Mac Tablet PC

Mac OSX 10.5.3 update on my X60

noreply@blogger.com (MArC) — Sat, 28 Jun 2008 21:45:00 +0000

Almost a week without posting... but now I'm back with some info about MacOSX.

Because I want do do some iPhone applications development on my X60, I need the latest version of the Mac OSX (10.5.3) to install the newest SDK.

So without further ado I got two 10.5.3 updates:

kalyway_10.5.3_ComboUpdate
JaS OsX86 10.5.3 Intel SSE3 Combo Update + SMB Fix

Since my original OS was also a Kalyway, I decided to go first with the update number #1.

The install process looked really ok, I just had to choose a kernel... and didn't know what to choose... so I went with "whatever" option... and after I got it installed... I rebooted...

and saw a blue screen... nothing more. Couldn't get it to work...

As unpatient as I am, I decided install Mac OSX again and now to go with the solution #2

It worked! I installed both the new OSX and the share-fix... and I saw this screen:

Now. After the reboot the system kept on working. So this is good news!

Now the bad news. Some stuff doesn't work, although it did work on the 10.5.2...

Altogether lots of things don't work, here's the list:

No wireless (Intel 3945 ABG card...)
No standby (after I want to bring it back - I get an error: "Error 0192: System Security...")
USB doesn't work as it should (pen drives won't get accepted)
No battery/ACPI support so my tablet is really battery hungry when on OSX
No Tablet functionality as of yet...

Over the next few days I'll try to get some of this working... wish me luck!

Installing Ubuntu Linux on Lenovo X60 TabletPC

noreply@blogger.com (MArC) — Sun, 22 Jun 2008 10:27:00 +0000

After I've installed the MacOSX it's time to enable triple-boot I need a Grub boot loader and while I'm not only interested in Mac OSX but Ubuntu Linux as well, I decided to install the newest, 8.04 version of Ubuntu.

Installing Ubuntu with Gnome

I initially wanted to install Kubuntu but after I've checked it, I decided to go with the traditional Ubuntu Linux since I kinda like the Gnome interface better. I popped in the CD and booted it and wen ahead with the installation which was really easy.

At one point, when asked about the partitions, I chose the "manual" way and marked my third primary partition as the "/" mount and my first logical drive as the SWAP mount:

Once this has been selected I proceeded to the installation and it worked pretty fast:

Now, once the system has been installed, I could reboot and GRUB bootloader has been installed for me by the Ubuntu installation... now I booted to Ubuntu to modify it and to make sure I could boot into Mac OSX as well.

Here's my modified /boot/grub/menu.lst file:

title Windows TabletPC
root (hd0,0)
savedefault
makeactive
chainloader +1

title Mac OSX Leopard
root (hd0,1)
savedefault
makeactive
chainloader +1

title Ubuntu Linux
root (hd0,2)
kernel /boot/vmlinuz-2.6.24-16-generic root=UUID=32f190c1-db6d-4055-bd74-199bfc3eb090 ro quiet splash
initrd /boot/initrd.img-2.6.24-16-generic
quiet

To edit it, I had to go to the terminal and go with:

> sudo gedit /boot/grub/menu.lst

give my root password and modify the thing and save. Once rebooted I was welcomed by this nice screen and could easily boot into all three of my systems:

Now, all is installed and I have three systems in place. I must admit it was fairly easy... but now it's time to configure both Mac OSX and Ubuntu Linux to make sure they work perfectly on my Tablet...

I'll be a frequent member of the gottabemobile forums, insanelymac forums and thinkpad forums to make sure I get all the support from the community to help me solve all the problems with these OSes and make sure they work flawlessly on my X60 tablet.

Till tomorrow!

Installing Mac OSX Leopard 10.5.2 on Lenovo X60 TabletPC

noreply@blogger.com (MArC) — Sat, 21 Jun 2008 09:48:00 +0000

Here's the complete guide on how I installed Mac OSX Leopard - latest version 10.5.3 on my Lenovo X60 TabletPC.

Fist of all, I needed an install DVD, I went with:

Kalyway_10.5.2_DVD_Intel_Amd

and I also needed an update to 10.5.3 so I got the:

JaS OsX86 10.5.3 Intel SSE3 Combo Update + SMB Fix

You can get both of them in the torrent networks, so don't even ask me for these two images.

I burned them, put my X60 into the X5 docking station, booted and placed the first DVD in the drive and booted into the MacOSX installation screen:

Now, the installation was fairly easy and I followed this great guide.

Setting up the partition

Before continuing, I clicked on the "Utilities" menu and chose to enter the "Disk Utility" application. This will help me choose the partition I had prepared for Mac OSX and format it into native HFS+ Mac-only file system.

From the list on the left of the app I chose the second primary partition out of my partition list (below the Windows Partition) and on the right chose the "erase" tab and chose the "Mac OSX (Journaled)" file system and gave it a label "osx".

Once this all has been done and my new partition was ready, I closed the utility and got back to the installation screen, I accepted the license agreement and chose to install Mac OSX on my new "osx" partition and got to this screen:

Customizing my installation

Before I hit "install", I clicked on the "Customize" button to make sure all the vital components of my installation are checked.

I had to make some corrections and chose to:

install Graphics_Drivers/Intel_GMA/GMA950 (important, otherwise screen won't work!)
install some Thirds_Applications like: Perian, Stuffit Expander, Textmate, VLC
install some Patches like: Power_Management_Bundle and Intel_Memory_controller

That's all folks, got all I needed:

...and I finally clicked "Done" and "Install" on the next screen.

