I’ve been intrigued by Snow Leopard (OSX 10.6) ever since it came out. Sure, many people hail it as the king of bugfixes (just like what Windows 7 is to Vista), but it does sport some pretty nifty features beneath that facade which are unseen.
Anyhow, in keeping with the times, we needed a new Mac-based machine in the office and I decided to get grimy and build one with Snow Leopard AND Windows. Yup, dual-booting it’s called. Over the weekend, I encountered numerous grey screens of death, hung computers and problems of every kind – I just could not believe how others said this motherboard was the easiest to install on. After awhile, I decided to return it to the store and get another unit, JUST IN CASE the motherboard had problems (which HARDLY ever happens, right?). Whaddya know… the install was flawless after I swapped it!
I haven’t got oodles of tips and tricks to share, but here are some of the things I did to get it going.
- If you haven’t heard of the all-time-awesome-kickass-Lifehacker-Snow-Leopard-install, then you simply must. It’s a prerequisite to building a hackintosh. Read here.
- Do as Lifehacker tells you – go prepare your thumbdrive with the install files, then come back here.
- Also, go procure your hardware – for BEST-est results, do get the Gigabyte EP45-UD3L, EP45-UD3R or EP45-UD3P motherboards. They allow you to pretty much get the retail Snow Leopard working out of the box. Any current NVIDIA graphics card will do. I got the 9400GT which has HDMI, DVI and VGA ports. As for the processor, any Core2Duo/Core2Quad ones are fine. I used a Q9400 Intel Quad Core CPU.
- Set your BIOS settings – this is important for the system to run optimally. The only settings you really need to modify are in “Integrated Peripherals” – set the ICH SATA Control Mode to AHCI [default is IDE] and Onboard SATA/IDE Ctrl Mode to AHCI [default is IDE].
- Now, proceed to boot with the thumbdrive – you have to configure your BIOS boot options to select the thumbdrive.
- Everything else is pretty dead easy (from going to Tools-Disk Utility and partitioning the hard drive), to installing the OS.
- Complete the installation process and when the machine reboots, let the thumbdrive boot again. On the OS selection screen, select the internal hard drive you installed it to. (The reason you do this is because the bootloader isn’t installed on the internal drive yet – don’t worry if you don’t understand this gibberish!).
- Now, download the file mentioned in Lifehacker (EP45UD3P Snow Leopard.pkg zip) and run it, but install it on the internal drive.
- That’s it really! If you’d like to run Software Update to upgrade to 10.6.1, you may do so (that’s the latest version as of today) – nothing adverse will happen.
If you’d like to dual boot between the Mac OS and Windows, here’s a spanner that gets thrown in.
- After booting into the installation (Step 5 above), go to Tools-Disk Utility and create 2 partitions. (Practical tip: make them slightly different sizes so you can identify them easily later in your Windows install). On one partition, set it to Mac OS Extended (Journaled) and on the second, set it to FAT32. Do click on Options and set the Partition Map scheme to GUID.
- After the partitioning and formatting is done, close the window and return to the installer. You can resume with Step 7 above.
- After you’re done with the Mac OS installation, pop in your Windows DVD and change the boot sequence in BIOS. I’m using Vista (*puke*) as I’ve got a legit licence for it. Let the DVD boot up.
- Click on Repair your computer link, then click Next and select Command Prompt.
- At the black screen, type diskpart [enter].
- Then type select disk 0 [enter].
- Type list partition [enter].
- You will see a list of your partitions with numbers on the side. You need to select the one you intend to install Windows on.
- Type select partition xx [enter] (where xx is the number you identified in Step 8).
- Type active [enter].
- Return to the Windows installer and continue to install Windows on the designated partition.
- When you’re done, Windows will boot by default (hey, where’s my Mac installation?).
- Don’t worry, you just need to download a program called EasyBCD that will easily tweak the Windows boot manager. Download it here.
- Run it and go to Add/Remove Entries. Select the Mac tab.
- Select Generic x86 PC and give it a name you like – Mac OS works well. Click Save.
There you have it… A Mac and a PC cohabitating on the same hard drive. How sweet is that…? Here’s the bootloader screen that gives you the option to select your OS.
Here’s my setup before I put it into a “nicer” casing. 2 friends commented that a hackintosh is function without form – I totally agree, and think that Hackintoshes are like Frankenstein – an ugly brute with force. Macs are the princess with elegance but less power.
