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[Success] General tweaking guide for Asus P8P67 Pro Rev3.0

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Motherboard
Asus P8P67 Pro Rev3.0
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Intel i5-2500k
Graphics
Ati HD6450
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General tweaking guide for Asus P8P67 Pro Rev3.0

I've started building a hackintosh a couple of months ago, it was my first time to enter this world, and I knew absolutely nothing about installing, using or configuring a Mac OS, now I already understood many things, and wanted to share my experience with my build.

My first steps were difficult, nothing worked out of the box, searching for help is difficult at first: you have all those questions, eager to ask in forums, but forum users doesn't answer noobs questions, and they are right because most of the answers are there between hundreds and thousands of posts, you just need to find them, which is very difficult too. This was my reason to write a guide that explains everything I learned to get a working system.

[WIP] WORK IN PROGESS​

NOTE 1: Remember, I am writing the experience of what I learned in the period of about 2 months, I might have understood things the wrong way, if so then I am open to any correction.

Note 2: I have a Computer Engineering background, and some of my notes might be technical (the way I do things), so be patient with me.

Step -1: Terminology & abbreviations
  • Kext: Check link[/*:m:3cgmudvc]
  • DSDT: Check link[/*:m:3cgmudvc]
  • KP / Kernel Panic: the screen of death in a Mac[/*:m:3cgmudvc]

Step 0: Hardware
My build is the following:
  • Motherboard: Asus P8P67 Pro Rev3.0 (B3), with Bios 2001[/*:m:3cgmudvc]
  • Processor: Intel i5 2500k (not overclocked, for the moment)[/*:m:3cgmudvc]
  • Memory: GeIL BlackDragon 8GB (4x2GB) DDR3 1600 Mhz CL8 (XMP profile)[/*:m:3cgmudvc]
  • Video 1: Sapphire Radeon HD 4670[/*:m:3cgmudvc]
  • Video 2: Sapphire Radeon HD 6540 (Switched to this video card few days ago)[/*:m:3cgmudvc]
  • Storage: 2x Western Digital 1TB drives (One for Windows, one for Mac)[/*:m:3cgmudvc]
  • Display: Dell SP2309W 23" (Resolution: 2048x1152), supports these connectors: VGA / DVI / HDMI[/*:m:3cgmudvc]

Step 1: Installation
There are many guides out there on how to install lion, I'll not get into this subject.
Once you install a base Lion, without any other package, your build will not work at all, you will not have a boot loader to start it, and the only way is by using the usb drive installer or the rBoot cd rom.

After the base installation you have to use the installation boot media to boot to the newly installed Mac OS to be able to install the boot loader (Chimera/Chameleon) and the extra kexts.

Step 2: Making it work the easy way
The first time I installed Lion, I did the easy way by installing Andy's P8P67 Pro Package, which includes all kexts needed to make everything work, including USB3, eSATA, Bluetooth, bootloader. Once you install the package, you can start booting directly with the harddisk.

You can grab his package from his thread.

Step 3: Making it all work the hard way
By hard way means doing everything manually, which is good if you want to learn what each component/kext do, and this is what I did the second install of Lion I did.

Step 3.1: Must have kext
The hard way must begin by installing few MUST HAVE kexts from MultiBeast, and the most important one is FakeSMC, without it no hackintosh can work.

TODO

Step 3.2: Boot loader
Unless a boot loader is installed, it will not be possible to boot directly from the harddisk where Mac OS is installed.
The main boot loader is the Chameleon, which loads the needed kexts and emulates an EFI BIOS so that Mac OS thinks it is running on a Real Mac Hardware.

there are many variants of Chameleon, all are different with their own features, but being on tonymacx86, we'll just stick with Chimera, a chameleon branch from macman.

It is possible to install it from the MultiBeast package, or the stand-alone Chimera install (which at the moment of writing this guide [November 3, 2011], is at v1.6.0, more recent than the one included in MultiBeast).

Installation is just straight ahead, unzip the package, start the package installer, and put install on the Mac OS partition.

For Chimera & Chameleon, there is a must have graphical configuration interface: Chameleon Wizard, it makes modifying the various settings easy and fast.

