0.8.5pre

NetbookInstaller 0.8.5pre is now officially released. There will not be a final release of NBI 0.8.4. This is a preview / prerelease of the changes in store for 0.8.5, there are bound to be numerous bugs. One bugs reported to me are worked out + features finalized, I'll release a 0.8.5 RC and go from there.

This version is very experimental will most likely break things that are working. There are a few major changes in this version that have not been very well tested, so there may be regressions. The main highlits include that NetbookInstaller and NetbookBootMaker have been merged into one application. As far as I can tell, there shouldn't be any issues with this.

The next major change is that NetbookInstaller nolonger patches the graphics and wireless kexts, this is done in the bootloader instead. What this means is that NBI no longer has to run after a major update to patch the operating system (it still does due to a bug with the apple hda driver). The kext patching feature is experimental in the bootloader and may fail if the struction of a kernel extension changes after an update. In the event that this happens, the worse case scenario is that you will no longer have either wifi, QE, or both. In either case, I'll make sure that there is an update to fix the problem (if I haven't already released one). Do note that this change will cause the boot up process to take a longer time until the spinner, however it should be slightly shorter after that.

Lastly, I've been focusing on supporting the Dell mini 1012 in this release, and support should be on par with the Dell Mini 1011 with the exception of hardware acceleration. The GMA3150 frambuffer kernel extension is patched in the boot loader, however the hardware acceleration kext is not yet.

Changelog

NBI Changes

• Integrated NBI and NBBM into one application.
• Removed NBI options to limit confusion
• Removed Legacy 10.5 code
• NBI is now compiled with ppc support
• NBI is now compiled with 10.4 support
• /Extra/Extensions.mkext nolonger contains extensions from /System/Library/Extensions/
• Kernel is booted in 32bit mode by default (for new atom cpus)
• NBI now displays verbose information when automaticaly run by chameleon. I may change this back to the NBI icon later. If I get a change (and write a kext for it) I'll probably display the progress below the icon.
• Disables ptmd, can cause high cpu usage
• SMBios machine name is set as Macbook2,1 to make the last macbook with a GMA 950 gpu
• Updated the DSDT patcher, should fix the loop issue. (untested)
• Added support for the Dell Mini 1012 (specifically new dsdt patches)
• GMA3150 patch for the GMA950 framebuffer kext, no QE yet.

Updated to Chameleon 2 RC5 codebas.

• Modules support in chameleon
• Updated kernel patcher, modified patches should be a bit safer
• Added a kext patcher. Patches the gma kexts and wifi kexts.
• added bdmesg, allows user to view chameleon output post bootup.

Kext Changes

• Added KextcacheHelper.kext, changes the behavoir of kextcache to support the chameleon kext patcher
• Removed NVEnabler. Chameleon's GraphicsEnabler now replaces this.

Regressions / Known issues

• Shift is nolonger used to enter the boot menu, use F8 instead for now. I'll fix this in the future
• Cpu frequency + bus speed may be incorrectly identified.
• Incomplete Asus 1201n support
• Hardware acceleration is not supported on the Dell Mini 1012 (GMA3150 video cards)
• Boot screen flickers / blanks. This will be fixed in a future version.

Grab the files below:

Again This is prerelease software and will break things. It should be safe to use on new installs (worse case is you go back to 0.8.4), however you should not use this on a current install unless if you are willing to fix any issues this may cause.

EDIT: If wireless and graphics are not detected properly, please run "sudo kextcache -system-mkext" in the terminal(no quotes). You should alternatively be able to run UpdateExtra again to fix it as well.