Now, write a comment and let me know if you’ve had success. Please don’t ask questions such as, “will this XYZ motherboard work?” – this short tutorial is solely for the EP45-UD3R and similar variants. If you want it to work, get this motherboard. I’ll try to put a video together when I work on the next installation of this setup, but it may take awhile…
Here lie my thoughts: that of an entrepreneur, media-junkie, gadget-junkie, photographer, videographer, once-PC-user-but-now-Mac-user and husband.
It can’t be that simple… I’m building one this week, and I will be following your tips. I’ve got an EX58-UD4P, which I hope works as well as yours did…
I wish you every success, Noah! Do update me on how it goes. It is pretty simple with the EP45-UD3R board.
I’ve got another 2 units to build, and I will TRY to get a video squeezed in.
I am having a bit of trouble selecting the drivers for my install, my Ethernet driver doesn’t show up,
should i use the AC97 Audio for my Soundmax Digital Audio?
and the NVinject 0.2.1 128MB for my GeForce 6600GT?
(all this is on my Asus A85 X motherboard with AMD)
Please help me I am a bit new to hackintosh =)
Sorry @Axoth, as mentioned, I can only answer questions related to the motherboard I used. I haven’t had experience with the Asus A85 X – go search online for help, someone else may have done it.
well, unfortunately, it didn’t work for me. I tried doing it on an external drive and it just froze my POST screen up when I had my drive connected via USB. Couldn’t get into my BIOS or anything :-/
hello once again,
I installed Windows 7 into a partition on my hard drive first then install iatkos v7 into the second partition, how would I achieve this?
I have also search online for the the AC97 sound driver but I ask you, is it compatible with my Soundmax digital audio card? No hope for online searching for me….
hey man, I stumbled on your site looking for the best way to dual boot, and your guide got me working 100% clear and concise instructions- thanks a lot! Dual boot OSX 10.6.2 and Windows 7 64!
I’ve read that the UD3L has no available patches for sound, since it has a different chipset. Did you have to use any patches at all or kexts when using the UD3R, it was as simple as setting bios options, and installing snow leopard, then when it rebooted everything worked?
I did not have to use any patches whatsoever with the UD3R. Everything from ethernet to sound to video just worked like a charm. If anyone is serious about building a hackintosh, I’d say go get the right hardware, you will save hours upon hours (and frustration) of time.
Thanks. Worked like a charm!
>K<
Thanks for the guide! I used the EP45-UD3R, Q9400, EVGA 9500GT, and everything worked great. The only issues I’m having is with Time Machine, it won’t start backing up no matter what. There is also something wrong with Bonjour I think. In iTunes, I can’t access any other iTunes libraries on my network, and I can’t connect my iPod touch with the remote app to iTunes because it doesn’t popup in the device list. If anyone has a solution to these problems, let me know!
Does this method only work for intel CPUs? Can anyone confirm that it does not work with AMD?
Thanks!
@Snake222 The CPU doesn’t matter as much as the motherboard does. You need to use the EP45-UD3R or EP45-UD3P with this guide, as they have the same chipsets, and only accept socket 775 Intel CPUs.
So no, AMD CPUs/motherboard will not work with this guide.
but the windows partition is not ntfs… can you do win7 on ntfs and osX on HFS+… that’s what im trying to do… and failing…
The Windows partition has to be NTFS in order for it to work. You can have HFS+ and NTFS cohabitating on the same physical drive.
Hey, I made a netbook hackintosh out of a lenovo s10, the motherboard I am unsure of but its an intel Atom processor, my question being, can this process work for my netbook or are the specs way too differnt?
@Dima This guide is for use with a desktop PC with the specs shown. There are many other guides available though to get OSX working on various netbooks. I suggest looking for one of those with your model.
This guide was simple and awesome! Everything works perfect, thanks a lot for posting this. Just one question, is there any way to drag and drop files between the 2 OS’s since when I’m using OS X I can see the Windows partition on my desktop, thanks for the help.
@JamieS Not really. It’s weird the way they see each other, I stopped messing with windows because one time it saw OS X as unpartitioned space and it deleted everything that was on my OS X partition. I would recommend using a flash drive or external hard drive if you wish to transfer files. You also stated that everything works perfect? Does Time Machine work for you?
