@Xenophage

Ok - I have an idea. I have an old G5 dual with one dead CPU. I haven't been using it much lately, and it's all but obsolete. Seems a shame to waste that gorgeous case. Long ago, I hacked an NVIDIA GeForce 6800 GT into the thing, using…

“Indeed - I'm delaying my hardware build for this. You're doing everyone a great service, and are to be congratulated. Here's an idea for the future - what if, instead of a huge, arcane list of drivers, you were to enlist the help of the var…”

“That's what I concluded the other day. As I said, I didn't really take the time to go that far. And - more bad news. My non-stickpin solution works for basic system audio, but it crashes Logic 8 something fierce. That basically leaves me av…”

“Sorry - been busy. I glanced at the PM thing yesterday, and couldn't immediately see how to attach a file to a PM, so I went on to other things. Regardless, you must have a real AppleHDA kext somewhere, no?”

“Well, dammit. Installing Little Snitch appears to have broken Stickpin's wonderful little solution. Reverting to my "Third Hack" works as it did before, Snitch be damned. I'll be sticking with that, I suppose. Pity. Stickpin's thing looked …”

“Well, I doubt InfiniteMac would want me to post actual Apple intellectual property here. There must be one out there somewhere.”

“I downloaded Stickpin's "Realtek ALC885/889A BETA V5" kexts. I then removed all other audio kexts in my s/l/e folder. No ALCInject, no AppleHDA, no HDAEnabler - nothing. I then put in the ones I downloaded from stickpin, AND a vanilla Apple…”

“AHA! That first link you posted is our path to glory. Someone is actually working on the 889a. Excellent. Although it's a step backward from the way he intends them to be used, I took his 889a kexts and put them into my s/l/e folder, and ev…”

“I dunno. Without some serious help from above (meaning Taruga and his minions) I don't see much point in it. It would take forever, since I'd have to cover all sorts of ground that's already been covered by others. Seems a waste. Still, I h…”

“Odd that your System Profiler shows two devices. At netkas - do you mean this thread? http://forum.netkas.org/index.php?topic=226.0 I've read it as well. It's definitely another clue to this whole mystery. I'm planning to play with these id…”

“OK - I've been digging further, and I've discovered several things; • Taruga's patcher application was made with Platypus - a script wrapper. • It contains an ini file, which has variables pertaining to "lineout1," "lineout2," and "lineout3…”

“OK, try this. It's another version of my hacked AppleHDA kext, only instead of putting ALCInject inside, I put HDAEnabler in there. Now, not only does it work for me, but my System Profiler shows that there is audio hardware installed! Reme…”

“By "more info" you mean System Profiler? It says "No Built-In Audio" even though it all works anyway. The screen shots are attached.”

“OK - I just did a test. I have a 4-channel (Quadraphonic) aggregate device defined in Audio MIDI Setup using the green and black plugs. I selected this as my default output in System Preferences. It is true that System Preferences does not …”

“You're positive you did everything you needed to to change your kexts? Something must be different. When I change kexts, I usually use the OSx86Tools application to make sure I've remembered everything. I usually check the following; Set Ex…”

“Regarding 5.1 sound, you need to use Audio/Midi Setup in your Utilities folder. There's a tutorial for it here; http://forum.insanelymac.com/index.php?showtopic=87336 ...complete with screenshots. If you find that your headphone outputs are…”

“Glad it's working for you. The hacking was very simple, really. No coding required. First, I found a proper codec dump for an ALC889 - not an 885 (someone on a linux board had posted it). Next, I simply used Taruga's HDA Patcher version 1.2…”

“Taruga has popped up in this thread on InsanelyMac; http://forum.insanelymac.com/index.php?showtopic=123057&st=40&gopid=953855&#entry953855 Attached, you'll find the kext I'm currently using. I tweaked it to provide a little more info, and …”

“More interesting reading from the ALSA project; mailman.alsa project.org/pipermail/alsa-devel/2008-July/009658.html Not a hopeful sign. If the 889a is proprietary to Gigabyte with no published specs, I suppose there's not much hope of suppo…”

“I don't really know how to answer. What mobo do you have? Some of the linux chatter has centered around trying drivers for the ALC888, I think. If you have a Gigabyte board, you're welcome to try my patched kexts. I haven't been able to get…”

“Support for the 889a appears to be rather wonky. From what I've been able to gather, the various incarnations of hacked Apple kexts derive key information from the drivers for the ALSA project in the linux world. ALSA has until recently had…”

“Not sure if this is even an appropriate place to post all this. I'm just going to charge ahead anyway in hopes someone will eventually see it. I just did a test of the inputs by plugging a simple stereo mini patch cable from the rear-speake…”

“Some more observations. I have a Gigabyte GA-EP35-DS4 v.2.1 mobo. With this dump patched in, my "Internal Speakers" play by default, and I can switch to "Line Out," which works just as well. These constitute the green and black mini-plugs o…”

“Actually - that's the dump for the 885. I did some digging yesterday, and there are reports of a bug in ALSA, resulting in many linux distros misidentifying the 889a as an 885. I tried a current Xubunutu CD on my hackintosh, and can verify …”

“Well, I now have a perfectly functional hackintosh in a temporary, generic, beige, boring case. The whole thing really works brilliantly, though. Aesthetics is indeed everything, however I'm wondering if it's worth the hacking and hassle. W…”

“Woah. Since posting this, I found like a TON of forum chatter out there. People seem to be doing this right and left. I actually have the rudiments of a plan forming. If I decide to gut my reliable old Mac and replace the innards with pure …”

“Not yet. Just waiting for stickpin to save us.”