in finder by opening Terminal (in utilities) and typing (copy / pasting) the following:

defaults write com.apple.finder AppleShowAllFiles YES

then

killall Finder

2. Mount your Mountain Lion DMG. If using a copy downloaded from the app store: Navigate to Applications (which is where it will save your downloaded copy of ML by default) -> right click "Install OS X Mountain Lion" and click "Show Package Contents" -> Contents -> SharedSupport -> Double click "InstallESD.dmg"

3. Mount BaseSystem.dmg by typing the following in terminal:

open /Volumes/Mac\ OS\ X\ Install\ ESD/BaseSystem.dmg

4. Go back to disk utility and click on “Mac OS X Base System”, click the “Restore” tab then drag and drop your USB to “destination” and click restore then erase. This will take a while.

5. You’ll now have 2 “Mac OS X Base System”s present in Finder, right click them and “get info” to determine which is your USB drive (hint: look at the size).

6. Navigate to the one which is your USB drive, open it and go to /System/Installation. Delete the “Packages” link then create a folder called “Packages”.

7. Open a new Finder window and navigate to “Mac OS X Install ESD”. Copy everything inside the packages folder to the packages folder you have just created. This will take a while.

8. Copy mach_kernel from “Mac OS X Install ESD” to the root of your USB drive.

 

C. Patching the installer for a PC

1. Remember the two kexts we downloaded above? Copy "FakeSMC" and "NullCPUPowerManagment" to /System/Library/Extensions on your USB stick.

1.A. Install MBR Patch- Copy "OSInstall.mpkg" to /System/Installation/Package/OSInstall.mpkg

1.A. Install MBR Patch- Copy "OSInstall" to /System/Library/PrivateFrameworks/Install.framework/Frameworks/OSInstall.framework/Versions/A/OSInstall

2. Run the chameleon installation package and ensure to choose your USB drive as the destination.

3. Run Doix's Installer and ONLY install the keyboard trackpad kext's to the USB drive.

 

Installing OS

This is where I just ran with it and it worked out.

 

1.Booted to USB drive, installed Mountain Lion to the partition I wanted.

2.Booted back into my working Lion install.

2A. Used KextWizard to install the "FakeSMC" and "NullCpuPowerManagement" kexts onto the mountain lion once again.

2B. Ran the chameleon installer on the mountain lion install.

3. Reboot onto the Mountain Install using -v (for some reason I have to use -v to boot, I understand this basically just makes it show the command lines, but for some reason it works, I saw the work around for this posted by DoiX earlier, I have yet to try it.)

4. Everything worked fine except sound, battery indicator, and speed stepping. I used the battery and audio kext from DoiX and everything works great.

 

Next to get sleep/speedstep enabled (I asssume its the same process as it was in Lion, I just have yet to mess with it for fear of crashing my new working install.)

 

So have I missed anything? On another note, I have ZERO artifacts/freezes in my video anymore, that alone makes ML worth the upgrade to me.

 

 

**UPDATE 1: after a short while my graphics artifacts began to come back exactly like they did in 10.7.4, The last kext i had installed was the battery kext. Once i removed it, the graphics problems have gone away. I don't see how there is any connection between the two, but for reason thats whats happening. I was using a kext in a package called "battery fix - Lion". I'll look into the issue later.

 

has anyone heard of a connection between battery kext and graphics issues?

Edited by pcwiz13
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DoiX
DoiX
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@pcwiz, i believe i explained here (or in another thread) that beside the usual memory leaks/over heating, those screen glitches appear when OS X doesn't like something you installed. Be it a battery kext, or a sound kext. Personally, voodoo keyboard kext unleashes hell on my screen.

 

ML Seems to be picky on this subject, more than Lion. Reverting back to Lion Graphics kexts won't work because the whole graphic frameworks got updated.

 

Another thing that increases the glitches: if i reset my system a couple times in a row, or if i improperly shut it down, at the next boot, or two, i will have loads of screen glitches.

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DoiX
DoiX
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Scrappy, i've answered this god damned question one too many times. Use the search function.

 

About ML install tutorial. I'm working on a little script to create the proper ML restore image (like pcwiz wrote in his tut, except it's for lazy people - like myself.)

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