2006/2007 Mac Pro (1,1/2,1) and OS X El Capitan

[mikeboss]

absolutely right! there was one boot.efi on the Recovery HD and two copies inside the BaseSystem.dmg (which is stored on the Recovery HD). now in El Capitan there's still one boot.efi on the Recovery HD. but on the BaseSystem.dmg there are three copies. also, BaseSystem.dmg is the starting point to create a USB installer stick. so, I was ending up with the three efi files on the installer volume. I ran a diff on the two copies residing in /System/Library/CoreServices/ and they are identical.

 

[mikeboss]

update: no matter what I try, I can't get the installer stick to boot. the bless command didn't make any difference. none of the available boot.efi versions leads to success. I'm always getting a kernel panic:

panic(cpu 0 caller 0xffffff801fed27d4): "Unable to find driver for this platform: \"ACPI\".\n"@/Library/Caches/com.apple.xbs/Sources/xnu/xnu-3247.1.99/iokit/Kernel/IOPlatformExpert.cpp:1665

 

[PeterHolbrook]

I've seen the initial response Pike has given you, but it seems he still has to look into a solution. Meanwhile, perhaps I could implement the changes he's mentioned and build a version for your tests. Do you think that would be useful or feel we'd better wait?

 

[mikeboss]

ah, I see that pike has answered and he also made some changes. then let's try the latest version of the El Capitan branch!

EDIT
@PeterHolbrook please do not forget to enable the debugging output.

 

[PeterHolbrook]

ah, I see that pike has answered and he also made some changes. then let's try the latest version of the El Capitan branch!

EDIT
@PeterHolbrook please do not forget to enable the debugging output.

Here you are. Good luck.

PS When I tried to alter a definition in the .h file referred to by Pike, I found that he'd already changed it himself, so I haven't altered his code in any way. Built as "Release/Win32".

 

[mikeboss]

making progress

with the boot.efi from thursday and the edited com.apple.Boot.plist (see pike's universum) I was able to boot into the installer's GUI!

now when trying to actually install El Capitan it halts with the following error:

OS X could not be installed on your computer
No bless setting for a primary boot program was found.
Quit the installer to restart your computer and try again.

 

[mikeboss]

forgot to mention the outcome with the latest boot.efi from today: booting the installer stopped with "Waiting for DSMOS...".

 

[PeterHolbrook]

forgot to mention the outcome with the latest boot.efi from today: booting the installer stopped with "Waiting for DSMOS...".

Remember to tell Pike. I may fail to read his blog. If there's something new and you notice I fail to react, send me a message in this forum (which I look at more often) and I'll recompile whatever refinements are introduced.

 

[mikeboss]

I sure won't forget to tell him. interesting: while trying to create a 10.10.5 installer stick I got the same kernel panic. I also had to edit com.apple.Boot.plist in order to get it to boot successfully.

 

[PeterHolbrook]

I sure won't forget to tell him. interesting: while trying to create a 10.10.5 installer stick I got the same kernel panic. I also had to edit com.apple.Boot.plist in order to get it to boot successfully.

That's odd. Have Apple changed anything in the kernel cache of both Yosemite and El Capitan? I can't follow the logic as to why explicitly saying where the cache is, it should work. Has it been moved to a different folder? Has its encryption been altered?

 

[mikeboss]

of course I am not 100% sure if peter used the latest source. with the latest boot.efi he compiled and an unedited com.apple.Boot.plist I’m getting “Waiting for DSMOS…” when trying to start from the installer media.

peter, did you use the latest commit "6687555535" for the boot.efi you compiled yesterday?

 

[mikeboss]

That's odd. Have Apple changed anything in the kernel cache of both Yosemite and El Capitan? I can't follow the logic as to why explicitly saying where the cache is, it should work. Has it been moved to a different folder? Has its encryption been altered?

in 10.10.5 it's still in the same place: /System/Library/Caches/com.apple.kext.caches/Startup/kernelcache
but when I tried to start from the freshly built stick it panicked. I then edited the com.apple.Boot.plist which is pointing to the cache file /System/Library/Caches/com.apple.kext.caches/Startup/kernelcache and then it worked again.

in El Capitan it appears Apple moved it to /System/Library/PrelinkedKernels/prelinkedkernel

 

[mikeboss]

update: I created a fresh installer volume. Pike's boot.efi from last thursday. unedited BaseSystem.dmg and edited com.apple.Boot.plist. I was able to complete a fresh install of El Capitan to an empty harddrive. somehow it ended up with Apple's own boot.efi in the usual places and of course it didn't start. I will try it with a modified BaseSystem.dmg.

