How to install Mac OS X on a regular computer. How to install mac os on a regular pc

It so happens that the vast majority of computers in the world have the Windows operating system installed, but this situation has developed not because there are no more worthy competitors, but due to certain of its features. There is a competitor to Windows and a very serious one. Many users complain that the system from Microsoft is not always stable and correct. Of course, such problems are a consequence of one of the main features of the Microsoft product, namely openness. This problem has been largely resolved by Apple, using their operating system, which is called Mac OS X. The operating system from Cupertino developers is superior in many aspects to its more popular competitor, which undoubtedly attracts more and more new users. In this article, we will take a closer look at how to install Mac OS X on a computer or laptop. Let's figure it out. Go!

Installing Mac OS X on your computer is very easy

The first thing you need to understand before installing OS X is that it is recommended to install this system on laptops with processors from Intel, because the system is not compatible with the AMD manufacturer. In principle, it can be installed, but this will be fraught with a whole bunch of different problems.

The next thing you need is a blank flash drive with at least 8 gigabytes and, in fact, the Mac OS operating system itself. You can download it on any torrent tracker. It is not recommended to download anything from suspicious sites, as this may lead to your computer being infected with malware. software. Find the file with the system to install on a USB drive and download it. After you download the file, you need to mount the disk image. To write an image to a flash drive, you can use the R DriveImage utility, which can be easily found and downloaded on the Internet. The flash drive must be bootable, otherwise you won’t succeed.

With the main window of the R DriveImage program open, click the “Restorefromanimage” button. Next, specify the path to the file with the “.arc” extension. After that, select the USB drive on which you want to burn the image, after formatting it in the FAT32 file system, and start recording. You can use the UniBeast program. With its help it is very easy and simple to create a bootable USB flash drive for OS X. This is done as follows. Open Disk Utility and locate your drive on the left. Go to the “Disk Partition” tab and then to the “Current” section. Specify the first section. Click the “Options” button and check the “Master Boot Record” checkbox. Set the name to "USB" and set the format to "Mac OS X Extended (Journaled)". Now launch UniBeast and go to the “DestinationSelect” window, after clicking the “Continue” button several times and agreeing to the usage policies. At this point you need to select your USB drive. Next, at the “InstallationType” stage, make sure that the line “MacAppYosemite 10.10” is checked. Enter your password and start installation. After that, everything is done the same for both methods. Choose the one you like best.

When finished, close the utility and restart your computer. During boot, press the F12 or Delete key on your keyboard to go to the BIOS (depending on the manufacturer of your laptop or computer; you can find out how to go to the BIOS on a specific computer on the Internet). Then set the flash drive to the highest boot priority.

After this the computer will start. When the “boot:” line appears, enter the command in it:

V GraphicsEnable=No

This is done in order to be able to track errors that may occur during the installation process. So, you can enter the name of a specific error on the Internet and immediately find out how to fix it. If everything goes well, pretty soon you will see a white screen with a loading indicator. After downloading, select the “Utilities” section in the top panel, and then “Disk Utility...”. Here you will need to select the disk partition on which you want to install Mac OS X. Go to the Erase tab. In the “Format” section, select “Mac OS Extended (Journaled)” and click on the “Erase” button. Everything happens literally instantly, so you can immediately move on to the next step.

In the window that opens, select the drive from which you just erased data and click on the “Continue” button below. The entire installation process of the Mac OS X operating system takes on average about 20 minutes. It all depends on how powerful your computer or laptop is. Then you will have to repeat the previous steps again, namely reboot the PC, open the BIOS and run the same command in the “boot:” line. The only difference is that now you will no longer need to boot from a flash drive, but from a hard drive. Don't miss this moment so as not to get confused and load normally. After this, you will be taken to the laptop desktop already running Mac OS X.

With its own pre-installed operating system Mac OS. Like all the company's products, it claims to be of exclusive quality and the use of advanced technologies. On this moment The following varieties are available for sale:

  • MacBook;
  • MacBook Air;
  • MacBook Pro.

Find out how to update your Mac's OS in the article below.

MacBook Pro is available in 13-inch and 15-inch sizes and in different specifications. All Mac models are equipped with Intel processors, the battery life without recharging is up to 10 or up to 12 hours.

