Yet another idea.

[pflatline]

Since I dont have a mactel machine,all I can do is throw in my 2 cents. Im just brainstorming here,but I will throw these out in the hope that someone may find them usefull.

 

1) Use a derivative of elilo to start a program that loads up a bios emulation layer (perhaps with code ripped from something like bochs). From there you should be able to start the NT boot loader on the install CD.

 

2) Make a OSX program,in the vein of the old DOS bootloader for linux. It would load up a boot environment and start the NT install.

 

3) Take a core duo laptop with similar hardware,suspend it to disk. Take that suspend file and write a program that can flush out OSX,and restore the suspend file to memory.If you have your partitions setup right,it might just work. (But would probobally just hang the machine,but no idea gets thrown out in brainstorming)

 

4) If the intel imac uses a PLCC firmware hub,AND if its socketed,you might be able to use a BIOS-Savior on it. I agree that firmware is VERY hardware sensitive however,it known that many motherboards CAN use firmware from other brands of similar motherboards. Sometimes it fails and sometimes it doesnt,thats what the bios savior is for. It all depends on how much the engineers changed the configuration from the intel reference design. If the aforementioned requirements are true,then trying a few dozen manufacturers firmwares would certainly be worth a try. The long and the short of it is,EFI is NOT bios. BIOS is very very sensitive to hardware configuration. EFI may be even more sensitive,or it may be much less sensitive. We just dont know.

 

5) Use the vista bootloader. It must know how to talk to efi. I am curious if EFI knows how to read the NT boot CD however. It might only have drivers for Mac partitions.

 

 

To all who are trying to solve this problem,good luck!

[R. Bear Helms]

Apple gave up socketing post Apple ][, I'm pretty sure of that. Surface mount for everything possible, including even if special order is needed. E.g., I have every confidence even the Core Duo is mounted to the motherboard and has no CPU socket.

 

The "bless" command can build an EFI for you, so honestly all someone needs to do is examine Darwin 8.01 open source code for it and figure how to make a bless that is, shall we say, more pious?

[Spanky Deluxe]

Apple gave up socketing post Apple ][, I'm pretty sure of that. Surface mount for everything possible, including even if special order is needed. E.g., I have every confidence even the Core Duo is mounted to the motherboard and has no CPU socket.

 

The "bless" command can build an EFI for you, so honestly all someone needs to do is examine Darwin 8.01 open source code for it and figure how to make a bless that is, shall we say, more pious?

 

Nope, the Core Duo in the new iMacs is in fact socketed. Some guy in Japan (I think) even got a 2.0Ghz chip and put it into his 17" model for a test and it worked.

 

CPU pictures are available here: http://www.kodawarisan.com/k2006/archives/...core_duo_a.html

 

Story on switching processors: http://www.macrumors.com/pages/2006/01/20060131134225.shtml

[Swad]

I've talked with a few people who are trying #1. I'll let you know how far they get.

[mk14]

I've talked with a few people who are trying #1. I'll let you know how far they get.

I guess that would be basically like re-implementing a CSM, just that it's not at the EFI level (like proposed by other people before), but at the bootloader level. Interesting approach.