Help with Aspire One iPC
 

I have an Acer Aspire One A150. I used the iPC 10.5.6 DVD on my machine to install OSX.
I think I have the Voodoo kernel.
I used Software Update and updated the Airport and also the OS 10.5.8 through it.
Now my Aspire One is stuck in a reboot loop.
Please help!

Try the boot flags -v and cpus=1
Did you back up the system prior to updating? The updates will have over written several files including your kernel.

No. What can I do now?

Well that depends on how far along you were with this machine. I don't mind packaging up the necessary files for you and explaining the process of installing them individually from the command line via a usb thumb drive but It would probably take a lot less time to backup anything important (Which I can explain how to do) and just reinstall. Thats probably what I would do.

Now if you have the machine decked out with all your software tweaked the way you want it then we can go through the process... Only if you promise to back up your system or at least your extensions folder and kernel. ;)

If you do decide to reinstall post back when you are finished and we can go over the backup and update process.

My netbook is already decked out with iTunes and other stuff. Could you guide me to making it work? I promise to backup my extensions folder and kernel.

Don't let the length of this post get you down as its not as bad as it seems. I have added explinations to each step so that others may better understand them and why they were used. Also keep in mind that the commands we are using will need to be entered correctly as missing a / here or there can cause havac on your machine and make the problem worse.

Things you will need:
1. Usb thumbdrive
2. The proper kexts ( Check your PM inbox you have a new msg)

The process:
1. Format the thumb drive
2. Copy the proper kexts to the thum drive
3. Start the computer up into Single User Mode
4. Mount the file system
5. Backup the existing files
6. Mount the usb thumb drive
7. Copy over the new files
8. Set permissions and users
9. Restart

Instructions:

1. Format the thumb drive
Make sure its formatted FAT32 or HFS and remember which one it was.

2. Copy the proper kexts to the thumb drive

3. Start the computer up into Single User Mode (Without the USB thumb drive plugged in)
We will restart the computer in Single User Mode by using the boot-flag -s this will give us a comand line and the ability to modifiy the files. Im not 100% sure if you need it but lets toss cpus=1 in addition to -s
4. Mount the file system
5. Backup the existing files
Even though the system does not boot we should backup the existing files before we do any modifications. You should not need to in single user mode but just in case you get a p

1. Make a new directory called "Backup"

Code:

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mkdir /backup

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2. Copy the Extensions folder and its contents to this new folder

Code:

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cp -r /System/Library/Extensions /Backup/Extensions

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3. Make a backup copy of your kernel.

Code:

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cp -r /mach_kernel /mach_kernel.backup

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If for some reason you want to boot this backup all you have to do is use the boot-flag mach_kernel.backup at startup. The vanila kernel will also require the cpus=1 boot flag on this machine.

6. Mount the usb thumb drive

Boot into Single User Mode without the USB thumb drive plugged in.

1. Make a directory in Volumes to mount your usb thumb drive to. We will call it "myusb" by typing:

Code:

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mkdir /Volumes/myusb

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2. Before we plug it in we need to make reference to what other drives we see in /dev by typing (You might want to write them down):

Code:

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ls /dev/disk*

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3. Now plug in the usb thumb drive, wait a second then look for a new addition by typing:

Code:

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ls /dev/disk*

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4. Now lets mount it. Lets say you there are two new additions disk1 & disk1s1. Type the following (replace msdos with hfs depending on how the usb thumb drive is formatted. If you use it on a PC too then its msdos):

Code:

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mount -t msdos /dev/disk1s1 /Volumes/myusb

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Then you can access your usb thumb drive at /Volumes/myusb
5. Lets give that a try and see if we can show a list of the files using the following two commands. Press enter after each line.

Code:

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cd /Volumes/myusb

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Code:

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ls

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7. Copy over the new files
This part is easy as long as your formatted the usb drive and the files I provided are the only ones on the disk. If there are other files on the drive DO NOT run the following commands.
We should still be in the myusb directory so lets copy the files. Remember press enter after each line.

8. Set permissions and users

1. Correct ownership for all kernels

Code:

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chown root:wheel /mach_kernel*

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2. Correct permissions for all kernels

Code:

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chmod 644 /mach_kernel*

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3. Lets move over to a closer directory to shorten up the following commands.

Code:

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cd /System/Library

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4. Set the proper permissions

Code:

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chmod -R 755 Extensions/

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5. Set the proper user and group

Code:

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chown -R root:wheel Extensions/

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6. Touch the extensions folder

Code:

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touch Extensions/

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7. Remove the extensions cache to force OSX to rebuild it with our new kext.

Code:

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rm -rf Extensions.mkext

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9. Restart
Reboot using the boot-flags -v -f
-v Verbose Mode displays useful information during the boot process.
-f Forces OSX to load kexts from the extensions folder instead of the cache file. We did delete the cache file so this is just a precaution.

Let me know how it goes. When you get into OSX I would also repair permissions by typing the following in Terminal

Thank you!

It worked!

Now lets do a small backup. Open Terminal and type the following:

I did that too. I used OSX86 Tools.

Good job. You can sleep a bit more sound. SuperDuper is also a full backup solution I find very easy to use.

I saw your post about distros and kernels.

I only added the Voodoo kernel as you mentioned you already were using it. It offers some features which are a no brainer for AMD users. AMD machines need to applications patched and it does it on the fly. Makes life a lot less troublesome.

I use it on my Aspire one because most of my other machines are AMD and so im failure with it. It does perform some other useful tasks such as "Blacklisting" certain files which give us osx86 users problems. Now I you should have disabler.kext which also performs the blacklisting function. I added it as a precaustion. There is an Alpha version of the more recent Voodoo Kernel that Im starting to use on my aspire one just so that I can provide them with feedback on bugs I might find.

With the disabler.kext file you should be able to run the vanilla kernel from apple. Just remember the kernel requires two other files to be of the proper version. System.kext and Seatbelt.kext must be of the same version in order for the machine to function properly.

If you are interested in trying out the vanilla kernel you will need to round these files up. You could download the 10.5.8 delta "not combo" update and use a program called Pacifist to extract them.

What do I do after having the delta update downloaded and Pacifist is installed on my system?

Make a folder on your desktop and use pacifist to open the Update. You will then be able to navigate through and pull the three files you need.
mach_kernel
system.kext
seatbelt.kext

Make sure your current kexts and kernel is backup up and then you can install the kexts using KextHelper or by the methods explained in my previous posts.

You can install the kernel by typing the following in Terminal (Note the ~ and replace FolderOnYourDesktop with yours)
Reboot using the boot-flag cpus=1

If you can't reboot we can restore the previous files as they should be backed up.

Should the cpus=1 flag be entered every time or can I make it do it every time some way?

There is a file called com.apple.boot.plist in /Library/Preferences/SystemConfiguration
Drag it to you desktop and open it up.

You should see something like:
Find:
and add the boot-flags here so in your case it would be:
Generally while Im setting up a machine I add -v to start up in Verbose Mode that way I can see whats going on. so
Save the file and then drag it back into the folder. It will prompt you to Authenticate and then ask you if you want to overwrite the file. Do this and it should work fine.