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Upgrading a netbook EFI install of Mac OS to 10.5.7

I wrote this answer in response to an email, and thought it would probably be better to share it with everyone 😉

  • Download the 10.5.7 Combo update from Apple (you can use the Delta update as downloaded from Software Update if you want – but I don’t use these even on real Macs: If you run Disk Utility’s ‘Repair Permissions‘ after a Delta Update, you’ll get lots of unfixable differences, but if you use the Combo Update there will be none of these);
  • Download the 10.5.7 Updated Driver pack from this site;
  • You will need to use either the ‘sudo‘ (assume the privileges of the root user with your password) or ‘su‘ (become the root user with the root user’s password) commands with a Terminal.app session, so ensure that you have a Mac OS user account with a password set (in the former case) or know the root password (in the latter);
  • Do NOT reboot your computer until both of the following steps are complete:
    • Mount your EFI partition (if you’re not sure how to do this, then see here and read on below) and rename your current Extensions folder from /Volumes/EFI/Extensions (without Chameleon) or /Volumes/EFI/Extras/Extensions (with Chameleon) to be named “Extensions-10.5.6” (or similar). Do this by running the commands:

      	cd /Volumes/EFI/Extras
	  - or -
	cd /Volumes/EFI/

	sudo mv Extensions Extensions-10.5.6
	  - or -
	su root -c mv Extensions Extensions-10.5.6

      Within this folder (/Volumes/EFI/ or /Volumes/EFI/Extras/ if it exists) extract the 10.5.7 update: the command to do this, assuming that you’ve downloaded the 10.5.7 updated drivers into your Downloads folder, is either:

      	sudo tar -xjvpPf ~/Downloads/Extensions-10.5.7.tar.bz2
	  - or -
	su root -c tar -xjvpPf ~/Downloads/Extensions-10.5.7.tar.bz2

      Finally, run /Volumes/EFI/update.sh in order to regenerate the Extensions.mkext to reflect the new drivers. This will simply be:

      	sudo /Volumes/EFI/update.sh
	  - or -
	su root -c /Volumes/EFI/update.sh

      … and then your drivers are fully updated! But don’t reboot until you’ve also completed the following step…

    • Now you can install the Apple Combo update, allow it to run, and reboot when prompted. The machine will restart, boot as far as the Apple logo, sit with a spinner for a while, and then reboot again: this is completely normal, and happens on real Macs too.
  • You should now have a fully working 10.5.7 installation! The only regression that I’ve noticed is that OS X now thinks that the Atom’s processor speed is 4.1GHz! 😉

A quick note from above: The first comment which I posted on the original Installation article contains a script to mount your EFI partition easily. The easiest way to use this is to copy the text from the page, and then perform the following actions in a Terminal.app session:

	mkdir -p ~/bin
	cat >> ~/bin/mountefi.sh

… at this point press Apple+V to paste in the copied text, and then press Ctrl+D to signal that you’ve finished. Now make the script executable by typing:

	chmod 775 ~/bin/mountefi.sh

You can now mount the EFI partition at will by running “~/bin/mountefi.sh” from a Terminal.app session. Please remember to unmount it afterwards with ‘cd ; sudo umount /Volumes/EFI‘ or ‘cd ; su root -c umount /Volumes/EFI‘ once you’re finished.

13 replies on “Upgrading a netbook EFI install of Mac OS to 10.5.7”

Hi Stuart,

Does your driver pack for 10.5.7 have the following included?

Voodoo HDA-0.2.2 beta
VoodooPS2Controller

This would be excellent if it did, then I would have scrolling and tapping on my trackpad.

I would also have the mic and headphones working properly.

Please can you let me know

All the best

NSCXP2005

The VoodooHDA kernel extension I known not to work correctly: after resuming from sleep (and apparently even after just running for long periods), audio breaks up and becomes of very low quality – although this can be mitigated by moving the cursor around rapidly or by typing fast. This makes me think that there’s an interrupt-related problem here. Even without this problem, the maximum volume with VoodooHDA is significantly lower than with AppleAzaliaAudio, and I would suggest isn’t high enough even when set to maximum.

I think that what the Voodoo team is doing is fantastic, and I’ll be happy to include VoodooHDA once it’s finished – but I don’t think that it’s yet ready for the big-time.

I must that, after reading several reports of people having VoodooPS2Controller break on them, leaving them without input ability, I’ve not tried it. Having said that, testing it is on my list of things to do, so watch this space 😉

(Also note that with the NC10 release of Audieee, you can switch sound output to headphones, although this admittedly doesn’t happen automatically. I’d say that Microphone input is the only completely absent function, sound-wise. I’d certainly like to see this fixed – but it’s not something I regularly use)

Just a quick note to confirm that I’m now successfully running 10.5.8, but am still checking it for problems.

Bluetooth, even after driver plist edits, doesn’t work unless an SMBIOS override is also used to present a valid Machine Model (without which the Bluetooth daemon crashes due to attempting to insert a nil value – bad programming, I’d suggest…). With an SMBIOS override, bluetooth does work correctly – but historically using SMBIOS overrides with Chameleon 2 caused the processor speed to drop to it’s lowest speed of 800MHz. This doesn’t appear to be the case with the latest Release Candidate, but I’m still testing to confirm this.

More news as I get it…

(To answer the question above: Sleep works when not running on mains power. When plugged in, the machine will sleep but then immediately wake. I’m looking into a DSDT-based solution to this, but don’t have anything definitive yet – the DSDT change needed doesn’t only depend on the specific model of NC10 and what hardware is present (e.g. presence/lack of internal 3G), but also on what BIOS options are set. This makes the production of any generic fix very difficult.

The problem with Deep Sleep/Hibernate has always been the mechanism by which the system dump is restored upon restart. On non-Apple hardware, this is a boot-loader function rather than anything directly OS-related. Unfortunately, with the first RC release of Chameleon 2 this didn’t work properly. I haven’t tried with the most recent Chameleon update.

Given that my system uses a 30Gb SSD, having to write and then erase a 2Gb memory dump (almost 7% of the total capacity of the device) on every sleep seems to be enormously wasteful of write-cycles – so I’m happy to stick to Suspend-To-RAM only.)

Thanks Stuart,

With the 10.5.8 update, did you do it from Software Update or Combo Update?
If Software Update, did you need any additional files for it to work?

Thanks for the response.

All the best

NSCXP2005

I always use the Combo-updates, even on real Macs! The Delta updates can leave file permissions incorrect so that running Verify/Fix Permissions from Disk Utility will always report errors, whereas the combo update doesn’t have this problem. My thinking is that if this isn’t updated correctly, who knows what else might not be done properly with the Delta update.

(Admittedly, the answer is probably “nothing” – but using the Combo update isn’t any great imposition – so I don’t see any reason not to).

You’ll also need to re-create/re-patch your drivers for 10.5.8 after installing the update but before rebooting. I have an automated system to do this which I’ve created for the 10.5.8 upgrade – but I’d advise holding off for now, until things such as the Power Management problems are fixed. Once the update seems safe, I’ll upload this upgrade tool.

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