@Alex
Yes, I was already running the hackintosh described in the lifehacker guide for about a month before stumbling onto this dual-boot guide so I backed everything up with time machine and formatted my drive into two partitions as described here.
@JamieS
Oh, so you’re using the UD3P?
I have the UD3R and I really want to use Time Machine but when I tell it to backup it just doesn’t start.
@TheBackpackr
Does Time Machine work with you on your setup?
Yup, everything works. And I’m using the UD3R as I need firewire.
Here’s a screenie of the issue I’m having http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Gt1pGWQ5bGw
Any help would be greatly appreciated.
@ Alex: I have the same exact problem Alex! I tried everything but it always schedule the backup for another time but never backs anything up. Please help.
just got a question I’ve hit a slight speed bump in the installation process it goes fine until the restart and I have to press the arrow key to bring up the menu it isnt responding so it goes straight back to the beginning of the install please help
Hello this is post regarding my shuttle XPC. I have followed some simple tutorials and everything almost immediately was up and running.
Recently I was inspired to try dual booting. as per your article. I disconnected the main hard drive in the Shuttle and introduced a smaller laptop hard drive to house Windows 7
I disconnected the SATA cable from the Mac hard drive and connected the laptop hard drive . I inserted the Windows 7 operating system and install it on my new hard drive. Windows 7 booted as it should. Then I ran “easy boot CD” on the Windows operating system which would allow Windows 7 to see the Mac operating system. I reconnected the Mac operating sata port 2.
Now when chameleon is about to boot I can interrupt the boot with the arrow keys which allows me to choose the Windows or Mac operating system. It appears both operating systems are running in my shuttle.
The problem is my external FireWire drive which I used for a Time Machine backup refuses to function. I noticed during the Mac boot up a FireWire GUID. error. I reloaded my extensions, Still no Time Machine.
Any Input would be appreciated.
rickgerhart@gmail.com
hi! i been trying to do all sorts but no luck still got stuck the apple logo(gray)…i’m using 9400GT asus GPU, ASUS p5QL pro, i will try to buy the UD3 later. but if you can help me with this one. pls do! i’ got the retail of both snow and 10.5 leo got the kalaway and efi still the same…they say it works well with P5 motherboard but i dont know whats wrong! pls help!
I just built with a GA-EP45-UD3P, Q8300, GeForce 7300 LE Graphics Card and Intel EtherExpress Pro/100+.
The procedure went flawlessly except OSX wouldn’t recognize the ethernet card, although it worked on a previous hackintosh. I enabled one of the motherboard LAN ports which OSX saw fine. It is dual booting with Windows 7.
Time Machine does not work.
Thanks for the procedure.
Found fix for Time Machine.
Was getting Unable to get UUID messages in log.
This link has code to be added to the NetworkInterfaces.plist
http://forum.netkas.org/index.php/topic,83.0.html
Just cut and paste the code into the plist. Had to give myself write permission to save.
I then rebooted (not sure if necessary) and Time Machine was happy to backup.
Not sure what Network Interfaces has to do with backing up, but it works.
@Dave
Thank you so much! The fix for Time Machine worked!!!
@Rondale
You need to enter the BIOS and under Integrated Peripherals, Enable USB Keyboard Support. Let it restart and you should be able to use your keyboard now.
Thanks alot alex everythings working as they should now
Ok, is anyone else getting stuck at the repair/install part of the dual booting into xp. i have a licensed copy of a dell install disk (the one that came with my 1525) and it keeps telling me that i can’t install on a gpt partition. Makes sense but what is everyone else doing to get around this? I’m about to reformat the os x installation and just do this what i understand is the easy way, install windows then os x.
Forgive me if I sound obtuse, but is this process feasible on a Dell Inspiron 1750, with the Intel(R) Core(TM)2 Duo CPU P7450 @ 2.13GHz, 4GB RAM, with an internal 500GB HDD, two external USB drives (1TB and 500GB), and an 8GB Express Card drive. I’m already running Windows 7 Home Premium 64-bit.
Can I follow this tutorial on this machine without having to re-install Windows?
@ Dave and Alex
I am still having the Time Machine problem even after editing the networkpreferences.plist. What am I doing wrong?
Hi I have done the whole lifehacker guide for bios setup did the thumb drive and used the EP45UD3P OSx86 v3 , but I still can not get the thumb drive to boot. am I missing something in the bios to get the thumb drive to boot? it just sits there PLZ HELP!!! I Have got a iDeneb disc to boot but I really want snow leopard.
