Noob here with a billion questions!

[19transam81]

Hi i stumbled upon this forum from afterdawn.com. Anyway this duel boot thing is pretty sweet. Currently i have a macbook that i duel boot with leopard and XP SP2. I love leopard so much that i would like to put it on my desktop however i still need XP on that machine as well. Now i have store bought copies of both operating systems. I have no idea where to start. I know some things about computers, i mean i can partition a drive and put XP on a pc all day. But this seems like a little bit more of a project. Can i put my store bought copy of leopard on my PC just like i would if i was putting on XP? I want to put leopard on my dell. Its new and it has an intell chip. Please help get me started :)

[Aydinz]

we need detailed models of all your hardware to start:

CPU:
MotherBoard:
Graphics Card:
RAM:
any other components like wireless cards and things as well :)

[lanceomni]

aren't u off topic here????.

note by Puttabong: @erick2red, I deleted your post.

No I would say he is right on topic if not ahead of the game. I think it should be the goal for most of us to do a retail install. People use these distros because they come prepackaged and make installing a great deal less difficult. Repackaging OSX and sharing it with others is illegal no matter how you slice it. Likewise you are at the mercy of the distro's creator. No offense to our dev teams out there. ;) I would hope that if you were using a distro you would also have a purchased copy of OSX. This doesnt change the fact that its illegal but I think of it as moral grey area.

I think there should be a bigger push towards distros designed to compliment the retail disk to do a retail instal. There has been a lot of discussion on this topic and I think it is the way to go.

[erick2red]

note by Puttabong: @erick2red, I deleted your post.

No I would say he is right on topic if not ahead of the game. I think it should be the goal for most of us to do a retail install. People use these distros because they come prepackaged and make installing a great deal less difficult. Repackaging OSX and sharing it with others is illegal no matter how you slice it. Likewise you are at the mercy of the distro's creator. No offense to our dev teams out there. ;) I would hope that if you were using a distro you would also have a purchased copy of OSX. This doesnt change the fact that its illegal but I think of it as moral grey area.

I think there should be a bigger push towards distros designed to compliment the retail disk to do a retail instal. There has been a lot of discussion on this topic and I think it is the way to go.
ok, then, i think i misunderstood the essence, but, there no trouble at that point. i certainly know is illegal to repack and share OSX, then let's help no matters who u get your OSX copy.

[lanceomni]

ok, then, i think i misunderstood the essence, but, there no trouble at that point. i certainly know is illegal to repack and share OSX, then let's help no matters who u get your OSX copy.

Yep, we are here to help ;)

[19transam81]

CPU 1.86-GHz Core 2 Duo E6320
System Memory 2048MB Memory
Video & Display
Graphics Adapter nVidia GeForce 8300GS
Graphics Board Type PCI Express
Graphics Board RAM (MB) 128
Graphics Board RAM Type DDR2
Monitor Model Dell E207WFP
Monitor Type LCD
Monitor Size 20
Storage
Hard Drives 1
Total HD Size (GB) 320 gb Hard Drive
RAID Type none
Optical Drive Type DVD±R DL/DVD±RW
Optical Drive Speed 16
Expansion
PCI Slots 2
PCI Express Slots 2
Open PCI Express X16 Slots 0
Open PCI Express X1 Slots 1
Open Slots 2
External Drive Bays 3
Open External Drive Bays 1
Internal Drive Bays 2
Open Internal Drive Bays 1
Ports
Serial Ports 0
Parallel Ports 0
Front USB Ports 4
Rear USB Ports 4
Front FireWire Ports 1
Rear FireWire Ports 2
Other
Audio Adapter Model Integrated 7.1 Audio
Audio Channels 7.1 surround
Network Adapter 10/100 network adapter
Case Type Minitower
Operating System Windows Vista Business (32 bit)
Other Included Hardware Power cable, mouse, keyboard

This is the spec sheet for my comp. Now i just want to know how to put my purchased copy of leopard on this dell. I dont know what OSx86 is or anything about hacks. I just want to partition my HD and duel boot leopard and XP SP2. With leopard being the work horse. I was also wondering if/when i get it on my dell how will i boot into windows? On my macbook i hold down "option" and i get to choose XP or Leopard. Well i dont have an options key on my dell keyboard.

I only need XP for a couple of programs for ripping. I am not impressed with mac the ripper and i cant seem to find anything out there for my mac like my XP programs offer for ripping. DVDSHRINK is also a program that i like b/c its simple.

[nfoav8or]

With you already owning a Mac this becomes tons easier. Once we know what kexts/kernel are/is needed for your PC system to run OSx86 (or OS X for the x86 PCs here) then we can apply these fixes to the Hard Drive.

First I would recommend making the hard drive in your PC an external drive that can connect to your Mac. Then I would boot up your Mac with the install DVD and install to the external drive. After this, restart into this newly installed system right from your Mac and set up user accounts, etc. Now restart to your internal Mac HD to manipulate/hack the external drive with the necessary kernel (voodoo possibly) and the necessary kexts for the chipset, video, audio, and LAN/wireless.

After you do this you can install a bootloader to the HD so a PC can boot it up. I recommend Chameleon (http://chameleon.osx86.hu/) or munky's Boot-EFI (http://forum.insanelymac.com/index.php?showtopic=127330) method. Then you can manipulate your drives to enable dual drives dual booting (via this dual-boot method (http://www.infinitemac.com/f19/how-to-dual-boot-windows-and-os-x-t1803/)) or single drive dual-booting using Chameleon's bootloader to allow you to select the proper system partition at bootup.

Hope this helps.

[19transam81]

how do i connect my HD from my dell to my lap top? Is there i plug that i can buy to do it? I.E. a usb to sata or something? I can figure out how to boot leopard because i did y macbook so it should be the same. Then are you saying set it up on my macbook before i install the HD back into the dell? Im not sure what you mean by a few terms:kernel,kexts?

[nfoav8or]

use an adapter like this one from newegg.com (http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16812232002) to connect the internal HD to your mac, install OS X from your retail DVD, then apply a few kext/kernel changes. I'll PM you with the links to some files you'll need to make this transition after we determine a few things.

Your spec list includes a lot of unneeded items and is also missing a few... like what motherboard you have. This will key us in to knowing what chipset your board uses and will dictate what kext (kernel extension... found in /System/Library/Extensions/) to use as well as if we need to use the voodoo kernel (kernel being like the central hub through which all things flow). We'll talk more specifics when you provide amplifying information.

[19transam81]

all-righty, im going to order that part and we will continue this project over the week. i really appreciate all the info that you guys are giving me.

[nfoav8or]

I can figure out how to boot leopard because i did y macbook so it should be the same.
The ways that Macs and PCs boot up to a hard drive are different. Once you go from being an external drive on your mac to an internal drive on your PC, the drive will not be recognized as bootable by the PC unless those methods I explained above are utilized before you make that switch.

Im not sure what you mean by a few terms:kernel,kexts?

Did the little explanations above help? I assumed since you were a Mac user already that you understood these terms or had simply looked them up. sorry.