[Guide] Success! Install 10.8 on old unsupported Mac

[PorkPieHat]

Where is MLPF?

I forgot to ask in my last comment if anyone knows where to go to download MLPF 0.3 (that’s the current version, right?). I’ve read 8 or 9 dozen comments here and in the other similar thread, and I checked the dev's MLForAll Twitter page, all to no avail.

 

[popayann]

MLPostFactorV0.3 Download Link

I forgot to ask in my last comment if anyone knows where to go to download MLPF 0.3 (that’s the current version, right?). I’ve read 8 or 9 dozen comments here and in the other similar thread, and I checked the dev's MLForAll Twitter page, all to no avail.

Here, (it's in the first post of this topic, you have to read it carefully) :

MLPostFactorV0.3 Download Link
(For Macs with GMA950, GMA X3100, X1300, X1600, X1900XT, 7300GT & 7600GT Graphics)
Download Link #1 Direct Link
Download Link #2 Mega Download Recommended!

 

[01mggt]

Well of course it would not: it's a bastardised version of ML with DP1 kexts & kernel! As such, it has defects as anyone could have expected.

For those old Macs that can natively run 64bit graphics (like older MacPro where 7300GT graphics card has been changed for a model suitable to ML), the vanilla method is of course to be preferred to MLPF, the hack being nevertheless the alternative/fallback solution for systems with 32bit-only graphics (GMA950, GMA X3100, GeForce 7x00, etc.).

According to posts on here you can run vanilla kernel on the x1600 imac. I copied the kexts and it was fine minus the lack of video acceleration. But when I copy the patched frameworks to fix that it causes issues that aren't supposed to happen according to the guides.

 

[PorkPieHat]

Thanks

Here, (it's in the first post of this topic, you have to read it carefully) :

MLPostFactorV0.3 Download Link
(For Macs with GMA950, GMA X3100, X1300, X1600, X1900XT, 7300GT & 7600GT Graphics)
Download Link #1 Direct Link
Download Link #2 Mega Download Recommended!

Thanks, popayann. I’ll give it a whirl soon.

Is anyone else having trouble with the Mega Download link? I tried it three times, and in each case it cranked my processor to 100% for the entirety of the download. But when it gets to 99% Safari freezes and brings my iMac to a slow crawl until I either restart or force-restart it. Then I tried the direct link, but it was ulcerously slow. So now I’m trying the Mega DL link for the 4th time and crossing my fingers.

 

[atvusr]

Is anyone else having trouble with the Mega Download link?

No, no problems. The best is to use Mega with the Chrome Browser. Safari and Internet Explorer are not fully supported. Run the Chrome Browser e.g. from a Virtual Machine if you don't want install it on your current system.

 

[01mggt]

Anyone tried candybar or cdock? Both have issues in MLPF for me and just wanted to verify if others have the same luck. Flavours works perfect

 

[01mggt]

Well I can confirm that candybar does in fact work. It's also freeware now directly from the author. I uses it and flavones to get a slick yosemite look however cdock does not work as it's a 10.9 app

 

[user1690]

Encryption Works!

I do apologize if this has been mentioned but i'm sure i had seen on a few posts here somewhere that encryption didnt work and me being...well me! Decided to see for myself.

In fact it does work, however you need a Lion Recovery HD, and a legit download of OS X Lion from the App Store.

I went ahead and followed these instructions to get the Recovery HD working: Clicky Click!

I then turned Filevault on and it gave me the recovery key, i opted Not to store it with Apple and then was surprised the machine rebooted and i was greeted with the login prompt, the system then successfully booted up completely and finished the drive encryption! Yay!

This should work 100% for those who received an error about some HD's not supporting the Recovery HD and that you should reformat.

Of course, BACKUP! BACKUP! BACKUP! as those instructions above deal with on-the-fly partition editing of your hard disk, and, as many will say, 1 slight typo or error in the command could potentially destroy the disk.

Heres my setup if it interests anyone

Apple MacBook2,1
Intel Core 2 Duo @ 2GHz
3GB DDR2 RAM
OS X 0.8.5 - MLPF 0.3 32Bit

 

[01mggt]

Well of course it would not: it's a bastardised version of ML with DP1 kexts & kernel! As such, it has defects as anyone could have expected.