Same problem here with Time Machine. Used “Text Wrangler” to edit my .plist. Rebooted but no luck. I’m using UD3P…Any other ideas??
@Chad
In BIOS under “Advanced BIOS Features”, “Hard Disk Boot Priority”, move your thumb drive to the number one spot. Use esc to return to main menu. Dont forget to save & quit.
Not sure if you did this or not…
May I know how to solve the problem about Kernel panic?? I can’t start my Snow Leopard and always need me to turn off my whole system when I am booting Snow Leopard. Have any way to solve this problem??
Just to let anyone know who is interested, it is safe to update to 10.6.3. I have updated and everything is still working.
Worked awesome, I followed your instructions on a toshiba satellite l355 and It worked great. Its pretty simple, and even simpler on intel based computers. Thank you for this awesome tutorial. Great work to the os x community =D
Beware!!!! Upgrading to 10.6.3. I lost my video on my plasma. It is hooked up via dvi-hdmi. My 19″computer monitor works…I will post when I figure it out.
I have been doing a project with a laptop I own and was trying to dual boot Vista and OSX. I tried SO MANY other tools and configurations but YOURS was the one that finally enabled it all to come together. Thanks a million!!
Pingback: p5gc-mx/1333 successful os x install - Hackint0sh
Wow, thank you soooooo much!!!
I could not figure out how to install windows on guid partition. Thank you!!!!
Will this work with XP too?
Like 3 or 4 weeks ago I managed to get my Asus P5K-E Wifi/AP Hackintosh finally workin(2Duo E6750 and 2 gigs of kingston ram)…Got a new HDD from Samsung few Days ago which is much better than my old one and its even better now…faster…just copied the drives with carbincopycloner….NOW MY PROBLEM: Just bought another 4gig of the same ram and now installed 6 gigs (2×1; 2×2)…The rams work fine cause windows 7 is booting nicely BUT my beloved Snow Leopard (10.6.0) freezed when the grey/silver boot menu with the apple appears…It Just doesn’t move no more…PLZ ANY IDEAS? would really appreciate it…
I ran the 10.6.3 update on a Dell mini9 with dualboot XP Mac OSX, but I was unable to restart.
After the OS selectionmenu, OSX delivers a mismatch error between kernal version and CPU. Is there a way to force a restart?
If you set the other partition to Fat32 though, do you end up having issues under windows 7? Fat32 limits file sizes to like 4.3 gb, most games are 11gb these days, as well as large video files. Im curious as to how this works out
i had to install on 2 hdds. i unplug 1 install mac. install win to thhe other.
@jjjjj
I did the exact same thing but windows wants me to repair…Im not quite sure what to do…if anyone has any ideas please email me at drake.danner@gmail.com
SPECS
Gigabyte motherboard GA-EP45-UD3L
nVidia GeForce 9800 GTX+
Intel core 2 quad 3.0 GHz
2x 1TB hard drives
8GB RAM
(I basically followed the famous Lifehacker Snow Leopard hackintosh with a few changes)
I’d also love to install a 3rd hard drive with Ubuntu! I followed Blackosx’s guide on insanelymac for the install and I think I might have a partial Chameleon install :-/ (im so lost when it comes to Chameleon)
Once again, email me at drake.danner@gmail.com I’d love some help and I’d love to help some people out with their hackintosh!!
AFAIK I followed these instructions and successfully followed up to item 6. I set up two partitions for the dual boot. I had a helper create the USB key with the OS for me with the add on file as per:
http://lifehacker.com/5360150/install-snow-leopard-on-your-hackintosh-pc-no-hacking-required
I am stuck on item 7 of the backpackr instructions: “On the OS selection screen, select the internal drive you installed it to.”
What is the OS selection screen and how do I select it? The computer boots up on the USB key and wants to reinstall Mac OS.
Help!
Noob:
I build my system with Gigabyte EP45-UD3L, figured out the Mac OS install. (posting above) Can somebody give me easy instructions to find and install the audio drivers? Thanks.
Hey,
I tried doing this but I ran into a small problem, when I try to make my partion for windows active I see this error:
The selected disk is not an MBR.
The active command can only be used in basic MBR disks.
Plz help!
Thank you a lot!