Installing Mavericks 10.9 on AMD with IDE Drives

[zeppfrog]

   Mavericks is old news, but I am an old dog. I like experimenting. After playing with my first mac Mavericks install, and updating, more or less successfully, to 10.9.5, I noted many things stopped working. Preview, Messages for instance. Well, I didn't really want to wipe out what I had going, and short on SATA drives, I needed to find a way to install onto an IDE (pata) drive to see what I could get going.

 

   So, I still had my vanilla "myHack" USB loaded up with Mavericks. I had already found the files IOATAFamily and AppleViaATA (AppleNForceATA was also there) that made ide drives visible on my current install. I added those files to the installer's S\L\E and gave it a try. I booted using -v npci=0x3000 (which was actually the wrong npci) and the installer booted, actually faster than previously. The install showed my drives, all of them. Mavericks does not natively see ide at all.

 

    I went through Disk Utility. set up my WD 80gig drive for GUID, and the regular MacOS EXTENDED Journaled. exited Disk Utility. At this point, prior to my little file additions, The installer would sometimes lock up here. No problems. Went back to selection, chose my IDE WD drive and moved on with install.

 

   As always, the install took quite some time. at the end, myHack offers to remove some files. I go with that. It also offers a choice of Generic or Use my own "EXTRA". I had my own ready. Then, myHack runs myFix. and for the first time, successfully. In the past, I would end installs with either a freeze or reboot. Several minutes later I get the message, Install Successful. 

 

    Now you aren't finished. I tested the restart, and to no surprise, it didn't load initially. 

    Next step is to open my new install from another working install. My case, I used my Snow Leo. reinstall my kernel choice. mine is named McKay_kernel. I don't remember where I got it, but it was the first one to actually load on my ASRockAlive sata2-glan / AMD 64 X2 4600+ Machine. Then look into your install S\L\E. Missing the new ata files I mentioned above. So I copied all those back in. Used Kext Wizard to repair permissions\ rebuild caches. Also, Used Chameleon Wizard to set up my org.chameleon.boot.plist and smbios.plist . smbios I kept simple. chose a preconfigured mac pro 6,1 (you can choose whatever you care to, 4,1 and 5,1 will probably be good choices)  

 

    The boot flags are the most important. in my case I used the following for initial success. -v -f cpus=1 busratio=12 npci=0x2000 PCIRootUID=1 Graphics Mode=1024x768x32 GraphicsEnabler=Yes . I will fine tune these later, removing any unneeded flags. The file should end up containing something like this

        <key>Graphics Mode</key>
	<string>1024x768x32</string>
	<key>GraphicsEnabler</key>
	<string>Yes</string>
	<key>Kernel</key>
	<string>mach_kernel</string>
	<key>Kernel Flags</key>
	<string>cpus=1 busratio=12 npci=0x2000 PCIRootUID=1 -f</string>
	<key>Timeout</key>
	<string>8</string>
	<key>UseKernelCache</key>
	<string>Yes</string>

Finally, I give everything the once over and reboot back to my Mavericks IDE install.

 

 and then I watch my dual monitors come to grey, then load the User Setup dialogues. These are all the basics. nothing really new. The cloud wouldn't set up, but that's not  a problem. I set that up via safari later. (not from preferences as the error message suggests)

 

   I am also using an nVidia GeForce GT 610 1gb. I didn't have any huge problems until attempting to load Multi-critter (you know what I am talking about) and then got a nice Kernel Panic from the desktop. I was after the voodoo drivers for my sound. So, next to update nvidia drivers and get the voodoo drivers elsewhere. I will further test to see if that particular app is the cause or it is a glitch in the geforce drivers.

 

 

pretty basic walk through, but if you have an older board like myself, this will give you access to your ide pata drives. Also, your old dvd burners, cdroms. But most of all, the HDD and installing on pata drives. PLUS, I think it actually made the installer work better being able to recognize my ATA ide bus. The files I used were found searching on Youtube. There is also a tutorial there somewhere, which I gathered the info to do this. My next test....

 

    will this work for Yosemite\ El Capitan....  have fun guys n gals.

 

keep experimenting and learning and thanks to all of you for sharing yours

 

 

[ Already tested the ata files in 10.9.5 successfully ]

[zeppfrog]

   After playing with things for awhile, everything seemed to stabilize pretty  nicely. I found and installed VooDooHDA V2.8.4 and set it up for my line out, then went to Sound and set that for line out and my noises are all here. 

 

   I did look farther and find that the ATA files were in fact inside of myHack.kext, so there may have been no need to re install those. 

 

   I do get some funny pinkish icon colors in things like LaunchPad, which really kind of has a cool look, and I don't use it anyways. None of this relates to the ata , but worth a mention, I suppose. May relook at my kernel.

 

   One thing I have run into, previously I pasted my working kernel into my USB installer, it never seems to load up correctly when I install. I always have to reinstall it afterwards. Maybe I need to address it's permissions on the USB drive, or the Installer is overwriting it from somewhere else.

 

    I also get an occasional kernel panic from the Realtek RTL8111 when booting. It is actually doing its job well enough. I used Mieze's version. It may be conflicting with my need for npci=0x2000 boot flag. But I need that to boot, so, will take the occasional restart.

 

   Finally, something I noticed was if I used PCIRootUID=1, it switches my main monitor. To be honest, I don't know the actual purpose of this flag, but I like the monitor choice. 

 

   Well, all looks good so far. My X.9.5 was getting random freezes and crashes over the last couple days, and without Preview and Messages, somewhat neutered. Might be time to erase it and try for Yosemite. By the time I get to el Capitan, You real os x'ers will have it all worked out for my old AMD.