The newest operating system currently used on Mac computers is Mac OS Sierra. Older versions of the OS can be updated for free via the Internet. The company's main advantage of the system is that it was created specifically for Mac equipment. Unlike Windows, which is installed on computers from a variety of manufacturers. By the way, now MacBook Pro and other models support the ability to install Windows.

MacBook Pro and others are sold with the system already installed. However, in some cases, you may need to install or reinstall Mac OS on your MacBook. It is necessary to distinguish between the terms:

  • The installation is otherwise called a “clean” installation, which is performed on a blank (formatted) hard drive or on a new one.
  • Reinstallation is when new system installed on top of the old one without full formatting and preserving user data.

The need to install and reinstall the Mac OS arises when there are serious problems with its operation or an unsuccessful update. Like Windows, it still leaves behind garbage, which over time leads to slowdowns, freezes and other troubles. We will consider these processes using the example of the latest operating system, namely Mac OS Sierra. For previous versions, for example Mac OS X, there will be essentially no differences, but it is still recommended to upgrade to latest version, if your device supports it.

Operating system installation

A clean installation may be necessary if you decide to sell your laptop and need to permanently remove all data and Apple ID from it, or if there is a serious system problem. The installation algorithm on a MakBook Pro looks like this:

  1. Data backup.
  2. Creating a bootable USB flash drive.
  3. System installation.

For Reserve copy data, use an external drive and the Time Machine program, which automatically launches when you connect a removable drive. The utility will ask whether to use an external drive for backup, click “Use.” as a backup drive."

After the backup is complete, you need to make a bootable USB flash drive using disk utility:


The MacBook Pro itself will find the desired image on the flash drive and begin installing the Mac operating system. You just need to follow the instructions on the screen.

Reinstalling the operating system

You can reinstall the system from the OS recovery menu on Mac OS, which is called up by a key combination during boot:

  • Command+R - reinstalls the latest version of the OS installed on the Mac, without updating to the latest.
  • Option+Command+R - update to the latest compatible Mac OS.
  • Shift+Option+Command+R - if macOS Sierra 10.12.4 or a newer version is already installed on your Mac, then pressing the combination will allow you to reinstall the OS that came with your Mac laptop.

After pressing these key combinations, a menu will appear in which you need to select “Reinstall Mac OS”. Next, do the following:

  1. When the name Mac OS Sierra is displayed, click Next.
  2. Select the drive on which you will install the system (usually called Macintosh HD).
  3. The system reinstallation will begin, after which the Mac laptop will boot as usual.

All data, including passwords and Apple IDs, will be saved, as well as user data. But still create a backup copy before reinstalling, just in case. Reinstallation is also sometimes called recovery, as it often helps solve performance and performance problems. If the problems have not been corrected, then you can already try installing a system with formatting the boot disk on your MacBook, not forgetting to copy all the data to an external drive, because after this procedure they will all be deleted.

Most users traditionally switch to new version OS X by simply clicking the “update” button in App Store. Undoubtedly this is the most easy way, but at the same time, it is not always the most effective, since over time many Mac users notice that their system is no longer as fast as it was at the beginning of operation, and updating does not solve the problem.

Users who constantly change and reinstall software on their Mac are especially susceptible to this problem. The reason for the decrease in performance is precisely various system garbage and “residues” from deleted programs that safely remain in place during the update. That is why many people prefer to install a “clean system”.

Things to remember before installing from scratch

First of all, be sure to back up your system. To do this, the standard set of OS X programs includes a wonderful Time Machine utility.

Also be sure to make sure that all your contacts, calendars, mail, etc. synced with iCloud (settings>iCloud)

Clean installation of OS X El Capitan step by step

2. Reboot the Mac while holding down the key option(aka alt).

3. Select a USB flash drive as boot media.

4. After the Mac boots Recovery from the USB flash drive, visually it will happen like this:

open Disk Utility and format the Mac hard drive.

5. To do this, select the hard drive partition in the panel on the left, then in the top panel click erase(do not change the format and name) then click again erase(at the bottom).

6. After formatting is complete, close Disk Utility and select reinstall OS X.

7. In the next window, select only the formatted hard drive and after completing the installation process you will receive a crystal clear OS X El Capitan.