Step 3.3a: CPU Kernel Panic/sleep mode
A clean Hackintosh install will nearly never work out-of-the-box, and in the case of the Asus P8P67, a clean boot will always give a Kernel Panic, the main reason is that upon booting this motherboard, the BIOS will lock some MSR (Model Specific Registors), which most other board leave unlocked, and when the Apple Kexts/Drivers tries to write to them (because it needs to for some reason), the whole Kernel crashes.

There are 3 ways to get rid of this Kernel Panic and start your system, only one of them is needed, mixing will not make things better (it might make things worst):
Method 1: Easy way
Install the NullCPUPowerManagement.kext (Multibeast: Drivers & Bootloaders -> Kexts & Enablers -> Miscellaneous).

This will put a kext in the /System/Library/Extensions that will do something to the registers to make the hackintosh load properly

Pros:
- Easy to install
- resolves your problem
- remains active after updates

Cons:
- at least in the case of P8P67 motherboards (if not all), you will lose the ability to put the PC to sleep or wakeup.

Method 2: hard way (not very, but...)
Use the SpeedStepper patcher (by flAked), which patches the kernel driver reponsible for the KP (Kernel Panic), which is the AppleIntelCPUPowerManagement.kext.

Pros:
- Resolves the problem
- allows the system to Sleep and Wakeup correctly

Cons:
- Updates to the kext will remove the patch and the system will return to give a KP on boot.

Method 3: Dangerous Way (REALLY DANGEROUS, CAN BRICK YOUR MOTHERBOARD)
This is the most dangerous method, for which I will not even provide how to do it, and in case some body wants to follow it, DO IT ON YOUR OWN RESPONSIBILITY ....
This method is done by patching the BIOS itself, removing the locks of the registers (While Method 2 patches the driver that writes to registers, this does the oposite).
The main BIOS flash file needs to be unpacked, patched where needed, then repacked, and flashed to the motherboard, any mistake and you risk damaging the motherboard itself.... and because I like risking, I did it :)

Pros:
- Resolves the problems
- allows the system to Sleep and Wakeup correctly
- All done without adding or patching any system file
- Unless you update the bios another time, it will survive all OS patches

Cons:
- Dangerous....

Step 3.xb: Sleep mode
Most of the sleep/wake up issues are related to the previous point, BUT there are some other causes, because I read some threads where people followed one of the 2 methods that should allow sleep/wake up and yet it doesn't work correctly. Some say the reason could be the Graphic cards, I can't help with this because for me sleep/wakeup works just fine (With methods 2 and 3).

While for those who chooses Method 1, there is a workaround for the Sleep, by using SleepEnabler kext, but it is not always compatible, and with updates it might give KP (For example with the 10.7.2 update)

Just to explain what the problem with sleep is (according to my experience, before applying methods 2 then 3):
When you select (from the Apple menu) the Sleep option, the PC will start working to enter the sleep mode, the screen becomes black (then turn off), the hard disks will turn off (I can hear them stop spinning) but the fans in the case are still going, and the case lights are still on, and the Power led will remain solid.
Trying to press any key or the power switch will have no effect, the only solution is to power off the computer and restart from zero.

After applying the correct patches, selecting the Sleep command will bring the computer to a complete sleep state: Screen is off, hard disks stop spinning, all case fans stop spinning, and the Power led starts blinking, all within 2 seconds.
To wake the system you can press any key on the keyboard or mouse, or the power button, this will bring back your desktop, also in about 2 seconds....

Step 3.3: Audio
Audio is another major issue with this motherboard, without the correct drivers you will not hear a thing from your computer.
(This motherboard uses the Realtek ALC892 audio chip.)

With Lion, most method requires the AppleHDA Rollback kext, which is simply an old version of the driver (Which was available in Snow Leopard versions before v1.6.x, which supported the Realtek audio chipset), while the Lion kext removed this compatibility. So to fix the audio you just put back an old version and there you have it (more or less, continue reading ;))

To fix the audio, there are also 3 methods:
Method 1: Easy Way
The easiest way to get audio working is to install 3 kexts with MultiBeast (Drivers & Bootloaders -> Kexts & Enablers -> Audio -> Realtek ALC8xx):
1- ALC8xxHDA
2- AppleHDA Rollback
3- Non-DSDT HDAEnabler -> ALC892

Installing these 3 drivers (In addition to "System Utilities") will bring back audio, easy and quickly.