For those old Macs that can natively run 64bit graphics (like older MacPro where 7300GT graphics card has been changed for a model suitable to ML), the vanilla method is of course to be preferred to MLPF, the hack being nevertheless the alternative/fallback solution for systems with 32bit-only graphics (GMA950, GMA X3100, GeForce 7x00, etc.).

I did it! It's a bit involved but I figured it to after a week! Here is how I did it:

I partitioned my drive in three partitions. The third one con taints the installer because I was tired of using a slow flash drive and I wanted it readily available if I needed it. I used SFOTT and selected this "Install" partition I made as my taget. I selected the 10.8.5 install .app from the app store as my source.

I used my MLPF usb key I made and installed on my "MLPF" partition. Yes this is the 32bit install but it is needed.

THEN I booted form my install partition and on the third partition I made I installed 10.8.5 and on first boot I ran all the updates (don't install kexts or frameworks yet). Then reboot and make sure everything still works ok (minus graphics acceleration of course). Check for updates again. Should be none.

Boot BACK into MLPF 32bit yo installed previously. Use KEXT Wizard and install the KEXT needed (use the ones found in your MLPF partition under system/library/extensions) View your 64 bit install and delete the OpenCL and OpenGL frameworks folders from system/library/frameworks and empty trash. Copy the two folders from your 32 bit install to your 64 bit partition. Now in Kext wizard repair permissions on your 64bit partition( it's in the first little tab ting).

Reboot into 64it install and it functions perfect and is much faster and more stable!

 

[atvusr]

Boot BACK into MLPF 32bit yo installed previously. Use KEXT Wizard and install the KEXT needed (use the ones found in your MLPF partition under system/library/extensions) View your 64 bit install and delete the OpenCL and OpenGL frameworks folders from system/library/frameworks and empty trash. Copy the two folders from your 32 bit install to your 64 bit partition. Now in Kext wizard repair permissions on your 64bit partition( it's in the first little tab ting).

Interesting. Other users wrote, that the OpenGL/CL Frameworks from 32bit MLPF will not work on a non-MLPF 64bit System .....

 

[RV-ABZ]

This procedure from 01mggt would appear to apply to certain older Macs only, like those based on ATI X1x00 or nVidia 7x00GT GPUs, not Intel GMA-based GPUs.

Why? Because the post bears no mention of Intel 64bit kexts and you can't load 32bit kexts in 64bit kernel mode. As it happens, Intel GMA kexts provided by MLPF are i386 only (from 10.7.5), not fat binary. For older ATI or nVidia GPUs, things are indeed different because the kexts installed after MLPF are either fat binary (eg: ATIRadeonX1000 and associated controller kexts, NVDANV40HalG7xxx) or remain x86_64 only (eg: NVDANV50Hal).

As such, caution must be exercised with statements made in the above post. As is, it does not apply to Intel GMA-based systems, only to ATI and/or nVidia based systems. It may work on Intel systems once GMA950/X3100 64bit kexts are installed in /S/L/E, but until someone confirms...

This remains a 64bit form of MLPF and should not be considered vanilla in any way, unlike the SFOTT method which provides a mechanism to boot 64bit OS X vanilla versions on older Macs with 32bit EFI and natively supported hardware (usually a simple graphics card swap-out). So, it's 2 totally different things altogether.

 

[bubor]

Use the SFOTT.app to make an Mountain Lion install drive (it's self-explanatory).
When you finished installing apply these patches: Graphics & Audio - Therefore you will need to install the framework files from the 10.8.5 folder by copying and pasting them to the appropriate directory and the other files from this folder (kexts, bundles) by dragging them onto the "Kext Utility" application, which is also included.
The "10.8.5 Installation" folder is not of any interest.

This only works for Mountain Lion 10.8.5. Earlier versions as well as Mavericks (10.9.X) won't work.
If you install the 10.8.5 supplemental update afterwards you will have to reapply the patches described above.

That's "all".

Good luck.

!!! For anybody else: This is only for MacBook Pro 2,2 and may work on an iMac with ATI X1600 graphics. All other machines are covered by MLPF.

its works still. I had some issue because latest security update http://support.apple.com/kb/DL1753. I've made backup before install this update, and rollback files:
/System/Library/Extensions
/System/Library/Frameworks/CoreGraphics.framework
/System/Library/Frameworks/OpenCL.framework
/Syetem/Library/Caches

Less secure, but it works.

 

[10tacleBoy]

Hello!

