I DID IT!! Hackintosh w/ Asus P6T & Intel Core i7 920 !!

After 3 days of trial and error, I finally did it! I managed to create my very first hackintosh.









This was the most agonizing 3 days of frustration that I have had, but the final result is something I am very much in love with. A fully functioning Hackintosh system Dual Booted with Windows 7 (sigh, Star Trek Online is coming out soon after all) and at about a third of the cost of an comparable Apple system. I ranked at about 9367 using GeekBench, and I haven't even overclocked yet.

If you are thinking of attempting this yourself, know this:

1) It is an extremely frustrating and sometimes hopeless experience. It took me 3 days, so don't give up. Google sometimes will fail you. Use the search feature on Insanelymac's forums. Sometimes insanelymac will fail you. Use google.

2) Though frustrating, it is extremely rewarding. I love my new Hackintosh.

3) MAKE SURE YOU HAVE AN NVIDIA CHIPSET VIDEO CARD. Some ATI cards are supported (see netkas's site), but you will be much happier using an nvidia chipset. I basically didn't have to do anything special except use the boot loader provided in the P6TEssentials file and I was up and running on my GTX 275.

4) WHEN YOU GET IT WORKING, FOR GODS SAKE USE TIME MACHINE TO BACK IT UP. Buy an extra USB drive (bigger, 100gb or so) so that when you get it working, you can always restore to that point. Make sure you have a backup before updating to 10.6.2, because you can always boot from your USB 8G stick, go into the installer, go up to utilities, and restore from time machine backup.

5) If you want to be safe and not have to worry about time machine, you can make a copy of your Extensions.mkext file in your /Extra folder before messing with your kexts. Make a copy, name it Extensions.mkexts.WORKS or something. That way if anything goes wrong, you can boot the USB stick, go into a terminal, and go to /Volumes/(your Snow Leopard HD)/Extra and restore your Extensions.mkext.WORKS to Extensions.mkext and reboot.

6) Don't use the EFI option with 3_Macloader script. I dunno, I just launched the 3_Macloader script and said NO to the EFI, and put the boot loader on the main mac drive. That way you can just unplug the mac HD, plug in an empty one to SATA 0, install windows, then put the mac drive back on SATA 0 and the windows drive on SATA 1,2,3,4, or 5. Boot to Sata 0 and the chameleon boot loader for the mac drive will automagically see the windows 7 partition and allow you to boot to it.

My first attempt with Leopard was a dismal failure, but with Snow Leopard and a thumb drive it was much easier. The hardest part was learning how kexts work with Chameleon. Once I figured out how to load them up it became much easier. The best advice I can give is to find a good tutorial on kexts or a good script that loads them for you. I found a pre-made script and analyzed it to figure out what the hell it was doing. Finding out which kexts to use for my hardware. Luckily, I found this guide by Trick77 which contained some very important information, including a comment by a reader which contained the scripts, kexts, and information that I needed:

http://www.trick77.com/2009/10/12/asus-p6t-64-bit-osx86/

If you look at eric r's post, he says use this guide:

http://www.insanelymac.com/forum/index.php?showtopic=189052

But with these files instead:

http://www.mediafire.com/?zzyzmjxm0xy

(PS, if the above link is dead I am also hosting this file here):

P6T Essentials File

This was a huge help, and eric R was spot-on and I love him/her/it dearly. This post is what finally got me working.

I am running the following hardware:

Motherboard: Asus P6T

NOTE: When I was reading the forums on insanelymac, etc, people were referencing P6T Deluxe, Extreme, etc. I have no idea if mine is one of these since it just says P6T on the box. But I know that there were a few P6T variation guides on insanelymac that were just NOT working for me. My motherboard has "Xtreme Phase" on the box as one of the features, but the box label and the manual itself just say P6T Motherboard... and my receipt just says Asus P6T, so I'm betting it's the standard version.

Processor: Intel Core i7 920 2.67 Ghz Processor
Memory: Kingston 6GB Set (2GB Each)
Storage: 2x750gb Western Digital drives
Video: BFG GTX 975 w/ 892mb Video RAM
Case: Asus 900

Monitor: Two 24inch LG's connected via VGA cable, but with two VGA-DVI converters when the cables get to the video card

Soooooooooooooo, off the top of my head, all I did was use an existing Macbook Pro to make a copy of Snow Leopard Install DVD (yes I bought it) onto an external USB stick using disk utility.