Pros:
- Easy & fast way

Cons:
- Updates can restore the original AppleHDA and breaks the audio, and you will have to reinstall the package to get audio back.

Method 2: DSDT Way
DSDT, as explained here, describes for the OS the components available in the system, so that the OS can automatically load the correct drivers.

this method requires you to have a patched DSDT for your motherboard, which MUST contain the HDEF (Check forum for guides). With this method you will still need to install Multibeast, but just with 2 options:
1- ALC8xxHDA
2- AppleHDA Rollback

The 3rd kext, which was needed before using a patched DSDT, in some way told the OS how to enabler the Audio chipset, now is not needed anymore because the OS finds from the DSDT what kind of hardware there is.

Pros:
- 1 less kext to load

Cons:
- Need some tricky work to get the correct DSDT
- Updates can restore the original AppleHDA and breaks the audio, and you will have to reinstall the package to get audio back.
- I still can't get the microphone to work correctly, still investigating.

Method 3: Patching AppleHDA Way
This method is done by patching the latest AppleHDA kext (the one from Lion itself), by adding the correct ID of the Audio chipset and layout in the original driver.

With this method, you will not need any extra kext from the Multibeast, but you MUST DO THE DSDT patch too.

Pros:
- 2 less kext to load
- All stock apple kexts (by Stock I mean the one that came with the OS, patched by yourself, without having to use and already patched kext by others)

Cons:
- Need some tricky work to get the correct DSDT
- Updates will restore the original AppleHDA and breaks the audio, and you will have to re-run this method.
- Need the correct patches to apply
- I still can't get the microphone to work correctly, still investigating.


Step 3.x: Video
Video is a whole subject that is different from configuration to configuration, will not discuss it how to fix it, I will just explain what I found and understood by myself (Based on ATI/AMD Radeon cards, no Nvidia discussions here).

NOTE: I did not really understand all the story behind video cards, but only a part, which is what I wrote here.

With my initial setup, I was using the Sapphire Radeon HD 4670 (512MB), which is supported by the Mac OS. By supported I mean that there was a kext, but not very correctly.

There are 2 modes of video in Mac OS: with and without hardware acceleration.

Without hardware acceleration (boot parameter GraphicsEnabler=No), the OS boots with a generic FrameBuffer, which works most of the time, most connectors of the video card works out-of-the-box, VGA, DVI.

When I enabled the hardware acceleration (With GraphicsEnabler=Yes), the OS loads a specific FrameBuffer for that specific video card (which MUST be completely supported by the driver).

Among the setting of the different framebuffers there is also the configurations for each connector, which describes what kind is it (VGA/DVI/HDMI/DisplayPort), what kind of video encoder it uses, ecc, but these settings are defined on how Apple uses the hardware, which might be different than the hackintosh hardware you have.

For example, my Sapphire Radeon HD 6450 has 3 connector: VGA, DVI, HDMI. checking the FrameBuffer for the ATI 6000 Series for my card I found that the configuration provided by apple defines all connectors as HDMI output, and connecting my monitor with DVI or VGA didn't work, because the video signal is being sent through that port in a wrong format, when I connected my monitor with an HDMI, it worked immediately.

A solution for this problem is to patch the FrameBuffer configuration by providing the correct output type, there are posts that describe on how to do this, but they are not very clear, and I was unable to modify the configuration for my 4670, so I replaced it with a 6450.

Step 3.x: Network
For the ethernet adapter, the only solution is to install the Intel E1000e kext, from hnak, just put in /System/Library/Extensions and it is done.
The latest version is 1.6.2, which works fine even at 1GBs.

The only missing feature for the Ethernet is the Wake-on-lan, which is not working at all (neither from standby, nor from soft-off), need some driver modifications.