I would like to know whether there's come up a final solution for the iMessage/FT issues.
My dad has got an old iMac from late 2006, which is, as you know, not officially supported by Mountain Lion.
My idea was to install ML on his machine unofficially so he can use iMessage on his Mac (that's the only reason for all the effort. Lion already provides everything he needs, except iMessage).

So I installed 10.8.5 with the help of MLpostfactor a few days ago and the installation worked fine without any problems. Even the system itself seems to run without any issues, at least I haven't found anything serious yet.
But unfortunately iMessage and Facetime don't work. I simply can't login with his Apple-ID. It always says "Your Apple ID can't be used to set up iMessages at this time" and that I should contact the support (which would have no use, right?).

What I have tried already:

- using the terminal by writing and inserting the serial number + 6 random digits in the end: sudo nvram 4D1EDE05-38C7-4A6A-9CC6-4BCCA8B38C14:MLB=

- logging out and in again with his Apple-ID/iMessage on his iPhone (he's got an iPhone 3gs, which works perfectly with iMessage by the way)

- trying the exact same procedure with 10.8.4 (instead of 10.8.5) since MLpostfactor only goes up to 10.8.4

Everything without success.
I am still wondering why iMessage works perfectly for some people, and for some it doesn't.
So I just wanted to ask for some further ideas if you have anything in mind? I mean, there's a lot of text (155 pages) in here, so maybe I have overlooked something... I really wish he could use iMessage on his Mac. Would be a lot easier to receive our messages and photos we always send him. Buying a new(er) Mac is not an option.

Thanks!

 

[ShiryuX]

Hello!

I would like to know whether there's come up a final solution for the iMessage/FT issues.
My dad has got an old iMac from late 2006, which is, as you know, not officially supported by Mountain Lion.
My idea was to install ML on his machine unofficially so he can use iMessage on his Mac (that's the only reason for all the effort. Lion already provides everything he needs, except iMessage).

So I installed 10.8.5 with the help of MLpostfactor a few days ago and the installation worked fine without any problems. Even the system itself seems to run without any issues, at least I haven't found anything serious yet.
But unfortunately iMessage and Facetime don't work. I simply can't login with his Apple-ID. It always says "Your Apple ID can't be used to set up iMessages at this time" and that I should contact the support (which would have no use, right?).

What I have tried already:

- using the terminal by writing and inserting the serial number + 6 random digits in the end: sudo nvram 4D1EDE05-38C7-4A6A-9CC6-4BCCA8B38C14:MLB=

- logging out and in again with his Apple-ID/iMessage on his iPhone (he's got an iPhone 3gs, which works perfectly with iMessage by the way)

- trying the exact same procedure with 10.8.4 (instead of 10.8.5) since MLpostfactor only goes up to 10.8.4

Everything without success.
I am still wondering why iMessage works perfectly for some people, and for some it doesn't.
So I just wanted to ask for some further ideas if you have anything in mind? I mean, there's a lot of text (155 pages) in here, so maybe I have overlooked something... I really wish he could use iMessage on his Mac. Would be a lot easier to receive our messages and photos we always send him. Buying a new(er) Mac is not an option.

Thanks!

Hi 10tacleBoy,

Just give Apple a call and they will ask you for your serial number (never say you run ML) and that they can unlock your machine for iMessage.

Worked as a charm for me with iMessage. Following this I was able to login to Facetime as well and see my contacts but calling them results in the call being dropped unfortunately. So if you are able to find a solution for that I would be grateful.

Good luck!

S

 

[10tacleBoy]

Oh, and I thought calling them wouldn't make sense because I expected them to find out that I am using an unsupported Mac.
That's good to know, maybe I should give it a try. Thank you!

It's just a pity that FT still won't work properly. I'll take care of in the next days and I'll see.

 

[rqn4x]

So I installed 10.8.5 with the help of MLpostfactor

Could you tell how? According to MLPF docs it only supports up to 10.8.4...

 

[10tacleBoy]

Just install 10.8.5 but choose 10.8.4 in MLpostfactor, works perfectly.

Once you have it installed, the OS X system profiler will tell you that it's 10.8.4, but that's no big deal.
Just go to /System/Library/CoreServices and copy "SystemVersion.plist" to your desktop.
Open it with a text editor and change every 10.8.4 to 10.8.5. Save the file, drag it back to /CoreServices and overwrite the old one.