By the way, you can reinstall the system from scratch without bothering with a flash drive. True, you need to have Capitan installed on your Mac before, also from scratch, otherwise the version of the system that came “in the box” will be installed.

So, if such a need arises, then restart your Mac while holding cmd+R, open Disk Utility and format the hard drive as shown above. Then you also choose Reinstall OS X and wait for the installation to complete.

Reinstalling macOS does not require offline media. Apple officially recommends that users use a network installation of the system. You can run it from a special recovery partition on your hard drive or using the Internet Recovery function. In this article we will tell you how to reinstall macOS using both methods.

Every Apple computer comes with the OS pre-installed. It doesn’t matter whether you buy an all-in-one iMac or MacBook in any modification: Pro, Air or 12-inch Retina. Not every user will remember the version of the operating system it was on when purchased. Regular free macOS updates eliminate the need to fill your head with this information. You may need it when you decide to reinstall the system.

  1. Click on the apple logo in the upper left corner of the menu bar. In the list that opens, select the topmost item marked in the screenshot.

  1. On the main tab we can find out installed version macOS. Below is information about the model and release date of the laptop.

If you are not an obvious opponent of updates, then you should have the latest OS version available for your hardware configuration. Otherwise, knowing the model and year of manufacture will allow you to determine it.

Available options

Now that we know the necessary information about our Mac, let's look at the available options. There are only three options to choose from various combinations Keys pressed when starting the computer:

  • reinstalling the current version of the operating system using the recovery partition on your hard drive or SSD – (Command ⌘ + R);
  • Restoring to the old OS installed at the time of purchase. Depending on the year of release, this could be Mountain Lion, Yosemite or El Capitan - (Command ⌘ +Option ⌥ + R);
  • Download and install the latest version of macOS that your Mac supports – (Shift + Command ⌘ + Option ⌥ + R).

An indispensable condition for the successful completion of all the actions described below is to connect the computer to the Internet. You will need it instead of installation media to download the required distribution.

  1. Call up the system menu and reboot.

  1. Depending on the selected reinstallation option, press and hold the desired keyboard combination. Using the Option ⌥ key launches Internet Recovery. You can release the buttons when a rotating globe appears on the monitor. The indicator below it shows the time until disk utility starts, which will depend on the connection speed. The download source is automatically detected and your Mac's serial number is used to find the initial OS version.

  1. After choosing to reinstall from the recovery partition to the SSD, wait until the loading bar logo appears on the screen. After this, the keys can be released. Any of the options used will lead us to the appearance of a window with macOS utilities. Further actions depends on whether you want to keep previously created system settings or prefer a clean installation.

The usual reinstallation option will keep all user data in place, updating only the OS. By selecting Disk Utility, you can completely erase the boot volume. If the second system is Windows installed, the Boot Camp partition can be left unchanged.

Installing macOS

Using Disk Utility is recommended when the usual one cannot be performed. For example, the installer diagnoses problems that may prevent the operation from completing without formatting the volume. When reinstalling and returning to old version OS, erasing the system disk is a mandatory procedure. Otherwise, the macOS installer will report that it has detected a more recent version and refuse to continue.

  1. Open Disk Utility on the left side of the window and select “Macintosh HD.” By default, the OS always uses this name for the system volume. In the top menu, the “Erase” checkbox will become active. In the drop-down window, select the file type indicated in the screenshot. In some cases, at this stage the third line asks you to select a hard disk partition scheme. For all versions of macOS we set the GUID.

  1. High Sierra supports the new APFS file system, adapted to work with SSDs. The installer will automatically select it when you reinstall to the latest current version of the OS. You don't have to enable disk encryption at this stage. If necessary, this can be done on an already installed system by activating the FileVault function. After formatting, close Disk Utility and start the installation.

  1. We accept the license agreement by clicking the marked button in the drop-down menu.

  1. The next few steps will allow you to complete the initial settings by specifying your preferred keyboard layout and region of residence. At the final stage, so that previously saved Safari bookmarks and music in iTunes appear in a clean OS, select login with Apple ID.