A few caveats:

The scripts provided in the 2nd link use the "3_Macloader" script (which is slightly different from the guide) to compile all kexts in the KEXTs directory and put the compiled Extensions.mkext into the Extra folder on your Snow Leopard partition. I found a lot of the guides referenced an /Extra/Extensions folder, which really you don't need, since this script pulls from the kexts in the KEXTs folder. When you unpack the files, you'll see what I mean. Take a look at Scriptfiles\snowleoinstaller.sh, and you will see how it compiles the kexts, sets the permissions, and then moves the Extensions.mkext into the /Extra folder.

My SATA LG DVD drive would not properly play DVD's at first. They would skip around and act choppy. My solution was to put it on the JMicron SATA controller instead of the regular sata controller.

Be careful updating to 10.6.2. The instructions say to make sure that you have SleepEnabler.kext installed BEFORE you update, and then make sure AFTER you update that you put the new 10.6.2 version of SleepEnabler on your system. I found that the best way was to not have SleepEnabler.kext at ALL, and then after you get your system booted with 10.6.2, install the NEWEST sleep enabler.

Also, after 10.6.2, audio doesn't work. You have to use a special AppleHDA.kext (i think I finally found it on the insanelymac forums... search!) and the newest fakesmc.kext (2.5 is what I used)

10.6.2 Info:

Here is a link to my KEXTs, which are what i'm now using on Snow Leopard 10.6.2 with working Sound, DVD, accelerated graphics, etc: My Kexts Click Here

Here is a link to MY KextScripts.zip file which is basically the P6TEssentials package with the kext's and scripts for 10.6.2. Just run 3_Macloader and it should install the right KEXTs. Please note, this has been modified a little and the KEXTs in the KEXT folder are for 10.6.2 and really just a reference for me. If you can get the P6TEssentials.zip file instead, that would be better for you (unless you are on 10.6.2 already and looking for how I got my audio working):

MY KEXTs & SCRIPTS for 10.6.2

Here is a list of the KEXTs I am now using in my final 10.6.2 System:

AppleHDA (modified version which enabled HD sound on Asus P6T)
fakesmc.kext (v2.5)
IOAHCIBlockStorageInjector.kext
IONetworkingFamily.kext
JMicronATA.kext
NullCPUPowerManagement.kext
OpenHaltRestart.kext
PlatformUUID.kext
RealtekR1000.kext
SleepEnabler.kext
UUID.kext


Extra Tips:

1) You can use Aqua Mac's "About this Mac" package to display the right processor information in About->About this Mac. Mine showed up at 2.7 Ghz Unknown until I ran his package. Now it always reflects the right speed. Make sure you have his latest one on the insanelyMac forums, because the earlier versions did not properly display overclocked speeds.

2) Download iStat Menus (google it) for a nice temperature readout of all your cores, CPU Core utilization, disk usage, etc. It makes it easier to keep tabs on your extremely awesome system. If you look at my screenshots, you can see it running in the upper-right corner of the finder bar.

3) Even though it doesn't look like you can type anything at the chameleon boot loader, if you start typing -v at the boot loader screen, it will allow you to type in kernel options. It took me a while to realize this.



TO RECAP:

Step 1) Use this guide:

http://www.insanelymac.com/forum/index.php?showtopic=189052

But with these P6T Essential files instead:

http://www.mediafire.com/?zzyzmjxm0xy

(PS, if the above link is dead I am also hosting this file here):

P6T Essentials File

This will get you to Snow Leopard 10.6.0. The only difference is that you use 3_Macloader instead of 3_Loader and the essential files I am providing you from Trick77's site.

Step 2) BEFORE YOU UPDATE, KNOW THAT IF YOU REBOOT AFTER THE UPDATE WITH THE SleepEnabler.kext that is provided in the KEXTs folder of the essentials file, you will KERNEL PANIC and have a problem!

Step 3) So, knowing that, do the 10.6.2 update:

Run the update (NOT FROM SOFTWARE UPDATE!!!) -- download it here:

here if your on 10.6.0
here if your on 10.6.1

DO NOT RESTART AFTER THE UPDATE!DO NOT RESTART AFTER THE UPDATE!DO NOT RESTART AFTER THE UPDATE!DO NOT RESTART AFTER THE UPDATE!DO NOT RESTART AFTER THE UPDATE! (get the point?)

Step 4) MAKE A COPY OF YOUR /Extra/Extensions.mkext file, so you can restore it if there is a problem!!!

Step 5) Replace your KEXTs in the KEXTs folder of P6TEssentials folder with these 10.6.2 kexts, specifically Sleepenabler.kext -- and re-run your 3_MacLoader. I would just get rid of all the KEXTs and replace them with these new ones:

MY KEXTs & SCRIPTS for 10.6.2

Step 6) Re-run 3_MacLoader (say NO to EFI). This will rebuild and replace your Extensions.mkext in /Extra

Reboot, light a candle, slay a chicken.