 

[PorkPieHat]

Difference between MLPF & Non-MLPF ways of updating an ATI 1600 5,1 iMac to 10.8.5?

Now that they’ve both been around a while and evolved a bit, what are the real differences between using the MLPF and non-MLPF methods of updating a Late-2006 5,1 Core2Duo 2.16 GHz iMac with an ATI 1600 GPU and 2 GB of RAM that’s currently running OS 10.7.5? Does one of the methods wind up with fewer or no operational limitations than the other? If not, I’d rather use the MLPF method because it seems massively easier — just let the MLPF app do all the work, right?.

 

[RV-ABZ]

MLPF creates what I call a "bastardized" version of ML in the sense that:
1) it replaces the 64bit-only vanilla kernel by ML DP1's 32/64bit version
2) it replaces the 64bit-only vanilla kexts in /S/L/E by the 32/64bit kexts from DP1
3) it adds 32bit kexts from Lion 10.7.5 for unsupported graphics such as Intel GMA950, Intel GMA X3100, nVidia GeForce 7x00, ATI X1x000, etc.
3) it replaces the vanilla OpenGL & OpenCL framework by those from Lion 10.7.5 (and they may be modified too, but I'm not 100% certain on that point).

The non-MLPF methods presented in this thread aim to install full 64bit vanilla ML on older Macs that have hardware fully capable of running 64bit vanilla ML (that may mean change of graphics card for models for which that is feasible - eg: MacPro1,1) but a 32bit EFI, i.e. can only normally boot a 32bit OS X version.

The difference may appear subtle but it is not: MLPF, being a bastardized ML installation, inevitably contains a few bugs and apps limitations that non-MLPF full vanilla installations do not have.

With MLPF, you can't do automatic updates, you have to do them manually and then re-run MLPF installer over the update.

With non-MLPF installations, you can update as normal and retain the full vanilla package.

It's easy to see that for a Mac with hardware capable of running full 64bit vanilla ML, the non-MLPF method is by far and large a lot better.

 

[PorkPieHat]

Where are OpenGL & OpenCL folders?

Thanks, RV-ABZ. One more question:

The "OS X 10.8.5 Installation guide for Macs w/ ATI X1600 Graphics...Updated” says the following:

"Also and again while having the Mountain Lion drive/partition mounted, open the following folders in this sequence: System/Library/Frameworks and locate both the OpenGL & OpenCL folders and move them both to the trash and delete them. Once deleted, copy both patched versions (Open GL: https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/....framework.zip) Open CL: https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/....framework.zip) of the same namesake into the same System/Library/Frameworks folder.”​

However, the above links to the patched OpenGL & OpenCL folders are dead — clicking them only leads to the message "The resource could not be found“. Anyone know where to find those now?

 

[atvusr]

However, the above links to the patched OpenGL & OpenCL folders are dead — clicking them only leads to the message "The resource could not be found“. Anyone know where to find those now?

You can find these files (10.8.5--64--X1600.7z) in Post #3741 as well as Post #3670.

According to Post #3862 the solution itself is still working - but applying the new Security-Update 2014-003 (30-Jun-2014) causes graphics issues (artifacts).

 

[HereBeMonsters]

Having had this on my Mac Mini (details in sig) for a few months, I've got bored of having to hack every single bit of software to get it to install, so decided to go back to 10.6 (Snow Leopard).

But even having formatted the disk completely, every time I try to install it from DVD (official SL DVD that came with my MM) I get a yellow ! error saying "The Installer Could Not Copy The Neccessary Support Files".

Is this because I've fiddled with it to say it can install 10.8?

 

[Cave Man]

I was able to update a Mac Mini 2,1 (2.33 ghz T7600) to 10.8.5 and all that's supposed to work seems to. However, now my Edimax EW-7811UTC USB 802.11ac wifi adapter isn't recognized. System Report lists it as a USB wifi adapter, but it does not show up in the Network pane, thus I cannot launch the Wireless Utility app, even after installing its 10.8 driver and software.

 

[snilson]

i've a problem to start MLpostfactor. how i can install?? i had put the .dmg in the install folder.

 

[Cave Man]

i've a problem to start MLpostfactor. how i can install?? i had put the .dmg in the install folder.

Did you have the "Install OS X Mountain Lion" installer in the Applications folder of your boot drive?