Step 3.x: Bluetooth
Bluetooth is not supported by default on this motherboard, and this has something to do with the firmware on the bluetooth device, there is an easy fix for this by installed this package, this will temporarily upload the correct firmware for the bluetooth device, which will make it work until the computer is turned off. For this reason the package will do its job on each boot of Mac OS

Step 3.x: SATA Ports

Open issues
- Audio playback is working, but the microphone is not, still checking for solutions.
- WOL for the network card
- P & C states generation is not working, with the BIOS mod I can get 2 p-states: 16 and 37.

Other modifications
While I was modifying the BIOS (RISKY THINGS TO), I also changed the boot screen of the motherboard using the Asus MyLogo tool (For Windows). This tool requires a 4:3 ratio, so the image is 1024x768, but the final result seems ok with 1920x1080, a bit stretched but at least better than the bad Asus boot logo.

This is not too much risky, under Windows, start the Asus MyLogo tool, load the bios from the computer of a downloaded file, and change the boot logo with the attached BMP.


[WIP] WORK IN PROGESS​
 

Attachments

  • mac_bios_splash.bmp.zip
    13.4 KB · Views: 338
I'm so psyched to see a Lion guide for Asus boards in general, and even more so since i have the same Pro Rev3.0 board. My only significant difference is that I have an Nvidia 560 Ti (for now). Keep up the awesome work, I'm glad you're paying such close attention to detail!
 
nice info.
would love to see more info on the bios editing
 
Thanks for you interest in my WIP guide, knowing that nobody till now wrote corrections means that everything is quite correct, and that's good to know :)

!! WARNING !! WARNING !! WARNING !!
NOT FOR BEGINNERS
!! WARNING !! WARNING !! WARNING !!

I see that you are more interested in the BIOS mod, which as I said is very dangerous, I did not want to give extra details because someone WILL make mistakes and brick his/her the motherboard and then blame me for it... but for those who like risking, like me, the easy to follow guide for the Asus P8P67 Pro is here, but all the credit should go to The King for figuring this out, and dsgsa for doing the first mod for the P8P67 motherboards.

I REPEAT, IF YOU WANT TO DO THIS MOD, DO IT AT YOUR OWN RISK
 
i am a noob in hackintosh but not in BIOS modding, checked out the mod it's relatively easy to do would you say this is the way to go ratter than kext patching?

are you happy with the Sapphire Radeon HD 6540 video card? i am looking for a silent solution. was it easy to get it to work? would you buy it again? i know you end up getting an HDMI cable for it to work which is i think preferred over VGA / DVi

Thanks
 
opty said:
i am a noob in hackintosh but not in BIOS modding, checked out the mod it's relatively easy to do would you say this is the way to go ratter than kext patching?
I would really recommend not messing up your bios, putting a wrong one, using the wrong tool, having a different version WILL brick your motherboard.
Start with the kext patching, has the same effect and is completely safe for the hardware.

opty said:
are you happy with the Sapphire Radeon HD 6540 video card? i am looking for a silent solution. was it easy to get it to work? would you buy it again? i know you end up getting an HDMI cable for it to work which is i think preferred over VGA / DVi

first of all, I got the 6450, not 6540. and yes, it works out of the box, no patching or other things needed, just the right cable.

I got this card after reading this post, and this guy got other connectors working out of the box, maybe my card is different in more just extra memory, but yes, HDMI should be better than vga.

If I know that I will use the computer for what I do now (internet, programming, photo editing and video playback), I'll absolutely get a low-end graphics card such as this one: it is silent, consumes very little (according the specs) and does the job just fine. But if I know I want to do some gaming, I'll get something more powerful.
 
i am not a gamer maybe some light Photoshop that's about it. so as long as it.s not a pain to get it to work it would be perfect for my need.

you are right BIOS modding is not for everyone. one wrong hex and it's brick.
 
it looks like you own one of these monitors "DELL SP2309W monitor". could you tell me if the webcam and mic is working for you.

thanks
 
opty said:
it looks like you own one of these monitors "DELL SP2309W monitor". could you tell me if the webcam and mic is working for you.

thanks

Yes, both works perfectly, even better than in Windows 7:
the webcam works always, but the mic in Windows worked badly for me, after a minute or two the other part hears too much noises, it was unusable. While now on Mac OS it's the only working mic to use for chatting....
 
woow great info :)
 
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