After around 20 minutes I had my Mac OSX Leopard 10.5.2 installed on my Lenovo X60 Talbet PC!

However... I couldn't boot into my Mac OSX system, because I didn't have a multi-boot loader set up, so the next thing I'm going to do is to install Ubuntu Linux with GRUB boot loader and set up all three systems to be able to boot into all of them.

Installing (mirroring) Windows XP

noreply@blogger.com (MArC) — Fri, 20 Jun 2008 09:24:00 +0000

Step 1 - let's get first with my Windows XP TabletPC edition - which is my current default operating system and my "day job". My computer came with this system pre-installed. I've optimized it (i.e. did a fresh-reinstall thanks to the great K0Lo of Gottabemobile forums and his helpful guide) and installed all the software I needed and did an image copy with Norton Ghost.

So now I just installed my working XP image on the 120GB hard disk I prepared earlier using the 2.5" HDD USB 2.0 enclosure and the Norton Ghost:

Note: unlike the Acronis Trueimage, Norton Ghost has an ability to install the system on a USB-connected drive which is really cool when you need to install your working system on an external drive just like I did.

Of course, I ghosted only the first primary partition with my Windows XP installation. I keep all of the rest of my data on an external 750GB disk :-)

Now I had to turn off my computer, remove the current 100GB disk and replace it with the newly partitioned and ghosted 120GB drive, it was fairly easy on my X60 (just a handful of screws and you're ready!)

Now my new drive is mounted and I have a working copy of my Windows XP with some other partitions ready to install the Mac OSX and Ubuntu Linux. Till tomorrow!

Preparing for triple-boot - Getting the Partitions Ready

noreply@blogger.com (MArC) — Thu, 19 Jun 2008 08:51:00 +0000

First things first - before I started my perfect triple-boot installation, I need to have my partitions ready... and preparing partitions for a triple-boot system is not all that easy.

Make sure you understand some limitations of partitions:

a hard disk can handle max 3 primary partitions.
a hard disk can have one extended partition with many logical drives.
Fat32 disk can have up to 30GB of space in Windows and the files may not be bigger than 4GIG each.

So after many hours of trial and error I came up with the perfect partitions layout for my system (on my 120GB drive):

Primary Partition for my Windows XP install (20GB)
Primary Partition for my Mac OSX install (20GB)
Primary Partition for my Ubuntu install (15GB)
Extended Partition with 3 logical drives:

SWAP partition for linux (4 GB ~ 2*times my RAM)
FAT32 partition for exchanging files between all systems (29GB)
NTFS partition for documents and larger files for my Windows system (27GB)

Total of 120 GB has been partitioned like this.

Now, how did I do this?

I simply went ahead and prepared the partitions using Windows XP "Disk Management" section in the "Computer Management" application in the "Administrative Tools in Control Panel. I created each partition and formatted all of them to Fat32 except for the NTFS partitions which I formatted to... NTFS of course.

This is how the partitions looked like after they were ready for install:

Tomorrow I'll start installing the Windows XP system, Mac OSX and Ubuntu Linux.

What is a Mac Tablet PC?

noreply@blogger.com (MArC) — Wed, 18 Jun 2008 08:02:00 +0000

Hello and welcome to my new blog about making my Lenovo X60 Tablet PC a "Mac TabletPC" that will triple-boot into:

Windows XP Tablet PC edition Service Pack 3 (obvious and default choice)
Ubuntu Linux 8.04
Mac OSX Leopard 10.5.3

Why Mac Tablet PC?

I've been always interested in the Mac platform and have heard testimonials from many geeks about the superiority of the Mac OSX operating system and decided to give it a go.

While I can't justify spending another 2 grands on a Macbook Air (yet!) just to be able to try the platform, I decided to go for a "hack-attack" and try to install Mac OSX on my TabletPC and give it a try first.

If I really get convinced that this is the platform to go, I'll definitely go ahead and purchase the most beautiful notebook computer known to men.

Disclaimer

Installing Mac OSX on a non-mac machine is not legal. Even purchasing a legitimate copy of Mac OSX won't make it legal. Apple wants the cat-like-operating systems to run on their hardware exclusively.

I'm aware of that and as I mentioned before - I'm doing it just to run a trial on their platform, learn about MacOSX and eventually, if all goes well, I'm more than inclined to purchase the hardware from Apple. I'm doing this only to try it out, not to make it my default working platform which is to this date the Windows XP operating system with TabletPC enhancements and it came preinstalled on my machine (luckily I bought the XP version, not the Vista edition... I would never go with the Vista).

What are the specs of my Mac Tablet PC?

I'll be doing all these experiments on my Lenovo X60 TabletPC with

2 GB Ram
Intel Core Duo 1.83 MHz processor
120 GB Samsung 5400 SATA disk
1400*1050 native SXGA screen with Wacom Digitizer

I also have quite a few support hardware to make the process less painful

spare 100GB 5400 SATA disk in a 2.5" USB 2.0 enclosure
X5 Tablet Dock with DVD reader/burner to make the installations easy
21" 1680*1050 Gateway external monitor to see how it works on two screens
My old Toshiba M200 TabletPC as a spare computer if I need to get some work done and my X60 is "under construction".

Here's the photo of my desk:

It's going to be a great ride! Let me know what you think about this idea in the comments below!