I tried to get osx (10.5 and 10.6) running in vmware with an amd athlon, but can't get it to work. I tried everything from complete preconfigured vms, hacked install discs, to original discs with an other bootcd you have to run before booting osx, and just nothing works. From all the guides I can see that it's much easier to get it running on an intel than on an amd. So I thought it may be possible to let vmware emulate an intel cpu. I know there are emulators to emulate arm or powerpc on x86, but is it possible to implement this into vmware (or virtualbox, may be easier because of open-source)? And it wouldn't have to emulate the whole x86 architecture, only the differences between intel and amd if possible. Can anyone help me with this? Thanks
Yes I know, that's why I want a layer between host and vmware or within vmware itself to let the cpu show up as intel to the guest.
There's always a way, it's just that this way seems pretty well hidden. I forgot about vmware and virtualbox and tried qemu. This also emulates the cpu and you can adjust much more hardware settings than with vmware. The only problem is that it crashes all times, even with a valid windows iso the vm just turns off. But I can set it to emulate a core 2 duo so I thing if I can solve the crashes then osx will run.
Maybe thats why qemu is used that much Like sebus said every major VM (Vbox, Hyper-V,VMWare) uses the physical processor of the host, the is no way you can emulate the processor in a stable VM
Yep, and qemu is bloody sh*t, the crashed are caused by the kqemu driver. This driver is used to run as much code as possible natively, and by this way destress the physical cpu. So all normal x86 instructions that come from the vm are ran on the amd and only specific intel things are emulated. When this driver is turned off it doesn't crash anymore, but it's way too slow and uses 50% cpu (so it seems it uses 1 core 100% and isn't even written form multithreading).
Yes, you will still need a bootloader for the kexts files. I would recommend Empire EFI. The CPU will be unnamed but you can use all of the cores, at least up to 4, which is what I have in my WKS. Quartz and Time Machine will not work but shared networking, sound, and other hardware components were functioning correctly. Also, all updates from 10.6.0 and up to 10.6.4 installed flawlessly. Another suggestion; use the Fusion VMWare tools which can be retrieved within the virtual environment. Let me know if you're not able to accomplish that task. The biggest use for this hack is to test applications within the Mac OS environment. However, if you can program for FreeBSD, NetBSD, or OpenBSD; then it should work in a Cracintosh.
Still can't get it to work Downloading a new vmware image of 10.6.4 that especially notes athlon x2, so thumbs up
At least you don't. And I just wanted to say I gave up the idea of intel emulation and try again with a new vmware image, so actually this thread can be closed. And that empireefi iso doesn't work, and I already tried all existing empireefi isos, so I'll try the vmware image first. But thanks though EDIT: AMD-V is off and hidden in bios, that's why empireefi doesn't work (and I think this will also prevent the vmware image to work)
If your Athlon X2 doesn't support AMD-V then the bootloader will not even allow you to boot the vanilla Snow Leopard. Also, it has to be a retail copy of SL and not those issued with a Macintosh computer. Anyways, if you are done with this trial, then I'll not be replying anymore. If you're game to keep trying. hxxp://prasys.info/2010/01/amd-testers-needed-for-osx-vmware-goodness/
It does support amd-v but it's lokked of in bios, why can't stupid acer just leave it on?? But it doesn't matter anymore, I can get a pentium 4 machine from school and with a little overclock it will probably work (I hope).
Correct. It is required that your platform firmware and processor support Intel or AMD virtualization technology for the Mac OS. I am not knowledgeable to explain why. If your platform firmware supports it and the CPU supports AMD-V then it should be enabled. You can check your processor specifications at AMD to be certain. I am not sure of how common it is today but many CPUs in the Intel PIII and early PIV product lines from China were rebranded because of the ability to change the multiplier core for a different frequency. I do not know if that is common for the AMD and Intel architectures fabricated in the past 2-3 years. I doubt that this is your problem but just a suggestion about the authenticity of the CPU. The only product lines that I had heard of which did not allow automatic enabling of the firmware for the virtualization technology based upon the CPU support was Sony Insyde EFI. There may have been others.