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OSX on a Microsoft Surface Pro

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That's great! Solid start. Actually, it's wicked to see so much works OOTB. Yeah, the challenge will be dropping in everything else, especially things like a touch layer... Ultimately I would like to see the wacom stylus able to be calibrated correctly… doing design work on the pro in a mac environment would be very cool.

Yah - I agree regarding the lack of attempts seen online. I find it amazing at the seemingly small interest in hackintoshing the Pro - the thing that I believe makes it a compelling device to put OSX on is that it's an SKU backed by Microsoft, meaning that we (hopefully) will see it rolled out widely across the world. And with a widely distributed standardized set of internals, it will be easy enough to package the bootloader process and make adding OSX onto a surface pro really straightforward. I imagine one day a downloadable iso for surface pro that you mount to a USB, plug in for boot, and once it installs, you have a perfect OSX installation with full compatibility on a Pro. It would be as easy as the one button jailbreaks we have now for ios.

If it becomes popularized, it could be an affordable way for people to get the 'iPad Pro' Apple will never make. A Surface Pro running OSX vs a Modbook is much cheaper, a (seemingly) nicer form factor, and most importantly, easier to get serviced if the hardware fails.

One of my friends is in US right now and I've asked him to bring back a Pro for me - I'm in Singapore and they are only rolling out the Surface RT next month. I'm hoping to have a go myself at the process when he returns, in the next fortnight or so. I've put together a few hackintoshes in the past over the years, and although I don't have the chops to write my own kexts and that, I'm happy to experiment and tweak whatever I can get my hands on. I really want to see this project take off.

Keep us all posted with your progress.
 
Enigma,

What was the magic you had to do with clover to get it to boot? I've been fighting with this too. I know you indicated you would write up a tutorial, and I'm happy to wait, but I'd love to move forward so I can help get drivers and such working.

Great work!
 
Okay so i've gotten my clean installed disk to boot and install. (I always like super clean installs instead of hacked/modified) I haven't gotten the installed OSX to boot though without safe mode. Although USB now works OOTB. So as soon as i figure out why it won't boot without safe mode(I believe it has to do with graphics) i will post a tutorial on how to get it installed so i can have others help me figure out ways and tweaks to get a good working system. So once i get this clean installed we will have graphics enabled, USB,and sound. Shutdown and restart work haven't tried sleep yet. pretty much i'll have the basic system working. Anyone that could help with my safemode problem please let me know. the quicker i overcome it the quicker i can move onto the next thing. i can provide screenshots and whatever else you'd need to help solve my issue. it may not be the graphics at all, it could be some underlying issue who knows.
 
The biggest thing holding me back from plopping down the cash for one is that internal WIFI doesn't have any Mac drivers, at least from the research I have done. So that would mean having to have a dongle plugged in, and that's no fun. :)
 
@Enigma85 can you please just tell me what kexts you're using. and your dsdt.aml? Thanks
 
I now have a surface pro! I made a quick attempt to install mountain lion. I've got a thumbdrive running clover r1242 which boots up fine, but when I boot the unibeast partition I am met with a kernel error - see the attached pic.

Enigma85, would you mind sharing how you managed to get a clean booting install on to yours?

Also if any of the veterans have any ideas, shoot them through and I'll give them a go.

WP_20130413_012.jpg
 
I was able to boot the installer, but once installed, am having the same issues as engima85.

Here's how I booted the installer:
  • Copy InstallESD.dmg to a MicroSD card, rather than a USB drive -- the system had trouble locating the boot drive ("Still waiting for root device") using USB. Some googling suggests that this is related to the fact that it was attached to a USB 3 port.
  • Install Clover to the MicroSD's ESP, including OsxAptioFixDrv-64.efi.
  • Use the following kexts: FakeSMC.kext, NullCPUPowerManagement.kext.
  • Use the following Clover config.plist:
Code:
<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>
<!DOCTYPE plist PUBLIC "-//Apple//DTD PLIST 1.0//EN" "http://www.apple.com/DTDs/PropertyList-1.0.dtd">
<plist version="1.0">
<dict>
    <key>ACPI</key>
    <dict>
        <key>DsdtName</key>
        <string>BIOS.aml</string>
        <key>FixDsdtMask</key>
        <string>0x0100</string>
    </dict>
    <key>PCI</key>
    <dict>
        <key>USBInjection</key>
        <string>Yes</string>
        <key>USBFixOwnership</key>
        <string>Yes</string>
        <key>InjectClockID</key>
        <string>Yes</string>
    </dict>
    <key>SystemParameters</key>
    <dict>
        <key>boot-args</key>
        <string>npci=0x3000 slide=0 -v -f</string>
        <key>prev-lang:kbd</key>
        <string>en:0</string>
        <key>InjectSystemID</key>
        <string>Yes</string>
        <key>LegacyBoot</key>
        <string>PBR</string>
    </dict>
    <key>Graphics</key>
    <dict>
        <key>InjectEDID</key>
        <string>Yes</string>
        <key>GraphicsInjector</key>
        <string>Yes</string>
    </dict>
</dict>
</plist>

osx_surface_installing.jpg
 
Pen works out of the box for me, both in the installer and in safe mode once installed. However, the cursor seems to be missing, and because the pen input is mis-calibrated when far from the center of the screen, hitting targets is a very trial-and-error process.
 
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