During the installation process, the computer will reboot several times on its own. Progress is shown by a filling indicator bar and a countdown timer.

Finally

As you can see, if you have an Internet connection, reinstalling macOS is not an option. challenging task. Creating in this case is a waste of time and may only be required if you want to use an OS version intermediate between the pre-installed and the current one.

Video instruction

The video below shows in detail all the steps described. After reviewing it, you can confidently proceed when reinstalling macOS yourself.


You cannot write code for iPhone on PC. Apple party politics. Although the iPhone SDK is classic GCC, I don’t know of cases where it was written on a PC. But you can still install the iPhone SDK on a jailbroken device, write and run code directly on the phone/tablet.

There are rumors that installing MacOS on a regular PC is "difficult and uneasy".
In fact, it all depends on luck :) On luck and on hardware.
In my case, installing MacOS X was a little more difficult than installing Windows 7.

There are a lot of installation paths. I will describe the simplest and most straightforward one. Complex options are not for me. If something doesn’t work out, it doesn’t mean that you can’t install MacOS. Perhaps it is possible, but in more complicated ways. For laptops, you can look for ready-made images of boot disks (modified by craftsmen).

The latest line of Macs is just a regular PC. An ordinary PC with a slightly modified bios. And MacOS only has drivers for a limited set of devices that come with Macs.

There is no need to reflash the bios (although this is one of the possible ways). I now have MacOS X, Win XP, Win 7 running on one hardware. But I’ll have to look for the firewood (written by craftsmen, even in the source code).

Briefly: "Download a special boot disk, reboot from it, insert the original MacOS X DVD, install it, update it, search for and install drivers. That's it."


0. Setting up bios

Optional, but desirable part.

1. Set the SATA controller to AHCI mode (I have always had it as AHCI).
2. Turn ACPI on (some people advise, on the contrary, turn it off).
3. Switch HPET (timer) to 64-bit mode (I didn’t find one like that).
4. Turn off all processor cores except one (I haven’t found one like this).
5. Turn off SpeedStep.

Everything works for me regardless of the ACPI and SpeedStep settings.

1. Is it worth visiting at all?

Burn .iso to CD-RW. We boot from it, if a disk selection menu appears - hurray, your PC is now almost a Mac. If it doesn’t work, try another .iso. I downloaded the very first one, for regular hardware: empireEFIv1085.iso.

If all .isos do not work, you can try older versions of EmpireEFI. If nothing suits you, then the simple option is not for you. There are a lot of complicated installation options left ( Google, forum and wiki to help), or buy Mac-compatible hardware (list), or buy a PC with MacOS already configured and installed (there are companies that do this), or find those who will supply MacOS, or still buy a real Mac ( having overpaid twice).

2. You need a regular MacOS X installation DVD

Now your PC is almost a Mac. You can insert the MacOS X boot DVD and install it.
For iPhone SDK 4.0, you need version 10.6 or older. I installed 10.6.3, auto update updated it to 10.6.4.

Where can I get such a disk?
1. From a friend of a poppy grower.
2. Buy in a store.
3. Download the image from the Internet and burn it to DVD-R DL (double layer) which is 8Gb.
4. Download the image from the Internet and make a bootable USB flash drive.

If you have a familiar Mac driver with a bootable DVD, this is the most The best way. It will help you install and configure MacOS.

If the “hi-tech crime department” often comes to visit you, buy the official disc. Installing MacOS on a PC violates the Apple license, but this license is not valid in the Russian Federation, because violates the laws of the Russian Federation (specifically, Article 1280 of the Civil Code). This license also violates laws and is not valid in Europe, but not in the USA.

You can download the image, for example, from here.
It is in Mac .dmg format.
This format for Windows can write (and convert to .iso): PowerISO, UltraISO.
You can simply convert to .iso using dmg2img.

You need to write to a two-layer DVD-R DL disc, at the minimum possible speed and with a recording check. If the installer cannot read anything from the disk, he will write to you that you can throw the disk out the window.

To make a bootable USB flash drive, you need an already installed MacOS (even one running under VMWare will do) and a flash drive with a size of 8Gb or larger.

