HOW TO – OS X on the MSI Wind

Wow, Jose @ Planetx64x has a nice step-by-step on installing Mac OS X on the super tiny MSI Wind, it’s a pockable Mac almost – via /.

Recently I’ve managed to install Apple’s OS X Leopard operating system 10.5.4 onto a 10 inch MSI Wind Netbook, and you can too. Let me preface this by saying that I consider myself an Apple fan, and run nothing but authentic Macs in my home studio office. If you’re looking for another Mac vs. PC debate, then there’s is nothing for you to see here. Move right along please.

The Victim: An MSI Wind U100 Netbook. This slick little machine comes preloaded with your choice of Windows or Linux. Armed with an Intel Atom 1.6 Ghz Processor, 1 GB RAM, 80 GB HD, built-in ethernet, wifi, webcam and bluetooth. That said, the most enticing feature is its crisp & clear 10 inch screen.

To accomplish this procedure, you will be opening the MSI netbook to upgrade the memory and swap out the factory wifi card (which will void your warranty). So think twice if you are not comfortable doing such a thing. We need to do this bacause having more memory always helps any operating system run snappier. OS X is no different. The MSI Wind takes up to 2 GB of RAM. More importantly the factory wifi card that it comes with, does not work in OS X out of the box. So you’ll need to acquire a Dell Broadcom DW 1390 or 1490 internal mini pci wifi card, which are both inherently supported in OS X.

I found both the 1 GB memory upgrade stick and a 1390 card on ebay for no more than $20 each. You’ll need a special Leopard build titled “MSI WINDos x86”, of which the Hackint0sh community should be credited for assembling. It’s a slipstreamed “Kalyway” build which includes all the proper Kexts, drivers, Kernel modifications, and other files necessary to achieve a fully working installation on the MSI wind. Please do not inquire about where to find this disk image, it’s in all the typical shady places on the net.