 

[PeterHolbrook]

of course I am not 100% sure if peter used the latest source. with the latest boot.efi he compiled and an unedited com.apple.Boot.plist I’m getting “Waiting for DSMOS…” when trying to start from the installer media.

peter, did you use the latest commit "6687555535" for the boot.efi you compiled yesterday?

Yes. As I said, I was about to change a header file when I noticed Pike himself had already edited it, so I didn't change anything. I simply compiled the version Pike committed himself.

 

[javirnat]

I only want to tell you (mikesboss, peterholbrook, pike.... and others ) that for people like me you are the very best because with your hard work we can continue with our old mac pro 1.1 and feel that it was the most modern of its class .
Thank you again and don´t give up , great job.
(sorry for my very bad english).

 

[PeterHolbrook]

I only want to tell you (mikesboss, peterholbrook, pike.... and others ) that for people like me you are the very best because with your hard work we can continue with our old mac pro 1.1 and feel that it was the most modern of its class .
Thank you again and don´t give up , great job.
(sorry for my very bad english).

Very kind words, but at least 99% of the merit should go entirely to Pike (and to Tiamo before him). The remaining 1% or 0.05% can be shared in equal parts by those who simply compile (like me) and those who do the testing (like mikeboss). Actually, those who do the testing deserve more than those who compile. Anyway, thank you. Let's hope we can continue to use our old machines at least one more year.

 

[PeterHolbrook]

with the latest boot.efi [...] and an unedited com.apple.Boot.plist I’m getting “Waiting for DSMOS…” when trying to start from the installer media.

If I've read you correctly, you succeeded in booting the El Capitan Recovery HD with a previous build of Pike's boot.efi for El Capitan only after editing com.apple.Boot.plist. I was wondering how your system will react with the latest build of the loader AND a similarly edited com.apple.Boot.plist. Does El Capitan itself boot in such a situation? Does the Recovery HD work?

 

[mikeboss]

yes, I was able to boot the installer media with the version of boot.efi from last thursday. with the version from sunday I'm getting "Waiting for DSMOS...". and like with the 10.10.5 installer media, it is needed to edit com.apple.Boot.plist. although Pike mentioned that it shouldn't be neccessary anymore with his final version of the boot.efi for El Capitan.

doesn't matter what I try, the latest version gave me "Waiting for DSMOS...".

 

[PeterHolbrook]

The eighth developer beta of El Capitan was released yesterday. Pike has also written some debugging instructions into his project. Herein is the new boot.efi, not of build 6b115594066c86e67b493330b825d871ebc43d0a itself, as that wouldn't compile because of a coding error, but of a slightly altered version thereof. I hope my interpretation of the code is correct. This is for mikeboss. It is probably not advisable that forum members should use this right now. Notice this is being developed and there might be significant risks involved in testing this. Never do so on a production computer. Let me know how it works, mikeboss.

 

[mikeboss]

thank you peter. I wanted to tell you that there's a new commit. you beat me to it...

with this latest version of the boot.efi I’m still getting the hang when trying to start from the installer media. the error message is again “Waiting for DSMOS…”.

 

[PeterHolbrook]

thank you peter. I wanted to tell you that there's a new commit. you beat me to it...

the latest version again gives "Waitung for DSMOS...".

OK. Let Pike know. Did you try this with the eighth developer beta or the previous one?

 

[mikeboss]

I already posted a comment on pike's blog (Your comment is awaiting moderation.).

I didn't check if Apple also updated the full installer. my installer media is not on the latest version of El Capitan.

 

[PeterHolbrook]

Pike has made a new commit. I don't really know whether there are any actual differences with what I compiled earlier today. In any case, here's the result (for mikeboss).

 

[PeterHolbrook]

Making double-sure my compilation actually is for build 56757bc28770e7bbb5f17f6be60d05050267e218. Please, disregard the one in message #248.

PS The reason for this double posting is that Pike changed a couple of things in his code, and I'm not really sure whether the previous build was of just the first change or of both. He might have changed the second one while I was compiling the result of only the first change.

 

[mikeboss]

the latest build is looking good so far! installer media booted to the GUI and the install procedure's doing its thing right now... and this is without a tweaked com.apple.Boot.plist file. installation completed! and again it ended up with Apple's own boot.efi on the harddrive. apart from that: SUCCESS!

now trying to update to yesterdays prerelease of El Capitan -> failed because of my SSD being too small ;-) will install to a harddrive.