3. Where will we put it?

How to put MacOS on one physical disk without erasing it already installed Windows- I don't know. Paragon Partition Manager can create MacOS partitions on the same disk with Windows; the MacOS installer even sees this partition, but refuses to install it on it. He wants a GUID for the entire disk, but refuses to install it on the MBR.

But you can install MacOS, and then Windows (using BootCamp).
I did a simple thing - I bought a new disk specifically for MacOS.

4. Installation

We boot from the EmpireEFI CD, when the disk selection menu appears, remove the CD and insert the MacOS DVD (or bootable USB flash drive), select the disk from which the installation will take place. That's all.
For advanced installation diagnostics: in the disk selection menu, press Tab (which will switch to text mode), select the disk (up/down arrows) and type "-v".

If you see a language selection menu, then you're in luck the second time :)

If the USB keyboard or mouse does not work, then try removing and inserting them until they work. This only happened to me once, all other times everything worked without problems.

Switch languages: Win+Space.

The installation is no different from installing on a Mac.

When prompted to select a disk where to install, go to the menu (which is at the top): Utilities -> Disk Utility, select the disk, go to the Erase tab, set Format as Mac OS Extended (Journaled), and click on Erase. After formatting, we exit the utility and see that a new disk has appeared suitable for installation.

MacOS will take up 7 GB of disk space.

5. After installation

After installation, my network card and Internet immediately started working. Updating the system to 10.6.4 via the Internet was successful (Apple -> Software Update), it downloaded more than a gigabyte. If the driver for the network card does not work, you can always configure it later.

I disabled all sleep modes (System Preferences -> Energy Saver). I have them disabled in Windows, and they wrote on the forums that there could be problems: either it won’t fall asleep, or it won’t wake up. I didn’t even try it myself. Restart and Shut Down - work.

MacOS will not boot on its own. To boot, you must first boot from the EmpireEFI CD and select the drive where you installed MacOS. To boot ourselves, we need myHack or Chameleon, both of which are on the EmpireEFI (Empire EFI/Post-Installation) CD. First, install myHack; if MacOS will not load, install Chameleon. And don’t forget to set the first boot disk with MacOS in bios.

If MacOS does not boot (wrong bootloader or driver does not fit), you can always boot from the EmpireEFI CD.

I have a new myHack, downloaded from the Internet, but it doesn’t work. Chameleon - got up, the old myHack with CD Empire - also got up, stopped on it, because... it boots MacOS without any extra clicks.

MyHack and Chameleon prompt you to select a boot disk at startup - this way you can boot into Windows (if you have one). You can also select the boot disk when you start the computer using Shift+F8 (my bios can do this).

6. Drivers

Drivers in MacOS have the extension .kext
The main (system) drivers are here: /System/Library/Extensions/
Drivers for PC: /Extra/Extensions/

A basic set of drivers is on the EmpireEFI CD: /EmpireEFI/Extra/Preboot.dmg/Extra/Exten sions/
Copy all these .kext to /Extra/Extensions/

Information about hardware as MacOS sees it: Apple -> About This Mac -> More Info.

If the network card does not work, you can search for drivers under Windows. MacOS can read NTFS and FAT drives. My MacOS sees all WinXP and Win7 disks in read-only mode. You can also download the drivers onto a flash drive.

Place the drivers in /Extra/Extensions. Sometimes you need to put the driver in /System/Library/Extensions, replacing the system one (this is written in the driver description). Sometimes you need to erase the system driver.

After changes in drivers, you need to update the driver cache.
This is easy to do using pfix. We launch it, it will ask for the password for the system and the number of the disk where the system is located. It works for a long time, about 15 minutes. If the system has an empty password, pfix does not understand this; it needs at least a 1-letter password (change the password here: System Preferences -> Accounts).

The driver for NVidia installed right away, I tried the first one I came across: NVEnabler 64.kext
After updating the driver cache and rebooting, the mode changed from 1024x768 to 1920x1080 and new modes appeared in System Preferences -> Displays.

I didn't find a driver for my mother. Everything worked as is, except for the sound. I read on the forums that my mother needs a universal sound driver, VoodooHDA.kext. I tried different drivers: either there was no sound, then volume did not work, then volume worked, but there was noise at maximum. This driver worked with a bang when the system AppleHDA.kext was erased.