For me it was less the Distro and more the Bootloader...

Specs below. I got 10.6.3 running very well by upgrading a fully working 10.5.8 install using iATKOS S3 v2. The included bootloaders WOULDN'T work with my setup however. Once I reverted to Chameleon 2 rc3 as my bootloader, troubles went away.

I could also install 10.6.3 cleanly using EasyEFI 2.1 and Retail 10.6.3, or EasyEFI 2.1 and iATKOS S3... I couldn't get them to boot by themselves however - I HAD to use EasyEFI as a startup after install. EasyEFI uses Chameleon rc3. Once I used it as my bootloader, I could ditch EasyEFI... I can use either the Legacy 10.3 or 10.4 kernel on my machine.

SL 10.6.3 starts up in about 25 seconds on this machine and most everything works. Only wierdness left is sound and that's always problematic with an AMD/ATi chipset and the ALC889a codec. My sound works, but only out the front headphone jack. (Voodoo HDA also says S/PDIF and HDMI Audio are enabled, but I haven't been able to check those)

With AMD and Snow Leopard, you also need to patch CPU ID's. Get Marvin's - it's just like the old days...

Gigabyte GA-MA78GPM-S2H (AMD/ATi SB700 series chipset)
- onboard video disabled
- onboard Realtek gigabit ethernet and TI 1394a supported OOB
- onboard ALC889a partially working - modified Voodoo HDA
- AHCI enabled on all drives
- ATA support with AppleATIATA.kext (mod for SL)
AMD Athlon64X2 5400+
ATi Radeon HD4870 1GB PCIe video card
SATA HD's, DVD burner, and Blu-ray burner
PATA HD

Attached Images

SLscreen.jpg (500.4 KB, 18 views)

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Running both 10.5.8 and 10.6.4 on my stinking AMD/ATi machine...