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DELL XPS 15Z(L511z) successfull GPT booting, and a confusing USB problem.

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Sep 15, 2011
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Motherboard
Dell XPS 15 9550
CPU
Core i7-6700HQ
Graphics
Intel HD530/NVIDIA GTX960M 2GB DDR5
Mac
  1. MacBook Pro
Mobile Phone
  1. iOS
Hi everyone.

I have been an owner of the Dell XPS 15Z for a year now, running Mountain Lion and Windows 7 in dual boot, from the beginning.
As most of you running ML on this computer already know, it’s not possible to boot this computer with GPT partitioned hard disk, but I have found a workaround.

I have replaced the DVD drive with a SSD disk, and as a replacement for the missing DVD drive, I bought myself a USB DVD drive.
Under normal circumstances you would install the SSD disk in the hard disk bay, and put the old hard disk in the DVD bay with an adaptor, running ML and Win7 in dual boot from the SSD disk. I did this for almost a year without the possibility to boot from a GPT disk.

Then the SSD disk broke down, and while waiting for a replacement disk, I install an old hard drive in the hard disk bay. Then I got the idea of formatting the second drive (the one in the old DVD bay as a GPT partition disk, and install both Win7 and ML to two separate partitions on that drive. It is not possible to boot from this second drive as Dell for some reason force boot from the primary hard disk. I then formatted the primary hard disk as MBR and created a HFS partition in the beginning of that disk to be able to install Chameleon and then boot Win7 or ML from the SSD disk.

This works, and now I run ML with Find my Mac working, as this requires the recovery partition and this is only possible to have on a GPT drive as far as I know.
Another step closer to a perfectly working MAC. Still remains to solve correct wake up from sleep and a trackpad supporting multi touch.

During this voyage I have run into a new problem, related to the USB ports. I am not able to boot from any of the ports anymore. I receive the cursed ”Operation system not found”. My only boot option except the working hard disk is the DVD drive over USB as long as I enable UEFI boot in bios and boot Win7 installation media. I also have to disable ”legacy boot from USB”

If I wipe both disks using WINDOWS 7, DISKPART and CLEAN, I am again able to boot from the USB ports making the whole thing rather illogical, if you ask me. Now I need to disable UEFI Boot and enable ”legacy boot from usb”

It`s part of the story that I am running a modded bios by jkbuba over at BIOS MODS. He is mainly responsible for having this laptop running ML today with so few remaining issues, as there are quite a few obstacles along the way to having ML running well.


Hopefully someone can help with the USB problems as this makes the setup rather vulnerable.

BR
Kurt
 
Hi Kurt, same issue here. After ML10.8.5 install, reboot from USB no longer possible.
Currently running BIOS.A12. I'm downgrading to A06 to check if the problem still exists.
 
Hi all!
I was have this problem with usb boot, and i found from what it coming.
I install Mac os X 10.6, 10.7, 10.8 and usb boot is still working. But if i try use the SLEEP on each OS, at this moment usb was not working.
Then i try re-flash bios under windows by downloading original bios A12 from official Dell site. Or this modded bios -
http://www.bios-mods.com/forum/Thread-UEFI-Dell-XPS-15z-L511z-modded-BIOS-and-HOWTO - and usb boot revert to work.
DO NOT TO USE SLEEP! If you want to use usb boot from usb stick or usb hdd and others...

I hope, it information be helpful for anyone. Sorry for my bad english.

P.S.R.
Now my xps 15z work on 10.7.1 on 100%, but i see some brakes in random time and when i try open "mission control". Anyone know how repair it?

you said what you work with Mountain lion, Video work on 100%? How do you do it? what kexts & dsdt do you use?

Thanks anyway.

P.P.S

For use GPT Boot on our laptop, use Clover uefi boot loader. It works so good on my dell.
If you want, I can give you my dsdt, kexts, config.plist.
 
I would be very interested in seeing your dsdt and kexts for this if that offer is menat for anyone interested. I am really working on an probook for now, but I also run that modded a12 bios as well on my xps 15z and would like to give that box a shot after I feel comfortable. Have you noticed running windows in efi mode on that dell quickset application and st-motion sensor cannot be installed with the modded bios in place?
 
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